21
THE GRACE’S WAR
Smoke. Fire. Screams and darkness. Pasha was in the Valley again, his body heavy and cold amid flames.
He opened his eyes and closed them. Reality rushed back, and the darkness pressed him into the slimy cell floor.
He opened his eyes again, felt something sticky and warm run into them, and squinted against the smoke. The distant screams and faint yellow flicker of flame didn’t fade. A fierce pain throbbed through his head.
“Pasha! Pasha! Pasha!” Anna’s hoarse voice, screaming his name. The battered cell door clattered and swung outward, but it wasn’t Anna who stood there. A man, tall, shirtless and emaciated, yellow hair and vast, wild beard that hid his face except for sallow, blue eyes.
He chattered something in neither N’narad nor Trade and made a quick gesture
