Raveler: The Dark God Book 3 by John D. Brown Page A

Talen said. “Saved me again. I thank you.”
    Harnock groaned. “Here we go again. I thought I told you I didn’t want your thanks.”
    “I’m sorry, but this is twice now.”
    “Three times, actually,” said Harnock. “That’s all I ever seem to do nowadays. But you can save your breath, Hogan’s son. Your sister’s put us into a precarious position. That weave may yet kill one of them, including the queen. We’re not safe until we’re well away from here.”
    “You told the queen you were fighting the Mokaddians,” River said. “Does that mean you’ve changed your mind? Are you coming back with us?”
    “She has the Book. We need to get it back. Which means you have to return. Which means I’m going to stick with you until you do.”
    “I have a good feeling about this,” River said.
    “I don’t,” Harnock said. “Do you know what you just promised them?”
    “We are natural allies.”
    Harnock shook his head. “You don’t know woodikin.”
    “I’m amazed at the queen’s command of Mokaddian,” River said. “Where did she learn the language?”
    “Human hunters and youths wander over the borders. When they do, the woodikin capture them. This queen is known for wanting her skinmen alive. She wants to know her enemy, so she makes them tutor her. Sometimes they live. Sometimes they die. Sometimes she trades them off to other tanglewoods.”
    Talen tried to imagine living among the woodikin. “Are there human slaves here now?”
    “Who knows?”
    “Do you think she will actually let us go?” asked River.
    “The Spiderhawks used to be the ruling tribe. But most of their tanglewoods were out along the coast. It was Spiderhawks who fought most against the early colonists. And so when Mokad finally beat them back, the Divines gave weaves of might to the Orange Slayers, their enemies. The Orange Slayers took out their revenge, stole Spiderhawk tanglewoods, slaughtered their warriors. But I’m sure the queen is motivated by more than hate. The Great Mothers of these tribes are shrewd. I’m positive she has some long game.”
    “What about the Orange Slayer dreadmen?” Talen asked. “The woodikin are powerful creatures without any lore. I can’t imagine them with it.”
    “Their ring warriors are horrors, but we don’t have to worry too much about that right now. Every year the Orange Slayers meet with the Divine of Mokad and his priests at a place a few miles inside The Wilds. The woodikin give Mokad valuables and renew their promises to stay clear of the borders. They also bring three woodikin with them for sacrifice.”
    Talen already knew where this was leading. “And Lumen, or whoever the Divine was, would drain the sacrificial woodikin of their Fire and refill the Orange Slayer weaves with it.”
    “Exactly,” said Harnock. “So Lumen was killed. The annual meeting that was to occur many months ago never happened. The weaves weren’t replenished. And now I suspect the Orange Slayers weaves are running dry. They might be completely empty. It’s a huge blow for them. The warriors and promises of healing helped the Orange Slayers maintain their power. Quite a number of the vassal tribes are bound to them because someone important fell sick and the Orange Slayers healed them with the weaves. And now that source of power is gone.”
    River said, “I think alliances would shift very quickly if another tribe had the lore. Think of the possibility of an alliance between the woodikin and the Groves.”
    “The only reason the woodikin stay out of skinmen lands is because they are dependent on us,” Harnock said. “Remove that dependence, raise up a tribe of ring warriors, and you just murdered half of the clans.”
    “Not if Shim rises.”
    Harnock grunted.
    Talen said, “So if the weaves were only given to Orange Slayers, how did this queen get hers?”
    “That’s an interesting question,” Harnock said. “I don’t know. But you can be sure the Spiderhawk queen is thinking