Six Paragraphs from This Battle Lord's Quest, Book 5 of the Battle Lord Saga.
1.
Smiling slightly, Atty tilted her head toward the man who had been her father’s best
friend, and who had adopted her when she’d been orphaned. “If we leave in the
morning, we could be out and back in less than a week. Come on, Fortune. There is
game out there. The pines are proof enough. We just have to figure out
where it is! Besides, you know that eventually we’ll have to send out another
scouting party, and soon. This is the time of year when the animals are stocking
up against the coming cold. If we wait much longer, we could lose that
advantage.” Leaning over, she stared directly into his eyes. “And you know what
it’s like when a compound has to go into starvation mode,” she reminded him.
2. He
began crawling toward the man, moving on his side rather than on his belly. Going
was slow in the mud, but he finally managed to drag up beside the soldier. Immediately,
he could see the problem. A huge, ugly gash ran diagonally from Paxton’s left
shoulder, down across his chest to his right hip. The coon’s claws had barely
marked him, but if they had fully connected, the man would be shredded slivers
instead of lying here intact. Renken stared at the wound. Incredibly, when the
animal had swiped him, the force of the blow had thrown Paxton onto the ground,
where he had rolled in the wet clay. When he’d come to an unconscious stop, the
mud blanketing him had sealed the wound, preventing the man from bleeding to
death. Renken didn’t dare try to lift the natural patch to see how deep the
wound might be, although a little blood tried to ooze out from beneath the
seal. “You are one lucky son of a bitch, Paxton.”
3.
His head was throbbing. He rubbed the heels of his hands against his eyelids.
It was
late. Too late to disturb MaGrath for a pain killer. Maybe there was some
powder left in the bag Liam had left at the house a few weeks ago. Yulen
grinned. The physician was learning first-hand all about babies and their sleep
patterns, and he was having to pull some all-nighters to take care of his
restless son.
4.
Holding her injured arm tightly against her chest, she crawled out of the den. Dizziness
hit her again, turning the world into a spinning, sickening mess. Forcing her
to lie on the carpet of dead leaves and wait for the moment to pass. Her
stomach heaved, but nothing came up. Her throat felt raw. She needed something
to drink.
5.
The same was true with trying to remember her past. It was like a giant hand
had reached inside her skull, grabbed a fistful of thoughts and memories, and
pulled them out by the roots, leaving behind open and bleeding wounds in her
brain. Every so often, a picture would flash behind her closed eyelids, or a
face. Or a sound would whisper in her ear, or a smell would drift up her nose,
when there was nothing around her to provoke any of them. These moments came
without warning and without reason, but they were more prevalent when she was
asleep. Some she remembered after she awoke, but many of them retreated back
into the black fog of her unconsciousness. All she had left to let her know
she’d been dreaming were their invisible ghosts floating in the corners of her
mind. Ghosts that never left, but continued to haunt her when she wasn’t
prepared for them to make an appearance.
6. “The damage was bad. In fact, it was still
tender to the touch. I had to knock her out to avoid causing her any more pain,
in order to clean the dirt and debris from it. Fortunately, the skin was
intact, but I could tell her skull had been cracked. She had swelling, which caused
her to suffer major headaches.” The man looked directly into Yulen’s eyes. “I
inspect it every day. The swelling seems to have gone down. The frequency of
her getting headaches appear to be decreasing, as well. But there remains the
damage to her brain. I don’t know if it’s irreparable, or if the organ is able
to heal like the rest of her. Assuming it can, then...” The man opened his
hand, palm up, on the table. “Time, D’Jacques. All she
needs is time.”
