ESCORTING HIS FATHERS BIER OUT THE EASTERN GATE IN THE hour before sunset, Tomasso bar Sandre settled his horse to an easy walk and allowed his mind to drift for the first time in forty-eight intensely stressful hours.

The road was quiet. Normally it would have been clogged at this hour with people returning to the distrada before curfew locked the city gates. Normally sundown cleared the streets of Astibar of all save the patrolling Barbadian mercenaries and those reckless enough to defy them in search of women or wine or other diversions of the dark.

This was not a normal time, however. Tonight and for the next two nights there would be no curfew in Astibar. With the grapes gathered and the distradas harvest a triumphant one, the Festival of Vines would see singing and dancing and things wilder than those in the streets for all three nights. For these three nights in the year Astibar tried to pretend it was sensuous, decadent Senzio. No Duke in the old days—and not even dour Alberico now—had been foolish enough to rouse the people unnecessarily by denying them this ancient release from the sober round of the year.

Loading...

未加载完，尝试【刷新】or【退出阅读模式】or【关闭广告屏蔽】。

尝试更换【Firefox浏览器】or【Chrome谷歌浏览器】打开多多收藏！

移动流量偶尔打不开，可以切换电信、联通、Wifi。

收藏网址：www.dd123.cc

(＞人＜；)