Free Witch Queen by Kim Richardson Page A

covered
most of their cloaks and tunics, I recognized only yellow and
orange Romilian colors.
    I leaped and made my way back towards the
silhouettes of men who stood near our camp. Leo was bent over and
breathing heavily, but he was alive. Will was gasping for breath
next to him, and Max and Lucas knelt in quiet conversation next to
something I couldn’t see. Nugar walked around the fallen bodies and
kicked a few to make sure they were dead. One of the bodies tried
to drag itself away, but Nugar’s axe found him. They were alive.
All except for one.
    I went straight to where Max and Lucas
knelt. And there he was.
    “Garrick!”
    He laid on his back in a puddle of his own
blood, and his face was expressionless and as pale as the moon. I
could see a gash on his chest the size of a man’s fist. I could
even see layers of pink flesh and white bone inside it. Bile rose
in my throat, but I pushed it back. Even though I knew no one could
recover from such a wound, I let my sword slip from my hand and
fell to my knees next to him.
    I pressed my hands against his wound
instinctively and attempted to stop the bleeding. But thick blood
seeped through my fingers like coagulated wine.
    Garrick’s wet eyes met mine, and his lips
moved.
    “Shh—don’t talk,” I said, blinking the
wetness from my own eyes.
    I felt the others crowd around me.
    “You need to keep your strength. We’ll—we’ll
find a healer. Yes. And they’ll stitch you up, good as new. Just
you hang on, you hear me?”
    My voice cracked, and I didn’t know whether
it was because I had been strangled, or because I was witnessing
the boy’s life spill away. He was too young to die. He didn’t
deserve this. I began to sob quietly.
    Garrick’s eyes gently rolled into the back
of his head.
    “Garrick!” I cried.
    But I knew he’d already gone. The light
faded from young Garrick’s eyes.
    I had never expected to feel anguish like
this for someone I hardly knew. In fact, I didn’t know him at all.
All I knew was that he had joined this quest to help me. And now he
had died in vain.
    Blinking through the tears, I reached out
and touched his cheek gently, staining his face with his own blood.
His eyes were the color of the West Sea. I had never even cared to
notice before. He would never grow up.
    I leaned over and whispered so that no one
else could hear, “I’m sorry. I’m so very sorry. Please forgive
me.”
    I wept as waves of emotions raced through
me, as though they had come from somewhere hidden deeply inside my
soul and been waiting to come out. The pain
was deeper and harsher than anything I had ever felt
before. I didn’t care that the others saw me cry, at least maybe
now they’d think of me as more human.
    As I
cried my last tea r,
an unyielding ra ge pounded through me.
    “Why? Why was he even here? He should have
stayed home with his family. He was too young, too
inexperienced.”
    “He had no family,” said Max softly, but his
black eyes were grave.
    “He was an orphan from the Pit. He had grown
up on the streets until we took him in a few years ago. We were his
only family.”
    I had more in common with Garrick than I’d
realized. “You shouldn’t have let him come. You should have known
better.”
    “Why? Who are you to stop him from doing
something he believed in?”
    Max’s face darkened. “He wanted to be here.
He believed in this quest, just like we do. He had the right to
defend his land just like any other man. He believed it was the
right thing to do. There’s honor in that. I won’t let you take that
from him.”
    My insides tightened. I knew Max was
right.
    “We all knew what we were facing when we
decided to come.”
    I looked up. Leo was staring at me, his gaze
as grim as the rest.
    “Garrick knew the risks,” he said. “And
still he wanted to come. There was no stopping him once he had made
up his mind. But he had vowed to see you safely into Witchdom. We
all had. And only death could release that pledge. He knew