The Spine of the World - By R. A. Salvatore Page 0,34
the mainland, Meralda had managed to slow her heartbeat somewhat. She understood her duty to her family, to her sick mother, but she felt as if she would faint, or vomit. Wouldn't the wretch Priscilla have a grand time with that, if she found that the peasant had thrown up in the gilded coach.
A mile later, still feeling sick and aching to be out of all these trappings, Meralda leaned out the coach's window.
"Stop! Oh, please stop!" she yelled to the driver. The carriage shuddered to a halt, but even before it had completely stopped the young woman threw open the door and scrambled out.
"My lady, I am to take you to your home," Liam Woodgate said, leaping down to Meralda's side.
"And so you have," the woman replied. "Close enough."
"But you've a long dark lane before you," the gnome protested. "Steward Temigast'll have my heart in his hand if-"
"He'll never know," Meralda promised. "Don't fear for me. I walk this lane every night and know every bush and rock and person in every house between here and my own."
"But . . ." the gnome began to argue, but Meralda pushed past him, shot him a confident smile, and skipped away into the darkness.
The coach shadowed her for a short while, then, apparently convinced the woman was indeed familiar enough with this area to be safe, Liam turned it around and sped away.
The night was chill, but not too cold. Meralda veered from the road, moving to the dark fields higher up. She hoped to find Jaka there, waiting for her as they had arranged, but the place was empty. Alone in the dark, Meralda felt as if she were the only person in all the world. Anxious to forget tonight, to forget Lord Feringal and his wretched sister, she stripped off her gown, needing to be out of the fancy thing. Tonight she had dined as nobility, and other than the food and perhaps the warm drink, she had not been impressed. Not in the least.
Wearing only her plain undergarments, the young woman moved about the moonlit field, walking at first, but as thoughts of Jaka Sculi erased the too recent image of Lord Feringal, her step lightened to a skip, then a dance. Meralda reached up to catch a shooting star, spinning to follow its tail, then falling to her rump in the soft grass and mud, laughing all the while and thinking of Jaka.
She didn't know that she was in almost exactly the same spot where Jaka had been earlier that night. The place where Jaka had spat his protests at an unhearing god, where he'd cried out against the injustice of it all, where he'd called for his life to flee, and where he'd vowed to steal Meralda's virginity for no better reason than to ensure that Lord Feringal did not get it.
Chapter 5 INSIDE A TIGHT FRAME
"Where'd you put the durned thing?" a frustrated Arumn Gardpeck asked Josi Puddles the next afternoon. "I know ye took it, so don't be lying to me."
"Be glad that I took it," an unrepentant Josi countered, wagging his finger in Arumn's face. "Wulfgar would've torn the whole place apart to kindling with that warhammer in his hands."
"Bah, you're a fool, Josi Puddles," Arumn replied. "He'd a left without a fight."
"So ye're saying," Josi retorted. "Ye're always saying such, always taking up the man's cause, though he's been naught but trouble to yerself and to all who been loyal to ye. What good's Wulfgar done for ye, Arumn Gardpeck? What good ever?"
Arumn narrowed his eyes and stared hard at the man.
"And every fight he stopped was one he started," Josi added. "Bah, he's gone, and good enough for him, and good enough for all of us."
"Where'd ye put the warhammer?" Arumn pressed again.
Josi threw up his hands and spun away, but Arumn wouldn't let him go that easily. He grabbed the little man by the shoulder and whipped him about violently. "I asked ye twice already," he said grimly. "Don't ye make me ask again."
"It's gone," Josi replied. "Just gone, and far enough so that Wulfgar couldn't call to the thing."
"Gone?" Arumn echoed. His expression grew sly, for he understood Josi better than to think the man had simply thrown so wondrous a weapon into the ocean. "And how much did ye get for it?"
Josi stuttered a protest, waved his hand and stammered again, which only confirmed Arumn's suspicions. "Ye go get it back, Josi Puddles," the tavernkeeper instructed.