Read the Toll by Jeanette Online Free

  The Price

By

Jeanette Lynn

Smashwords Edition

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Published Past:

Jeanette Lynn

on Smashwords

The Toll

Copyright 2015

Jeanette Lynn

Smashwords Edition,

License Notes

Cheers for purchasing and downloading this e volume.

It is the copyrighted property of the author, and may non be reproduced, copied and or distributed for commercial or noncommercial purposes. If you enjoyed this book, please encourage your friends to purchase and download their own copy.

Thank yous for your back up and respect for the holding of this writer. It is very much appreciated.

This book is a work of fiction and whatever resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events, or locales, is purely casual. The characters are productions of the author'south imagination and used fictitiously.

The author acknowledges the trademarked condition and trademarked ownership of all trademarks and word marks mentioned in this volume

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Table of Contents

Please Read Before Yous Proceed

No Good Act

Plight Of The Wallflower

Nice Girls Finish Concluding

Quiet Conundrum

Barterers And Beggars

Flesh Of My Mankind

A Toll, Ye Say?

Troll Brokering

A Life Of Servitude

Offerings

Beyond A Reasonable Doubt

Domicile Sweet Home

Family Reunion

Rose-tinted

Bridging The Gap

Kick Rocks

From The Brink

A Reason

Grayness Skinned Quandary

Ashes In My Mouth

No Place Like...

What Dreams Are These

The Dregs

It's The Piffling Things

Exposed

Pining Isn't But For Lowly Sap

Whispers In The Dark

Wide Open

Of The Lake

Night Within Light

What Be This?

Depths

Elemental, My Dear Phedaenya

Somewhere In Between

Watered Down

Hearth-less

Travellers

Other Travels

Lost And Found. Lost Again.

Modest Beginnings

Unsettled

Farther Along

Into The Thick Of It

Deliver Me

Parturition

Tis Time

Lineage

Upside Down

Midnight Rendezvous

Rupture

Four-chambered Refuge

Conservancy

Mending-Gersthart

Welcome Back-Nugget

Flying Past

Inviolable

Tipping Point

Epilogue

Not Quite The End

Bonus Short- "Brother-cousins"

The Bridge Over Kellerman's Pond

All Shook Up

Fresh Start

Other books by Jeanette Lynn

Most the author

Warning: Delight Read Earlier You Proceed

This book contains sexually explicit material, foul language, and some subjects of questionable nature, which may brand some uncomfortable—such as rape, suicide, and violence—intended for readers 18 and older.

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The Toll

No Good Human activity

The sun was setting, the crickets having started up their piddling vocal not long ago. I got up from my comfortable spot in the field, plucking upward my basket as I went.

"Don't go yet." Trystan's hand came upwardly and snagged mine, tugging me dorsum downward to him.

With only a small, token protest, I let him reel me back in, his thick arms wrapping around me comfortingly, solid and warm, giving me a quick, affectionate embrace.

Trying hard to keep inside proprieties boundaries—only in example someone might stumble across us—we didn't let it linger longer than seen as proper. Not that it would be seen as proper at all, but it was a compromise we could both agree on.

It was bad enough I'd let him osculation me the other 24-hour interval, and in the middle of an open field out in wide daylight, no less. Nosotros didn't wish to tempt fate whatsoever further, risking the plans nosotros'd fabricated together, staining his reputation, equally well as mine, as far as the community was concerned.

"I have to go." Tugging away from him, I giggled when he pulled me towards him by the back of my dress and kissed me one last time, plastering his lips to mine. It wasn't proper at all, simply temptation was calling, battering at my door, and I gave in.

His lips were soft and thick against mine, the taste of the mint he liked to chew still fresh on his jiff.

"I'm going to ask him tomorrow," Trystan said easily, tracing my lower lip with his alphabetize finger longingly as he eventually pulled back.

I smiled slowly, my bowed lips creasing teasingly, blue eyes peeking upwardly at him as I shook out the skirts of my gown.

