The Gathering Storm (Crown of Stars 5)

Villam’s son Berthold rests peacefully on a bed of gold and gems, surrounded by six sleeping companions. He sighs, turning in his sleep, and smiles.

A hand scratches at the door of a hovel woven out of sticks, the one in which Brother Fidelis sheltered. As the door opens, the shadow of a man appears, framed by dying sunlight, his face obscured. He is tall and fair-haired, not Brother Fidelis at all. Crying out in fear, he runs away as a lion stalks into view.

Candlelight illuminates Hugh of Austra as he turns the page of a book, his expression calm, his gaze intent. He follows the stream of words, his lips forming each one although he does not speak aloud. A wind through the open window makes the flame waver and shudder until she sees in that flame the horrible lie whispered to her by Hugh.

Heresy.

She knelt in the place of St. Thecla as the holy saint witnessed the cruel punishment meted out by the empress of the Dariyan Empire to those who rebelled against her authority: The blessed Daisan ascended to the sacrificial platform. He was bound onto a bronze wheel. Never did his smile falter although the priests flayed the skin from his body. Joy overwhelmed her, for was she not among the elect privileged to witness his death and redemption?

The floodwaters of joy wash back over her to burn her.

Is this not the heretical poison introduced into her soul by Hugh’s lies?

Yet what if Hugh isn’t lying? Has he really discovered a suppressed account of the redemption? It surpasses understanding.

In her confusion, the dream twists on a flare of light.

In a high hall burn lamps molded into the shapes of phoenixes. Their flames rise from wicks cunningly fixed into their brass tail feathers. Here the skopos presides over a synod called to pass judgment over the heretics. The accused do not beg for mercy; they demand that the truth be spoken at last. Her young brother Ivar stands boldly at the forefront. Who will interrogate them? Who will interrogate the church itself? If the Redemption is true, if the blessed Daisan redeemed the sins of humankind by dying rather than being lifted bodily into heaven in the Ekstasis while he prayed, then have the church mothers hidden the truth? Or only lost it?

Who is the liar?

“Sister, I pray you. Wake up.”

Dark and damp swept out from the dream to enclose her, and the cold prison of stone walls dragged her back to Earth. Light stung her eyes. She shut them. A warm hand touched her shoulder, and she heard Brother Fortunatus speak again, although his voice had a catch in it.

“Sister Rosvita! God have mercy. Can you speak?”

With an effort she sat up, opening her eyes. Every joint ached. The chill of the dungeon had poisoned her to the bone. “I pray you,” she said hoarsely, “move the light. It is too bright.”

Only after the light moved to one side could she see Fortunatus’ face. He was crying.

Her wits returned as in a flood. “How long have I been here? Without the sun, I cannot mark the passing of days. I do not hear the changing of any guard through that door.”

He choked back tears. “Three months, Sister.”

Three months!

A spasm of fear and horror overcame her, and she almost retched but her stomach was empty and she dared not give in to weakness now. Strength of mind was all that had kept her sane in the interminable days that had passed since that awful night when she had heard the voice of a daimone speak through Henry’s mouth.

“What of King Henry? What of Queen Adelheid? Has she not even asked after me? Have none spoken for me, or asked what became of me? God above, Brother, what I saw—”

“Sister Rosvita,” he said sharply, “I fear you are made lightheaded by your confinement. I have brought you spelt porridge flavored with egg yolks, to strengthen your blood, and roasted quince, for your lungs.”

They were not alone. The man holding the lamp was Petrus, a presbyter in the skopos’ court, Hugh’s admirer and ally. What she needed to say could not be said in front of him, because she dared not implicate Brother Fortunatus, the girls—Heriburg, Ruoda, Gerwita—and the rest of her faithful clerics. If she could not protect herself, then certainly she had no hope of protecting them. Her father’s rank and her own notoriety gave her some shelter, which was probably the only reason she was not dead; she doubted Fortunatus and the others could hope for even such small mercies as being thrown into a cell beneath the skopos’ palace. Fortunatus went on. “Sister Ruoda and Sister Heriburg bring soup and bread every day, Sister Rosvita, just after Sext, although I do not know if you receive it then.”

He watched her with an expression of alarmed concern as she worked her way down to the bottom of the bowl. She was so hungry, and she supposed she must smell very bad since she was never given water to wash. But no disgust showed on Fortunatus’ lean face. He looked ready to begin weeping again.

“You have not been eating well either, Brother. Have you been ill?”

“Only worried, Sister. You wandered off in a sleeping dream that night, as you are wont to do, and never returned. It did not take us long to discover where you had wandered to in your delirium, alas.”

He smiled and nodded as if she were a simpleton whom he was soothing, but she read a different message in the tightening of his eyes and the twitch of his lips.

“Three months,” she echoed, scarcely able to believe it. In that time she had meditated and prayed, and slept, knowing that whatever she suffered at the hands of men would only test the certainty of her faith in God. Yet who had lied to her? Hugh? Or the church mothers? She could not shake that last desperate dream from her thoughts.

“Truly, the weeks have passed,” Fortunatus continued blandly. “King Henry has ridden south with his army to fight the rebel lords, the Arethousan interlopers, and the Jinna bandits in southern Aosta. Queen Adelheid and her advisers rode with him. Since I could not go to the king, I asked for an audience with the skopos. After eight weeks of patient waiting, for you know that the cares of the work and of the heavens weigh upon her, I was admitted to her holy presence two days ago, on the feast day of St. Callista. She refused to release you, but she agreed that you ought to be allowed exercise in the corridor each day between the hours of Sext and Nones. Her generosity is without measure!”

Amazing, really, how he kept his voice steady, how he managed to keep sarcasm from his tone. The horrors of her confinement, the intense focus of mind she had brought to her prayer to keep herself from utter despair, were lightened by hearing him and by clasping his hand.