Dark Ages Clan Novel Assamite: Book 2 of the Dark Ages Clan Novel Saga by Stefan Petrucha

Author:Stefan Petrucha [Petrucha, Stefan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: vampire: the masquerade, horror
Publisher: Crossroad Press
Published: 2019-06-24T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fourteen

June 18, 1204

There had been little to comfort Amala of late; Sihr had yet to resurface, and now it had been several nights since she’d seen Fajr. It was to be expected, since she’d been traveling outside the camp with Sir Hugh as he rallied support, but the fact of it did not aid her faltering spirits. The confident ease that enveloped the five knights as their steeds moved languidly along the wide flat road didn’t help much either.

The night before, they’d been attacked. Twenty witless rogues provided the Templars with little more than a minor distraction and pleasant repast. The knights’ unleashed ferocity hadn’t surprised her—Sir Hugh actually snapped one in two with his knee and arms—but their sword-skills had. She calculated she could take as many as three of them, and perhaps Hugh as well, but no more.

This night, the hilly woods subsided into more open, flatter farmlands, where such ambushes were more difficult to engineer and thus more unlikely. As of sunset, they were north of Constantinople. While there was some foot and horse traffic as they passed over the Bridge of Justinian, once they traveled due east rather than south into Galata, the city’s Genoese district, the passersby thinned to nothing. The square tops of a few genteel estates could be made out above the treetops, and the knights wondered which might be their goal.

Amala shared a horse with Sir Hugh, her arms wrapped tightly around his waist, agitated all the more by the comfort she found in his physical nearness. Though a fine rider herself, even by Assamite standards, the Byzantine tunic and heavy, dark blue stole he’d given her forced her to ride sidesaddle, accounting for some of their leisurely pace. Worse, the sensation of chainmail pressing against her reminded her of Andret. It was a feeling a part of her wanted badly to explore. It was yet another feeling that had to be balanced against her duty to Alamut, strategic planning, spiritual responsibilities and an ever-present hunger for blood.

Increasingly pummeled by the divisions in her own mind, she thought, I have become too many people.

After a lengthy silence, Sir Hugh suddenly asked, “When and how did He come to you, Amala?”

Of late, he’d taken to speaking with her in the presence of his fellows as though they were alone, or the other Templars mere extensions of his will. They were for the most part his loyal childer, it was true, but speaking in front of them still made Amala uneasy.

Not now! Don’t demand I speak of Jesus as Lord now! Allah forgive me.

She leaned out a bit and allowed her round green eyes to focus on his face. “It took many years. I was raised Muslim. To accept Him meant turning against my family, my father, my mother, my brother and sisters,” she said, parsing her words.

“I am come to turn brother against brother…” Hugh quoted. “But there was a moment, wasn’t there? After which the world itself, though familiar, clearly was no longer the same?”

“Was there such a moment for you?” she asked.

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