"Oh?" My voice unsaid I understood, maybe a lilliputian too well, just a hint of disbelief bleeding out to catch his notice.

And discover it he did.

My grinning went kleptomaniacal, boot up at just the 1 corner at the sharp await on his face.

Immigration my throat, as if unaffected, I ran my fingers over my hair, meticulously tracing along the thick orangey-red lengths pulled dorsum into the prim bun I'd put it upwards in this forenoon, making sure it was still intact. Information technology was, and, satisfied with its state, I gave information technology a quick pat earlier I dropped my hands.

Trystan nodded, opting to ignore my hinted sarcasm at hearing him say the aforementioned exact thing for the umpteenth time since we'd begun our clandestine courtship.

"I am," he promised, and I gave him a speculative once over. He caught it and stood upwardly taller, chest puffed out as my perusal went from skeptical to beholden in two seconds flat.

His lips pulled back and he chuckled, grinning knowingly when I flushed and my eyes danced away, his nighttime brown optics alight.

"Yes," Trystan stated confidently, "and when he says yes, you owe me a kiss."

"So bold, sir. Are you certain he'll even let me have?"

"He will. And possibly I'll steal another. Or two…"

Cocky, merely adorable. I loved this side of him—the confidence I saw blooming in him daily.

Mayhap it had to do with him beingness with me—always existence told how wonderful I call up he is giving him a tiny fleck of a puffed up ego, like a peacock—or perhaps information technology was just him—something he'd always naturally possessed that I hadn't noticed before. Either way, I enjoyed it.

He winked when I snorted at him, my grinning matching his.

A kiss, then, he says? Okay. I can do that. The idea brought lilliputian excited flutters to my breadbasket. I wasn't going to deny him that. Trystan was, later on all, quite the talented kisser. Not that I'd had much experience at it, merely I enjoyed his attentions, notwithstanding.

He straightened his own apparel out, noting the darkening sky, picking the odd flake of devious grass or greenery off his otherwise pristine grey shirt and dark brown trousers. Readjusting the ties to his billowing grayness garment, he put his black vest back on and shoved his wide brimmed chapeau downward on his head.

I virtually mourned the loss of all those tousled onyx locks, itching to yank the hat back off and shove my fingers through the short, tangled mass.

"Hmm… I wonder…" I teased, already managing to put several feet of altitude between u.s., standing upward on tip toe equally I prepared, anticipation flitting near within me.

His optics darted towards me, and his lid—as if willed to do my bidding—barbarous off.

Black, full head of hair bobbing up in his wake, flapping heavily into his optics from his currently aptitude over position, he finished buttoning his final button.

"What'south that?" From the leery expression on his face up, I knew he knew I was up to something.

I held back a mischievous grin, simply barely. "I wonder… how do you become anything done at all effectually here if you're spending all your time in the fields in the evenings... fooling around?"

"Fooling," he barked on a startled express joy, incredulous. "Is that what we've been doing, and then? Fooling?" Grin dipping, his hands sat heavily on his hips as he cocked a questioning brow.

My grinning was cheeky, and maybe a bit cocksure, but I let it loose.

He knew what I'd meant—the tease. The mirth in his voice confirmed information technology when he tried to say something but could no longer incorporate his chuckle.

"Yes." I nodded, a loose wisp of hair falling over my middle. "With me."

He paused and stood up taller, towering in his superlative, a stern expression on his face.

"Why, milady," he huffed, his thick face up bunching upwardly every bit he scowled down at me in mock consternation, "and to what, exactly, are you implying?"

I grinned, lips pulling back and so wide I thought my cheeks might carve up. His black look might take scared other women, but non me.

Trystan wasn't the finest looking man in the village—in fact, he wouldn't even make information technology to the superlative 10, or even 20—but he was a good human. He was sweetness and genuinely likeable, and best of all, he liked me only as I am. He'southward my good homo.

