The Gathering Storm

by Kate Elliott

“We must go where they cannot follow, and pray that we will be given shelter.” With some effort she raised herself on her elbows. Her hair had gone utterly white, startling even through the grime of the dungeon. “We must go to the Convent of St. Ekatarina. Mother Obligatia helped us once before. If she still lives, I pray that she will aid us again.”

  4

  ON that morning when Hathumod and her companions left Hersford Monastery, the whispering hadn’t gone away with them. For days and weeks after they left, as autumn lingered and winter gathered its strength, their heretical words endured like a ghostly presence among the inhabitants of the monastery and estate. Doubt haunted the monks and the laborers. Many scoffed, but others whispered of signs and miracles, of a phoenix, of lions, and of seven innocent and holy sleepers lost beneath a hill.

  Although Father Ortulfus delivered more than one furious sermon on the dangers of heresy, even he could be found at odd intervals consulting books in the library or standing lost in contemplation at the edge of the forest, seeming to stare, as Sorrow had that night, at an unseen threat—or toward a promise.

  XII

  A CALF IN WINTER’S SLAUGHTERHOUSE

  1

  IT was a dreary ride in horrible cold weather from Hersford Monastery to Autun. Ivar lost count of the passing days as their escort prodded them grimly along. Once they were forced to spend a week locked up in a freezing outbuilding at a convent because ice floes made a river crossing impassable. Once Prior Ratbold came down with such a bad fever that they had to bide in the stables at an isolated monastic estate while the prior thrashed in delirium, but by the fifth day he sweated out whatever evil humors plagued him and within two weeks felt strong enough to set out again. No one else got sick.

  At Dibenvanger Cloister, Sigfrid almost got his tongue cut out a second time when he squeezed through a gap between boards—he was the only one small enough to fit—and sneaked into the novices’ house to preach for the whole evening before Prior Ratbold noticed he was missing.

  “A fox among the chickens!” the furious prior roared. “The only way to stop him is to make sure he can’t speak!”

  The mild-mannered abbot of Dibenvanger Cloister dissuaded Ratbold from any violent acts and sent them on their way the next morning, but not before coming himself at dawn to counsel the wayward prisoners.

  “Do not despair, friends,” he said quietly. “You are not alone.”

  These mysterious words lifted Ivar’s spirits as the days wore on.

  Yet when at last they descended into the Rhowne Valley, a fit of melancholy swept over him. The painful anticipation wore him out. How would Biscop Constance rule at their trial? Would she be lenient or severe? Would they face excommunication? Even death? It seemed impossible to hold onto resolve through bad times as well as good.

  The Rhowne Valley was rich country, well populated with prosperous holdings and verdant estates. Even blanketed by snow the roads and fields had a tidy look to them, well traveled and well tended. Biscop Constance shepherded a thriving flock.

  A bell hung under a thatched awning by the ferry crossing. Prior Ratbold rang the bell. The rest of them dismounted and led the horses around to keep them warm while, on the other side, the ferryman emerged from his cottage, surveyed their distant party, went back into his house, and came out a while later to haul the ferry across by a cable strung over the broad river.

  It took three crossings to get them all across. While he waited, Ivar brooded.

  Gerulf and Dedi went over with the first load. The two Lions had developed a friendly banter with the monks who were their guards; three of the monks had been in the Lions before they’d retired from war and the world and dedicated their lives to the church. Despite their misgivings about the heretical charges set on Gerulf’s and Dedi’s heads, they still respected former comrades. It was its own form of kinship, based not on family ties but on shared service to the king. They’d fought, seen comrades fall, suffered and marched and remained faithful.

  Prior Ratbold, a younger son of a noble house, had no such reason to treat his charges kindly. His family had no connection to any of theirs, and their families weren’t important enough to matter to him. To Ratbold, they were sinful heretics, nothing else.

  Maybe Ivar’s sister Rosvita could have helped him, had she wished to, but she wasn’t here. And his father had long since contrived to get rid of him. The old familiar desolation washed over him as he clutched the railing of the ferry in the last group to go across. Brownish-green waters swirled beyond his boots. A big branch thudded against the side of the ferry, rocking them and disturbing the horses, before the river’s grip carried it on.

