BooksBarbecue
Back A Burning Sea
Chapters (54)
  1. CAST OF CHARACTERS
  2. PART ONE
  3. CHAPTER ONE
  4. CHAPTER TWO
  5. CHAPTER THREE
  6. CHAPTER FOUR
  7. CHAPTER FIVE
  8. CHAPTER SIX
  9. CHAPTER SEVEN
  10. CHAPTER EIGHT
  11. CHAPTER NINE
  12. CHAPTER TEN
  13. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  14. CHAPTER TWELVE
  15. PART TWO
  16. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  17. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  18. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  19. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  20. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  21. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  22. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  23. CHAPTER TWENTY
  24. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  25. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  26. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  27. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  30. PART THREE
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  32. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  33. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  34. CHAPTER THIRTY
  35. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  36. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  42. PART FOUR
  43. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  44. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  45. CHAPTER FORTY
  46. CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
  47. CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
  48. CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
  49. CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
  50. CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
  51. CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
  52. CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
  53. HISTORICAL NOTE
  54. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

‘What have you there?’ demanded the emperor.

‘The key to Lilla’s freedom,’ replied Erlan and passed it over.

CHAPTER FORTY

Illustration

Footsteps faint as butterfly wings, yet they pricked as needles in her heart.

‘Again.’ The word she had come to dread.

The footsteps sounded louder, clear and confident on the stone passage. The door opened. Lilla cracked open her red-rimmed eyes, ready for her ordeal. Except she saw a face she recognized, a streak of white in dark hair, a tender voice saying her name.

‘Grusha?’ she croaked, her eyes staring madly, her body limp as they let her down. ‘Grusha,’ she murmured, collapsing into her friend’s embrace. ‘Grusha.’

‘You’re safe now, sweetling. You’re safe.’

No tears came. No sudden rush of relief. She just lay folded in her friend’s arms, Grusha’s tears raining down on her filthy face. Lilla wondered whether Grusha could feel it. Whether the weight of her limbs or the stiffness in her body or the staring gaze of her dry eyes betrayed the truth. That she had become hard as iron. . .

Illustration

‘How long was I down there?’

‘Six weeks,’ Gerutha said, sponging down her back. The water in the copper bath was beautifully warm and clean. Gerutha had arranged everything well for her mistress’s release.

‘Six weeks?’ Lilla shook her head. ‘You could have said six months and I would have believed you. Or six days, even.’

‘One hour would have been too long. But I know it was as long as Erlan was out of the city, to the day.’

‘He’s alive then?’ The thought of him sent a jolt of relief through her body, but also something else. A kind of anger.

‘He’s coming here soon. He wanted to be here now but I insisted not. I didn’t want you overwhelmed.’

‘So he succeeded?’

‘Aye.’ Gerutha grinned. ‘The Bulgar army awaits to the north. Ready to sweep them Arabs from under the walls. That’s what he said.’

Lilla nodded, digesting each piece of information slowly, like morsels of bread after a long famine.

‘Oh, I’ll never forgive myself – you being in there all that time,’ Gerutha continued, scrubbing busily at the layers of grime that had accumulated on Lilla. ‘I tried to see you but it was hopeless. And the only ray of light I found led to nothing.’

‘What ray of light?’

‘Alethea.’

‘What? The beggar? Why her?’

Gerutha explained what she and Domnicus had discovered, what Alethea had seen and the knife she had found. ‘She was certain the time and place matched the circumstances of the murder. But when I took the knife to Katāros, he dismissed it almost as nothing.’

‘Katāros?’ The name made her wince, like a thumb pressed into an old wound. ‘You took it to him?’

‘He was in charge of the investigation. I was sure it would clear your name.’

‘He’s no friend of mine. What did you tell him?’