Read The Golden Key (Book 3) for Free Online Page B

nothing.
    “You know we aren’t going to find him,” Ortis said, his
voice soft. “That thing carried him away.”
    Hobart nodded again. He had seen that thing ripping Angus apart
like a hungry soldier rending off a chunk of day-old bread, and then it had carried
him away. There was no telling how far it had taken him, but that didn’t matter
to Hobart. “He’s a part of the banner,” he said, his tone resolute. “We owe it
to him.”
    Ortis shook his head. “Not to our own peril,” he said. “You
know he wouldn’t want that. It would be different if we knew he was out here
somewhere. We don’t. That thing could have carried him anywhere. Or worse.”
    Hobart’s jaw muscles tightened and his eyes narrowed as he
fixed his stare on the pink and purple sunset. Under other circumstances, its
beauty would have gladdened him, but not this time; this time, it was the torch
igniting the flame of Angus’s funeral pyre. “You heard the thunder,” Hobart
said, his tone defensive, decisive. “He used the wand.”
    “Yes,” Ortis agreed. “But to what effect? You saw how my
arrows passed through that thing as if it wasn’t there, and your sword sliced
through it as if it were made of air. Don’t you think that wand would have done
the same thing?”
    Hobart frowned and shook his head. “You know that spell he
has that makes the breeze? It blew that thing away from us, remember? The wand
is a lot more potent than that spell.”
    Ortis shrugged but said nothing. What more could he say,
anyway? Hobart wondered. Ortis was right, and Hobart knew he was right. But he
wasn’t ready to admit it. Instead, he stared at the sunset and let the thin,
chill mountain air ruffle his cloak. He had failed, and there was nothing he
could do about it, no body to take back to bury. At least he knew Giorge had
met his end, the one meant for him, and that gave him some sense of closure,
but Angus? Where was he? Was he alive? He clenched his fists in frustration and
anger. Was Angus being tormented by that thing? Was it ripping him to shreds
even as they sat watching the darkness creep in around them? Was he already dead?
    Hobart sighed, the kind of sigh that made his whole body sag
as if it were under a great strain, and looked down at the broadsword laying
across his knees. He eased the tension in his fingers and said, his voice grim
and decisive, “All right, Ortis. We’ll start back in the morning.”
    They sat in silence until the darkness had consumed them,
and then Ortis pointed at the black silhouette of the mountain southwest of
them. “We can cross back on that side of the valley,” he suggested. “We might
be able to see something from that vantage point that we couldn’t see from this
side.”
    Hobart, his head still bowed, nodded and pulled his cloak in
around him. He leaned forward and closed his eyes, thinking about how foolish
he had been since Giorge had died. If he had been thinking clearly, he would
have brought the tent, more provisions, torches.… But their gear was with Ortis
and the horses back in the cave because he had made a mistake no soldier should
make: he had let grief overwhelm his judgment before the task was done.
    He shook his head and shivered. A lot of good a tent did
in a cave , he thought as he began to doze.

2
    Angus reached up and pressed his fingers against the ice
shaft. The surface was fairly smooth, and a thin, fresh layer of ice had formed
on it. It was as slick as could be, and there was no way he could climb up it
in his condition. As he considered what to do, water formed beneath his fingers
as the ice began to melt. He pressed his palm firmly against the ice and
waited.
    Seconds passed before a tiny streamlet trickled down to the shelf
below him. Minutes passed before the indentation was deep enough for his hand or
toes to fit into it. He removed his hand and reached up a little higher and to
the left. He pressed against the icy wall and waited. Minutes went by before he
was