Endless Knight (The Arcana Chronicles) by Kresley Cole Page B

let me go! End this hold you got over me.”
    “I didn’t mesmerize you. I wouldn’t.” Surely I wouldn’t?
    “ ‘Come, touch, pay a price?’ That’s your call? Well, I did . I’m paying it still.”
    He snatched up his bow and bag and strode away into the dark, leaving me trembling, cold, adrift. I stared after him for long moments. When I pulled my knees to my chest, Matthew crossed to sit beside me. “Not Arcana.”
    “Can you see Jackson’s future?”
    “I see far.” He frowned. “Not with him. Unknown. Variable. Strike from equation!”
    “Would he be safer away from us?”
    Matthew gave me a raised-brow really? look. Stupid question. Then he tilted his head. “More dreams of Death?”
    I forced myself to stop staring in Jackson’s direction and pay attention to Matthew, who sounded relatively coherent. “Yes. The same encounter with Death, after he’s stabbed me.” Again, I’d noted that he looked younger then. “If he’s immortal, how does Death age?”
    “Duration of the games. Game begins—he ages. Game ends—he stops.”
    “He doesn’t look that much older now. How long do these games last?”
    Matthew sighed. “This will be one of the longest.”
    “If I can regenerate, then is his Touch of Death the only way to kill me?” Or maybe I was like the Bagmen, taken out with a shot to the brainpan?
    Shrug.
    Change of tack. “Does he always kill me?”
    “Not always. And Lady Lotus didn’t die once.”
    I swallowed. “Meaning others have slain me—and I actually won a game?” I almost wished I hadn’t known that. “How many did I personally take out then?”
    Hesitation. “More than anyone before. Or since.”
    I was a record-holder. No wonder Selena worried about me getting a word out when we met new Arcana. They’d all be after my head. “Who else got me?”
    Matthew studied his hand, hard, end of subject.
    “At least tell me how many times Death has done it.”
    “ This Death? Two out of last three.” Matthew’s brown eyes were so grave as he said, “Practice makes perfect.”

9
    DAY 254 A. F .
    SOMEWHERE IN THE APPALACHIAN MOUNTAINS
    “If it seems too good to be true . . .” Jackson muttered to no one in particular.
    We’d come upon an abandoned homestead, a quaint cabin perched high on a rise, with rocking chairs on the front porch and a nearby barn. It looked like it’d once belonged to someone who’d smoked a corncob pipe, wore “dungarees,” and called bears “bars.”
    At the sight of a man-made shelter, I almost salivated. We hadn’t had a proper roof over our heads since the hut five days ago. As usual, everyone except Selena was soaked and freezing. My teeth were chattering again, my stomach growling. At these higher altitudes there was more bone-chilling fog and even frost.
    But we were all wary.
    “Even if it’s empty, can we risk staying here?” Finn asked, looking at the place as longingly as I was.
    Zombies continued to trail us, and we still had a couple of hours before dusk. “The Baggers sh-should have trouble on that l-last rise, right?” I asked.
    “Just like you, Evie!” Selena said brightly.
    Bitch. There’d been a sheer rock face to scale. We’d had to use a rope! I’d never climbed a cliff in my life and had flailed like a trout on a line. I’d been as worried about Matthew as about myself, but compared to me he was a mountaineer.
    Jackson didn’t join in the discussion, just started toward the cabin. When we followed, he said, “I go alone.”
    In the past, Selena would’ve trotted after him anyway, but she’d been remaining close to me. Like gum on the bottom of my boot.
    I told him, “Fais gaffe à toi.” Watch out for yourself.
    Jackson’s gaze cut to me, and I saw some emotion flicker there before he masked it.
    As I watched him stride off, crossbow ready, I wondered yet again what was going on in that head of his. We hadn’t spoken since I’d kissed him. Did he still regret kissing me back?
    After that night,