  Everyone had deserted him. His father had never cared for him, not really, and he’d been an infant when his mother had died. To his brothers and sisters, he was a nuisance, the red-haired baby who got in their way. Hanna had ridden away to become an Eagle. Liath had tempted him and then abandoned him for the embrace of a prince. Yet his life had been good before Hugh had come to Heart’s Rest. He had a memory of how much he had once hated Hugh, a feeling like holding a burning blade in your hand. Hate had felt good once. Now his hate streamed away with the river’s water, flowing downriver to the sea.

  If he threw himself in the river, no one would miss him. Not even Hugh would care. Hugh probably didn’t even remember his name.

  The river tugged at the ferry as it tugged at his heart. He saw figures in the water, water nymphs calling to him and stretching out their arms as they beckoned and wept. Come to us, they said as their bodies undulated through choppy wavelets. Come to us. A cold grave, but a peaceful one. He tightened his grip on the railing and leaned far over, giddy with despair. The water looked so comforting. So final.

  “Are you crazy?” Baldwin grabbed Ivar’s shoulder, jerking him back. “You might fall over and drown, and then what would I do? You’re not even paying attention to what I was saying! Can you see it, there? That’s the tower of the biscop’s palace of Autun.”

  Ivar’s eyes were too blurred with tears to see. Ermanrich appeared on his other side, setting a steadying hand on his elbow. “Yes, I see it, Baldwin,” he said, without letting go of Ivar.

  “Don’t you see, Ivar?” demanded Baldwin impatiently. The river wind streamed through his pale hair; color blushed his fair cheeks. If the water nymphs were mourning and wailing, it was probably because they’d just realized they’d never get their hands on any creature as handsome as Baldwin. “The biscop’s banner isn’t flying over the palace. She’s not there! And if she’s not there, she can’t hold a trial!”

  To the ferryman’s disgust, the others crowded over to stand alongside Ivar. The ferry pitched like an ungainly horse, and water spilled onto the boards and seeped away.

  “Where do you think the biscop has gone?” Hathumod asked.

  “She’s duke of Arconia as well as biscop of Autun,” said Ermanrich. “She’ll have duties elsewhere in the duchy, not just in Autun. When I was a novice at Firsebarg, I saw her one time when she rode by on her progress.”

  He glanced at their guards, standing at the opposite railing to make a counterbalance. The ferryman and his assistant pulled mightily, dragging them along while the current did its best to wash them downriver.

  “Biscop Constance is a fair-minded noblewoman,” Ermanrich went on more quietly. “I’ve never heard any but a respectful word spoken of her, even where it couldn’t be heard. She’ll be a fair judge.”

  “If there can be a fair judge,” muttered Ivar.

  “You must trust in God, Ivar,” scolded Sigfrid. “Hasn’t She watched over us all along?”

  Baldwin leaned against Ivar, folded a warm hand over one of Ivar’s cold ones, and bent his head close. “Of course she has.” His voice caressed like a gentle kiss. “We’d be dead two or three times over if it wasn’t for God. I’d still be married to Margrave Judith.”

  Who had died three years ago. It didn’t seem right, or possible that so much time could have passed. Had Father Ortulf
us lied to them as a cruel jest?

  “Ivar, what do you think will happen if Biscop Constance isn’t there?” asked Ermanrich expectantly. The others echoed his question: shy Hathumod, frail Sigfrid, even Baldwin, although Baldwin didn’t speak, only batted his gorgeous eyelashes in attractive confusion.

  They waited for him to speak. They looked to him for answers. Why on God’s earth did they think he had any answers, when he couldn’t even fathom his own heart? Yet they expected him to lead them. They counted on him.

  They needed him.

  “There!” Baldwin pointed. “Now do you see it?”

  Ivar glimpsed a stone tower among trees, lost as the ferry pulled laboriously in to shore. The banner flying from that tower didn’t look like Biscop Constance’s white-and-gold standard.

