The Burning Stone (Crown of Stars 3)

They all expected to see the Lion standard appear around every bend. The manure that dotted the track was still warm. Fresh wagon ruts had made treacherous ridges and valleys in the muddy road, a trap for horse’s hooves. A few isolated fields and the well-worn trail suggested that a village was near, and Ivar hoped against hope that the army that marched just ahead of them had stopped there, even though it was just past midday. He surveyed the gloomy landscape, the unkempt strips of fields lying to the south, the mucky road that stretched east toward war and adventure and, perhaps, freedom. To the north lay woodland, thin but dark under the gray clouds. The branches of the trees rattled in a gentle drizzle.

“Imagine, Ivar,” Ermanrich said, “you were to enter the monastery of St. Walaricus that lies somewhere out here in these Godforsaken lands. But I suppose that the missionaries who bring the word of truth are the favorites of God, not the forsaken ones.”

“We should remain out here after the war is over,” suggested Sigfrid. It was still startling to hear his voice. “Maybe this is where we’re meant to preach.”

Baldwin replied, but Ivar didn’t really hear him. Something held his gaze on that strip of northern woodland, something about the way distant branches shifted as the wind died and the drizzle let up. The others began to move on, but he held his mount up short and stared into the woods.

o;The Quman move swiftly,” she said at last. “If you’re caught on the road, you’ll all be slaughtered. The rains have been bad enough that the roads are terrible in any case. It took us three days to get this far from the fortress of Machteburg, and you’ll find no closer refuge than that. I think you’re better off building a second palisade hard up against the ditch, and bracing for a siege. If your Salavii neighbors are good Daisanites, you might try to ally with them to protect yourselves—”

But that was more objectionable even than the thought of dying at Quman hands. True, the Salavii had converted ten or even twenty years ago, and they weren’t particularly belligerent even as more Wendish settlers moved into what had once been exclusively Salavii territory—their Wendish overlords saw to that—but everyone knew that they were dark, dirty, different. Their daughters were whores and their sons rams. They talked a funny language and were too stupid to learn Wendish. They couldn’t be trusted. Worst of all, when the church had finally sent a deacon to minister to the region, she had established her parish by the Salavii village instead of in the perfectly fine little church they had built here in expectation of her coming, and she walked here on Hefensdays and LadysDays to lead Mass and preach a sermon. It was a terrible insult.

Hanna had a fair idea that it was wise of the deacon to stay closest by those of her flock who were most likely to stray. But she wasn’t about to tell these people that, not when their anger roiled in the longhouse as acrid as smoke from the hearth fire.

“I pray you, friends,” she began, raising her hands for silence. “These are difficult times, and we must pray to God to give us guidance. But if there is nothing further I can do to help you, then we must march on so that we can join up with the host of Princess Sapientia. If Margrave Judith has joined them with a host as well, then perhaps the Quman need never reach your village at all, and you can get on with your harvest.”

“If there is a harvest with all this rain,” the talkative Ernust began. “We haven’t had more than ten days of sun this summer—”

The distant blare of a horn drowned out the rest of his complaint. The startled servant girl dropped the pitcher, and it hit the corner of the table, cracked, and spilled crockery and fragrant mead all over the packed earth floor. Every head turned toward the sound.

Hanna was already on her feet and headed toward the door when the others began talking, calling to her, begging to know what the horn symbolized.

“It’s the call to arms,” said Hanna, and then she got outside and ran toward the gate.

“What are they talking about now?” Ivar reined up next to Baldwin, who had for the first time in the two days since they’d left the fortress of Machteburg fallen back from his favored position riding beside Prince Ekkehard. Right now, the prince was conferring with the captain of his new escort, a dozen light cavalrymen who had agreed to ride with him as far as Prince Bayan’s encampment, which according to the last report lay somewhere to the east.

“I think they’re agreeing that there’s nothing worse than trailing an army,” said Baldwin.

“It would be worse not to be trailing an army,” retorted Ivar. “The enemy could be anywhere out here, so they said at Machteburg.”

Ermanrich, mounted on a sway-backed gelding which had seen better days, only snorted. “We won’t be trailing them for long from the looks of it.”

They all expected to see the Lion standard appear around every bend. The manure that dotted the track was still warm. Fresh wagon ruts had made treacherous ridges and valleys in the muddy road, a trap for horse’s hooves. A few isolated fields and the well-worn trail suggested that a village was near, and Ivar hoped against hope that the army that marched just ahead of them had stopped there, even though it was just past midday. He surveyed the gloomy landscape, the unkempt strips of fields lying to the south, the mucky road that stretched east toward war and adventure and, perhaps, freedom. To the north lay woodland, thin but dark under the gray clouds. The branches of the trees rattled in a gentle drizzle.

“Imagine, Ivar,” Ermanrich said, “you were to enter the monastery of St. Walaricus that lies somewhere out here in these Godforsaken lands. But I suppose that the missionaries who bring the word of truth are the favorites of God, not the forsaken ones.”

“We should remain out here after the war is over,” suggested Sigfrid. It was still startling to hear his voice. “Maybe this is where we’re meant to preach.”

Baldwin replied, but Ivar didn’t really hear him. Something held his gaze on that strip of northern woodland, something about the way distant branches shifted as the wind died and the drizzle let up. The others began to move on, but he held his mount up short and stared into the woods.

There it was again. Branches moved. A pale form flashed beyond a thicket.

“Ivar, what is it?” Baldwin called back to him.

“Wait,” he replied in a low voice. First Ermanrich, then Baldwin, then Sigfrid reined their horses aside. They, too, looked into the wood. Surely they were as nervous as he was.

Leaving the fortress of Machteburg and crossing the Oder River had made the adventure of war and righteous preaching seem a little less golden. Yet when he closed his eyes, he could still see the phoenix, rising, and he knew in his heart that he had to find that splendid creature again, that in the cloud of its being he would find truth, and peace. If he breathed enough of that magical smoke, surely he would stop dreaming of Liath. What shifted among the trees wasn’t golden, but for an instant he thought it was another great bird, caught in the forest.

Then he realized his error.

Sigfrid gave a croak of dismay and alarm, then recalled he could speak: “God have mercy!”

“There!” cried Ermanrich. “To the left of the wide oak.”

“Oh, shit,” murmured Baldwin.

The wings had the high sweep of a vulture’s and the same cold white underside. But it moved swiftly, negotiating the trees not with great flaps but at a canter. Other wings appeared behind trees or rising from gullies or over hillocks. Maybe they would have been visible all along had he thought to look. Or maybe they were cleverer than the troop of half-grown boys and the untried escort who had crossed the Oder River with the idea that adventure lay beyond it.

His heart pounded so furiously that he couldn’t speak. Maybe there was a reason adventure always sounded so good in the safety of a hall, with a bard singing to those who had survived.