Elliott, Kate - Crown of Stars 1 (24 page)

"Truly Our Lord and Lady work in strange ways,"

said Biscop Antonia. "Such a creature I have never seen before, and yet I know that the creation of all beings on this Earth are the work of God in Unity. But this kind is surely made more out of the things that grow within the earth, of stone and dark metals, than of light and wind."

"You have received no messages, no offer for ransom?" Sabella asked.

"I fear he will be of no use to us except as a hostage," said Count Lavastine. "Truly, he eats as much as two of my hounds and is less useful."

"He does not speak?" asked Sabella. "Perhaps if persuaded he could give information about the ships and movements of his people."

"We have tried. He speaks nothing of our tongue, and no one here speaks anything of his, if indeed these Eika savages speak in words and not just in animal cries."

"Perhaps he could be taught," said Sabella, but even she looked skeptical. "There are marks on the chains, here."

"He tried to gnaw through the metal but could not, even with those sharp teeth. He has since given up trying to escape, or so we suppose."

"Patience is a virtue," said Biscop Antonia. "As is submission to the will of Our Lord and Lady. There may yet be hope that his kin can be brought into the Circle of Unity."

The Eika prince said nothing, made no movement, only watched, surveying his captors as if to memorize their features. Alain wondered how much he
did
understand. He suspected, now, that the prince understood more than he let on. Two days ago he would have said, like the others, that the prince was unable to speak.

"If he is of no use to you," added Biscop Antonia, "then I would gladly take charge of him when we leave here."

Take charge of him? Alain was not sure he trusted anyone but himself to care for the prince. If they discovered the prince could speak, what then? They would torture him; it was the usual way to interrogate prisoners.

And why not? The Eika tortured and mutilated innocent villagers and the monks and nuns who haplessly bore the brunt of their merciless attacks. Why should he be merciful toward a creature who would kill him, given the chance?

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.

"Your Grace is most generous," said Count Lavastine, "but it is not necessary. I consider him surety for the safety of my lands from further attack."

"If indeed," said Sabella, "his kind care enough each for the other that they would forbear to attack you in order to save one of their own. Perhaps, like wild dogs, they would as soon eat their own comrades as their enemies." Lady Sabella moved away, her attendants crowding after her like so many beads pulled along on a string. The hounds, with remarkable restraint, merely growled after them.

As she left, Prater Agius bowed his dark head and clasped his hands together piously. "Little by little is coming to pass that threat spoken by Our Lady through the mouth of Her prophet: 'A scourge out of the North shall spread abroad over the inhabitants of the Earth.' '

Biscop Antonia glanced sharply at the frater. Then she extended a hand. "Stay for one moment, Count Lavastine, if you will."

"As you wish, Your Grace." He waited, his servants clustered behind him.

"What if I can, by interrogation, gain information from this prince? May I trade to you the intelligence so gained in exchange for his person? I have a great interest in those of Our Lord and Lady's creation which are unlike ourselves, which come from elder times and are more memory to us now than familiar sight. Call it a study, if you wish, a catalog done in the style of the Dariyan philosophers, if I may be forgiven a reference to the pagans." She smiled gently and looked questioningly, or perhaps reprovingly, toward Frater Agius. "Yet the blessed Daisan himself rose out of their number to bring to all who lie in darkness the truth found in the light."

"If that is your command." Lavastine looked just barely annoyed, but she
was
a biscop.

"I think it would be best, Count Lavastine." Her gaze shifted, caught on Alain, and stayed there until he wanted to sink into the ground to escape her notice. She glanced beyond him toward the hounds, then all at once moved away to follow Lady Sabella. Count Lavastine escorted her.

Frater Agius, too, was looking at the hounds, who snarled as the biscop walked past, well out of their reach. She did not appear to fear them, as many did. "You tend the prisoner every day, do you not, Alain?" asked Agius suddenly.

Alain bowed his head obediently. "I do, Brother." But he was as aware of the Eika's gaze on him as of Agius'. Staring, both of them. He threaded his fingers together and squeezed them tight, so the pressure might keep him calm.

"You might have seen things others have not." "Yes, Brother."

"You will speak to me honestly, I trust." Heat burned his face. He shuffled his feet restlessly but could not answer, either to lie to the frater or to betray the prince. And yet, what duty had he to the Eika prince? Should his loyalty not be given first to Our Lord and Lady and second to the count?

"You will attend me tomorrow," said Agius suddenly. "After morning service. Is that understood?" "Yes, Brother." Then, mercifully, he left. "Halane."

Alain started guiltily and looked round quickly to make sure no one was about, but they had all left, grateful to get out of the stockade. The hounds had settled back on their haunches, waiting patiently for Alain to free them.

"You must not speak," he said, and was aghast to hear himself saying these words. "Only when we are alone. Otherwise they will hurt you."

"No hurt," said the Eika. "No hurt Halane. Go free."

"I can't free you. I must serve the count."

"Name man."

"Count Lavastine is the name of your captor. Surely you know that by now."

"Tre man look. Un, do, tre man. Name man."

What did he want? The name of the people who had come to look at him? Did he think they were all men, males, or did he have no word to differentiate male from female? Alain could not know. But he knew that just as he could not bring himself to betray the captive and helpless prince, neither could he betray the count's trust. What if the prince did escape and then knew by face and name Lady Sabella? If the Eika recognized the word "king," might they not also recognize "queen" or "prince?"

"I can't tell you their names. You must understand that, I beg you."

The prince did not reply. He blinked once, owllike, deliberate. Alain fled. It was too much to understand.

