Free Blades Of Illusion: Crown Service #2 by Terah Edun

creature put them out of their misery. Sara and the survivors didn’t wait to find out which.
    “They’re supposed to lay there like victims,” Sara had said, “But if there’s anything true about a band of mercenaries, it’s that they’re no victims.”
    Ezekiel had looked at her uncomprehending until she glanced back at the fallen leader and so did he—only to see a healer swiftly lean over and cut the man’s throat. He had been too far gone to save or drag through the swamp for aid. So they had done the only thing they could—given him a merciful death.
    Ezekiel had shuddered and paled. “Promise me something, Sara.”
    She had looked over at him.
    “Promise me you won’t leave me to die, nor slit my throat like a carcass before the slaughter.”
    Sara had frowned as she switched to polishing her long blade. “That was an honorable death. More honorable than being eaten alive.”
    Ezekiel’s desperate gaze had caught her own. “Promise me.”
    Sara had narrowed her eyes. “Think you’re too good for an honest death?”
    He had wet his lips nervously. “I think there’s much left for me to do in this world.”
    Sara had chuckled and her gaze had swept over dead and dying bodies all around them. They had briefly stopped on a semi-dry mound in the swamp to care for their wounded. “Don’t we all?”
    Ezekiel’s gaze had stayed determined.
    “Fine,” she grouched, “But I want a promise in return.”
    He nodded.
    “A clean death. Don’t drag me half a mile, don’t let my insides putrefy, and don’t let me die face down in the mud while a creature straddles my back for a bite.”
    Solemnly, he had said, “It’s agreed then. You’ll save my life.”
    “And you’ll take mine.” They’d ended that conversation with a brief handshake. Ezekiel had then gone back to one of the five books he’d managed to snatch out of compartment chest before mercenaries had pushed it into quicksand—over his loud and furious protests—in order to form a bridge for them to pass. Sara had wondered why he’d bothered carrying them into a swamp with all the wet mildew that would make short work of his pages but Ezekiel had looked over at her with a disdainful sniff and simply said, “Magic can preserve all things and these need to be preserved.”
    Now as Sara looked over at Ezekiel, she gave his waist a slight squeeze. She doubted he even felt it. It made no matter. She would keep her promise. Even now when the yellow ichor leaked from Ezekiel’s left upper thigh. When he had begun to falter in his steps, Sara had done the only thing she could think of. She had grabbed some supple branches from the swamp interior as well as thick hanging vines, which the damned bog had plenty of, and bound his left leg to her right with sailor’s knots. That way when his mobility started to fade, Ezekiel could keep going.
    She was actually grateful the venom had affected him differently than the others. If he had lost all mobility in the legs too quickly and she couldn’t get someone else to help, she had been prepared to tap into her battle magic and lift his weight with her own strength, but with his ability to hobble with her help, she only had to use all of her physical strength and endurance to get them by.
    As they walked forward, Sara knew that eventually her natural strength would come to a limit. Before it did, she would rid herself of her armor before she left Ezekiel to die. What came next would be up to her compatriots.
    “Forty minutes,” grunted Ezekiel as they hopped and walked along the way.
    Sweat beaded on her brow, her right side felt like it was going numb from the strain, and she was damned hungry for some of that elephant meat. It was long gone by now, but it was sign of the desperate time that she actually desired its return. But she couldn’t stop, wouldn’t stop. Because stopping meant death.
    “What?” she muttered.
    “Forty minutes until I die,” he wheezed.
    “Do you have a death wish?”