The Burning Stone

by Kate Elliott

  Ai, God. It was like the battle of Gent all over again; watching your faithful retainers fall one by one as they protected you. It made Alain sick at heart to see the hounds suffer so. “The deacon must bless this hall, and place an amulet over every threshold.”

  “I dislike resorting to sorcery. Yet … Send a mage to kill a mage. We must speak to the deacon about this matter, and send word to Biscop Thierra. She may have certain clerics among her schola who can drive out demons and other creatures molded in the fires of the Abyss.”

  “What about guards?”

  “It would be wise, I suppose. But we are better protected by the hounds.”

  “They always know,” said Alain. “They can smell it.”

  “You must not go out alone, Alain. You must be careful.”

  “It’s not stalking me—”

  “How can we know? Curses are driven by hate, not intelligence. I will not risk you, Son. We must behave as if any person who marched to Gent is under attack.” He sighed suddenly and reached to tweak Alain’s sleeve straight. “You will need another cloak. Here, now, open the shutters. Give her some light. Perhaps if we soak the wound, and draw out the poison—”

  But in the end it mattered not. It took her six days to die.

  7

  RAIN poured down in torrents. It had been days since they had seen the sky or even the steep ridges around them as they struggled through the Julier Pass on their way to Aosta. The road had washed into mud, and Rosvita had given up riding on her mule and now, like every other soul in Princess Theophanu’s army, she picked her way along the path one foothold at a time.

  “Beware!” The shout startled her.

  Ahead, the horrible ripping sound of sliding rock made her stop dead. She clutched the reins of her mule and muttered a prayer. Arms waving, Brother Fortunatus slipped from the path in a cascade of mud and gravel.

  “Brother!” she cried, but she had learned not to move. She had seen a pack mule and drover lost that way, walking where the ground had just poured over the path. But God were merciful this day. Fortunatus fetched up a man’s height below them, and once the mud had stopped moving, the men-at-arms threw down ropes to drag him up. He had lost his mule the day before when it had gone over the cliff, caught in yet another avalanche of mud and shale.

  “I hear we’re almost at the top!” Fortunatus cried cheerfully after he had caught his breath. “It certainly looks farther down to the rocks than it did yesterday!” He was coated with mud, but then, they all were.

  “But isn’t it easier to climb up than to climb down?” wailed poor Constantine, who looked truly frightened, more like a little boy than a young man. “We’ll never live to get there!”

  “Hush, now, Brother,” said Rosvita. “We must go on and trust that God will see us through safely.” She gave Fortunatus a hand and helped him struggle to his feet, no easy task on a path washed slick with endless rain. But at least it hadn’t starting snowing.

  “We ought to have waited in Bregez,” cried Constantine, “and crossed next summer!”

  Fortunatus snorted. “With a royal bride and all of Aosta within our grasp! You can be sure that the Aostan lords won’t bide their time through winter and spring.”

  Rosvita set a hand on Constantine’s shoulder. He was trembling. “We have come this far, Brother, and it is only the first week of autumn. We’ve just had ill fortune with this rain. There is nothing we can do but go on.” Were those tears in his eyes or was it only the rain?

  The day passed, one slow step after another. By midday they had reached an exposed side of the mountain where rain battered them, but word came down the line that the princess deemed it better to forge forward even in such terrible conditions than to try to make camp where they would be at the mercy of the elements. For the first time, as they floundered forward on the narrow path with a sheer cliff rising up on the right and a rugged drop-off plunging down to their left, Rosvita heard the men-at-arms grumbling.

  “We should have turned back.” “Why didn’t we wait until summer?” “Our luck is run out.” “Do you think we’ll even reach Aosta or all die at the foot of these cliffs?”

  “They won’t last much longer,” said Fortunatus to Rosvita when the entire line came to a halt while they waited for a wagon in front of them to get unstuck. “They don’t trust her, not like they would the king or Prince Sanglant.”

  “Why does everyone speak so lovingly of Prince Sanglant?” demanded Constantine. His hood kept getting swept back from his face and by now his hair was plastered to his head. “He’s no better than a dog. He behaved so strangely.”

