Strands of Starlight (43 page)

He nearly fell over the black-clad figure who stood at the side of the Little Mary. Eyes like jet glittered in the dimness. “Baron Paul delMari?”

“I am he.”

“Follow, please.”

As Paul followed the Benedictine into a passage behind the altar, there was a momentary lightening of the gloom: a large, roughly dressed man opened the main door, entered, and knelt. Perhaps he was a poor laborer who came to pay his respects to the divine this May morning.

The Benedictine escorted Paul to the vestry, then through a low archway and into a small office. A man wearing robes the color of amethyst waited there, small and tensed. Paul's tic throbbed, and the wine he had drunk that morning burned and sloshed in his otherwise empty stomach.

“Bishop Clarence,” he said.

Clarence a'Freux bowed slightly. “I'm very glad you could come, Baron Paul.” He extended his ring.

Paul pretended not to notice. “I assumed that anything that would take a newly appointed bishop away from his see and bring him to”— he half smiled, indicated the dingy surroundings—“to Hypprux must be important.”

Clarence rubbed his hands. “I'm glad you're interested. Please sit.” He indicated a chair near the hearth and with his own hands he brought Paul a cup of wine before he dragged up a stool for himself. He sat, poised, like a cormorant inspecting a river for fish. “You were not followed?”

“I assume not.” Paul looked into his cup. The wine was dark, venous, and he set it aside, untouched.

“Assume?” The bishop looked incredulous.

“I do not habitually look over my shoulder when I walk abroad,” said Paul. Clarence made him itch as though he had scabies. And that one by the door! By Our Lady! “There was no reason for anyone to follow me.”

Clarence ran a hand back through his thin blond hair, cleared his throat. “Let me begin, then. My predecessor, Augustine delAzri, was more interested in the hereafter than in the here and now. I differ with him. If the work of the Holy Church is to be done, then by necessity it must be done on earth. Therefore we must take no little interest in the affairs of state that go on about us.”

Paul smiled. “You would be well received at Avignon.”

“Thank you. I was.” Clarence glanced sharply into the flames of the fire, snapped his gaze back to Paul. “Word has come to Maris that Aloysius Cranby is dead.”

“I believe that's well-known by now. It's certainly no secret.”

“What is also known is that Aloysius had very interesting plans regarding the Free Towns. He shared those plans with Roger, Baron of Aurverelle.”

“So I . . .” Paul hesitated. After his conversation with the papal legate about the midwife, he had hoped that his part in those whole affair was finished. He was having bad dreams about it: screaming in the darkness, pleading eyes regarding his own from inches away. His wife would not sleep in the same bed with him now. “So I have heard.”

“The thought has come to me, Baron Paul: what will become of those plans now that our dear brother in Christ, Aloysius, has departed us?”

From somewhere outside the room came a noise like the scraping of a boot on the floor. Clarence looked at the Benedictine, and the man slid into the hallway like a shadow.

“I take it you have something in mind,” said Paul.

“I do.” Clarence chose his words. “I see no reason why the bishop's carefully laid plans should come to naught. And it seems to those in Maris that perhaps Hypprux is striving after too much power in the south. This threatens to upset the balance that has been maintained for the last four centuries. This could lead to”—his milky blue eyes blinked at the baron—“disorder. . . .”

“There here and now,” Paul commented dryly.

“Exactly. I am beginning to establish contact with the southern barons regarding this matter. You, my lord, are baron of Furze. Your city would be threatened by an increase in the power and influence of Hypprux. I know that you have some disagreements with Aloysius Cranby's methods. I can assure you that an alliance with me would not be unprofitable.”

“You forget something.”

“And what is that?”

“Baron Roger of Aurverelle.”

Clarence smiled faintly. “I am not overly worried about Roger. He is a brutal man, canny in his own way, but he was only one-half of a team of horses. And his mate lies dead in the harness. He will give us no trouble.”

“I should not like to be wrong about that,” said Paul.

Clarence shrugged. “Are you with me?”

Paul let the silence grow. The fire crackled and spat with the exuberance of unseasoned wood. The tall Benedictine reentered, took his place by the door, shook his head in reply to Clarence's questioning glance.

“Well?”