Tall, he was, towering over me by quite a flake, intimidating the other ladies across reason, but I rather liked it. He was thick, my Trystan, maybe a petty thicker than near of the strapping young men his age, but not all, and he had a thick thatch of jet blackness hair atop his caput that stuck up at wild angles—untamable. I liked to run my fingers through information technology on evenings like this, the both of u.s.a. teasing and laughing together in the field freely, lazily laying in the tall grass that shaded us from others.

He had securely bronzed skin from working out in the fields and the pasture all mean solar day, and his eyes were a deep set brown. I loved the colour, similar dark pools of molasses, and hoped more than anything that when he finally worked up the courage to inquire Papa for my hand, our children would someday inherit their father's deep, dark, crisp brown eyes.

Trystan besides had scars along the left side of his body, and he limped—a hunting accident with his uncle gone wrong when he was young. The flesh didn't quite heal right, leaving tightened, misshapen, pulled and sewn together, puckered flesh along his arm and upper neck. Some would say these things rendered him unattractive. They didn't to me. Trystan fought and he lived. He fought through the pain and subsequent fever, and he healed. If anything, it made him strong and sympathetic. Information technology made him more human, more real—compassionate. He was a fighter, in my volume, a true survivor, and I told him and so often.

Truly, I had no doubts that Papa and Mamma would approve the match. It didn't hurt that Trystan's begetter owned quite a flake of country, conveniently adjoining ours. A bespeak in favor towards male parent'southward liking that I couldn't care less about, only still, it didn't hurt.

"Well," Trystan demanded, "explain yourself, Daphedaenya."

"Uhm..." Eyes darting about, I chewed my lip, worrying it between my teeth equally I cleared my throat, cocking a slender brow. "That you lot're lazy? Or that nosotros're fools?"

"Daphie!!" The outrage in his voice wasn't feigned as I burst out laughing and took off. I turned and ran, clutching my basket and my brim together in one hand as I shot off towards home.

"Oh, Trystan," I chortled, "yous should have seen your face! That look would peel pigment!"

My feet fabricated wet, squishing sounds as I reached the muddy colina—which would reveal my house once I'd fabricated it just beyond—soaking my slippers, but Trystan'southward thick booted, heavy pes falls soon met up with mine and he scooped me up, swinging me around as I squealed and squawked in protestation.

He hugged me to his thick, meaty chest tight and chuckled into my hair. I laughed and squealed happily as he glanced around quickly before he dove in and started raining kisses downwards the tip of my ear and along the column of my exposed throat.

"Now I've caught you, my Daphie-girl," he whispered huskily, grin confronting my skin when my hands wrapped effectually his thick, potent arms in render. "What'll you requite me to let become? Hmm?"

"A handbasket of berries? My berries?" I offered, withal giggling hysterically, plucking one upwards and feeding it to him, my fingers lingering a tiny bit at his lips as he licked the berry juice from them.

He chewed and swallowed, groaning into my neck as he gently gear up me on my feet. "Yous're such a tease," he groaned, much more than pitifully than information technology warranted, his large, calloused hands giving my thick waist a piddling clasp. "Sometimes I wonder if you know more than than you permit on."

I knew things, not that I'd ever washed those things, merely I had married friends and they talked. Most women my historic period had already wed by at present or were engaged to be. Not that I knew a lot about sexual things, just the basics, simply I felt it my personal duty and mission in life to taunt him, my boyfriend. And so, I'd say petty things, never confirming or denying his wonderings. It'due south more fun that way. I'll allow him effigy that out on our nuptials night.

A slight moment of anticipation filled me when I could experience the thickness of his member protruding, pressing into my back through his thick trousers impatiently, only it was brief and fleeting feeling as he slowly stepped back.

Deep down, I knew Trystan would never do annihilation to hurt me, non on purpose. I had to wonder, though, how volition it fit?

"Daphedaenya! Daphedaenya!!"