  Before disembarking, Ivar paused to study the flowing river. Had he only dreamed the water nymphs? Certainly he now saw nothing except water streaming past, its melodious song singing in his ears. Their horses were brought, they mounted, and rode on. Where they came out of the trees, Autun rose before them, its main ramparts clambering along a defensible hill and more recent settlements sprawled below the old walls along the river, each ringed by a palisade. The biscop’s palace stood between a timber-and-stone cathedral and the old duke’s tower, a squat watch post built entirely out of stone in the time of the Dariyan Empire. Above these magnificent edifices, on the highest portion of the hill, lay Taillefer’s famous palace and the splendid octagon chapel where his earthly remains were interred in a marble tomb.

  The banner flying from the biscop’s palace displayed the green guivre, wings unfolded and red tower gripped in its left talon, that marked the presence of the duke of Arconia.

  “Strange,” murmured Prior Ratbold. “Why isn’t the biscop’s banner flying at its side, as it ought to?”

  They waited at the main gates while the Autun guards sent for a captain from the citadel, a man called Ulric. He had a grim face and a cynical eye, and orders from his superiors.

  “Heretics, is it?” he asked wearily, as if he’d heard this tiresome refrain a hundred times already that day. “Come all the way from Hersford Monastery, have you? Isn’t that in the duchy of Fesse?”

  “So it is, Captain,” agreed Ratbold, “but you might recall Father Ortulfus was but recently a member of the biscop’s schola. That’s why he was given the abbacy at Hersford when it fell vacant.”

  “Ah, yes, so he was.” Ulric grimaced in much the same way as might a man commanded to eat maggots. “I’ll take these prisoners from you, Prior, and see that they are housed as they deserve. You may return on your way.”

  “Without even a night’s shelter and a hot meal for our pains?” Anyone would have been outraged at this insult, and Prior Ratbold was not the most sweet-tempered of men. “I can’t believe we’d be turned away after a journey of four weeks’ time, standing in muck to our ankles and likely snow coming on.” The monks muttered among themselves, shocked by such a breach of the customs of hospitality. “Where are we to stay this night?”

  “The ferryman has lodging enough to house you.”

  As Ratbold began to protest again, Ulric quite unexpectedly grabbed the prior by his robe and pulled him close. Only Ivar was close enough to overhear the captain’s soft words. “Listen, friend. I’d advise you strongly to turn right round and get on your way before anyone takes notice of who your master is. You’re just lucky it was me on duty this afternoon, or you’d be marching to a nice locked cell at this very moment. Do you understand me?”

  “B—b—but—” For once, Prior Ratbold lost his power of speech.

  Ulric let him go and watched with narrowed eyes and a bitter frown as Ratbold hurriedly got his party turned around and headed south, away from the city. The captain had the patience of a saint. Only when an orchard and a dip in the road hid their backs from his sight did he turn to regard his prisoners.

  “Bring in the heretics,” he said caustically to his guardsmen. “What’s seven more in our lady’s service?”

  They were taken to a low room in the barracks loft, the kind of prison that soldiers accused of a crime like petty theft or fist-fighting would be thrown into. Here they languished for four days, measured by the light coming and going in the smoke hole. Food and drink arrived at regular intervals. Their slops bucket was emptied twice a day. They had no fire but plenty of straw for padding and although it was cold enough that Ivar was always shivering, the heat from below made it bearable. In fact, judging by the noise and activity, there seemed to be an awful lot of soldiers gathered in Autun, as many as if. the king dwelled here. In the dim light they couldn’t tell what was going on. They could only listen and pray.

  On the fifth morning the trap was flung open, admitting a roil of smoke and a summons. One by one they climbed down the ladder. The awkwardness of their descent on a rickety ladder made them vulnerable, as did a dozen sour-looking guards waiting below. Impossible to make an escape in these circumstances.

  “They’ll need a wash before they’re taken in to see Her Most Excellent Highness.” Captain Ulric paused in front of Baldwin, scratching his beard as he looked the young man up and down. “See that this one is given clean clothes. One of you can trim his hair and beard, but don’t let him or any of his comrades handle the razor.”

  “Going for a bonus, Captain?” jested one of the guards, a slender young man with pale hair.

  “Shut up, Erkanwulf. I do what I must to protect my position and the men under my command. If I can gain Her Ladyship’s favor, so be it. Now move along.”

