The Gathering Storm (Crown of Stars 5)

He gestured toward a tent shaped differently than the Wendish campaign tents—a mushroomlike felt shelter lying low to the ground, more a bulge than a tent. Three stocky young Quman men loitered under the angled awning, gazes fixed on the griffins, but after a moment Liath saw that Fulk was pointing toward two men standing in the shadow cast by the tent. They edged forward rather like starving beggar children might creep toward a forgotten crust of bread left lying on the roadside, trying very hard not to draw attention to themselves or the crust. They wore threadbare robes cut differently from those in the west and their red caps came to a curling point.

“What are two Jinna men doing here?”

“They were among the slaves your daughter freed from the ship. We offered them their freedom, but there’s none here who can speak to them. I don’t know if they stay because they don’t know they are free or if they’ve nowhere else to go. They’re good with horses. They do their share of work. We’ve no complaints of their service, even though they’re heathens.”

The two young men dashed forward. Fulk leaped out, drawing his sword.

“Hold, Captain!” It had been a long time since Liath had spoken Jinna; she could read it better than speak it, but the basic words did not elude her. “Honored sirs, it is better if you approach with prudence.”

The two men threw themselves down bellies to the ground and dipped their foreheads three times to the earth before rising to their knees and extending their hands, palms up and open.

“What means this?” asked Fulk, astonished.

Their postures looked uncomfortably like those of slaves offering submission to a master.

“What do you mean by this, honored sirs?” she asked, echoing Fulk’s amazement.

One raised his head. He steepled his fingers and, hiding his eyes behind the “v” made by his hands, replied.

“Do not disdain your servants, Bright One. Let us serve you, who walk on Earth and speak with human speech. We recognize you as one of the holy messengers of Astareos.”

“What are they saying?” asked Fulk as a number of Sanglant’s soldiers gathered at a distance to watch. There was nothing to do in camp except stare at the terrifying griffins; these men welcomed a new source of entertainment.

Liath had forgotten how much she hated being the center of attention of any crowd; and all of Wendish court life was crowds. One could not be a prince without a retinue. No noble lady had ever traveled alone with just her father, making her way through the world.

One of the Jinna spoke. “If we have displeased you, if we have sinned by calling attention to your presence, Bright One, speak only the word and we miserable worms will slit our throats.”

“No,” she said hastily. “Do not hurt yourselves. I am surprised, that is all. No matter.” That was the first phrase one learned in Jinna, a word so useful and so complex that it could not be properly translated into Wendish. No matter.

“What is your wish, Bright One? We are your servants.”

She did not want a retinue. She had never become accustomed to one. But as she glanced around the camp, seeing the shining bulk of the griffins, the herds, the tents, the patient army of men and women who had followed Sanglant across the wilderness simply because he had asked them to, she knew that what she wished for most—solitude—was to be denied her.

Duty came first.

“Obey this man, as you have been doing,” she said at last, resigned to her fate. “He is called Captain Fulk. He is a good man. I must go to the camp of the Horse people. When I return, you may serve me.”

They wept with gratitude.

She could have wept, with frustration, but she didn’t have time. She didn’t need the burden of their belief that she was something she was not.

“I pray you, my lady, what do they want?” asked Fulk again, too eaten up by curiosity to take heed of her sour expression.

“The Jinna worship Astareos, the fire god,” she said at last. “It is no secret that, like Prince Sanglant, I am only half human. By some magic known to the Jinna, they must see my mother’s soul in me. They think I am an angel.”

“I will agree to attend a council,” said Li’at’dano when Liath returned to the centaur encampment to begin the second phase of her campaign, “but I am not accustomed to the presence of males who claim to speak with authority. They are emotional and unstable. I grant you that a stallion may be a handsome creature, but all he is good for is fighting and breeding. Still, because I have known a few human and Ashioi males who have—what shall I say?—been able to think with the same rigor and intellect as a woman, I will allow all those you mention to join the council. In exchange—”

This was the part of negotiation Liath hated most: all the stipulations and exceptions and claims and demands.

“—the child will be given into the care of my people. She will be well cared for, bound around with magic so that she cannot suffer or weaken.”

“And when she wakes?”

“If she wakes.”

“What if I give her to you only to discover that she is being held as a hostage? What if we succeed—as we must succeed—in defeating Anne, only to find Blessing used as a weapon held at our throats, to make us agree to whatever conditions you demand?”

“Desperate times call for desperate measures. You must trust me, Daughter. Are you not my namesake?”