Free The Path of Destruction (Rune Breaker) by Landon Porter Page A

why I can't do that.” Her annoyance swirled in the link, but a sudden flash of worry and shame mixed in. “Is it because of your scars?”
    “No.” He said brusquely and almost missed a set of calculations along the rim of a control circle.
    Taylin stepped through the veil, shattering the hastily constructed illusion and transforming the black fog into a shower of ice crystals that glittered in the setting sun before falling down around her. The cold made her flinch and fold her wings up tight, the feathers ruffling in her discomfort
    Her new armor was professionally made by metalworkers who knew what armor was for, and so didn't gleam. The chain hauberk that fell to her thighs was dully metallic, and the leather kilt, which stopped above the knees on the minotaurs it was made for but stopped just below hers, was cured in such a way to leave it rough, as were the padded leather breeches she wore under them. More hardened leather was fitted across her chest and laced to another piece that extended between her wings to cover the opening that had to be worked into the hauberk to allow her to put it on around them.
    It was all unadorned and highly functional. The only seeming concessions for looks were the chain gauntlets with plate over the backs of her wrists and plain leather over her fingers, and the sandals on her feet which were all shiny and brand new.
    Dóttir Logi was in its mechanized scabbard, the hilt peeking over her shoulder. Not content with just the one weapon, she had two wide-bladed hunting knives sheathed on her hip, and another strapped to her leg.
    Now more than ever, Ru was reminded of the old legend of Lady Death he'd quoted back during the King of Flame and Steel's attack. He'd seen Taylin fight several times now, but he'd never seen her fully equipped and readied for battle.
    She took no notice of the thoughts in his head and fixed him instead with a look of nagging concern he'd grown to dread. “Will you at least tell me what it was that I accidentally took away?”
    “That has nothing to do with why I won't fight now.” Ru looked away from her and down at the army. Scouts on spider and ornis-back were returning from a fruitless search for a ford somewhere upstream. Oddly, they hadn't sent anyone toward the Homestead. In his trained senses, he could tell that someone was moving a great deal of akua , though. Perhaps they were considering forming an ice bridge?
    “I believe you.” Taylin baldly lied. “But I would like to know anyway. It's important to me.”
    And she used the link to impress upon him just how important. For a brief moment, he was subjected to the stomach knotting tension she'd been feeling since she learned of what she'd done in her attempt to save him from the agony of Matasume the Wind's attack. And with it came the skittering paranoia and guilt that she may have crippled him in some way.
    “Oh you are a bright soul, aren't you?” He dredged up another archaic epithet just for the occasion. “Not above manipulation with the link, but actual compulsion is too far?”
    She strode past him to stand on the slope leading down to the army. “It isn't manipulation if you know what I'm doing.”
    “I wonder if you believe that.”
    She was silent and let the link return to its baseline, broadcasting only her tension at having to go down and meet with Percival again, the omnipresent concern over his lost scarifications, and if he concentrated, the thrum of anticipation she was hiding even from herself at the prospect of a fight.
    “Heh.” He said to the last one. “Very well, seeing as you may well be in the midst of a suicide in the next few hours, I will tell you the simple version: In the third year after he rescued me, Gand sent myself, Seth, and Gloryfall to visit neighboring lands where magic was accepted; even embraced.
    “I traveled to the Chiimiko-Han Mountains, to a people called the Matul Garu. They were an entire people who were sparkers like I was, and they built