Crown of Stars

by Kate Elliott

  Liath met her gaze and nodded. “You have a home with me.”

  “What of the child, my little beast?” asked Zuangua. “I’ve gotten fond of her.”

  The girl had seen it all, crouched on the steps. But instead of answering, she lifted her head. Liath, too, heard footsteps. Anna ran into the nave and, with the aid of the staff, shoved her way through the bundle of soldiers, out of breath and crying.

  “My lady! Princess Blessing! They’re all waking up! And they look so angry!”

  The girl looked first at her mother, then at her uncle, and finally at Anna. It was Anna she crawled to, sobbing and coughing between heaves and wheezes.

  Zuangua gestured. He and his warriors ran out the door, leaving a stillness behind them, the quiet after a storm. In such stunning calm, one might hear the gentle breath of God.

  Liath swayed, rushed by a prickling thrill that ran all along her skin but also made her battle against tears. She could not stop the tremor that afflicted her hands.

  “Let us go quickly, Anna. Bring her.”

  “Where do we go now, my lady?” asked Anna as she gathered Blessing into her arms in an embrace that made Liath want to sob, seeing how the girl clung to Anna so trustingly and yet had not given her own mother a second glance. “Is—he—dead?”

  Hugh sprawled on the floor, the stump mercifully hidden under a fold of sleeve. His blood smeared the stone floor. Flecks of soot from the shattered and burned window streaked and spotted his robes and hair. He was still breathing.

  “No, but he has been crippled twice over. He’ll never weave the crowns again. He’ll never read another book. Let us go, immediately. I want no trouble with the poor souls who live here and serve God so faithfully.”

  Dread already possessed her. Because, after all that, Hugh’s last spell had woven into her flesh and her heart to eat at her as one might burn a man from the inside out until he shrieked and howled while his flesh melted away. He was not done yet. She had hurt him, but he had gotten in the last blow.

  “Quickly,” she repeated. “We must take those horses we saw and ride to Kassel. Ai, God. Sanglant. I fear—I fear—”

  She could not say it. The fear choked her, just as Hugh had hoped it would.

  XIII

  THE ABYSS

  1

  SHE could no longer ride through deep forest without looking over her shoulder. She could not forget the daimone that had stalked her, or the galla, whose darkness eats souls. She could not forget the elfshot that had killed her mount years ago, although she knew the shades of elves no longer stalked the shadows.

  No, indeed, they walked abroad in sunlight, and they were still angry.

  She had commandeered nine horses—all that Hersford possessed—but her two Ashioi companions were terrible riders. Again and again she ranged far ahead, only to wait champing, as she did now, for them to catch up together with Anna and Blessing. Usually she heard them coming because of Blessing—the girl had a penetrating voice and seemed determined to comment on everything—but it was getting close to dark and perhaps after all she would have to turn around and ride back.

  God, she wanted to leave them behind and move ahead. She could lead her horse all night; her salamander eyes would guide her. But she had to stay with the others. She could not leave Blessing behind again, nor could she expect the two masks to ride into Kassel without her escort. Anyway, there might be bandits on the road, or Zuangua might have changed his mind and followed them. Or worse things might stalk their trail, starving wolves and ravenous guivres, although she could imagine nothing worse than this fear riding as if on her shoulders, claws digging into her neck. Her jaw ached from clenching down tears. She had no reason—no reason—to believe him dead.

  Only that Hugh had said so. Only that Hugh could carry out such a plan. He alone might recognize a daimone, might think to push such a complex interlocking set of spheres into motion, hoping that the promised conjunction would fall into place as the spinning orrery came to rest.

  It was so quiet here, shaded and peaceful. A bird chirped, giving her heart. It was good to hear the call of birds again. A doe and half-grown twin fawns trotted into view, looked her way, and slipped into the green. She heard no sign of the others.

  There.

  On the path behind, an aurochs paced out onto the path. It paused, and the wind died, and for an instant there fell a silence that might have extended across the entire world, heavy and profound, woven through all the wild places that have not yet been touched by human hands. Beneath the vault of heaven, a single life is nothing, no more than a catch of breath, a shattering tear, a falling leaf. The tides of the world will ebb and flow regardless. Our lives are less, even, than the wrack upon the shore.