  Fortunatus laughed bitterly, and for once his inexhaustible store of humor failed him. “You didn’t know him before, you young fool. Now shut up!”

  A crack like thunder shuddered in the air. A man screamed. Not twenty paces forward the road collapsed and a wagon, two oxen, and the driver plunged down the slope. Everyone screamed and shouted at once, men cursing, others shouting orders that no one heeded as the wagon crashed down the cliff only to lodge in a fissure. The driver clung to the wagon as it creaked. Scree poured down around him and rain battered the wagon as its contents slid away into the misty vale below. One ox lay limp, its weight dragging the wagon inch by inch out of the fissure; the other fought madly until it worked free of the harness and, with a last bellow, vanished into the mist.

  “Ho, there, lads!” cried a captain, coming up alongside Rosvita on his horse. “Throw down the ropes!”

  “But it’s too dangerous to go up to the edge,” shouted one of the servingmen. It was the only way to be heard above the rain. “We’ll never get across. We may as well turn back now!”

  “Hold your mouth! The princess is ahead of us. We can’t abandon her.”

  “Why not?” demanded the man. “We’ve no cause to be following her.”

  The captain raised a hand to strike, but a new shout came from the other side of the scar torn out of the road. “Make way! Make way!”

  If a heart could be said to lodge in a throat, Rosvita’s did so now. Theophanu’s figure was instantly recognizable for her height and broad shoulders and the fur-trimmed cloak she wore, but also because she rode her light gelding, Albus, a most intelligent and levelheaded horse.

  Now, despite shrieks of fear and protests behind her, Theophanu urged Albus forward over the broken road where the least misstep would cause her to fall to her death. The slope plunged down in jagged bursts, so steep that only a few stunted trees had found a foothold. Theophanu did not hesitate as she crossed he washed-out gap, even when wind gusted and her cloak swept out like the wing of an eagle, billowing over empty air.

  As everyone stared, she came clear of the breach and calmly reined up beside the captain. “Captain Fulk, throw ropes down to that man. The wagon is lost to us, but we need not lose him as well. And have the servingmen get shovels. The pack mules and foot soldiers can cross the fall, but we’ll need some bracing for the wagons.” She appeared oblivious to the rain, immune to it—unlike the rest of them. Then her gaze caught on Rosvita. ‘How did you come to be toiling back here, Sister? Ride forward with me.”

  “We are needed here, Your Highness.”

  Theophanu looked startled. Her gaze flicked over the waiting soldiers and servants, all standing as still as statues under he pounding rain—all except those who had thrown ropes down to rescue the driver. Another crack snapped the air, and the wagon lodged in the fissure shuddered, lurched, and crashed downward, shattering into bits.

  Theophanu frowned. She urged Albus closer to the edge, and Fulk began to object, then faltered. “Ah,” she said, “they have him.” Under her cool eye they hauled the driver up. He appeared o have a broken arm and many bruises, but was otherwise whole. ‘As you wish, Sister Rosvita,” she finished coolly. “Attend me this evening.”

  Without another word, she turned, crossed back over the washed-out area, and vanished into the rain and mist that shrouded the road before them.

  “She’s got
courage, I’ll give her that,” said the captain in a loud voice, meant to carry.

  “She’s got no heart,” objected one of his men. “Not like our—”

  “Hush! Now get on with it.”

  Mercifully, the rain slackened to a drizzle, and after about an hour’s work they were able to get wagons over the cut in the road. On they went. The wind cut through layers of damp clothing and only the endless trudging walk gave any warmth.

  Late in the afternoon they came upon a village perched in a high valley as an eagle perches in its aerie. The villagers were tough, squat mountain people, and not even the presence of a royal princess could awe them. They demanded an exorbitant rent for the use of their stables. While Theophanu’s steward haggled, Rosvita found blessed shelter in the shed which Theophanu’s servants had commandeered for their mistress. It stank of mildew and pigeon droppings, but it was dry, and a fire burned merrily in the stone hearth.

