Read Online Quintessence Sky by David Walton - Free Book Online Page B

going to do with me?"
    He switched back to English. "Me? I will do
nothing. It is not for me to decide your fate."
    She closed her eyes. Whatever was to come in
the morning, she wanted to have her full senses working for her.
She hoped she would be able to sleep despite her hunger and
discomfort. Moments later, however, pincered hands closed around
her arms and yanked her to her feet again. They untangled her from
the netting and forced her to walk forward. Apparently she was not
yet allowed to rest.
    It was never entirely dark on Horizon. As the
stars drew close in the western sky, they grew enormous, casting as
much light as the full moon in England. The place where they'd
stopped, however, was high on the eastern face of a mountain, and
the peak blocked most of the western stars. It was darker outside
than she had seen in two years, which, combined with the
invisibility of her captors, made her suddenly very afraid. She was
led forward, but she couldn't see where she was going.
    The manticores jerked her to a halt just as
her leading foot felt air instead of ground. She felt forward with
her toes, but could feel nothing. In front of her, a deeper
darkness seemed to suck the air from around them, breezing her hair
gently forward. It wasn't a cliff. It was a hole in the
mountain.
    "Mighty lords of the earth," Rinchirith said
in his own language. He spoke slowly and gravely, so Catherine was
able to make out the words. "We have seen your wrath in the deep
places. Judge if this creature and her kin are the cause. We
sacrifice her to your pleasure, that your anger may abate, and your
life power spring up again from the earth."
    He shrieked, a long, ululating cry that
echoed far below her feet, gradually more distant until the sound
faded. Then, without warning, he pushed her over the edge.
     
     
     

CHAPTER 5
     
    IT TOOK a week to travel from Valladolid,
landlocked in the center of Spain, to the harbor at Cádiz, and
another several weeks to make the trip to England. They sailed on a
huge galleon at the head of a small fleet. Ramos was uncomfortable
for much of the time, appalled by the language and manner of the
sailors, and sickened by the poor food. Nevertheless, he cared for
Antonia's needs, feeding her and changing her and continually
speaking to her in both Spanish and Latin in the hopes that she
might understand. Many on the ship, seeing his priest's cassock,
came to him for confession or spiritual advice, and he was glad to
listen to them.
    He was free from the Inquisition, summoned by
the greatest monarch in Christendom to do a great work, but he grew
more melancholy as the trip progressed. Of all the Geminis Ramos
had found, only King Philip had escaped the madness. If he had been
spared, why not Antonia? Was he more righteous than she? Perhaps
Philip was vital to the Lord's work, and had thus been granted
special mercy.
    He brooded on the meaning of the nova, what
had caused it to appear, and why it had brought such grief. Most
people considered it a harbinger, merely a portent of the madness,
rather than its direct cause. Ramos didn't think that way. When two
unlikely things occurred at the same time, he assumed one was
probably the cause of the other. That or both were the effect of a
third cause, as yet unseen. He wasn't content to shrug and blame
the whims of an unknowable God. Instead, he spent his days in
prayer and meditation, following the spiritual exercises taught him
by his mentor years before, and asking God for insight.
    Finally, they arrived in England, where a
river guide came on board and guided the ship's captain through the
ever-changing currents and shoals of the Thames. They tied up at
Greenwich, where a vast shipping yard crawled with workers. The air
was filled with the sounds of ringing hammers, creaking pulleys,
splashing water, and the shouts of men. Ramos held Antonia's hand
and stood on the dock, blinking in the sunlight.
    "Ramos? Ramos de Tavera!" A thin Spaniard
with a trim, triangular