  Yet for all that, they are a blessed gift, however small, however brief.

  The aurochs bolted, crashing away into the undergrowth, swallowed up by the trees.

  She heard the slap of hooves coming out of the east. Swinging around, she pulled free her bow and nocked an arrow. Her spare horse tugged sideways, seeking forage along the verge, but the horse she was mounted on held steady, trained and ready for war. As was she.

  The rider came clear, emerging around a bend in the path. He was an ordinary figure, covered by a gray cloak trimmed with scarlet and leading a spare mount behind him laden with a pair of saddlebags.

  “Wolfhere!”

  As he came closer, he said, “I pray you, Liath. Lower that bow.”

  Startled, she twisted the arrow away and stuck it back in the quiver. “God Above. How come you here, Wolfhere? Where have you been? What news? Oh, God. Oh, God.”

  Of course, she could not get the words out. He had come from Kassel. Where else? That was where this path led. She feared to ask them, all the heart and breath squeezed out of her.

  “Are you alone?” he asked.

  She waved toward the west, at her back, and spoke in a voice more squeak than word, “A small group travels with me, but they fell behind.”

  “Who is with you?”

  Only then did she recall how he had come to depart from Sanglant and his army in the Arethousan port of Sordaia. “Where have you been all this time? Is it true you tried to kidnap Blessing?”

  He recoiled, raising a hand. “There, now, Liath. I am no threat to you. I am alone.”

  “What of Anne? You were always her creature, one of the Seven Sleepers!”

  He was silent a while. Bunches of bluebells clustered in the shade where the road gave way to underbrush; they nodded as the wind rippled through them. A hawk shrieked far above, unseen beyond the trees. Finally, he shrugged.

  “I have spoken of this before. I was raised with Anne. She and I were taught that my service in life was meant for her, for the Seven Sleepers, who continued the work begun by Biscop Tallia and Sister Clothilde. They sought only and always to prevent the return of the Aoi.”

  “It seems you did not succeed. Anne is dead, the Ashioi are returned, and the Seven Sleepers are scattered or dead. You may be the last one of them who lives.” She did not mention Hugh.

  “I no longer count myself among their number. I was nothing more than the cauda draconis.”

  “The tail of the dragon, least among them.”

  His smile was faint. But there was something about his smile that she had always trusted, even now, when she knew she ought not to. “As you say. I came to distrust Anne, alas, although I never ceased loving her, as I was taught to do. Some bonds cannot be broken, even when they are betrayed.”

  She waited, forgiving him nothing and yet wondering what he would say next. An unseen chain bound her to him, since he was the one who had freed her from Hugh. That ought to count for something. But she also waited for the sound of hoofbeats behind her. If he and Blessing must meet again, she would be here to oversee it.

  “When she brought that corrupt woman, Antonia of Mainni, into her councils, then I knew I could no longer serve her. That is why I left the Seven Sleepers behind and rode on my own path.”


  “Then who do you serve, Wolfhere?”

  “I am in the service of the king, as I have always been. My first loyalty was always to him, whom I loved best and most faithfully. All I did, in the end, was at his command.”

  A twig snapped, and she jerked in the saddle. Her mount shied, but after all, it was only a deer in the forest bounding away.

  He coaxed his spare mount forward, untied one of the saddlebags, and withdrew a bulky object wrapped in oilcloth to protect it from rain.

  “This belongs to you.” He held it out, arm trembling at its weight.

  Ai, God, it was heavy. She set it across her thighs, settled her reins over her horse’s neck, and unfolded the oilcloth. Underneath, a round, spiky shape was tightly bundled in purple silk of the highest quality, so tightly woven she could scarcely perceive the weave.

  “What is this?” she asked, knowing the question pointless as she pulled the layers free. Her horse flicked its ears when she gasped. Wolfhere said nothing.

