The Burning Stone (Crown of Stars 3)

The stablemaster examined Ardent, stroked his beard and looked puzzled. Neither adders nor any poisonous snakes were commonly found in this district, he explained, but he sent men at once to beat the bushes around the complex and to warn the king.

“Come, Son.” Lavastine gave Ardent a pat on the head and rose to collect gloves and spear. “We must attend the king.” Alain hesitated. “I will do what I can to help the girl,” added Lavastine softly.

“Then I pray you, Father, let me stay with Ardent.”

Lavastine glanced at Tallia, who still stood by the window, nodded curtly, and left.

“She’s a strange-looking woman,” said Tallia. “I remember seeing her before, when we rode to Quedlinhame.”

“She fought with us at Gent.”

“Then she was given a handsome reward by you and your father. People will speak of your generosity, and you will be known as a Godly man.”

So was he reproved however gently for that brief desire that envy would prick her until she bled and, bleeding from jealousy, fell into his arms. He would have to win her over in a nobler manner than this. Ardent burrowed her head more deeply into Alain’s lap and whimpered, and he stroked her ears and scratched her head, giving her such comfort as he could, knowing that his presence itself was comfort to her.

“Poor suffering soul,” murmured Tallia. “I will pray to God for healing.” She knelt, bent her head, and lapsed at once into a melisma of prayer.

Several young nobles stuck their heads inside the chamber to check on the progress of the hound. They all had their own dearly-loved hounds, and Alain could not help but be touched by their concern. But though they urged Alain to join them in their hunt for snakes, he would not. He could not bear to leave Ardent’s side all through that long, hazy morning as she struggled to breathe and by degrees her leg turned, seemingly, into stone.

4

SANGLANT woke stiff and sore somewhat after dawn. After twenty-nine days sleeping in the second finest bed on the king’s progress, his limbs had grown used to comfort. Now, rising from the ground, he ached everywhere, but he didn’t mind it. The pain of freedom is never as harsh as that of slavery.

“My lord prince!” said one of the Lions in an urgent whisper.

He heard them coming down the narrow footpath that led from the bluff’s height far above to the river’s shore below: the king and a small entourage.

“Prince Sanglant.” The Lion had a shock of red hair and part of one ear missing, the lobe sliced cleanly off and healed into a white dimple. “If we may—your clothing—”

Only now did he glance at himself to see in what disarray he stood; tunic skewed around his body and stained with dirt; sandals scuffed; leggings half unwound on his right calf; his belt lying like a sleeping snake, all curves and loops, on the ground by his feet. Two of the Lions ventured forward—he smelled their caution—and tidied him up so that by the time his father appeared, skirting an old fall of rocks that had half obliterated the last bend in the footpath, he looked presentable.

Henry shaded his eyes against the rising sun. “Sanglant.” Sanglant knelt obediently. Henry’s hand, coming to rest on his hair, had uncomfortable weight. “You did not come in last night.”

“I slept outside.”

Henry removed his hand. Sanglant looked up in time to see the king gesture to the others and, together, entourage and Lions moved away until they waited out of earshot. “We must talk, Son, before I hold my morning’s audience. Walk with me.”

Sanglant rose. Though he was half a head taller than the king, he never felt he dwarfed him; Henry used his power too well.

“You are restless,” observed Henry as they strolled down along the river, away from his entourage, which consisted of the six Lions who had guarded Sanglant through the night, four servingmen, Margrave Villam, and Sister Rosvita. “You heard the news brought last night, that both regnants in Aosta are dead. There is a single heir, the Princess Adelheid.”

Sanglant shrugged. He had not heard the news; once Liath had entered the hall, everything else had become a roar of meaningless chatter. She had a distinct way of walking, that of a person who has covered many leagues on her feet and found no weariness from walking as would a man or woman used to riding. The quiver rode easily on her back; she was used to its weight, and confident with it. Her braid had a distracting habit of swaying as she walked, drawing the eye down her back to the swell of her hips. She had looked at him over her shoulder. And then, when he had followed her outside, she had kissed him despite his confused confession that would have made another woman scorn him. Surely that kiss—however greatly it had disturbed him bodily—revealed the wish of her heart.

“Sanglant! You are not listening.”

It took him a moment to remember where he was. He bent, scooped up a long branch, and commenced snapping it in half, and the halves in half again. It was the only way he could keep his attention from wandering back to her.

“You will lead an army to Aosta. There, you will place Lady Adelheid on the queen regnant’s throne, and you will marry her. Once that is accomplished, and with my power behind you, the Aostan princes will not contest your election as king regnant. You will reign beside Adelheid, as her equal. No one can doubt your worthiness for the Aostan throne, since it is as often claimed by force as by inheritance. That is what the Aostan princes prefer, to keep their regnants weak and dependent on their power as queenmakers. Once you have established yourself in Aosta, with a royal wife and a child to prove your fertility, then it is only a small step for me to name you as my heir here in Wendar and Varre as well. Who will contest us then, if the prize is the restoration of the Holy Dariyan Empire? The Empire lies within our grasp at last. With you on the Aostan throne, I can march south and have myself crowned as emperor and you as my successor and heir.”

The branch lay in pieces at his feet. An osprey soared above, heading upriver. The river flowed steadily along behind him; he could almost hear each least grain of dirt being spun off from the shoreline and washed away downstream, caught up in an irresistible current that would drag it all the way to the sea. He was suddenly tired. Henry, like the river, was an unstoppable force.

“Liath,” he whispered. It was the only word he knew how to say.

Henry grunted in the way of a man prepared for the blow that strikes him. “As Villam warned me,” he muttered. “I swear that Wolfhere sent her to plague me and ruin you.”

Henry regarded the river with a frown, and Sanglant watched him, caught up without meaning to be in that strong attraction that a regnant must necessarily wind around himself, like a cloak. A regnant is no regnant without it. Henry had a strong profile, most often stern, with the dignity appropriate to the responsibility God had given him. He had as much silver as brown in his hair now, and a neat beard laced with white. Sanglant touched his own—beardless—chin, but the movement brought Henry’s attention back to him.

“Very well.” Henry could not conceal his annoyance, but he attempted to. “Take her as a concubine, if you must. You won’t be the first man—or woman—to keep a concubine. The Emperor Taillefer was known to keep concubines while between wives. But—”