In the Ruins (Crown of Stars 6)

“I pray you, be well,” said Alain. “Do not weep.”

There was Master Rodlin, without the whippets, who stared at him and said, “What of the hounds? They follow you still. Is that not the mark of Lavas blood? And if not, then what is it?”

“They cannot answer, for they do not have human speech,” said Alain. “They chose to follow me long ago to help me on my path. Serve the rightful heir, Master Rodlin, as faithfully as you did Count Lavastine.”

“When will that one come?” he demanded.

“Like the hounds, I cannot answer. If Lavrentia is the rightful heir, you must serve her with the same loyalty you showed to Count Lavastine.”

Rodlin frowned but grabbed the lad’s hand and led him away. The holding was hidden by the trees and the stone tower by a twilight that caused colors to wash into one dim background.

One remained, wringing her hands. “Do you remember me?” she said. “Will you curse me, for teasing you when you first were come here? Do you hate me for it?”

Her eyes were still as startling a blue as when he had met her years ago. She had a well-fed look to her and her belly curved her skirts in such a way that he supposed she was in the middle months of pregnancy.

“Did you ever meet the prince in the ruins?” he asked her.

Her lips twisted into a resigned smile. “Did you lie to me that night when we both went up to the ruins?”

“No, I did not. I saw him.”

“Then you saw more than I did! I looked, but I saw nothing. Or maybe that’s just how it goes when a girl is young and stupid. I married a good man who works hard and can feed me and my younger sisters and our child. There are only shadows in those ruins now.”

“Have you walked there since?”

“I went there at midwinter, just a few months back. Because I thought of you, in truth. Because we saw you in the cage. I didn’t think that was right. It was Heric done it, and I cursed him for it.”

She paused, waiting.

“What do you want?” he asked her. “You did no wrong to me, and I none to you, I think.”

“I just wanted to see you in the dusk,” she said, “to see if the shadows made you look like they say that prince did. To see if you might be his by-blow, as some whispered. Shadow-born. Demon’s get.”

“Do you think I am?” She puzzled him. She was cleaner and prettier than she had been before, better cared for in both dress and manner, and while she did not seem precisely friendly, neither did she seem spiteful.

“You’re not what you seem,” she said, turning away. She took three steps before turning back to look at him. “There was nothing in those ruins, not even shadows, because there was no moon to make shades. But if you want to hear the weeping of ghosts, go to Ravnholt Manor.”

Because of the cool weather and the clouds, the abandoned path leading to Ravnholt Manor was not at all overgrown or difficult to pass except for some fallen branches and a thick cushion of leaf litter. He came into the clearing at midday two days after his departure from Lavas. He discovered eight graves dug beside a chapel that was just big enough to seat a half dozen worshipers beside its miniature Hearth. From a distance, the mounded graves still looked fresh, but that was only because so few weeds had grown in the dirt. It wasn’t until he came up close that he saw how the earth had settled and compacted. A deer’s track, its sides crumbling, marked the corner of one mound. A rat sprinted away through the ruined main house, whip tail vanishing into a hole in the rubble. Otherwise it was silent.

No. There. He heard a faint honking and, looking up, saw a straggling “v” of geese headed north, not more than a dozen. He put a hand to his face, feeling tears of joy welling there, and he smiled. Rage and Sorrow snuffled around the fallen outbuildings. There was a weaving shed, a privy, two low storage huts, and a trio of cottages. The byre hadn’t burned, but its thatched roof had fallen in. Alain poked through the rubble of the longhouse with his staff, but he found nothing except broken pots, a pair of half eaten baskets, and the remains of two straw beds dissolving into the ash-covered ground.

A twig snapped.

“What do you want?” asked a voice from the woods, a man hidden among the trees. The voice seemed familiar, but he couldn’t place it.

“Just looking for the four women who were taken from this place by bandits.”

He felt a breath, an intake of air, and threw himself flat. An arrow passed over his head and thunked into a charred post behind him. Barking wildly, the hounds charged into the trees. By the time Alain scrambled to his feet, he heard a man shrieking in terror.

“Nay! Nay! Call them off! I beg you! Anything! Anything!”

Alain pushed through the brush to find Sorrow standing on top of a man. His right wrist bled where Rage had bitten him. A bow carved of oak lay on the ground atop a fallen arrow. The man writhed, moaning and whimpering, as Sorrow nosed his throat.

A ragged wool tunic covered his torso. It had been patched with the overlarge stitches that betray an inexperienced hand. His hands were red from cold. He was also barefoot; his feet were chapped, heavily and recently callused, and the big toe of his right foot was swollen, cracked, and oozing pus and blood.

Alain picked up the arrow and broke it over his knee, then unstrung the bow and tied it onto his pack.

“Mercy! Mercy! It was my sin! I am the guilty one!”