  “Sister Rosvita!” Theophanu was weathering the journey well, but she had her father’s stamina and rude good health. She has chosen her attendants—young noblewomen all—for the same qualities; they laughed, drank ale, and chatted as if they had just finished an exhilarating hunt instead of a struggle through a downpour on a dangerous road. “Sit next to the fire. Leoba, let the good sister take your stool for a while.”

  Rosvita sat down gratefully and warmed her hands at the fire “You took a great risk today, Your Highness. I must advise against such—”

  “Nay, Sister, do not take me to task. They don’t love me. If I fell to my death, half the men in this army would shrug their shoulders and then march on to Aosta and win the throne to hold in readiness for my brother. Have you heard about Captain Fulk and his men?”

  “No, I have not. He’s a steady man.”

  “So he is, and a loyal one.”

  “I saw that today.”

  Theophanu’s lips quirked up as at a joke only she knew. “Indeed. They came and pledged service to me—pledged service, I should add, because my brother Sanglant had told them to do so They offered to ride with him into exile, but he told them that where he meant to go they could not follow, and he bid then follow in my train until such time as he returned! It’s odd, though. They said there was another woman with him besides the Eagle. Do you know anything of that?”

  “I do not! I heard the tale as everyone else did: that he and Liath rode off alone, no one knew where.”

  “You may question the good captain if you wish. I’ll have him brought here.” She sent a servingwoman out into the drizzle.

  The captain seemed grateful to stand by the fire while Rosvita asked him questions. He had observed that the woman was of noble rank, dressed in robes. “I thought she was a cleric, perhaps. And—well, I recall it now. The prince called her ‘Sister Anne’.”

  “Sister Anne!”

  They heard a shout at the door, and a moment later an Eagle crossed the threshold and knelt before the princess. He was wet through, even with a cloak tied over his shoulders, and his silver-white hair lay plastered against his head.

  “Wolfhere!” exclaimed Rosvita, standing out of sheer surprise.

  “My father’s favorite Eagle,” said Theophanu with a glint in her eyes. “What news do you bring us, Eagle? Where have you come from?”

  “From Aosta.” He looked first at one, then the other. “But I am surprised to see you here, Your Highness. Sister Rosvita.”

  “You thought to see my brother?” asked Theophanu. “He left the king’s progress in disgrace.”

  Rosvita did not know Wolfhere, of course, but she knew of him; he had been a fixture of King Arnulf’s court, the kind of man people whispered about. No one knew why Arnulf favored him, but many guessed. When Henry had come to the throne and made it clear he was no longer welcome on the king’s progress, the rumors had only gotten worse. What secrets did he hold locked within him? He was only an Eagle, and yet for all that, he was not the kind of man one could simply ask such questions of.

  His grimace now concealed more than it revealed. “What of Liath?”

  “It seems everyone has an interest in her,” remarked Theophanu lightly. Her little court gathered closer to hear; even the youngest members of the king’s progress had heard gossip about the mysterious Wolfhere, a man whom the king hated but would not lift a hand against. “But I will take pity on you, Eagle. She left with Sanglant.”

  “But where did they go?” he demanded.

  “No one knows.”

  “They must have gone to the convent at St. Valeria,” said Rosvita suddenly. Why else would Sister Anne have been with them? “Surely, Eagle, you know that is a good thing.”

  He did not reply. He seemed distracted, discouraged.

  “You had a special interest in her,” Rosvita continued, her curiosity wakened by his grim expression. “What did you mean to do with her?”

  “To do with her?” he exclaimed indignantly. “I meant to help her. I freed her from that terrible situation—”

  “Hugh,” breathed Theophanu.

  He looked at her, startled. It was rare to see the old Eagle surprised. “Oh, yes, and Hugh also, of course.” His hands were in fists, and then he recalled himself, drew off his gloves, and fumbled at his belt pouch with fingers made stiff by cold. “I rode in haste, Your Highness, and crossed the mountains some weeks ago with this message from King Henry to Queen Adelheid, pledging his support.” The rolled-up parchment had water stains on it but was otherwise intact.

