The strengthening light illuminated rows of humped figures on the floor, wrapped in their drab cloaks or huddled up to their neighbours for warmth. He put the candle down on the altar, lit a taper from it, and went around touching the flame to the wall lamps, his long shadow reaching up the wall each time like a reflection, his taper meeting the shadow taper at the wick of the lamp. At the eastern end of the long room, behind the altar, a monk came through the door carrying a single candle. Somewhere there was the sound of two people doing the thing parents did but never spoke of, the thing Gwenda called Grunting because she had no other word for it. Now and again someone spoke, uttering the half-formed words of sleep talk. A child cried out, as if woken by a dream, and was quickly silenced by a murmured endearment. The straw that covered the floor whispered constantly as people stirred and shifted in their sleep. She could see nothing, but there was plenty to listen to. However, she could not even see a faint patch of grey where the window should be. There was no glass-only the most important buildings had glass windows-but a linen blind kept out the cold autumn air. She knew that the wall opposite her had an arched window. She stared into the gloom, trying not to think about what frightened her. Gwenda was wary of evil spirits, like every sensible person but she was more scared of what she had to do during the service. Hundreds of people had come to Kingsbridge from the surrounding villages, as Gwenda's family had, to spend Halloween in the sanctified precincts of the priory, and to attend the All Hallows service at daybreak. By the same token the night before was All Hallows Eve, a dangerous time when evil spirits roamed freely. When dawn broke it would be All Hallows, a Sunday this year and therefore a specially holy day. The hospital was crowded, and though she could not see the other families lying along the floor, squashed together like sheep in a pen, she could smell the rank odour of their warm bodies. Beside Ma was Pa, and next to him Gwenda's older brother, Philemon, who was twelve. Her mother lay next to her, and Gwenda could tell, by the warm milky smell, that Ma was feeding the new baby, who did not yet have a name.

She was at Kingsbridge Priory, in the long stone building they called the hospital, lying on the floor in a bed of straw.

When she opened her eyes she could see nothing, but that was not what scared her. Gwenda was eight years old, but she was not afraid of the dark. The cathedral and the priory are again at the center of a web of love and hate, greed and pride, ambition and revenge. World Without End takes place in the same town of Kingsbridge, two centuries after the townspeople finished building the exquisite Gothic cathedral that was at the heart of The Pillars of the Earth.

World without end follett novel