Spires of Spirit by Gael Baudino Read Free Book Online Page B

clearing, and there was the circle of stones . . . but there was no trace of the Leather-woman; and when he made his way back up the trail, he found nothing more than what he had seen from a distance. Even the ashes of the fire were gone.
    The world suddenly looked very bleak, and he felt empty and sad. But he turned away, turned toward the village, for he knew that Elizabeth and the children would be frantic about his absence.
    Slowly, he descended through the boulders and into the bracken and the heather, and when he came to the Leather-woman's hut, he found that its fire had died. The dwelling now looked untenanted, even more forlorn than before. The wind stirred the dead heather, and snow was blowing in through the open door.
    Andrew stood for several minutes, grieving over his failure, for the hut was almost accusatory in its desolation. She was gone. There would be no more chances.
    But then he heard weeping. A soft, quiet voice.
    He wiped his eyes and followed the sound, and in a clump of heather he found huddled a young girl, not more than seven summers old. She was dressed in rags that looked woefully inadequate to the cold, and Andrew tore off his cloak and cast it about her shoulders while she looked at him, wide-eyed.
    “Don't be afraid,” he said.
    She had great self-control for one so young, and she blinked back some of her tears and managed to whisper, “Thank you, sir.”
    “Who are you?” said Andrew. “Where are you from?”
    “I . . .” Her hair was long and dark, and as she stared at him out of eyes as blue as mountain lakes, her lip trembled. “I don't know. I don't—” She suddenly winced and looked down at her legs.
    Andrew was puzzled, and when he pulled the cloak aside, he had to stifle a cry. Her right leg was perfectly straight, sound, and healthy, but it was imprisoned in a harsh, iron brace that bent it unnaturally.
    “I couldn't get it off by myself,” she said.
    Andrew stared for a moment, then pulled out his knife and cut away the old leather fastenings. He eased the brace from her leg and rubbed warmth and blood back into the flesh. “Who . . . who did this to you?”
    He looked into her face as he spoke, and then he knew, for she was staring at the iron brace with a dim flicker of pain and recognition, and her eyes were growing troubled. But Andrew stood, picked up the brace, and threw it as far away as he could; and then her pain and recognition faded . . . and her memory, he supposed, faded too. Her eyes cleared and shone. They were lake blue, tranquil.
    Andrew knelt before her. “What's your name, maiden?”
    “I don't know. I don't remember. I don't think I have one.”
    “Nor home, neither?” But he knew the answer already . . .
    “No, sir.”
    . . . just as he knew his own reply, for: “You have one now,” he said. “You'll come and live with me and my wife, Elizabeth, and our children. My name is Andrew.”
    “You're a . . . a carpenter,” she said suddenly, then looked uncertainly at him, smiled, and shook her head as the last trace of remembrance fled.
    He picked her up and carried her home. The villagers marveled at the pretty young waif from the bracken, and they marveled more at how she had been abandoned by all, to be rescued only by chance. But Elizabeth met him at their door, and she kissed the child and bade her be welcome, and she gave her warm clothes and a hot breakfast. She met Andrew's eyes, and he knew that she had guessed.
    They named her Charity.

Lady of Light
    The west doors of the church were open, and the reddening light of sunset spilled in, setting the length of the nave aglow and illuminating the bare wooden cross above the altar. David's hands were in his tunic pockets, and he kept them there while he examined the cross, lips pressed together, uncomfortably aware of the priest who stood beside him.
    “I want it finished by next Easter,” said Jaques Alban, lacing and unlacing his fingers inside the sleeves of his soutane. “With your