Page 7 (1/1)

Bertha grunted an answer, too angry to agree but too wise to object Hanna fu as the soldiers fell back into athered on top of the roadblock, staring, until the fork in the road was lost behind the trees and the contour of the road

"How could you?" demanded Hanna at last "They owe us shelter …" She sputtered, too angry to continue

Rosvita paced alongside theh to accoons, which seemed always to be half mired in muck, but in truth Rosvita had not weakened on this journey She had groiry, strong enough to walk all day without flagging She often co back felt, although she slept on the ground le," she said now "This is not a battle worth fighting"

"What can have"War between neighboring lords The Qureat storm What else may have afflicted them I cannot tell"

"I am puzzled," said Rosvita, "by what he ainst us when Lady Bertha lant It nant when he suffers, and love the king when he prospers," said Bertha dish folk in these last weeks e ought to have seenin the woods without their parents Freshly dug graves Solitary corpses This is not just famine at work"

"What, then?" asked Rosvita

Bertha shrugged Hanna, too, had no answers

II

ARROWS IN THE DARK

1

IN the end they ca the daensburg, Lady Bertha insisted they set up caainst the unrelentingherself to call rain

In some ways, theirs was an ions, one noblewoed clerics, fourteen stolid soldiers, one sequestered Kerayit sha chickens, and the steadfast dogs Many had died after the battle with Holy Mother Anne’s forces: all of the Kerayit guardsatani’s two slaves, and sixteen of Bertha’s war band But since that day in Arethousa when Hanna had joined them, they had, miraculously, lost no one else and had sustained only one perht foot had been crushed when the son had slipped sideways down an incline at the side of a side

Two eant Aronvald set up a perimeter around the reon wheels were braced against rocks and the horses taken out to graze, water, and roll Soldiers tossed tiles out of the ruins of the chapel to ed up canvas to shelter the apse where the altar had once stood Brother Breschius e two covered bronze buckets, one riding light and the other heavier, he walked toward the rear of the palace compound where kitchens once stood

Lady Bertha paused beside her "Will you coh the ruins of the town to see if there’s anything we can scavenge" A trio of soldiers loitered behind her, chafing their hands to warh the palace ruins," said Hanna "If ICome!" The last was addressed to her retainers They left

After rubbing down her horse and turning it out with the others, Hanna walked through the ruins of the palace Fallen pillars striped the ground She traced corridors and roo crawled along her skin, like fire that warmed but did not burn She had walked here with Bulkezu and his brother Cherbu In this place Cherbu had discovered the na

"Liathano," she said softly She shut her eyes and listened, but all she heard was the hiss of a light rain on the ruins and the grass and the rattle of wind in the distant trees This was a dead place

"What happened to the town?" asked Brother Fortunatus, co your pardon!" he said, chuckling a little as he touched fingers to her elbow "I did not rin, but he narrowed his eyes "What ails you, Hanna? Ghosts?"