Child of Flame (Crown of Stars 4)

“Hsst!” Ekkehard stepped forward, sword drawn, to stand beside Hanna. “What do you see, Eagle?” he whispered. Behind, his companions drew their swords while the soldiers scrambled to ready spears and shields. Hands shaking, she hoisted her bow and nocked an arrow.

There was nothing there. Snow tumbled from a heavily-laden fir tree, shrouding the imagined wing shape, and all was still. The moon’s light cast a drowsy glamour over the silent forest.

“Hai!” cried the sentry, so startled that his spear fell, clattering on stone foundations.

It arrived noiselessly and settled down in the midst of a stretch of untouched snow. Despite its size, it did not break through the hard crust. It was the largest owl she had ever seen, with tufted ears and a coat of mottled feathers, streaked with white at the breast. The owl gazed at her, unblinking, incurious, looking ready to snatch her up as it would a delectable mouse.

“That would make a tasty meal,” muttered Ekkehard, elbowing Hanna. “Shoot it.”

“Nay, my lord prince,” she answered, suddenly afflicted by dread at the thought of shooting this magnificent creature, “for everyone knows that the flesh of an owl is like poison to a human being.”

Ekkehard hesitated. In that instant, the owl took flight and was gone.

“Damn it! We’ve few enough provisions, Eagle. One owl shared between us wouldn’t have sickened any one of us more than the rest!” He seemed ready to go on chastising her when Lord Benedict hurried up.

“Your Highness, come quick. The sick man is vomiting blood, and the old sergeant thinks he’s going to die. You’d better give him a blessing so his soul will be safe when he passes to the Other Side.”

The poor man did die, a little before dawn. Hanna paced all night, wrapped in her cloak, too cold and nervous to sleep, while the moon set and the forest sank into a deeper slumber. As Ekkehard’s company drifted in and out of their fitful sleep, interrupted now and again by Lord Lothar’s hacking coughs, she wondered if she would have been better off if the deserters had invited her to join them.

They found their bodies the next day.

They had saddled up their remaining eight horses in the morning and started down the road, following the tracks left by the others. The cold had frozen a crust over the snow heavy enough to take a man’s weight for a few moments before he broke through, and while that made the traveling easier for the men, it doubled the effort for the horses. Hanna quickly dismounted to lead her horse, and after a few more struggling steps, the young lords did so as well. They weren’t fools about horseflesh. Hanna had long since observed that many noble folk had more concern for their hounds, horses, and hawks than for the common people bound into their service.

“Look here,” said Frithuric, who had taken the lead as usual.

“There’s a set of tracks leading off the path, into the forest. Back toward the abandoned village. Should we follow them? Maybe one of these damned deserters had a change of heart and came back to look for us.”

“Nay,” said Ekkehard impatiently, “we’ll want shelter tonight and I’ve no intention of wasting time on them, since they’re the ones who left us behind.”

They went on, breath steaming in the cold air. The exercise made Hanna sweat, but her feet stayed cold and her toes ached incessantly. They had followed the path for less than half a league when Lord Frithuric, still ranging ahead, gave a strangled cry. Hurrying forward, they saw him beside a wayside shelter, chasing away crows.

Lord Dietrich’s cousins and their seven fellow deserters had made their final stand at the wayside shelter, vainly attempting to use its walls as protection. Three of the men were missing their heads; the rest were simply dead, stripped of their weapons, any decent armor, and, of course, the three horses. Blood soaked the snow. Fire had scorched the thatch before burning itself out harmlessly. Singed straw lay scattered downwind along the snowy ground as far as Hanna could see. By the evidence of hoofprints, the deserters had been attacked by at least a dozen horsemen. A few stray feathers trampled in the snow or caught beneath the corpses left no doubt that their assailants had been a Quman raiding party.

Bayan wasn’t bent on revenge or intrigue. In truth, Prince Ekkehard was a nuisance: young, untried, immature, and reckless. And as big a fool as Ivar to get mixed up in heresy. In Bayan’s place, she would probably have done the same thing. Only she wished right now that she was snug in that sleeping platform in Biscop Alberada’s hall instead of standing out here in the middle of wilderness with no fortified holding within a day’s ride on either side. This was just the kind of place a small party like theirs could be attacked and overwhelmed.

In the distance, a wolf howled, the only sound in the lonely landscape. Whispered talk died by the fire as men paused to listen, but nothing replied to that solitary call. A twig snapped at the fringe of the trees.

Was that a shape, creeping in among the snow-laden branches? Were those pale wings, advancing through the trees?

“Who’s there?” demanded the sentry. His voice trembled.

“Hsst!” Ekkehard stepped forward, sword drawn, to stand beside Hanna. “What do you see, Eagle?” he whispered. Behind, his companions drew their swords while the soldiers scrambled to ready spears and shields. Hands shaking, she hoisted her bow and nocked an arrow.

There was nothing there. Snow tumbled from a heavily-laden fir tree, shrouding the imagined wing shape, and all was still. The moon’s light cast a drowsy glamour over the silent forest.

“Hai!” cried the sentry, so startled that his spear fell, clattering on stone foundations.

It arrived noiselessly and settled down in the midst of a stretch of untouched snow. Despite its size, it did not break through the hard crust. It was the largest owl she had ever seen, with tufted ears and a coat of mottled feathers, streaked with white at the breast. The owl gazed at her, unblinking, incurious, looking ready to snatch her up as it would a delectable mouse.

“That would make a tasty meal,” muttered Ekkehard, elbowing Hanna. “Shoot it.”

“Nay, my lord prince,” she answered, suddenly afflicted by dread at the thought of shooting this magnificent creature, “for everyone knows that the flesh of an owl is like poison to a human being.”

Ekkehard hesitated. In that instant, the owl took flight and was gone.

“Damn it! We’ve few enough provisions, Eagle. One owl shared between us wouldn’t have sickened any one of us more than the rest!” He seemed ready to go on chastising her when Lord Benedict hurried up.

“Your Highness, come quick. The sick man is vomiting blood, and the old sergeant thinks he’s going to die. You’d better give him a blessing so his soul will be safe when he passes to the Other Side.”