The Legacy of Lord Regret: Strange Threads: Book 1 by Sam Bowring Page B

shining in his eyes. Redstreak
     moved towards him, flexing his hands and rubbing them together. Tursa looked around desperately.
    ‘Rostigan!’ he mewled. ‘Help me!’
    Rostigan was already running at Redstreak, whose head snapped about to see who was coming. Deftly, Redstreak slipped around
     what would have been a tremendous blow, which, in missing entirely, sent Rostigan staggering forward. Redstreak danced around
     behind him, and Rostigan felt iron fingers close upon his throat. He twisted, swinging Redstreak off his feet – the Unwoven
     weighed little for all his strength, and held on tight.
    ‘I don’t know what you are, warrior,’ came his voice in Rostigan’s ear as the grip contracted, ‘but I bet you die when your
     head comes off, just like everyone else.’
    Rostigan saw spots before his eyes, and awkwardly plunged his sword over his shoulder. Redstreak shifted his weight, pushing
     off Rostigan’s hip to clear himself of the blow.
    ‘Oh, hold me,’ chuckled Redstreak throatily, swinging about Rostigan as if his neck was a beanpole, pulling him off balance
     this way and that. ‘Embrace me, why won’t you love me?’
    Rostigan dropped his sword as his hands went to his throat, trying to prise the fingers loose. In the deep place, his little
     flame snuffed out.
    ‘Your flesh is strong,’ said Redstreak, digging in his jagged nails. ‘But I think I can do it. I think I can!’
    Rostigan tried to gasp for breath, but no air entered his lungs. The pressure increased, grinding the bones in his neck, and
     he fell to his knees. Where the flame had gone out, the deep place yawned wide, and he saw his life unfurl like a great scroll.
     He’d bested opponents worse than a single Unwoven before. Unexpected – was that not the very nature of death?
    Is this where it ends?
    Strangely, he felt something like relief.
    Redstreak gave a grunt, and suddenly the constriction around Rostigan’s neck went away. He sucked in air and rolled, coming
     up to see Tursa backing away with a swordthat dripped whitely. Redstreak was staring at the advisor malevolently, one of his arms severed at the elbow.
    ‘Can you do it with one hand?’ Tursa snarled.
    Redstreak reached out with his good hand to grab the elbow of Tursa’s sword arm before the man could strike.
    ‘Can you?’ Redstreak said. He squeezed with a force that brought the sound of cracking bones. Tursa instantly lost all colour
     and dropped his sword.
    From behind, Rostigan caved in Redstreak’s head.
    He wrenched his sword free of the toppling corpse, and rubbed his bruised neck with a grimace.
    ‘Thank you,’ he croaked to Tursa, who was cradling his jelly-limp limb with a kind of strange fascination.
    ‘Did you see what I did? I chopped off his arm!’
    ‘That you did. Now listen to me, Tursa – you get yourself back to the king, you hear me? Tursa?’ He gave the man a little
     slap, and Tursa jolted, finally looking at him. ‘Back to the king with you, yes? Maybe one of his threaders can fix you up.’
    Rostigan turned back to the battle determined to make up for lost time. Although the Unwoven fought furiously, there were
     fewer of them now, for they had never tried to stay together. Each time one of them fell, more soldiers were free to help
     surround those who remained. Many of the silkjaws still airborne were at least partially undone, flapping wildly to compensate
     for trailing wings or dangling bones. Others were redly saturated, and these were the worst, ripping and tearing through groups
     of soldiers,resistant to fire, yet threaders attacked them wherever they landed, hands raised to send out myriad gestures. The best thing
     to do, Rostigan decided, was to hasten things as much as he could, in the hope of saving that many more soldiers. If there
     were enough left unscathed, maybe they could press on to the Pass.
    He pushed aside others to get to the fighting, still avoiding confrontations with silkjaws when possible. Each