Pursued - Entire book

Chapter 66

He woke to people yelling and running through the streets and Klair sat up rubbing his face. They found Maken. Hopefully Emson was back to the camp by now. He was glad that now he'd started going to sleep without the Sheenay. He now woke without nightmares.

Emson suggested that tonight they wouldn't' burn a fire and thus would be less likely to be discovered.

They'd wait for a day before heading back to Petta.

If the woodsmen were discovered, maybe the Kapawn would think Emson and the others were a diversion and choose to ignore them. Klair had successfully tricked the Kapawn when they searched their camp once. The woodsman of Petta previously constructed some planks under one of the wagons with rigging hanging down on each side. Klair could rest quite comfortably there for spans if necessary. It worked so far.

All Klair wanted to do is find and protect his mother.

The door suddenly opened to the abandoned house. A man with a black sheen of hair identifying him as Kapawn stood within the frame. "He's not here," he told some accompanying townspeople. "The Psi nets haven't been triggered. We'll see if he ends up here later, since we know that is his pattern." They pushed on, slamming the door behind them.

The search parties continued down the street in the approaching dusk. Numerous torches were aflame to illuminate the ground to dispel any shadow that might hide someone.

Klair remained frozen until he was sure they were gone.

He leaned over the boards where he slept. Psi nets? What Psi nets? The room looked vacant. It just looked dusty. Had he walked into the room like he originally planned what would have happened?

Only after considerable effort did he sense a slight tingle in the air. Not malevolent but still a slight undertone of magic. Since his experience in Koova, Ronta and Qwatan he thought he'd be able to recognize any magic.

This was high, an almost hidden magic.

It scared him.

He searched into the shadows of the floor below and extended his senses. He sought any life form that could act as a guinea pig. Finding a mouse, he captured it. He floated it to the center of the room. He watched the small creature jerked about frantically in the air trying to escape. As he moved it further and further into the center of room the creature began rolling in the air in obvious pleasure. It stretched its legs out and its tail twitched.

What's wrong with it?

Something Klair couldn't see was affecting it. He rested it in the center of the floor and released it. He would have thought, once freed, the mouse would scamper. It didn't. Instead, it lay there quivering in some animalistic ecstasy.

Klair floated it back to its original corner.

The creature scampered back towards the center of the floor again to roll around in the dust. It squeaked excitedly from some hidden pleasure.

I can't see anything. Invisible nets? His stomach tightened. That could have been me. If he was as happy as the mouse he might be there on the floor singing at the top of his lungs like a drunkard. His mind briefly touched upon his and Tarrant's adventure with too much ale before Trenny arrived.

Some of the actions of the mouse looked like it was mating. His thoughts turned to Rosla.

He could be dreaming of him and Sticks coupling with an audience barging in to watch and laugh.

The possibility brought something to his mind.

Something that Ilock said while attending him. "At Taaken there are other ways to ensure your cooperation and you'll find them to be quite... addicting." The wizards at Taaken might fool someone into imagining any act of pleasure and it could become an addiction. Wouldn't one naturally want to continue it? Do anything to get such a reward?

At least there was no Trenny to deliver private punishment.

Klair watched the mouse with a growing horror. "Shards!" His lips pressed in a growing anger. "Anywhere I go is a trap.'

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