Prince of Dogs (Crown of Stars 2)

“But Theophanu in the forest—”

“What are you talking about? Liath, stop it! He doesn’t care about me, he only cares about you. As long as I behave myself, he won’t notice me. Lady and Lord, Liath, I have survived Antonia, an avalanche, creatures made of no flesh or blood, two mountain crossings, a Quman attack, flooded rivers, and your bawling. I think I can survive this!”

“Promise me you will!”

Hanna rolled her eyes. “Spare us this!” she said with disgust. “Now go collect your things.”

Liath winced, remembering. “Burned,” she whispered. “Everything burned in the attic.”

“Then tell Hathui and she’ll see new gear is issued to you. Oh, Liath—did you—did you lose the book, after everything?”

“No.” She shut her eyes, heard the soft flow of words from inside the tent, heard Hugh laugh at a jest made by the king, heard Rosvita answer with a witty reply. “Hugh got the book.”

“Well, then,” said Hanna sharply, “it’s just as well I stay behind to keep an eye on it, isn’t it? Wasn’t it I who got it away from him at Heart’s Rest?”

Liath wiped her nose with the back of a hand and sniffed, hard. “Oh, Hanna, you must be sick of me. I’m sick of myself.”

“You’ll have no time to get sick of yourself when you’re traveling all day and just trying to keep alive! That’s what you need! Now go on. The king wants his Eagles sent out as soon as they can get horses saddled.”

Liath hugged her and went to find Hathui.

But in the end, when she left the king’s encampment, the road swung back by the market village and, curious, she took a quick detour up to the rise to see the burned palace. Hathui had found no bow to replace the one lost, and there were no swords to spare with so many having been lost in the burned barracks. She had a spear, a spare woolen tunic, a water pouch and hardtack for the road, and a flint to make fire. She had not told Hathui she needed no tools to make fire.

She could not help herself. She dismounted at the charred gates and led her horse into the ruined complex. Already human scavengers tested the blackened timbers nearest the edge of the fire, those that had cooled; they searched for anything that could be salvaged. Liath threw the reins over the horse’s head and left it to stand. She trudged through wreckage, boots collecting soot, her nose stinging from the stink. A sticky trail of blood from her nose tickled her lip, and she licked it away and sniffed hard, hoping the bleeding would finally stop.

She knew where the barracks stood. Though confused about the palace’s layout in her first days at Augensburg, she now knew the route well because of the fire, when she had plunged in more times than she could count in her vain attempt to drag all the sleeping Lions to safety.

There, at that spot, in that courtyard, she and Hugh had jumped to safety. He had had the presence of mind to grab her saddlebags before he jumped. That he still limped from a twisted ankle gave her some pleasure, but not enough.

She had been too horrified to think. The flames had come so fast, so fierce, and she had not meant them to come into being at all. They had come to her as fire leaps to any dry thing within its reach. She had scrambled to safety after him, and only then had she remembered all the people lying asleep in the palace.

I will not blame myself. He sent them to sleep. He drove me to the act, whose consequences I could not imagine.

But that was no excuse.

Da had been right to protect her. But he should have taught her, too. She had to find some way to teach herself. She had to find a way to keep Hugh away from her.

Light winked, a jewel flash among ash and fallen timbers. She stepped forward over the crumbled threshold into the main portion of what had once been the barracks. Everything had caved in and she could not tell which planks came from the walls, which from the attic floor, and which from the roof. Her boot broke through a plank and she fell, foot hitting the ground a hand’s breadth beneath. She tugged her boot out of the hole and gingerly stepped over two fallen beams, skirted a litter of swords and spear points and shield bosses, all chary and still glowing, and stopped where three planks composed more of charcoal than of wood lay in perfect alignment, one, two, three in a row like the lid to a chest. She nudged one aside with her boot.

There, lying amidst cinders and ash and blackened wood, rested her bow in its case, untouched, unharmed except for a thin layer of soot streaking it. Amazed, she lifted it off the ground to find her good friend, Lucian’s sword, beneath it, still sound, as if together they had weathered the firestorm.

“Liath.”

She started back, grabbing bowcase and sword to her, and spun, stumbling over a fallen beam and the detritus of the blaze.

But there was no one there.

XI

THE SOULS OF THE DEAD

1

ANTONIA had become heartily sick of staring into fire. The smoke stung her eyes and chapped her cheeks. But she knew better than to complain. At this moment, as the heat chafed her skin, she watched with her five companions. She had not yet mastered the art of opening such a window, a vision drawn through fire, but she could see with the others. In her first days in the valley she could not even do that, and Heribert, who had tried many times, still could not see through fire or stone.

She saw shapes as insubstantial as flames, but the others had assured her that these shapes were the shadows of real forms, real people, real buildings; they had assured her that every incident they saw through the window made by fire occurred somewhere in the world beyond their little valley. By this means, through their power, they could see what transpired in the world beyond—although there were limits to their ability to see.

Right now, in a distant place whose outlines were limned by the hearth fire, a young noblewoman and her retinue arrived at the gates of a convent and requested admittance to pray and offer gifts.