Ashes of Time (The After Cilmeri Series) Read Free Page B

craned her neck to see who
was asking to be admitted, but she couldn’t see around Anna. Her
daughter stood in the doorway for a second, one hand on the frame
and the other on the edge of the door, not moving.
    “ Who-who are you?” The
panic in Anna’s voice had every adult at the table rising to his or
her feet.
    “ An old friend.” The voice
came clearly from beyond Anna. She stepped back, holding out her
hands in front of her, her posture stiff. Something wasn’t right.
Meg still couldn’t see past Anna to whatever was the problem, but
she moved with everyone else to find out.
    As Anna took another step backwards, her hip
hit the door, opening it wider and enabling Meg to see beyond her
to Rhuddlan’s steward, Alan, who had fallen to his knees on the
landing. Meg’s breath caught in her throat as a second man—the
tardy Marty—grabbed Alan by the cloak, tugged him to his feet, and
shoved him so that he stumbled through the doorway past Anna and
into the room. Alan collapsed against the wall a few feet from Meg,
bleeding from a gash in his belly.
    And then, the bloodstained blade flashing in
his hand, Marty grabbed Anna, dragged her with him into the room,
and kicked the door shut behind him.

Chapter Two
    November 1291
     
    Anna
     
    A nna’s family stared at her, and she stared back at them, each
individual a dark silhouette against a brilliant background because
she was hyperventilating. Mom had been sitting at the near end of
the table and was already on her feet by the time Marty—it had to
be Marty because who else could be ‘an old friend’?—had spun Anna
around and put the knife to her throat. She was the only one who
had been close enough to see him stab Alan. The poor steward—a
thin, balding man in his mid-forties who hadn’t been prepared to be
assaulted with a knife—clutched his hand to his side, bleeding out
while everyone stood frozen in shock at the scene and out of fear
for Anna.
    David had already been on his feet, since
he’d been talking and walking, but he was yards away from where
Anna now stood. Although six inches taller, twenty years younger,
and far stronger than the somewhat tubby Marty, David couldn’t
subdue him from there. Ieuan, his jaw set, put his foot on his
seat, prepared to climb over the table to get to Anna. Papa pushed
back his chair and stood up, while Gwenllian slipped her hand into
Lili’s. Anna wished Lili had her bow because she would have trusted
her to put an arrow through Marty’s eye without blinking.
    Anna’s vision narrowed as she looked at each
person, and then her gaze lingered on her husband. Math’s face
mirrored the horror Anna was feeling. He’d risen to his feet, but
as Elisa had crawled into his lap earlier and was now clutching him
around the neck, he was frozen too.
    Then Bronwen hurried around the table to
crouch in front of the steward. Marty didn’t stop her, but he did
edge Anna farther into the room, along the wall away from them.
Anna couldn’t move her head enough to see either of them clearly
and hoped Alan wasn’t already dead. In the Middle Ages, a knife
wound to the gut was rarely anything less than a death
sentence.
    Marty looked at Meg and said in American
English. “Hello Meg. Long time no see.”
    “ Marty, don’t do anything
more stupid than you’ve already done.” David advanced slowly, his
hands out.
    “ Don’t anybody move!” Marty
squeezed Anna tighter against him.
    David stopped. Anna’s tongue had stuck to
the roof of her mouth. She couldn’t say anything and wouldn’t have
known what to say if she could speak. She ran through possible
escape moves she could make. But as her sensei had told her so many
years ago, when a knife was involved, somebody was going to get
cut. And with the blade at her throat, that person was going to be
Anna. In addition, after nine years and three pregnancies, she was
really out of practice with karate.
    She tried not to look anywhere but at Math.
He’d schooled his