  Even in the shady woods, under a cloudy sky, without sunlight to brighten it, the crown gleamed. It was thickset and nothing delicate, a reminder of the burdens of empire that must crush down on the neck of the one who rules. A crown is a form of binding; that she knew. The crown of stars held seven points, each one set with a gem: a shining pearl, rich lapis lazuli, pale sapphire, carnelian, ruby, emerald, and banded orange-brown sardonyx. She almost laughed, seeing the pattern unfold. Even Emperor Taillefer had sought the secrets of the mathematici. His crown mirrored both the stone crowns which in ancient days had forged the great weaving, but also the fabled earthly palace of coils whose winding path echoed the ladder that climbs through the spheres: the Moon, Erekes, Somorhas, the Sun, Jedu, Mok, and Aturna.

  “Why do you give it to me?” she said at last. “I am not Taillefer’s heir.”

  “Are you not?”

  Her anger sparked. “You know this better than I, since you were there when my mother was called and caged. I am the child of flame. Not Anne’s daughter.”

  “Not Anne’s daughter,” he agreed, “but who is your father’s mother?”

  She flashed a smile, meant unkindly, because she was really getting irritated now. Blessing would come, and she desired no conflict, not now, not when she had to get to Kassel to find Sanglant but also had to ride at this agonizingly slow pace in order to protect those she was responsible for.

  “I don’t trust you, Wolfhere,” she said, as if that was his answer. “But in any case, I know who my father’s mother is. I have met her. A very aged lady, a holy woman.”

  “The hand of the Lady has guided you,” he said with surprise. “How comes it you have met her?”

  “That is a tale I’m not sure I wish to tell you, until you tell me how you are come here this night. And how you came into possession of this crown. And what is happening at Kassel.”

  He was in a mood to duel. There was a demon in him tonight that made him more oblique and maddening than ever. “What of her mother, then? Who was your father’s mother’s mother?”

  “I don’t know. Neither does she. She was a foundling, given into the church.”

  He nodded, as the praeceptor does when the discipla gives the long awaited, and correct, answer. “Therefore. The crown belongs to you. Your right, to determine who will hold it, who wield it, and who wear it. And if you do not believe me, ask the hounds of Lavas.”

  Always he had the means to confound her!

  A high voice rose in the air, and faded. Liath turned as the sound of approaching riders caught her ear. She had not keen enough hearing to sort out numbers and speed, not as Sanglant could, but she had recognized that voice’s timbre immediately. She swung back. Wolfhere’s hands had tightened on his reins, and his chin lifted and eyes narrowed as he squinted west along the road.

  “If you threaten my daughter,” she said in a low voice, “I will kill you. I have come through too much. My patience is all burned away.”

  He bowed his head without answering; his right hand slid into his left sleeve and he sighed and rested his arm there, as if releasing Taillefer’s crown had taken all his strength. She turned her horses all the way around and moved a few paces back the way she had come to get the best vantage of the unwinding path. Wrapping up the crown, she stowed it in one of the saddlebags she had taken from Hersford half-filled with supplies. She refused to mention her encounter with Hugh until Wolfhere confessed the whole, and he seemed just as unwilling to speak.

  Silence is a locked chest.

  Without speaking, they waited until the company rode into sight with Falcon Mask in the lead, Anna behind leading the string of spare mounts, and Blessing on her own small mare. Buzzard Mask had fallen behind to become rear guard.

  “Hai!” called Falcon Mask with a big grin. “We thought you’d outraced us, Bright One!”

  “They’re too slow!” Blessing had no volume below a petulant shout. “I’m trying to teach them to ride faster. They’re so slow! How soon until we reach Papa?” She tilted her head back and sucked in a breath through her nose. “What’s that smell? Sharp, like magic.”

  Anna sneezed.

  Buzzard Mask trotted up, clinging to the saddle like a sack about to slide off. “Ow! Ow! Ow!” he cried as he jerked on the reins, but his horse had already decided to stop, with the others, and he did slide off, starting slow and then falling hard, unable to stop himself. “Ah!” His string of curses was powerful.

  Anna dismounted and offered a hand, but he brushed off his legs, tugged with a look of disgust at the short tunic that Liath had insisted he wear over his otherwise naked torso, and offered Anna a grateful smile. He was young, like Falcon Mask, healthy and attractive because of his youth. Anna blushed and backed away. She gripped the dog-headed staff as if it were the only thing holding her upright.

