Crown of Stars (Crown of Stars 7)

o;We’ll search more quickly with more scouts,” he continued, “but if the Lost Ones bide in the woods, then they’ll kill them.”

“They did not kill you, walking here.”

“I am no threat to them. They may fear Sorgatani, as they should.”

She nodded. “I’ll come alone, and Sorgatani will search with us.” She ran back to the gate and told Ingo what she meant to do, and when he began to protest, she cut him off. “Let no man walk beyond these walls lest he see what will kill him. Believe what I say, and if you will not believe me, then believe Aronvald or Sister Rosvita. Stay close.”

The path lay quiet. Nothing disturbed them, although water dripped now and again from branches. She stopped once to drink from a brutally cold stream. She had forgotten how thirsty she was, and she gulped down the water and felt her head ache as if the iciness of the water were trying to freeze it.

Sorgatani waited by her painted wagon, anxious as she scanned the forest. “They are gone,” she said to Hanna without turning to see who it was.

“Are you sure?”

She pointed. “Liathano went in that direction. Come.”

They made of themselves a line with Sorgatani in the middle and Breschius and Hanna to either flank. Moving into the trees, they found no bodies. If Sorgatani had killed any, then some had survived to carry away the dead. The light trailing through the trees had a brighter edge today, although haze again covered the sky. Was it thinner? Was there hope that the weather would change?

“Here!” called Breschius.

Hanna beat a path to him with her staff, cutting through thickets and slogging through a patch of mud that slimed her boots. He stood in a clearing staring down at an object hidden by grass. Sorgatani stood beside him; she hid her eyes behind her hand, as if she did not want to see but knew she had to look. Hanna came up to them.

Liath’s bow could never be mistaken for any other. It lay, strung, in the grass, carelessly dropped. Beside it her quiver rested untouched, still full of arrows. A polished black beetle crawled across the clustered shafts of arrows, then balked as it tested the cruel ledge made by a griffin feather.

“Do you think …” whispered Breschius, as if the words actually hurt “… that the galla caught her?”

The beetle vanished down the shaft of one of the ordinary arrows, hidden by the stirring of grass as the wind gusted and died. A weight settled on Hanna’s chest and she could not shake it loose. But she must observe. She must report. Such was her duty. She released a clenched hand and bent to pick up the bow.

“There would be bones. That’s all the galla leave of their victims.”

“Where is she gone?” Sorgatani scanned the forest. Only the wind cried in the trees.

Hanna steadied herself. The bow hummed in her grip, as though trying to communicate. Its touch prickled her skin rather like the wasp sting that bound her to Sorgatani. Magic lives here, she thought, setting down the bow. She hoisted the quiver, and strained because of its unexpected weight. Tucked in with the arrows, wrapped in oilcloth, rested another object whose dimensions were familiar to her. She unwrapped it to glimpse the cover, but she already knew what it was. How had The Book of Secrets come back into Liath’s possession?

No matter. Seeing it, she despaired.

She looked at her companions. “Liath would never have left these things behind of her own choice. Never.”

“Is she dead?” cried Sorgatani.

“The simplest answer is usually the best one,” said Hanna. “Though it makes me sick at heart to think of it. Because it would also explain why the raiders disappeared.”

“Ah,” said Breschius.

She nodded. “They captured her, and ran with their prize.”

“How could they have captured her?” demanded Sorgatani. “She is too powerful for them to bring down.”

Breschius knelt, reached, and brushed his hand over the grass where, having some time ago been flattened, it was slowly springing back. “Blood.” He sniffed it, but did not taste it, turned his hand up so the two women could see the red stain on his fingers.

Sorgatani tilted her head back and without warning trilled a high, long, keening wail that made Hanna shudder to her bones. Folk might cry so over the grave of one lost.

“She is always vulnerable to arrow shot,” said Breschius pointlessly, since they could all see for themselves, “if she is taken unawares.”

“Oh, God.” Hanna collapsed to her knees. She thought she would faint, but she did not. She held on. “A poisoned arrow would kill her!”

“Stay, now.” Breschius steadied her. “Why, then, would they take the body?”

“To prove they killed her,” said Sorgatani. “Such is the custom among my people. A trophy. A prize.”