Paul got up. “I don't want any part of this. I delivered an old woman up to the torturers a while ago, and I haven't been sleeping well since. Call it the weather. Call it a whim. Call it—” He thought of George, smiled again in spite of himself. “Call it the farting of birds. I'm not interested. I'm glad she escaped. The devil take you all.”

Without waiting for a response, he stood up, pushed past the Benedictine, and found his own way down the hallway and into the nave.

He was already out on the street when he remembered that he had left his cloak behind. With a shrug at the loss, Paul continued on his way, his feet finding their own way through the garbage. He brooded on the midwife, but mixed up with his hopes for her were images of Clarence's face, smooth as melted wax, watching him expectantly, waiting for his reply. Another one like Aloysius Cranby. And, no doubt, he would find another like Roger of Aurverelle, and so there would be two factions of nobles fighting over the Free Towns. If there would be much left to fight over after a few months of battles and sieges.

He was so absorbed in his thoughts that he did not hear the tread of heavy boots, nor was he sensible of the bulk of the man behind him until he was seized—a strong hand over his mouth—lifted bodily, and borne into a dark cul-de-sac.

He was spun around as though he were a sack of grain. Roger of Aurverelle's face was inches from his own. “Carrying tales to the legate, eh? Plotting behind my back, eh? You little effeminate worm . . .”

Paul delMari felt only the first blow of his head against the thick stone wall.

***

Mornings grew around Mirya: bright, clear, the grass gleaming with dew. The days were full of sunlight and blue sky. Evenings were quiet, with stars like double handfuls of diamonds scattered across the firmament.

She did not don a disguise, but she did not ride upon the road, either. She kept to the grasslands, traveling up and down rolling hills, crossing streams at shallows. She went slowly. The lattices told her that haste for now was not important.

She stopped often, both to rest Cloud after the hard riding of the recent past and to give herself time alone, apart even from the horse. While Cloud grazed, Mirya wandered. At times she cast herself at full length to contemplate a flower, as if now, with Terrill's final benediction, she was able to see the bloom for the first time in all its presence, all its potentials, all its futures. At other times she merely sat, the sun warm in her hair, wondering.

Her hands, lying lightly on the ground, felt more than the soft grass of spring. They felt the individual plants, the earth beneath them, the webs that wound through all. And when she stood up and gazed across the miles to the city that was no more than a brown smear of haze on the horizon, she found herself ever more distanced from it. It was walled, roofed, polluted, the muddy streets bounded by houses and overhung with the pall of woodsmoke. Windows opened into dark rooms of battered furniture, cracked paneling, frayed hangings; rooms in which money changed hands, conspiracies were framed, wise-women were condemned to the rack and to the stake.

Directly or indirectly, she had felt the effects of those rooms. She had been pursued, captured, tortured, and condemned. She knew what it was to flee, what it was to feel fear as an intrinsic part of existence—like breathing, or eating. She knew the fire of red-hot tongs and the touch of the iron spike.

And yet those same dark rooms, rank with the odors of human sweat and the sickly decay of mortality, held people who loved her. She could have spent an hour naming them all: quiet people of the Free Towns and elsewhere who gave of themselves, who fought for those things they found precious not because they would gain or profit from the spoils, but because precious things were worth saving.

Those same rooms, dark and human though they were, could come alive with candles and rushlights in the night, with warm hearth fires that illuminated a mother nursing her newborn or a rough but gentle father telling stories about someone—Elf or human, it really did not matter—who, regardless of the Cranbys and the Albans and the Baron Aurverelles of the land, had preached about kindness, giving, healing.

She saw Hypprux, but she knew Saint Brigid, knew those rooms, candlelit and filled with the simple, homely love of human beings, one for another. Once she had wanted some of what they contained. She had departed from Hypprux in torment, and she had left Mika with a final vision of denial and fear, despairing, believing that she would never have those candlelit rooms, that gentle man. And indeed she would not. Ever. The rooms were gone, left behind, grown out of; and she had entered into a world of forests, quiet evening fires, and the eternal, ineffable light of the stars.

