The Path of Giants, B.T. Narro [the speed reading book .TXT] 📗

it fearfully, glanced up at me, then back at the rock…then back at me.

“We have things to do,” Kataleya informed them, most likely sensing my impatience. “If neither of you are going to do it, then I’m going to take the healer to my house to meet my father. You can see him heal others later.”

“No, I want to know what it feels like to be healed,” said the boy holding the rock. He gritted his teeth and smacked himself in the arm with it ever so lightly. “Ouch! Ow, ow!”

With a roll of my eyes, I told him, “I can’t cure pain if there is no damage to go along with it. You’ll have to hit yourself a lot harder than that.”

“Give it to me!” said the other boy as he took the rock from his friend. He had a few little breaths of fear before letting out a whimper and smashing the rock into his forehead hard enough to startle both me and Kataleya.

His screams were for real as blood trickled down an open wound. Soon he started to cry, but I was right there to close the wound and fix all the damage.

“It’s done,” I said. “You shouldn’t feel anything anymore.”

Slowly his whimpering stopped and a smile grew on his face. Kataleya wiped a bit of blood off his forehead with her handkerchief.

“What did it feel like?” the other boy asked.

“It hurt, and then it didn’t.”

“That’s all?”

“Yeah. You try!”

The other boy took the rock and stared at it for some time before finally giving it back to his friend. “You do it to me.”

“All right,” he answered happily, then smashed the rock against the side of his friend’s head.

The blow was hard enough to take the boy off his feet. I caught him before he fell and healed the welt on his temple as he screamed.

Then I steadied him and let him know it was done.

He sniffled a few times, then tentatively touched his temple. There was no blood this time.

He showed his friend a toothy smile. “Wow! It really works!”

“I know!”

But then the last boy who was hit had a sinister look in his eye. He grabbed the rock out of his friend’s hand and motioned as if to hit him, but his friend ran with a scream. As the boy with the rock took one step to chase after him, Kataleya grabbed him and took the rock out of his hand.

“Jon can’t spend the whole day healing just the two of you. There will be no more hitting each other with rocks, or anything else, for that matter.”

“What about before he heals everyone else?” asked the closer boy.

“No, you will not hit each other.”

The other asked, “What if we fall and hurt ourselves…a—accidentally. We could really need healing.”

Kataleya had a serious look as she crouched in front of the boy. “This is not a game,” she explained. “Jon is a sorcerer of the king. We are busy defending the kingdom. But we have taken time away to give people water and take away their suffering. Now I don’t think it’s right to take any more of Jon’s time for games. Do you?”

“No, ma’am.”

“No,” agreed the other.

“Run along, now.”

They hurried off, leaving Kataleya with just me and my horse.

Kataleya was not only smart but looked the part as well. There was a twinkle in her sharp gray-green eyes that made her appear clever. She had a way of smiling with half of her mouth when there was something she wanted to say.

“So?” she began. “Are you engaged to any of the fine girls of Lycast that you met?”

I scoffed. “How did you know I would receive many proposals?”

“Because the same thing happened to me, and I’m no healer.”

“Yes, but you have the Yorn family name.”

“Does that mean you denied every proposal?”

“Of course. I’m in no position to be married right now.”

I worried for a moment that I had offended her. She had spoken to me about marrying a man named Trevor whose last name I had not cared to learn. He was the pick made by not only Kataleya but her family as well, which apparently carried great importance to Kataleya.

But she shrugged off my comment and asked, “How many proposals did you receive?”

“I lost track. What about you?”

“I believe in the tens.”

“Did you have any other trouble during your trip?” I had feared for Kataleya traveling on her own, but she had assured me that with her newly learned spell of fire, even someone sneaking up behind her and putting a knife to her throat wouldn’t be able to do much to threaten her.

“Everything went just fine,” she said. “Though I did miss you. Did you miss me?”

“Kat…” I started to lecture.

“As a friend of course.”

“Yes. I really missed you.”

She nodded solemnly. “I wish to apologize. I know it would’ve been nice to travel together, but…” She glanced around. A few people were watching from afar, most likely just curious. I knew it didn’t look too bad for Kataleya to be speaking with me. We were peers after all.

“I may have misled you earlier,” she continued, “when I gave you my reason for wanting to travel separately. It wasn’t so much that I would regret anything that would happen between us if we traveled together. I would only regret what it would do to us later, because I knew it was very unlikely we could be together.”

“I see,” I said, but I did find it strange that she now said it was very unlikely we could be together. Earlier she had given me the impression it was impossible. I didn’t want to go down that road of guessing, however.

“I’ve moved on,” I said. It had been easier to let go of Kataleya over time, as I knew it would. She was still beautiful to me, still someone I enjoyed spending time with, and if things were different, of course I would pursue her. But I didn’t like myself in that state. I didn’t want to