Later that evening, as he served at the table, the talk turned to the reign of the Emperor Taillefer, he who one hundred years ago had united Salia, Varre, the westernmost duchies of Wendar, and most of the southern princedoms into a great confederation blessed and anointed by the skopos in Darre as the rebirth of the Dariyan Empire. Only then did Alain realize that the Eika prince had counted
one, two, three
in a bastardized form of the language spoken in Salia. He knew a bit of it, enough to communicate with those Salian merchants who beached their boats at Osna village. But how had an Eika prince come to learn it? Truly, there was more to him than met the eye.

In the morning, Biscop Antonia led a somber service to celebrate the second day of the Ekstasis. As the congregation left, Alain sidled away to kneel in the chapel. Lackling followed him, and although with signs and whispers Alain tried to make him go away, the halfwit remained stubbornly blind to the hints. Or perhaps he truly did not understand. But the boy knelt quietly, breath sucked in noisily and blown out with a slight whistling through the gaps in his teeth. Lackling had never once broken the silence of church with his grunts, his half-formed exclamations, his snorting chuckles. Alain laid a hand on Lackling's shoulder and in this companionable way they considered the altar, dedicated to St. Lavrentius, who had died before the time of the Emperor Taillefer while bringing the Circle of Unity to the Vanish tribes that lived in this region.

They knelt there so quietly that the mice who nested beneath the altar grew bold enough to venture forth from their safe haven. Lackling held his breath; he loved the tiny creatures. Alain slowly slid a hand along the floor and one of the little brown creatures, dark eyes bright, nose twitching, anxiously darted over to investigate his fingers. Gently he lifted it up and let Lackling stroke its downy coat. Alain did not have the heart to kill them, although they were pests, not when they came so trustingly to his hands.

Suddenly the mouse scrabbled frantically up Lackling's fingers and leaped out of the halfwit's hands. It vanished under the altar and all rustling and scratching ceased.

"My friend."

Even having braced himself, Alain still started when Agius spoke softly behind him. A moment later Agius knelt beside him, although the frater did not allow himself the luxury of kneeling on the pillow laid there for that purpose.

"Is there anything you wish to tell me, Alain?"

Alain gulped down a sudden lump in his throat.

"I swear to you that I will consider this as a private confessional, between you and God."

"A p-private confessional?"

"There are some of us in the church who believe that confession ought to be a private matter between the penitent and Our Mother, in which such as I serve only as an intercessor. I do not believe in public confession, Alain, though some might call me radical for professing such a belief. Each one of us must bend our heart to Our Lady and the Divine Logos, the Holy Word, for it is the inner heart and not the outer seeming which matters to God."

"But, Prater Agius, does not the outer seeming reveal the inner heart?"

"We can never know the inner heart except through Our Mother's grace. It might appear to you that I serve Our Lady faithfully, with a true and single-minded heart, and yet how can you see past this outer seeming to know that my inner heart is riddled with vainglory and pride, in believing that I can serve Our Mother better than any other man? So do I pray each day for the lesson of humility. I beg you, my friend, for the sake of your immortal spirit, tell me the truth of what you know."

"I
—I know nothing. The Eika prince spoke a few words to me. That is all." Even clasped before him, his hands shook as he spoke. "Words in what language?" "Wendish. I know no other language." "Many of the people here in Varre also know Salian." "I know a few words. The prince counted in Salian, or at least, the words sounded something like Salian but not exactly like. But he said almost nothing. He cannot truly speak our language." "Why did you not tell Count Lavastine?" Alain felt like a cornered rat. " —I just think it wouldn't be merciful for him to be tortured, if he can't speak well enough to truly talk to his interrogators." He risked a glance at Agius, afraid that he had revealed disloyalty, but Agius' expression did not change. The frater stared fixedly at the image of St. Lavrentius on the burning wheel.

"You have a compassionate heart, Alain. I will think on this before I act. Is there anything else you have seen or heard that you wish to tell me?"

The Lady of Battles. The vision he had seen in the ruins. The owl that had hunted that night, on Midsummer's Eve. But he dared not speak of these things to Agius or to anyone except his kin. Afraid that he was about to blurt out these secrets, he said the first thing that came to mind.

"Why is Lady Sabella not Queen of Wendar? She is the elder child, isn't she?"

"The sovereign does not chose the heir only because of primacy of age. To rule is a great burden, and the child named as heir must have other qualities. Chief among them is the ability to produce an heir in her own right. A family only stays strong as long as there are strong children to carry on the line. Surely you have heard of the heir's progress?"

Alain shook his head.

"When the heir apparent reaches his or her majority, then she or he is sent out on a progress around the realm, just as King Henry travels constantly on his own progress, seeing to the health of his kingdom. The Lady watches over this progress, and if She grants Her favor to the claimant, the woman will get with child, or the man will make a woman pregnant. So is the chosen one marked as heir, for so it is assured that this prince of the realm is fertile."

"But couldn't a man lie about getting a woman pregnant?"

"Both he and the woman whom he has gotten with child must swear before a biscop, in the name of the Unities, that the child is of their conception. And the child must be born healthy, to prove its conception was not tainted with sin."

"What happened to Sabella?"

"She went on her heir's progress and did not get with child."

"But King Henry did?"

"Ah, yes. King Henry did, although in a strange fashion. But that is a tale in and of itself."

"Then why can she rebel now? How can she claim she is the rightful queen?"

"Many years later Lady Sabella married and gave birth to an heir, thus proving her fertility. After the birth of Tallia, Lady Sabella demanded that Henry stand aside in her favor. Of course he refused."

"Oh." Although Agius spoke of the doings of the great nobles, this story had a familiar ring; an Osna family had two years ago gone through an acrimonious dispute over inheritance rights, settled (after one unfortunate death) only by the intercession of the deacon, who had made all the parties involved kneel for five days and four nights at the Hearth in the church while she recited from the Holy Verses. "Do you think her cause is just, Brother?"