Prince of Dogs (Crown of Stars 2)

“Kinless,” she said flatly. “All I have are the Eagles. I pray you, Sister, I am no threat to anyone.”

Rosvita glanced up at the stars as though to ask them if this was truth, or a cunning dissemblance. But the stars only spoke to those who knew their language, so she did not. “I dare not keep this,” she said in a low voice.

“How did you get it?”

“That does not matter.”

“Can you—how much did you—?” But she was afraid to ask. She shifted. Beyond, the three servants who had escorted the cleric huddled close, sharing something from a leather bottle. She thought she smelled mead, but there were so many smells mingling and unraveling in the air around them that she could not be sure if it was honey’s fermented sweetness or the aftertaste of drying blood.

“I cannot read Jinna, although you can.” It was not a question. “And the fourth language is unknown to me. I had only a moment to look at the Arethousan and the Dariyan, but I needed no more than that to recognize what I was seeing. Lady protect you, child! Why are you riding as a common Eagle?”

“It is what was offered me.”

“By Wolfhere.”

“He saved me from Hugh.”

The moonlight bleached Rosvita’s face of expression, but she shook her head and then simply offered the book to Liath.

Liath grabbed it and clutched it against her chest.

“I think it properly belongs to you,” said Rosvita softly, hesitantly. “Pray God I am right in this. But you must come speak to me, Eagle, of this matter. Your immortal soul is at risk. Who are the Seven Sleepers?”

“The Seven Sleepers,” Liath murmured, memory stirring. “Beware the Seven Sleepers.” Or so Da had written. “I only know what he wrote in the book.”

“You’ve never heard the story as related in Euseb?’s Ecclesiastical History?”

“Nay, I’ve not read Euseb?.”

“In the time of the persecution of Daisanites by the Emperor Tianothano, seven young people in the holy city of Saïs took refuge in a cave to gain strength before they presented themselves for martyrdom. But the cave miraculously sealed over, and there they were left to sleep.”

“Until when?”

“Euseb? doesn’t say. But that is not the only place I have heard that name. Do you know of a Brother Fidelis, at Hersford Monastery?”

“I do not.”

“‘Devils visit me in the guise of scholars and magi,’” quoted Rosvita, recalling the conversation vividly, “‘tempting me with knowledge if only I would tell them what I knew of the secrets of the Seven Sleepers.’”

“Were they the ones—?” Liath broke off. Wind rustled the canvas of tents, and she was suddenly reminded of the daimone who had stalked her on the empty road. She shuddered. “I don’t know what to do,” she murmured, afraid again. Da always said: “The worst foe is the one you can’t see.”

Rosvita extended a hand in the fashion of her kind, a deacon about to offer a blessing. “There are others better able to advise you than I. You must think seriously about making your way to the convent of St. Valeria.”

“How can I?” Liath whispered, remembering her vision of stern Mother Rothgard. “The arts of the mathematici are forbidden.”

“Forbidden and condemned. But it would be foolish of the church not to understand such sorcery nevertheless. Mother Rothgard at St. Valeria is not a preceptor I would wish to study under. She has little patience and less of a kind heart. But I have never heard it whispered that she is tempted by her knowledge. If you cannot bring yourself to trust me, then go there, I beg you.” She glanced behind toward her servants. “I must return to the train, or they will wonder why I am missing. Morning comes soon.”

She paused only to stare at Liath, as if hoping to read into her soul. Then she left.

Liath was too stunned to move. Her arms ached where they clasped the book, and one corner of the book pinched her stomach, digging into her ribs. She stood there breathing in and out with the breath of the night. A flash of white startled her and she spun to see a huge owl come noiselessly to rest on the torn-up ground just beyond the nimbus of lantern light that illuminated the awning of King Henry’s pavilion. It stared at her with great golden eyes, then, as suddenly, launched itself skyward and vanished into the night.

“Liath.”

Of course he knew.

She didn’t turn to face him. She couldn’t bear to.

“You’ve stolen the book,” he said, astonishment more than accusation in his voice. “I left the field as soon as it was clear we’d won the battle and rode all the way back to the train, only to find it missing. How did you manage it? What magic did you employ?”