Prince of Dogs (Crown of Stars 2)

“I’ve heard of demons called Eika.” Godesti’s brother had just come from checking on the animals. He hunkered down by the fire to listen. A small child crept from her bed and slunk into the shelter of his arms. “But I thought they was just stories.”

“Nay,” she said, “I’ve seen them with my own eyes. I saw—” Here she faltered.

“What did you see?” demanded the son, creeping up beside her, face alight with interest.

So she told them about the fall of Gent, and somehow, telling it to these simple farming folk whose farthest journey was to the market town two days’ walk from here, it became more like a tale of ancient and noble deeds told a hundred times on a winter’s night. Somehow, telling the tale drew the pain out of it.

“Ai, the prince sounds so brave and handsome,” breathed the sister by the hearth.

Her young brother snorted. “That would be a cold lover for you, Mistress Snotty Nose, too good for your suitors.”

“Now, you!” said Mistress Godesti sharply, chucking the boy under the chin. “Hush. Don’t speak ill of the dead. His shade might hear you.”

“But all souls ascend to the Chamber of Light,” began Liath, then stopped, hearing a whispering from the alcove and seeing a certain furtive look pass among them all.

Mistress Godesti drew the Circle at her breast. “So they do, Eagle. Will you have more cider to sooth your throat? This food is scarcely fit payment for such tales as you have told us this night.”

Liath accepted the cider and drank it down, its bite a fire in her chest. After eating a second helping of stew, she rolled herself up in her cloak near the fire on a heap of straw filthy with fleas. The house cat, as dainty a creature as ever prowled a longhouse for mice, curled up against her stomach, liking the warmth of her body. Waking on and off, restless, she saw one or another person kneeling beside the hearth, a chargirl, an old man, a woman dressed even more poorly than the others, each taking a turn tending the fire through the long winter’s night.

In the morning, in a light fall of snow so insubstantial that little seemed to touch ground, she rode on. Mistress Godesti’s brother walked with her a good hour or more beyond the hamlet into the forest, though she tried to dissuade him because he had no boots, only sandals with cloth tucked in to warm his feet. But when they reached the spot where the autumn rains had washed out the path as it twisted down a thickly wooded slope, she was grateful for his guidance. He showed her where the new cut lay, a detour that switchbacked down a ridge and back to the old road. This far out, there was deadwood aplenty and no felled trees marking where folk from the village came out to get firewood. He made polite farewells.

“Not all in Varre have been so friendly,” she said, thanking him.

“Aid the traveler as you would wish to be aided were you in their place, that’s what our grandmother taught us.” He hesitated, looking troubled. “I hope you know my sister meant nothing by her mention of the dark shades walking abroad.”

“I carry messages for the king, friend. I do not report to the biscops.”

He flushed. “You know how women are. If the old ways were good enough for our grandmother, then—” He restlessly hoisted his threadbare tunic up higher through his rope belt.

“You live close by the forest. Why shouldn’t you see the old gods of your people still at work here?”

This startled him. “Believe you in the Tree and the Hanged God?”

“No,” she admitted. “But I traveled to many strange places with my da and—” She broke off.

“And?” Did he look curious or merely tired and worn out? By the age of his children she guessed he was only about ten years older than herself, yet he looked as old as Da had at the end, aged by constant work and worry and by grief at the death of his wife. “Godesti says that if my dear Adela had given gifts to the Green Lady at the old stone altar, then she wouldn’t have died, for the Green Lady helps women through their labor. Is it because she did as the deacon from Sorres village commanded and turned her heart away from the old ways? She prayed to St. Helena when her birth pains came on her, but maybe the Green Lady was angry for not receiving any gifts. Is that why she died?”

