Extract/Excerpt from White Lion
Today I am taking part in the blog tour for White Lion, thanks to Love Books Tours. I have been specially given a little extract from the book to give you a sneak preview of what you can expect from this fantasy. White Lion is a Quick Read book and is Dyslexia Friendly. Discover the blurb and then find out a little about the atmospheric, tense part – The Lion At Bay.
Blurb
In war-torn Acre, a different sort of battle is being fought as Tancred of Antioch, the White Lion, plays a desperate game of cat-and-mouse against those who would see the kingdom of Heaven in shambles. But, as armies inch ever closer, the question remains: who does the White Lion serve, Cairo or Jerusalem?
THE LION AT BAY
It was the soft scuff of booted feet that caused the man to whirl, one sinewy hand dropping to the hilt of his long knife. The sound of pursuit did not bode well in the tight warren of alleys that was at the heart of ancient Acre – sandwiched between the Venetian Quarter and what had once been the district of their ancestral enemies, the Genoans. But, the solitary man did not pause to see who it was who shadowed him. Not here; this no man’s land was not the place for confrontations. He spun and lengthened his stride.
By the moon’s fulsome light, he descended rough-hewn steps until he emerged into a crude square where four crooked alleys met. The Piazza di Lazaretto, it was called – the Lepers Square – for here is where the afflicted stopped on their way to the leprosarium of the Order of St. Lazarus of Jerusalem. This evening, however, the place was deserted.
Awnings of slatted wood protruding from mud brick facades, some mere frames hung with tattered canvas, spoke to the square’s use in the past. Nothing moved in the silver-shot gloom. No lepers seeking shelter. No street corner fences hawking stolen wares; no strumpets on the prowl or pimps looking for fresh meat; no dagger-men lounging in the shadows, seeking to hire themselves out for a dishonest night’s
work. Only a soft dry breeze reeking of dust and antiquity. In its rustle, the fellow heard the stamp of feet and the panted curses of his pursuers.