Servant of the Serpent (Serpent's War Book 1) by Jason Halstead Page A

snake men and on her way to the humans. Maybe she’d arranged it behind his back. The timing was right—he’d left to go to Fylandria and she had no one to stay with her and watch over her. The perfect time to escape her persecution. She was shunned by the elves, but he’d heard humans didn’t care about the purity of their blood. They were barely better than animals; she’d be like a queen among them.
    A second silk bluebell dropped amid a cluster of flowers that grew beside a trickling stream pushed the dark thoughts away. Corian let out a sigh of relief and snatched it up. He brought the decoration to his face and inhaled, trying in vain to catch his sister’s scent.
     
     
    His faith restored, Corian lurched to his feet and splashed into the tiny stream. He slipped on a rock and slipped again when his other foot slid on the mud. Corian grunted as he crashed to the ground and knocked his head against the root of a tree. He lay dazed for a moment, staring up at the trunk and panting for breath.
    The leaves rattled on the callowill as a breeze blew across the roof of the forest. Corian tilted his head, marveling at the way the branches spread out and covered the sky. They shaded him and the forest floor around him at the same time they captured as much sun and star light as they could.
    The trees were like the elves, he mused. They sheltered and protected what was within their realm and spread themselves as wide as they could to ensure they had what they needed. Beyond that, the world didn’t matter. The affairs of humans and splisskin were just that: the affairs of others. Until they came with axes to chop them down, that is. Or steal their sisters away.
    Corian shook his head and rolled onto his side. The shadows had grown longer while he lazed on the side of the stream. His bow dug into his back, making him reach up to the bump on his head and wonder how hard he’d hit. He hissed as he probed the bruise. Hard enough to knock the sense out of him.
    Corian climbed to his feet and staggered. He reached out and caught the rising bank to steady himself. He shook his head again and groaned. A whisper jerked his head to the side, searching for its source. A flitter of movement pulled his eyes the other way, but nothing was there.
    “I’m mad then,” he muttered. A rustle of leaves jerked his eyes up and to his right. This time he spied a squirrel hurrying about his business as he leaped from branch to branch. Corian grinned, pleased to restore a tiny measure of faith in his senses.
    He forced himself upright and moved on, searching for new signs of his sister and her captors. Panic gripped him when he realized his floundering had destroyed their tracks. He searched wider, circling slowly and retracing his steps to the other side of the stream. A scrap of cloth he’d missed earlier was wedged in a crack.
    Corian cried out and ran over to reach for it. He stopped, his hands hovering inches above it, and studied it more closely. It looked the same color and texture as one of his sister’s dresses, but the bundle of fabric was ripped in a peculiar way. The bulk of the scrap was caught up in the rock at the waterline. Several loose threads were caught in the current, trailing downstream from it. Corian stared at it, sensing there was a message to it.
    His sister knew cloth and string better than anyone alive, as far as he knew. Why would she risk letting so much of it be visible? Fear the water might rise and hide it? Or was there more to it?
    Corian’s eyes followed the stream to the south. He stepped away and began to study the bank as he moved one cautious step at a time. After a dozen paces, he cried out. He’d spied a footprint! A print with a harder edge near the water. That meant some kind of footwear. Even better was a partial handprint in the mud. He made out three fingers before the soft mud melted away to a smooth surface.
    “Jillystria,” he breathed. He clenched his fist and closed his eyes as a wave of