Marek (The Knights of Stonebridge Book 1) Read Free

drew her last breath,” the priest stammered. “I felt the coldness of her skin as I helped your brothers place her lifeless body upon the pyre.”
    Kitty had to listen carefully to understand their strange speech. It was English, but not like anything she was used to. Scrunching her eyebrows together, she looked at her surroundings. The pyre in question stood but a few feet away. Steam rose from the wood stacked around the platform, the fire nearly extinguished by the rain, not a fire hose. Behind her was a stone church she had never seen. It must be two hundred years old. Thick blades of grass shot through the flagstones leading to a wooden door. It barely hung on hinges that, even from this distance, looked rusted and unsecured. The entire building leaned slightly and had the overall appearance that it could simply fall over at the slightest breath of wind.
    But the people. A small crowd had gathered in the churchyard. They looked like they had just come from the Renaissance Festival. Kitty swallowed the lump that clogged her throat at the memory, nearly a year ago now. The three of them, she, Jake and Vanesa, had gone to the festival in Annapolis as they had every September since Vanesa could walk. They went all out, dressing up in costumes, calling each other by some bizarre medieval-sounding name.
    But their costumes had not been the drab homespun of these dreary-looking people. These outfits could barely even be called clothes, much less costumes. Threadbare and ragged, the cloth hung from bodies that looked half starved.
    The haunting voice of her husband, seeping through the priest’s lips, called her attention back to the immediate problem. “”Tis more of the devil’s work, my lord, I insist that the lady accompany me to the church. There I can properly examine her and, if needs be, exorcise the demons in possession of her immortal soul.”
    “Thou shalt make no demands of me, priest. My wife will accompany me back to the keep. I will examine her myself.”
    By now, discontent had begun to rumble through the crowd. As one, the congregation began to move away. Kitty recognized fear in the expressions of most. She didn’t feel exactly comfortable with Gigantor. His resentment of her was obvious. But she was terrified of the priest, for no real reason except his resemblance to Jake. Her mind told her he could not be her husband, but she despised the priest immediately nonetheless, and found herself afraid of him, as well.
    So when her protector moved away and started to press through the crowd, she clung to him, following so closely she nearly brushed against his back as he walked away. The shabbily dressed people backed away from them. Everyone she looked at made the sign of the cross and turned from her. Many rushed away, their faces paled, their eyes widened.
    Kitty shivered. Where a few minutes before she’d been overwhelmed with heat, she now felt chilled to the bone. Glancing down, she remembered that she wore only her flimsy nightgown, and it nearly burned away. No wonder they stared at her so. Thank God she’d put on underwear before she went to bed.
    Gigantor stopped in front of her, causing her to crash into him. He turned with a scowl. The emotions she saw in his expression, such hatred and malevolence, unnerved her. She imagined she would have looked at Jake that way, had she been able to confront him before he died.
    Without a word, he pulled the cloak from his shoulders. Beneath it, he wore a quilted jacket of sorts. When he wrapped the cloak around her shoulders the lingering heat from his body enveloped her, permeating the chill in her bones and offering relief from the cold drizzle. Glancing over her head, he glowered at the people behind her.
    Kitty turned, following his gaze. The crowd had thinned considerably, most having fled, probably in fear, she realized, and not from the shock of her near nudity. The priest remained, glaring back at the man he’d called ‘lord’. Kitty wrapped the