The White Towers Read Online Free Page B

Crowe’s eyes fluttered and opened, and his blackened, crisped, well-cooked face turned from frown to grimace…
    “Who are you?” he said.
    “My name is Salvond.”
    “Where’s Agathe? And Grace?”
    “They are… sleeping a while.”
    Crowe started to struggle up, his movements weak and obviously causing him great pain. Reality came flooding over the dam of his security, and he realised, in a split second, how vulnerable he was. And as he looked into Salvond’s ancient dark eyes, a kind of understanding came to him. He stopped struggling and lay there, teeth bared, growling softly, burned fingers clenching and unclenching the blankets.
    “You killed them?”
    “Yes.” Salvond shuffled a little closer. He was within striking distance now. Crowe summoned up every ounce of strength and energy he had. This disgusting, terrible creature had murdered the two reasons Crowe was still alive; it had crushed their old beauty to shards. Something broke inside Crowe, and part of his old self came back. Part of his old bad self: distorted, crooked, cynical, hateful, merciless… something dead.
    “You’ve come to kill me?” he snarled, finally, froth on his flecked lips, preparing to launch himself at the curiously disjointed monster.
    “No, my dear boy,” said Salvond, bending over him, his hand reaching out. Tendrils started to squirm and spiral from the palm of his hand which caught Crowe’s attention and held him fascinated, hypnotised, in terror. “I’ve come to save you. And to learn from you. And to use you. You will become one of us. You will show me… how you humans work.”

THE ANCIENT
    The knocking came hard and fast, shaking the heavy door in its smooth teak frame. Grumbling, her wrinkled face squinting as she lit a lantern, Haleesa pulled a heavy robe around her ancient, stooped shoulders and padded barefoot across the hard soil floor.
    The knocking came again, and mumbling, “Ha, it’s enough to wake the dead,” Haleesa threw open the portal to reveal the fury of the raging elements outside her thick-walled cabin. Rain slammed in diagonal sheets, and thunder rumbled distantly as the howl of the wind swept into the cabin, bringing the scent of the nearby forest.
    “Is there no peace in the Palkran Settlement tonight?” scowled Haleesa.
    “Come, come quickly.” A round white face peered up from the darkness, flickering and strangely demonic in the wildly whipping flame of the fish-oil lantern. Miraculously, the flame did not extinguish, and the rain-soaked woman was beckoned across the cabin’s threshold and into the dry warmth by Haleesa’s wrinkled claw.
    “Some problem?”
    “Sweyn sent me to fetch the Shamathe . Gwynneth is having difficulty with her child. She is ready to deliver the babe… but cannot. You understand?”
    Nodding, Haleesa pulled another, heavier, hooded shawl about her delicate shoulders, and gestured for the girl to lead the way through the storm.
    The long hall was well lit and filled with warmth from a large fire-pit after the wildness of the storm-raped forest, and the young girl led a dripping Haleesa past roaring flames which the old woman fixed with a look of lingering despondency. And then they were through, into a room with a low cot and a scene dragged screaming from nightmare…
    A man, Sweyn, stood to one side, his face drawn tight with weariness, his fingers rubbing the palms of his sweating hands in an unconscious display of fear. Two women were kneeling beside the low cot upon which writhed a beautiful woman with long dark hair. She was naked, her hair a waterfall of velvet across her milk-gorged breasts. Her legs were open, labia and inner thighs smeared with blood and amniotic fluid which had soaked the rough wool blankets beneath her.
    Haleesa dropped her shawl. “Your first child, Gwynneth?”
    The woman met the Shamathe ’s gaze and held it, face contorted in pain. She nodded, her darting tongue licking at sweat-smeared lips.
    A brave woman, thought