Adept (The Essence Gate War, Book 1) - By Michael Arnquist Page 0,49

his most recent scheme.

“What are you doing here, Brek? This is my patrol route tonight, may the sergeant’s eyes be blasted from his head.”

“Can a man not keep his friend company on this dreadfully dull stretch of night?” Brek asked. “By the heavens, there is nothing else going on up here to keep one awake.”

Eskaras chuckled and resumed walking along the battlement, and his friend fell into step beside him. He watched Brek from the corner of his eye, feeling a mix of envy and annoyance at the man’s jaunty, carefree gait with his own crossbow resting upon his shoulder. Brek somehow seemed utterly at home no matter where he was, and was at ease talking with anyone, regardless of station or appearance. Eskaras had never enjoyed that talent, finding all too often that his tongue became thick and clumsy when he tried to converse with superior officers or attractive women.

They walked together, and though Brek evinced no urge to break his affable silence, Eskaras grew ever more agitated. He could count on his friend for any favor, no matter the size or risk, but Brek was just as quick to make requests of his own, and helping the man seldom came without consequence. And just as old scars sometimes itched before a coming battle, he knew that Brek was after something. At last, Eskaras could take it no more.

“Out with it,” he said. “What are you after?”

Brek blinked at him with wide, ice-blue eyes that had unlocked more than a few bedroom doors. “Whatever do you mean, Eskaras?”

“Save your honeyed words for those who do not know you as well. You risk punishment for us both by abandoning your patrol route to join mine.”

“Bah,” said Brek, lifting his hand from his sword hilt to give a dismissive wave. “Our beloved sergeant favors the guard house by the northeastern corner, since it is nearest the refectory. With his great girth, he can only climb the long stairs to the wall-walk once or twice per night or risk heart failure, and he has already been up to glower at me once tonight. If he achieves the battlement again tonight, he will surely lack the wind to come within sight of your route.”

“But if he does, it will put him at the end of your route,” Eskaras said. “And you can scarcely afford to incur his wrath yet again, just as I would prefer not to share it for knowing you.”

“You raise an excellent point, Eskaras,” Brek said with sudden gravity. “I am a poor friend indeed for not having considered the reflection upon you should my plans tonight go awry.”

“What plans?” Eskaras asked as a sinking sensation developed in the pit of his stomach.

“Well, I had no wish to make you complicit in my own tangled affairs,” Brek said, lowering his voice and glancing about as if fearing to be overheard. “There is a certain merchant’s wife, forlorn in her plump, sweaty husband’s absence only slightly more so than when he is in town…”

Eskaras rolled his eyes. “I should have known.”

“I find I cannot be so callous as to abandon her to her plight,” Brek said.

“To be sure,” Eskaras said, wringing sarcasm from each word.

“So I must slip away from my pointless post this evening for a time, that I might console her,” Brek continued, as if his friend had not spoken. Eskaras snorted, and the other ignored that as well.

“As I said, however, I had not considered the potential impact on you, my closest friend, were my absence to be noted. I am resolved to take the compassionate path over treading an empty wall all night, but I could not ask you to cover for me on the lovely lady’s behalf.”

The man lapsed into silence, furrowing his brow and chewing on his reddish beard as he sought a solution. Eskaras glared at him through narrowed eyes, but Brek was as incapable of shame as ever and continued with his pensive display, seeming unaware of his friend’s eyes boring into him as they walked. At long last they reached the point on the wall where their respective patrol routes met. Eskaras sighed and cleared his throat, shrugging aside the familiar feeling of having been maneuvered.

“If we put aside the only sane choice, the one where you do not leave your post,” Eskaras said with a pointed look that met only an intent and innocent expression on Brek’s part, “I suppose I could walk the full eastern wall tonight. If I encounter