Free Harbinger: Fate's Forsaken: Book One by Shae Ford

he’d like to knock the sneer
right off Brock’s face. “I won’t let you call me a coward —”
    “Hush, boy. Be
like the fox,” Roland muttered.
    He spoke well
out of the elders’ range and when Brock asked him to repeat it, he wouldn’t.
Not that it would have mattered: few understood Roland’s words. But Kael had
heard them long enough to understand that he was telling him to be cunning. He
must know when to fight, and when to yield.
    So as much as he
didn’t want to, Kael apologized and clamped his mouth firmly shut.
    Brock was far
from appeased. He pursed his lips so tightly that they nearly disappeared in a
crevice of wrinkles. “For the shameful act of breaking your bow, the elders
ruled to banish you. But out of respect for your grandfather, we’ve agreed to
lessen your sentence.” His fist came down with every term, sealing them in
Tinnark’s law. “You will live out your days as a healer, bound to the hospital.
You will not be allowed to venture into the village — and this includes
the Hall. Your meals will be brought to you thrice daily. You are stripped of
your privileges as a man of Tinnark, forbidden to walk where you aren’t wanted
and forbidden to speak without permission. The elders have spoken.”
    When his fist
fell that last time and the hollow thud finished bouncing through the rafters,
Kael’s first thought was that he’d have rather been banished.
    “That isn’t
what’s fair, that’s torture!” Roland bellowed, shaking his fists.
    Brock’s arms
trembled as he leaned to put his nose in Roland’s face. “The elders have
spoken!” The others stood in a chorus of creaking joints and took up his chant.
“The elders have spoken!”
    “I’d like to see
every one of you strung up by your beards!” Roland said through their cries. “A
colony of miserable old bats, that’s what you are —”
    Kael grabbed him
by the arm. “Enough, it isn’t worth it.”
    “You aren’t
allowed to speak!” Brock shrilled.
    “He has my permission !” Roland snapped back.
    Kael squeezed
his arm hard, fighting his own fury long enough to quell Roland’s. It would do
them no good if the elders decided to punish them both. In the end, he seemed
to realize this. Roland went silent — but did not relinquish his glare.
    When the Hall
was quiet, Kael nodded once. And then he left.
    Roland went to
follow, but the elders held him back. “We are troubled over the storehouses,”
Brock said. “They aren’t anywhere near full enough to get us through the
winter. And this morning your men brought in less than half the game of the
morning before — hardly enough to fill the pots. Do you have an answer
for this?”
    “I’m no Seer,
but perhaps it has something to do with the fact that the best trapper in
Tinnark is no longer allowed out in the woods.”
    The
uncomfortable silence that followed made Kael’s chin lift a little as he headed
for the door, but for the most part he felt like he’d been sentenced to death.
    Everything was
numb: from the soles of his feet to the top of his head. He didn’t feel the air
rush past him as he strode out of the Hall, he didn’t feel the rude wood of the
heavy doors as he shoved them open. When he saw Marc standing bowlegged up the
path, some object clutched in his meaty hand, he didn’t even break his pace.
    “Get out of our
village, Bow-Breaker!” he said as he threw.
    The rainstorm from
the night before left the ground sopping wet. Footprints in the dirt path
filled with water, which turned to mud. And mud made for a handy weapon.
    A fistful of wet
earth struck him in the head, the slapping sound it made stung his ears. The
tiny bits of rock stuck into it cut his face. Grit caked his tongue and he
staggered backwards as he tried to spit it out. That’s when another clump
struck his ear.
    He heard
Laemoth’s voice, muffled through the dirt: “Get out, Bow-Breaker!”
    Soon mud was
striking him on all sides. He could hear the angry cries of the