The Burning Stone (Crown of Stars 3)

“Is it an assassin?” a servant wailed.

“Nay, an evil curse!” shouted another. “The dead hand of the Eika, avenging hisself on the count for his victory at Gent!”

Haze made the landing yellow as Alain chopped. Wood splintered, and his blade cracked through, hung up in the wood. The hounds fell silent except for a whimper coming from one of them.

“Hold!” Lavastine’s voice came abruptly, from the other side of the door. “Stand back.”

They all obeyed without thinking. The latch moved. The door creaked, shifted, grated.

“It’s stuck,” said the soldier, and he and Alain got their shoulders behind it and shoved. It gave way all at once, and Alain fell into the room, staggered, and caught himself, blinking. The shutter lay wide and the thinnest gray streak of light blurred the horizon. Servants crowded in behind him, but the silence was frightening, and intense.

Lavastine stood barefoot, in a shift, on the stone floor. In his right hand he held his unsheathed sword, in his left a knife. Sorrow and Rage growled at the men until Alain bade them hush. They were so tense that even then they growled, but they sat. Terror lay on the floor licking one of his hind legs, and Fear crowded directly behind Lavastine, a headless bulk.

The torchlight made shadows dance crazily in the room as the servants moved forward, muttering, afraid.

“Father!” Alain found his voice and stumbled forward to grasp Lavastine’s wrist. His skin was terribly cold, but his face was flushed. “Ai, God! What happened?”

Lavastine opened his hand and the knife fell to the floor with a thud. Fear growled, a rumbling in his throat. He moved around Lavastine, and Alain had a brief glimpse of something white dangling from his jaws before the hound opened his mouth to drop a sickly white ratlike creature at Lavastine’s feet like an offering. It looked quite dead.

But it was too late anyway.

Alain’s gaze, drawn down, stopped at the count’s bare feet, pale, well-groomed, and clean… except for two spots of blood on his ankle, set close together. Lavastine said nothing, only set a hand on Alain’s shoulder for support and with Alain beside him limped back to the bed, where he sat down.

But his expression was perfectly calm. “Call the deacon,” he said. “I have been bitten.” The servants wailed aloud, all clamoring at once, but he raised a hand for silence. “Nay, God is merciful.”

“Merciful!” cried Alain, aghast. He did not want to look at the creature that lay exposed on the plank floor, but one of the soldiers poked it with the haft of its ax, and it did not stir, made no movement. It was completely lifeless.

“Now it is dead and cannot harm you, Son.” Finally, one of the soldiers hurried away down the stairs. Lavastine touched Alain. His fingers seemed as cold as marble. “See that it is burned, but out away from the village where the smoke cannot poison anyone.”

Across the room, Terror whimpered, and suddenly the count’s cool expression faltered, and the shadow of death flickered in his eyes. “Ai, God. My old Terror. Most faithful.”

“Here, now,” said Alain brusquely, “sit there, Father.” He grabbed the knife from the floor and cut a cross over the wound, then set his own mouth to it and sucked, although Lavastine began to protest but gave up. His blood tasted as bitter as hope. Alain spat it out on the floor, sucked again, and again, and then did the same for Terror while the servants hurried to get hot water, cloth to bind the wound, and a shovel to carry away the dead creature. The deacon came as the sun rose. She busied herself making a poultice, and Alain sent a messenger to the monastery of St. Synodios, asking them to send their Brother Infirmarian at once.

Lavastine sat throughout as calm as stone, and never once cried out in pain, never cursed the Eika enchanter, only waited, stroking Terror’s head, and watched with that least smile, the one that denoted his approval, while Alain ordered the servants and then, finally, because there was nothing else to do, knelt beside him and prayed.

PART TWO

THE TURNING WHEEL

VIII

THAT WHICH BLINDS

1

“HERE comes the young lord!”

Alain heard the shout rise up as his entourage rounded the forest path and came to a halt in a clearing. Ten huts stood along the path with narrow garden strips stretching out behind each one. A score of cows grazed along the forest’s verge. Fields of winter rye sprouted beyond the village. He dismounted and gave his reins to a groom.

“This is the disputed land?” he asked his steward, but already the village folk swarmed forward and in the old tradition began clamoring all together to get his attention.

A steward brought his stool, and he sat down, although that did nothing to mitigate the outcry. So he just sat, calmly regarding them with Sorrow on one side, Rage on the other, and Fear flopped down at his feet, and after a while one and then another stopped shouting and gesticulating as, one by one, they realized he did not intend to speak until there was silence. In time, because he was patient, they all stood respectfully before him and waited.

“It has come to the attention of my father, Count Lavastine, that certain disputes have disrupted the peace of this village and that several men have been injured in fighting. It is my father’s will that no feuding be allowed on his lands, so I have come I settle the matter. Let those with an interest each come forward—No!” He had to raise his voice as several crowded forward at once, arms raised to get his attention. “Each person will have opportunity to speak, no matter how long it takes.”

Their testimony took a while to give, and it was cold word especially since he was obligated to sit still and listen under a chill autumn sky. But he had a fine, fur-lined wool cloak, and in addition, he never wanted for hot cider brought to him by the village children. He listened, because he was good at listening, and after a while as the village folk saw they would truly each be heard, a certain temperance settled over their speech and they began to accuse less and explain more. Once he had sorted through their complaints of each other and the petty injustices and quarrels over the meadowland, grazing rights, division of rents paid to their lord out of the common rye fields, how to parcel out the remaining fallow lands, and how often to let the fields lie fallow, he lifted a hand for silence.

“This is the root of what I hear you say: that you have a prospered so well under the rule of Count Lavastine that there isn’t enough land for your children to inherit so they can each have a portion as large as the one you have worked in your time.” They dared not quarrel with his opinion, but he saw the idea take hold in their minds. Once he had seen the pattern emerge, he knew how Lavastine and Aunt Bel would answer it and he wanted to do the best he could. In truth, he could have sent a steward to deal with the problem, but with Lavastine ill he needed to be seen. And anyway, staying busy kept his mind off Tallia.