“I don’t know your Green Lady. But I lived in Andalla once, with my da. The Jinna women there didn’t pray to Our Lord and Lady, they prayed to the Fire God Astereos, yet they survived and bore healthy children—many of them, at any rate. I’m sorry about your wife. I’ll pray for her soul. Maybe it had nothing to do with God—except that God watch over us all,” she added quickly. “Maybe the child didn’t move right within her. Maybe it was breech and couldn’t come out. Maybe some sickness got into her blood and made her weak. It might be any of those things, or something else, and nothing to do with God at all, just as”—she gestured at the path behind them—“this track was washed away by a combination of rain and rockslides, not because the creatures of the Enemy made mischief here to bedevil you—”

“I pray you!” He drew the Circle at his breast hastily, and then another sign, something she didn’t recognize but which was clearly pagan. “The shades might be listening.”

“The shades?”

“The souls of dead people too restless to board the ship of night and sail to the underworld. Or worse …” He hefted his walking staff, twirled it once, dropping his voice to a whisper. “… the shadows of dead elves. Their souls are confined in a dark fog. They have no body, but they weren’t released from the earth either. They aren’t allowed into the Chamber of Light, but they have nowhere else to go if they were killed on this earth. They haunt the deep forest. Surely you know that, you who have traveled so much.”

“The shades of dead elves …” She stared at the forest around her: leafless winter trees stood dark against the gray-white sky with undergrowth of all shades of brown and dull green and the pale yellow of decay interwoven beneath; evergreens skirted the edge of open areas. All of it was dense with growth and fallen limbs and the tangle of a wild land untouched by human hands. Had that been Sanglant’s fate? To wander the earth as a shade, because he could not ascend through the seven spheres to the River of Heaven and thence stream with the other souls into the Chamber of Light? Was he near her now?

Then she shook herself roughly, and her horse stamped and shook its head as if in sympathy. “Nay, friend,” she continued. “The blessed Daisan taught that the Aoi were made of the same substance as humankind. Some of the ancient Dariyan lords converted to the faith of the Unities. So why should the blessed Daisan turn elvish kin away from heaven if they served God faithfully? And even if they do live here, why should they concern themselves with us?” Suddenly, Liath realized she didn’t believe the souls of dead people lurked in the forest. And she wasn’t afraid of the shades of dead elves. Of course, many other things might lurk in the forest, wolves and bears least among them. “To be fearless is to be foolhardy and likely dead,” Da always said. But away from Hugh, fear did not ride constantly on her shoulder.

“Who knows what lingers in this forest.” The man looked around nervously, afraid even in a morning light that painted the gray-limbed trees and stubborn clouds of morning with the burnished light of pearls. “Near the ford there may be bandits. But by dusk tomorrow you’ll come to a big town called Laar.”

They parted. He seemed relieved, but whether to be returning to the safety of his village or to be rid of her and her uncomfortable views Liath could not be sure. She did not mean disrespect to the old gods or the saints. But it was not God or the shades of dead elves or the half-formed creatures who served the Enemy who had caused her to miscarry last winter. No, indeed. It was the very abbot whom these villagers praised.

Snow drifted down between the bare branches of trees. She walked most of the day to keep warm and to spare her horse. The road was good, considering what little use it must get. Two wagon ruts wide, it remained clear of undergrowth, and puddles hidden beneath a film of ice were the worst of its treacheries.

Was there really any point to being in a hurry? It had taken Hanna months to reach the king. No one would know why she had herself been delayed, and in any case, Count Lavastine would be unlikely to muster an army before summer. Spring, with sowing and swollen rivers and muddy roads, was not the time for an army to march. The Eika surely could make no attack down the Veser River in the full flood of springtide.

o;And?” Did he look curious or merely tired and worn out? By the age of his children she guessed he was only about ten years older than herself, yet he looked as old as Da had at the end, aged by constant work and worry and by grief at the death of his wife. “Godesti says that if my dear Adela had given gifts to the Green Lady at the old stone altar, then she wouldn’t have died, for the Green Lady helps women through their labor. Is it because she did as the deacon from Sorres village commanded and turned her heart away from the old ways? She prayed to St. Helena when her birth pains came on her, but maybe the Green Lady was angry for not receiving any gifts. Is that why she died?”