  “But you have not delivered it,” observed Theophanu.

  He held it out to her, and after a moment she took it from him, opened it, and smoothed a hand over the finely-written letter. Rosvita recognized the hand as Sister Amabilia’s. Had she reached St. Valeria Convent in time? Had she escorted Mother Rothgard to Autun for the council? Had she crossed paths with the prince and his concubine?”

  “I could not,” said Wolfhere finally, starting back as if his thoughts had wandered again. “I found Queen Adelheid, but I could not reach her. She sits besieged in the citadel of Vennaci. John Ironhead, lord of Sabina, had settled his army outside the walls and his intent is to capture her, make her his wife, and crown himself as king over Aosta. But he is not alone in this wish, he is only the one who reached her first.”

  “It is good you found me, Eagle. Now we know where we must march. Is there aught else we should know of the road ahead?”

  “Your Highness, Lord John’s army is far larger than yours.”

  “Well, we shall see. Queen Adelheid must have an army within the citadel. We can catch him between two pincers.”

  “If you can find a way to get a message to her. Lord John has sealed all ways in and out up tight, or you can be sure I would have gotten in.”

  “I feel sure you would, Eagle. It is well known that you are as cunning as the serpent, and you have had many years to hone your wisdom.”

  His smile was brief but true, and he seemed about to chuckle, but he did not. “As for the road, you have crossed the worst of it. I had better weather than this, and if the rain stops, you will be well on your way.”

  Theophanu had her captains summoned, and Wolfhere went on, then, to describe in detail the number and disposition of the lord of Sabina’s army as well as what information he had gleaned about the citadel itself and the various factions in Aosta, all of whom seemed set on fighting with each other for this prize like dogs over a bone. Rain had started up again and pattered noisily on the roof. It was getting smoky inside, and a servingwoman opened the door, which seemed to have little effect beyond letting in a blast of cold wind that eddied the smoke from the hearth into every comer of the shed.

  Rosvita let herself out as the last downpour passed, and as she walked through the village searching for her clerics, a few last spitting drops wet her cheeks. Brother Fortunatus had found refuge in a stall, and she was relieved to see that their pens, ink, and parchment had come through the day unscathed. The Vita of St. Radegundis, wrapped in oilcloth, was dry, as was th
e incomplete copy that Sister Amabilia was still working on, and her own History. Now that the rain had stopped, they all trooped outside where the village folk had built a fire and there they took turns trying to dry their clothing.

  She noticed the wink of a tiny fire away from the village. Even after the hardships of the road, she could not resist the prick of curiosity. Because the sodden ground cushioned her steps, she got out away from the village and was able to come up behind him without him noticing she was there. By the fire back in the village, soldiers laughed and began to sing.

  The old Eagle sat on the ground, on his cloak, and stared into a small campfire with such intense concentration that he might not have noticed her even had she called out to him.

  “Lady have mercy,” he said in a soft voice. “I am so weary.”

  At first she thought he knew she was there, and that he had confided in her. His shoulders sagged, and his real misery cut her to the heart. She took a step forward—

  The fire hissed. She stopped dead.

  There were shadows moving in the fire.

  She almost shrieked, but she had honed her control over many years in the king’s schola, and the fear skittered over her like a thousand bugs crawling on her skin and then faded as her vision sharpened—as she began to understand what she was seeing.

  “I have failed,” he added, speaking to the shadows within. He sounded close to tears. A slow drip, drip, drip of water serenaded them where moisture seeped off an overhanging rock. Beyond it, she could hear a distant waterfall—or was that the crackle of the fire, a whisper ….

  “Do not worry, Brother, you have done your part well.”

  Ai, God! Old secrets hoarded by certain Eagles, the ability to see through fire or stone, an old trick that had, so it was said, fallen into disfavor after the Council of Narvone. But such a trick remained useful to the regnant, kept secret among the Eagles by their pledge of loyalty to each other and to the king. How else could they bring their messages so quickly, know where they were going so clearly, and bring such exceptionally valuable intelligence when they arrived?