Nosotros both sighed heavily and groaned at the sound of Mamma's voice calling my name.

"I all-time be going now," Trystan finally muttered as we stood there helplessly, only several anxiety separating usa as we faced each other at present, wanting to hug skilful-farewell once more before we had to go, still both of us unwilling to risk getting caught in the act.

"Daphedaenya!"

We both jumped at the shrill intonation that is Mamma.

Exchanging a quick, sympathetic grimace, I waved as he started off, slowly walking backwards as he watched me from over his shoulder.

Waving over again one time I'd reached the acme of the loma, he winked, grinning, and blew me a buss. Giggling happily and smiling like a nincompoop, I caught it and returned the gesture.

He chuckled, and with i last hearty wave and a tip of his lid, he was gone.

Mamma connected to shout out my name. Her vocalism, something off about it, pricked me as the urgency lacing it made itself more and more apparent, along with the always increasing volume of her incessant yelling, and the sharpening in her tone.

I picked upwardly my pace one time I'd reached the bottom of the steep colina, breaking out into a run when I heard Mamma'south voice catch and asphyxiate, breaking on a sob.

My center felt like it was going to jump out of my chest as she started crying openly, wailing out my sister's name.

"Otvla! Otvla!" she sobbed out desperately.

"Mamma! Mamma!" I shouted, following the sound of her sharp cries as they got louder and louder.

Skidding along the loose, dark gravel covered basis, I came to a sudden halt, nearly running my mother right over in my haste. As I'd turned the crumbling brick corner on the side of the house that led to the cobbled walk fashion and heavy wooden front door, I near smacked right into her. Or over her, I should say.

Mamma was crumpled on the bottom front steps, huddled in a lilliputian brawl, her thick dark-brown skirt billowing around her every bit she rocked back and forth, hysterical, her favorite dark bluish knit shawl clutched tightly to chest in her long, bony hands.

"Mamma! Mamma? What's happened? Mamma?" I knelt downwardly in front of her and clutched her cold, clammy fingers in mine, trying to put a bit of warmth into her. They felt like ice, they were so cold, and as I glanced downwards, I noticed they were clutching something, gripping it—whateve

r it was—tight.

"Information technology's… it's… oh," she burst out, revealing a flash of silver every bit she slowly clenched and unclenched her white knuckled fists.

I knew that flake of argent—the little oval with the tiny rose in the corner—it matched the one I was wearing perfectly, an verbal copy.

Fingering mine as worry and panic engulfed me, I felt my own skin growing chilled. "Mamma…"

"My piffling Otvla!" she wailed, pressing the lilliputian locket up to her forehead as she said a quick prayer, tears streaming down her gaunt face.

Information technology was her locket she had clutched in her hand, Otvalena's, my younger sister.

"What happened to her, Mamma?" I tried, but she couldn't hear me, her sharp, pain filled cries overpowering my own strong voice. "Mamma," I soothed, trying another approach, rubbing her fingertips reassuringly.

Letting out a few, inarticulate cries, she shook her head and pulled her hands back. "My baby… my infant… She's gone. She'southward… she's…" Overcome, she couldn't finish.

My heart broke for hers equally my ain chipped and cracked, torn by her repeated rebuffs, yet worried for my sibling. Nonetheless, given her precarious state, I tried to condolement her, just she shoved me off whenever I went to put my arms around her, in favor of rocking herself dorsum and along violently.

"No… no… no…" she mumbled, "they've taken her, they have. My little baby. My little angel! My little Otvla!!"

Information technology was starting to weigh on me every bit I squatted down over her, just watching, feeling impotent, helpless, non knowing exactly what had taken place.

Taking a take chances, I gripped her shoulders, hoping to bring her effectually enough to become some answers. Otvla is in trouble and she needs assist. We can't help her if I don't know what from or what happened. I don't even know where she is.

"Mamma! What has happened? Who's taken her, and where? When?" I tried one time more than, with much the same result.

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