Read Online The Bard Speaks by Montgomery Mahaffey - Free Book Online Page A

inside a forest a few miles inland from the north shore, far from the hunting grounds of villages, cities, and towns. She spent winters in this grove because of the hot spring she had found deep in the woods, which made the perfect hiding place where survival wasn’t difficult. She had found the tower after a storm. She was riding her stallion that day, carving paths before the snow hardened between the springs, her camp, and beyond. The air was crisp, stinging her cheeks, the sky deep blue against the white stretching as far as she could see. She traveled farther than usual, for she’d never seen the trees end at a peak arising from nowhere.
    The mound was covered with snow, but the shape was strange, more like a cone than a mountain and standing alone. She stopped her mount and frowned. Its presence in an otherwise flat landscape was bizarre. Her eyes climbed up the face where she saw even rows of dents in the snow up to the pinnacle. This couldn’t be the work of nature. She walked her horse around the base, scraping snow and pushing her hand through the dents, making hollows to open space. She’d come full circle when a broad swathe of snow fell to the ground, revealing a passage leading inside. The corridor was too low for the stallion, but not for her. She peered through the passage and saw beams of sun lighting up an inner chamber.
    She dismounted and walked the passage. She stroked the walls and streaks of soil marked her palms, the earth dense yet pliable, giving way where her fingers dug. She entered the cave, her eyes following shelves curving around the walls to the apex, interrupted only by the windows to the outside and intersected with eight columns of vertical stairs climbing far enough to reach the highest shelf. The room was round and in perfect symmetry. The route of shelves, the placement of windows and stairs were balanced. She had no doubt this tower was built by man and thinly camouflaged by nature, and that it had been long abandoned.
    She climbed the stairs, pushing snow from all the windows, and came back down to spin around slowly. She watched beams of light pour inside to ignite pink tones in the dull brown walls, and she remembered the hearts she had in her satchel. She went up the stairs across and to the left of the passage, opening her satchel and placed one of the hearts on the top shelf. The organ's pulsating beat sounded against the hard surface and ricocheted off the opposing wall, doubling the rhythm with its echo. She reached into her bag and pulled out another and set it on the shelf below. Then she went to the opposite stairs at the right of the passage and emptied her stash to the shelves directly across the other two hearts. Back on the ground, she stood in the center of the tower and closed her eyes. She smiled listening to the rhythms of dissonant pulsing. This cave was the perfect cache and now it was hers. She came back whenever she had hearts to hide.
    She could hear her lair beating from far away, riding through the forest in the violence of its final bloom before winter came and stripped the trees bare. She had a good hunting season and hadn’t been here in a long while. Her satchel was heavy, slung over both shoulders. She dismounted and went through the passage to the cacophony of sound.
    The den was filled with hearts beating along the shelves curving to its peak, but there was no harmony. They pulsed in different rhythms, with varying tones and speeds. Some rocked steady in a low hum, others had a rapid beat and a high pitch, while others skipped and changed pace and tone until skipping again, their beats doubled in echo. The inner chamber was a symphony of dissonance, a massive yowl vibrating through the tower.
    Several lay silent. She took the hearts that were far from the freshly dug graves of their deceased and dropped them in her satchel. Then she replaced the dead with the living. She stepped down to the center and closed her eyes, letting the riot of noise pulse