Read The King's Blood for Free Online Page A

out of memory as possible. The castle is swarmed, but Scepticar willing, the Emperor's men will not notice a pair of young servants."
    Ciara nodded, her hand still wrapped around the boy's, watching as her father picked up his sword coated in lamb drippings. He did not sheathe it, which would have made her mother mad and instead turned once more to look upon his daughter for what he feared would be the last.
    Kissing her upon the head again, he said, "It will be all right," and walked steadily towards the light of the hall and out of her life.

CHAPTER FOUR

    S words clattering against shields, other swords, the walls and, more disturbingly, something soft and gushy faded into the background as Ciara pulled the boy down the stairs into the kitchen.
    Things had gone from panic to full blown stampede mode with word of the invading dragons somehow fitting through the narrow passage ways and making towards the kitchen. Every available basket, pot, pan, potato, and the giant roasting spit had been piled up in front of the door. The invading dragons were going to either have a mess to wade over to attack the servants or a very nice appetizer before the main course.  
    She shook her head, there was no getting anywhere past that mass and even if she could, it would simply lead back to the hall where this all began. Even through the faces distorted in fear she tried to find the familiar one that could make anything right, be it brown butter turned black, a woolen sweater that could now fit the original sheered sheep, or the need to sneak past enemy lines with a wet limbed boy who refused to raise his eyes.
    But, her mother was nowhere to be found amongst the crowd. The thought of her caught in the path of the invaders clutched at Ciara's throat but her father had been there. If that were the case, he would have protected his wife and not some nobleman's bastard. Content in that bit of round logic she pushed into the larder, pulling the boy with her. His fancy shoes slid on the lamb juices and he fell into a face full of mutton.
    Crying like a small bird that just slipped from the nest and landed in front of the cat, he tried to scramble up, but the sight of so much blood seeping onto his hand caused him to panic even more. Ciara grabbed both of his hands and raised him up, finally looking into a muddled pair of blue quartz.
    "Calm down. You're overreacting."
    As what happens to anyone that's ordered to calm down, the boy panicked harder, waving his hands around and screeching, the lamb's blood growing stickier in the desert of the kitchen. Fighting back the urge to shudder at the gore, she firmly took his right hand in hers and closed her fingers tight, "I'll get us out of here. No matter what."
    The boy looked down at his own hand, still limp in hers and nodded slowly. "Promise?"
    Ciara was surprised at the level voice, expecting little more than a whisper in the wind from the kid, "By my father's honor."
    Again his eyes met hers and he said firmly, "Then, by mine as well."
    She had no idea what he was swearing too, but it wasn't really the time to draw up pre-quest agreements to see who stood the most honor to lose with this deal. There were larger monsters to slay, like how to get them out of the bleedin' castle in the first place.
    Marna!
    Closing her fingers tight, she pulled the boy down the crumbling black staircase eliciting a gasp from him. The shadows in this place offered only pain as far as he knew. But there was no stopping the woman who had a half a foot on him as she barreled downward, waving her dagger in case a monster should suddenly phase out of the walls.
    "Marna!" she wheezed at the bottom of the stairs, her wind finally spent from first the climb, then the re-descent.  
    The ghost appeared suddenly, like the old tales of the unblinkin' others that never ashed. Her hair was wild with straw, nearly camouflaged inside it. Eyes wide as one of the nocturnal squirrels and bluer than the sapphires in the crown jewels