  Falcon Mask was rigid in the saddle, fixed at an awkward angle with one hand gripping the cantle behind her and the other holding the reins wrong. “I can’t get down!” A wild grin twisted her face; unlike her cousin, she was enjoying this knife edge between triumph and disaster.

  “Why are we stopped here?” Blessing brushed dark hair out of her eyes. Bruises purpled her wrists, the marks left by Hugh. Her cheek was split where his ring had gouged her, and she held one leg stiffly. But she challenged Liath with her gaze. Anna, seeing that look, hurried over to grasp Blessing’s knee as though her touch might steal the girl’s voice. “We’re in a hurry. We have to go faster!”

  Anna withdrew her hand and ran back to Liath. “I pray you, my lady,” she whispered. “Princess Blessing is in pain. That makes her temper short.”

  “I just want to go!”

  “We must rest,” said Liath. “Water and feed the horses. It will be dark soon. We’ll take a little time to plait torches so we can light our way through the night. Will you ride with us, Wolfhere?”

  They all looked at her as if she was a madwoman.

  “Wolfhere?” said Anna. “My lady. Are you feeling well? Perhaps we need halt for longer, if you’re needing to sleep.”

  That was when she looked around to see the empty road behind her. Wolfhere was gone. Even the hoofprints of his horses, which ought to have marked the dirt, had vanished.

  “And of course,” she told Falcon Mask later, “he never answered any of my questions.”

  They had found a site to rest where a hedge of dense honeysuckle—not in bloom—shielded them from the road. Blessing had fallen asleep soon after choking down a slice of dry bread and pungent cheese; the others had gathered twigs and stems and piled them in a heap. Some of these Liath had kindled into a fire beside which Anna bent studiously to her task, tongue jutting out between teeth as she plaited twigs, both green and dry, into easily-carried torches.

  Buzzard Mask took the first watch. His straight silhouette paralleled a slim birch tree growing beside the road; he had a good view in either direction along the road and just enough light to keep watch by. The sky was strangely glamoured this night, the clouds
so high and thin that although she could not actually see the moon’s disk, she could almost breathe in the misty glimmer of its light seeping through that translucent veil of cloud.

  Falcon Mask turned the crown of stars one complete revolution, and shook her head. “Pretty ugly,” she said. “I’d take it to the fire workers and let them melt it down for something better. The gems are good, though.”

  Liath laughed. “Give that back to me!”

  Falcon Mask grinned and set the crown on her own head. It stuck on her topknot, and she grimaced. “Too heavy! Eh! This would give you a sore neck. Who wants it?”

  “Many people want it. But how and where did Wolfhere get it, and why did he give it to me?”

  Buzzard Mask hooted twice, the crude but easy signal they’d agreed on. Two for the east, three for the west, four for the woods. Liath smothered the fire. The flames died, and smoke wisped up in fading trails barely visible to Liath’s keen sight. Falcon Mask bundled the crown away and shifted from seat to crouch without a sound, knife drawn. Anna shifted back to kneel beside Blessing while Liath traced a path to a knob of cover they had identified before sunset. Buzzard Mask had retreated here. She crouched beside him.

  A pair of lamps, one in front of the other, swayed along the road like will-o’-the-wisps. The walkers came without speaking, but they had horses in their train: one, two, three—probably four. As their shapes got closer, Liath traced the shadows of each creature. There were two men and, indeed, four horses. Travelers meant for reasonable speed, hoping to make better time with a spare mount and a way to travel straight through the night. Just as she hoped to do.

  She tapped his arm in a four square pattern; let them pass. He returned the tap on her forearm to show he understood. He shifted back as she shifted forward to get a better look. Most likely they were messengers, but it made sense to be cautious until she was sure they were not enemies.

  The wind fluttering in the trees and the soft tap of their footfalls covered their words, so it wasn’t until they were close enough to toss a stone at that she realized they were speaking in low voices, a murmur as constant as that of a stream. She could not distinguish words, although Sanglant could have, but she could tell that they were arguing. The lamps swayed in their hands; held low to illuminate the road, the swinging lights captured only flashes of a chin or cheek until all at once one of the walkers raised her lamp high and stopped dead. The light shone full on her face.