Amra 5 snippet

***Minor spoilers for Book 4 below***





“Right, then, let's see what a mage packs when he goes to hells.” I stuck a hand in his pack, and was met with a sticky, tacky residue of something that seemed to cover everything inside it. “What the hells got in here?” I asked, pulling my hand out and wiping it on the rag.

He coughed slightly and shifted himself higher in the bed, then leaned back against the pillows. “There was a river of blood. I had to cross it.”

“Oh.” What do you say to that? I opened the pack wider and started to pulling things out, wiping them cleanish as I went.

“Oh, look. A monster's head under glass.”

“Amra, meet Halfmoon. Halfmoon, Amra. He's not very nice. He wants to eat my brain.”

“Well who wouldn't? It's a very clever brain.” The thing blinked its dozen eyes and ran a long, gray-blue tongue along the glass. I shuddered and put it aside. Facing the wall. “Mages,” I muttered. I rooted around a bit more and came up with a small glass vial.

“Anonymous powder,” I said. “Let me guess, an ingredient for a spell.”

“No, that's a jar full of the Road.”

“Seriously?”

“Yes.”

I shook my head and threw it in the fire. “What, wine just not scratching the itch anymore? I take back what I said about your brain.”

“Well I never opened it,” he said, peevishly.

“Thank Vosto.”

“Yes, as a matter of fact.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

“What was that like?”

“He compared me to a turtle stuck on its back, intimated that I was pathetic and ridiculous, told me I was in his debt, then told me to bugger off. Also, he really seemed to enjoy calling me a fool.”

“Sounds like my kind of god.”

“Meeting a divine being not threatening or actively trying to kill me was a nice change of pace.”

I rooted around some more in the bloody goop inside the pack, but couldn't find anything else. “Is that it?”

“All that's left, anyway.”

“You could have told me instead of letting me play with hell blood!”

“I could have. But you said hurtful things about my brain.”

“When you get better I'm going to smother you in your sleep.”