She reached the edge of the flax fields at the end of the fourth day. The land was flat here, with only a few hills, and she skirted the fields and found herself traveling northwest, toward a curve in the Aleser Mountains that cupped a large valley where a forest grew and was sheltered. It was there, to Beldon Forest, that the noble and the wealthy went to take their sport chasing deer, or boar, or in the hilly, unforested region hard by, hunting pheasant and quail.

“A little farther, Cloud,” she murmured as the sun slid behind the mountains. “Then you can have a long rest.”

Toward midnight, she passed under the trees. Beldon Forest was of another sort than Malvern. It was tamed, friendly, and open . . . to humans. Paths and trails—not hidden—crisscrossed through it, but farther in, it was a little wilder, and Mirya knew—as only an Elf could know—that she would be undisturbed. She found water and grass for Cloud, and after she brushed the mare carefully and saw to her needs, she let her run free.

She walked in a night that was not dark to her eyes. No, this was nothing like Malvern, but it was nonetheless her home, as forests and glades and rivers and streams would always be her home. Forever . . . or until the end of her race claimed her. She stepped into a meadow, looked up, and saw Vega glittering fiercely near the zenith. It seemed both a beacon and a promise.

She found a tree that felt right and sat down at its base, leaned against it, wriggled until she felt comfortable. Closing her eyes, she watched the silent stars until one called to her, and then she reached out, wrapped herself around it, held it in her mind. For an instant, before the rushing filled her ears and the star bloomed like an immense flower, she heard a nightingale singing in Beldon Forest.

Then she was standing on a grassy plain, facing a Woman robed in blue and silver. She regarded Mirya quietly for a moment. “Child . . .”

Mirya knelt at Her feet. “I . . . I'm sorry,” she choked. “I have to. Please forgive me.”

The Lady's gaze was compassionate. “Forgiveness is in your own hands. I am here: I have been with you from the beginning, and I have always loved you. But forgiveness is yours alone, to grant or to withhold as you choose.”

Mirya looked up into the gray eyes. “I'm torn. I've changed . . . but I can't be free until I do what I have to.”

“Are you asking for My approval?”

“I don't think I believe You'd give it.”

The Lady knelt, took Mirya's head in Her hands, peered into her face. “Child, I can neither approve nor disapprove. You are responsible for your own actions. You can see the futures, and you can see the past. You do not act in ignorance.”

“Can't You help me?”

“Not in the way you want, Mirya. I can tell you that I love you, and that I will love you regardless of your actions. But with regards to those actions, I Myself am helpless.”

Mirya looked at Her, incredulous.

“I can love,” said the Lady. “I can cushion a all . . . sometimes. Perhaps I can bring comfort and strength. But in the end I must fold My hands and watch, helpless, while My children do what they must. I cannot violate your free will, nor that of anyone else.”

Mirya was crying again. “But what do I do? I'm still angry. I still want to kill.”

“Sorrow, guilt, regret, hate, anger: you take them on of your own free will, and you put them off also. They are not Mine to give or take.”

“I know.” Mirya hung her head. “I . . .” She felt empty, hollow.

“Be at peace, child.”

Beldon Forest blurred into existence about her once again, and Mirya sat for a few minutes. She had not expected approval or encouragement. She had not even expected love, but she was given it freely, without question or condition.

But she had to put the love aside for a time. Roger of Aurverelle was waiting somewhere among the futures, and tonight she had to find him, to plan how her vengeance might be accomplished.

She closed her eyes again, steeled herself, let the stars shine. Carefully, unsure of her powers, she felt through the rolling world, balancing past and present in her mind, weighing both against events that were even now sliding toward reality. She followed her own past back to Malvern, then northward to Hypprux until, once again, she crouched under cover at the base of the curtain wall, listening to Roger of Aurverelle upbraid one of his officers.

The sound of his voice rattled her, but she reminded herself that all her actions would be in vain if she could not control that refractory anger. Clinging to the stars for strength, she managed to center herself, held on to the images.

Carefully, she followed Roger's actions, watched where he went and what he did. She kept herself from blenching when the gate guards were flogged, and she shuddered when the baron—now chamberlain of Hypprux, she realized—gave orders for a house-to-house search. Something similar had occurred when she had escaped from the keep by herself, and she recalled the screams, the pounding on doors, the miserable townsfolk driven into the freezing rain.