Hump Day Hook is a weekly blog hop where writers are invited to hook readers with just a few paragraphs from a work in progress or published work. Visit their site by clicking on the button below for a list of other participating writers and share the love! Today’s hook still comes from The Last Hour of Gann because I haven’t had time to look for anything else.  This snippet continues where the snippet from last WeWriWa left off, so feel free to go back and catch up. Odds are good that I won’t get organized between now and the weekend, so this coming Sneak Peek and Weekend Writer Warrior will probably finish out the scene between Meoraq and the boy.

“I probably should have waited until we were closer,” the boy mused, circling again. “Not sure how I’m going to move your body sixteen spans to the camp, but I probably don’t need the whole thing. Nothing about the head proves you’re Sheulek…and the arm doesn’t prove you’re dead…” The boy hunkered down to pick up one of Meoraq’s sabks. He admired it in the stormlight, then struck it under Meoraq’s chin and rocked his head back and forth. “What would you do if you were me?”

Meoraq took the knife and slammed it into the side of the boy’s throat.

He and the boy stared at each other. He felt no need to speak. He had no questions, really.

The storm was moving on, lightning breaking into separate sparks, thunder growing distant. The rain fell even harder, but that was all right; the rain was cool on his scraped throat and bruised ribs.

Meoraq pushed himself awkwardly to his knees and then his feet, dragging the boy up with him. “The law,” he rasped, and had to stop and cough into his palm. There was no blood on his fingers and the pain of the effort was minimal. It took strength to break a man’s ribs, and everything this scrawny youth possessed had gone into the choke. Meoraq hurt, but he thought he was all right.

“The law requires me to ask,” he said again, adjusting his grip on the knife’s hilt. “Do you wish to pray?”

“This is not supposed to happen,” the boy whispered.