The Gathering Storm Read Online Free PDF Page B

impossibly wide expanse.
    “You’re white,” said her companion. “Sit down. I’ll bring some lads to carry you over. You shouldn’t be walking.”
    “Nay, no need. I can walk.”
    The servingwoman shook her head as she helped Hanna to sit on the wooden planks. “You haven’t caught the plague, have you?”
    “I pray not.” She leaned against the railing, shivering; aching, and with a dismal pain throbbing through her head and hip and chest. “It starts in the gut, not the lungs.” She glanced up, sensing the other woman’s movement, and got agood look at her for the first time: a handsome woman, not much older than she was, with a scar whitening her lip and a bright, intelligent, compassionate gaze. “What’s your name? It’s kind of you to be so … kind.”
    The servingwoman laughed curtly, but Hanna could tell that the anger wasn’t directed at
her.
“It takes so little to be kind. I’m called Frederun.” She hesitated; cheeks flushed. Her unexpected reserve and the color suffusing her face made her beautiful, the kind of woman who might be plagued by men lusting after her face and body. The kind of woman Bulkezu would have taken to his bed and later discarded. “Is it true you traveled with Prince Sanglant? Has he really rebelled against his father, the king?”
    “What does it matter to you?” Hanna blurted out, and was sorry at once, throwing sharp words where she had only received consideration. Was sorry, twice over, because the answer was obvious as soon as the words were spoken.
    “No matter to me,” said Frederun too quickly, turning her face away to hide her expression. “I only wondered. He and his retinue spent the winter here last year, on their way east.”
    “You don’t grieve that Lord Hrodik is dead?”
    Frederun shrugged. “I’m sorry any man must die. He was no worse than most of them are. He was very young. But I’m glad Princess Theophanu came, seeing that we have no lord or lady here in Gent. That will keep the vultures away.”
    “But not forever.”
    “Nay. Not forever.” As if she had overstepped an unmarked boundary, she rose. “Here, now, sit quietly and wait for me.”
    As soon as she left, shame consumed Hanna. What right had she to torment a kindly woman like Frederun? She pulled herself to her feet and, jaw set against the pain, hobbled across the courtyard as rain misted down around her. She could walk, even if each step sent a sword’s thrust of pain up her hip, through her torso, and into her temple. She could walk even if she could not catch her breath. She could walk, by the Lady, and she would walk, just as Bulkezu’s prisoners had walked without aid for all those months, sick and dying. She was no better than they were. She deserved no more than they had received.
    She was staggering by the time she reached the barracks, and for some reason Folquin was there, scolding her, and then Leo was carrying her back to a stall filled with hay. The smell of horse and hay made her cough. A spasm took her in the ribs.
    “Ai, God,” said Ingo. “She’s hot. Feel her face.”
    “I’ll get the captain,” said Folquin.
    “Maybe they have a healer here in the palace,” said Stephen.
    “Hanna!” said Leo. “Can you hear me?”
    She choked on hatred and despair. Dizziness swept her as on a tide, and she was borne away on the currents of a swollen river. She dreamed.
    In her nightmare, Bulkezu savors his food and guzzles his mead and enjoys his women, and even the gruesome wound is healing so well that folk who should know better turn their heads to watch him ride by. How dare he still be handsome? How can God allow monsters to be beautiful? To live even in defeat?
    Or is she the monster, because despite everything she still sees beauty in him? Wise, simple Agnetha, forced to become his concubine, called him ugly. Surely it is Hanna’s sin that she stubbornly allows her eyes to remain clouded by the Enemy’s wiles.
    A veil of mist obscures her dreaming, a