  “Something doesn’t feel right,” whispered Ermanrich, before getting a hard tap on his behind from the haft of a halberd.

  “No talking,” said the one called Erkanwulf. Like his captain, he had a surly expression as though he’d eaten something disagreeable.

  Ivar glanced at Gerulf, but the old Lion just shrugged. Something wasn’t right here, but it was impossible to know what it was except for the unusual concentration of soldiers, visible as the prisoners were marched through the barracks, out through the busy courtyard, and over to the famous palace baths.

  In these stone halls, built long ago by Dariyan engineers, Emperor Taillefer had held court while luxuriating in the waters. His poets had sung of the curative powers of the baths, and more than one tapestry woven in those times depicted Taillefer at his ease among his courtiers in the baths or reclining at dinner on couches as the ancient Dariyans were said to do. The great emperor had restored the glory of the old Dariyan Empire for a brief and brilliant span.

  Yet his Holy Dariyan Empire had collapsed when he had died. No one after him had been strong enough to hold it together.

  A pair of elderly women had charge of the baths at this hour. Not even they, crones both, were immune to Baldwin’s staggering beauty, and by the time they were done with him, he looked better than he had in weeks with his hair neatly cut in the style favored by the royal princes and his beard trimmed to show off the handsome line of his jaw. A guard brought him a clean wool tunic, simple in cut and color but more than adequate compared to their travel-stained gear. Even Gerulf whistled admiringly.

  “God above,” swore Dedi, as if he couldn’t help himself. “I’m glad my Fridesuenda never got a look at him. She’d have forgotten I ever existed.”

  Baldwin looked ready to weep, like a calf just realizing that it’s about to be led off to the slaughterhouse. Ivar set a hand on Baldwin’s shoulder. “Just stick by me.”

  “You won’t abandon me, will you, Ivar?”

  “Of course not, Baldwin. I’ll never abandon you. Never.”

  Baldwin’s bright-eyed gaze made Ivar uncomfortable, and even a little aroused. What had Ivar ever done to deserve Baldwin’s loyalty? Well, a few things, maybe, that he blushed to recall now. Those months they’d spent drinking and carousing and whoring with Prince Ekkehard were not ones he cared to dwell on; it was as if they’d been stricken by a plague of lechery and greed that had burned away anything go
od in them until they were merely rutting husks. But it hadn’t been all bad. He didn’t regret the intimacy he’d shared with Baldwin, because that at least had arisen from genuine love.

  Love.

  Ai, God. Why hadn’t he seen it before, when it had been staring him in the face all along? Baldwin stood there in all his beauty, so delectable that with only a little effort he could have just about any woman, and a few of the men, at his feet with a smile. But it was Ivar he gazed at trustingly, Ivar he clung to, Ivar he followed through thick and thin.

  He loves me.

  Captain Ulric arrived and, with a curse, surveyed Baldwin, Ivar, and the silence that had fallen between them. “Please don’t tell me he can’t get it up for women.”

  “He’s a novice, sworn to the church,” retorted Ivar angrily, hastily removing his hand from Baldwin’s shoulder. But he knew a blush flowered in his face. His complexion always betrayed him.

  The guards snickered until Ulric shut them up with a curt command. “Move them along. Her Most Excellent Highness doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”

  From the baths to Taillefer’s palace was a climb up a flight of stairs carved into the rock. A light snow fell, white flakes spinning down to dust rocks and rooftops, but not a single flake touched them because of the walkway built over the stairs so that the emperor could walk to and from his baths without getting rained on. Slender stone pillars supported a timber roof. Each pillar had been carved in the shape of an animal: dragons, griffins, eagles, and guivres accompanied their climb. Once Ivar came abreast of a noble phoenix, but when he paused to touch its painted feathers, Erkanwulf prodded him in the back with the butt of his spear.

  “Move along, just as Captain said.”

  By chance he had ended up behind Baldwin, and as he climbed he could not take his gaze away from the curl of Baldwin’s hair against the trim of his tunic, or the way glimpses of his neck, still moist from the baths, revealed themselves as Baldwin’s tunic shifted on his shoulders to the rhythm of his climb up the stairs. Did Baldwin really love him? Or was he just the only thing Baldwin had to hold on to?