One night, as Ruza was spinning at her distaff, something strange happened. Once liberated she made a path toward the city, dragging a winding sheet behind her and leaving tracks of raw earth. The commanders ordered them not to loot the nearby villages, but their sense of duty only went so far. There was gold on her finger and around her neck, and he was eager to be done with this ghoul’s work. The warmth of his living breath tickled the sweet rosebud of her mouth. He remembered the stories he’d heard about the old, haunted city on the Vlatava: About the Headless Templar who rides by night, and the cursed gravedigger who gambled with the spirits of the dead and lost, and the rich man who burned to death with his bags of gold and even now tries to escape the city with his riches in tow… There were more important matters. What poor madwoman did those people take her for when they found her wandering the streets that night, lost and apparently out of her wits?
