Elliott, Kate - Crown of Stars 3 (71 page)

The winding path broke through bracken and swathes of grass turned brownish gold. They pressed higher, each turn of the path taking them up in switchbacks until they had to get off and lead the horses. The midday sun made the rock outcroppings shimmer, but only Rosvita seemed to suffer under its heat although the soldiers, too, were sweating. On one rocky stretch the wagon finally broke an axle. A great wailing arose among the servants as Adelheid surveyed this calamity with a frown. Anger sparked in her eyes, but not for her servants.

"We must keep the royal insignia and the crowns and the tribute lists at all costs," she commanded. "But leave what we can't carry of the rest of the treasure. Gold will be of little use to me if I am locked away with it all in my lap in a prison of Ironhead's devising."

"If we could hide some it off the road, Your Majesty," said one of the stewards, "then perhaps we could return and find it."

"Look!" Captain Rikard had sought out a vantage point, the rains of an old tower somewhat above the main track. As Rosvita rode up beside him to look down at the rugged hills up which they had come, helmets bobbed into view far below. "Ironhead's men," he told her, pointing. From this ancient site, soldiers of another race had surveyed the southern approach with ease, as Rosvita did now, shielding her eyes from the sun's glare as she squinted south. Vennaci's towers lay small and dust-hazed far beyond, no taller than her hand measured from this distance. She searched to the west, where Theophanu had set her camp—

"There!" cried the captain.

There! Fire ravaged the Wendish camp, tents ablaze. Smoke obscured the struggle raging below, and in any case they were too far away to truly make sense of what they saw. Was Theophanu routing Ironhead's troops, or being routed in her turn?

"They are closing," said the captain, and all at once Rosvita realized that he cared so little for the Wendish camp that he wasn't looking there at all: He was still measuring the progress of Ironhead's soldiers. A helm winked in sunlight, then was lost to shadow as a score of soldiers vanished up a switchback, riding in the vanguard. Below them, a banner appeared, colors Rosvita could not quite make out but which the captain recognized.

"Ironhead himself dogs us." Hurriedly, they made their way down to the main path, where Adelheid and the others waited. "Your Majesty, we must leave those on foot behind or you will surely be captured. Ironhead has learned of the trick. He himself leads the party that pursues us."

She said nothing for a moment that seemed to drag out into infinity and yet comprised no more than ten heartbeats. But her servants, quickly understanding the situation, threw themselves onto their knees among dirt and stones and begged her to go on. She blessed them and, with tears in her eyes, abandoned them to the mercies of Ironhead's men.

"Was I wrong, Cleric?" she demanded finally as they picked their way down a defile: the queen, a dozen courtiers, six servingwomen, four clerics, Rosvita and about eighty soldiers. Her servants followed en masse, for here on the roughest part of the trail it was no hardship for them to keep up with the horses. "Was I wrong to believe that it was time to make my escape? Should I have thrown myself on Ironhead's mercy? Should I have maintained the siege through the winter and prayed for deliverance? Was the vision seen in the sky of an army marching in flames a sign sent from the Enemy, not from God?"

"Only God can know, Your Majesty. Their plan remains a mystery to those of us of mortal kin. You did what you thought was right at the time."

Adelheid glanced at her sharply. "What of your lady, my cousin Theophanu? Perhaps this plan of ours has resulted in her death. Was it foolish to try?"

"God have given us free will, Your Majesty. It is in our nature to take risks, to press onward, sometimes foolishly into disaster, sometimes recklessly into unexpected success. I cannot answer. I can only say that we can be no more than what we are."

For a while the path led smoothly alongside a stream flowing down the length of a narrow valley otherwise inhabited only by scrub trees and grassy slopes. Here they made good time, leaving the mass of servants behind. Once they heard a shout, carried on the wind by an echo. But soon the trail turned rough again, pushing up and over several ridges. They came to a stony patch of ground where the path plunged down into a defile, then took a steep turn upward, only to descend again in the next valley, where rocky outcroppings formed fantastic shapes along the steep valley walls, sculpted by a millennia of wind and rain.

"Our road to Vennaci was much smoother than this," said Rosvita to one of the clerics, a lean, unsmiling man called Brother Amicus.

"You came on the road through the Egemo Valley," he observed. "We move west and north into the country of the Capardian ascetics. It is harsh country, and will be hard enough for us to cross. But it will be harder for Ironhead and his men to cross because they have more horses to water and men to feed. It is possible we can hide there until he gives up the chase."

Would Ironhead turn back to take Theophanu prisoner? Or was she already in his hands, or dead?

The horses struggled along on stony paths that in some places were little more than goat tracks. Toward dusk, one went lame. Its rider threw off his armor and took to the countryside, hoping to escape Ironhead by hiding in the hills. The rest pressed on. By this time Rosvita's robes were covered with dust, her lips chapped, her face burned by sun and dry wind. Her back still ached, and she was hungry. But at least her horse remained sound and strong. Slowly, her world had shrunken until the health of her horse and the blessedly empty path behind encompassed her entire world.

Water had collected in the shadowed depths of the next defile, a trickle that fed into a pool and then drained away into rocks. Here they stopped to drink and to water the horses. They were not well provisioned; food and clothing had been lost with the wagons, but the soldiers carried with them dried meat and yesterday's bread, made palatable by keen hunger and by the knowledge that Ironhead was better armed, better provisioned, and probably gaining on them. There were enough oats for the horses for three days at most. After that, they would have to forage in an increasingly harsh countryside.

Twilight had lowered over them suddenly, but a waxing gibbous moon shone strong enough to light their way as they walked, leading the horses. It was very quiet except for the sound of their passage. Leather creaked. A man whispered to his companion. Brother Amicus coughed. Water trickled down a stony rock face, and after horses and people had drunk their fill, Rosvita took handfuls of it to bathe her face. Grit smeared on her cheeks. One of the combs holding up her hair had come undone, and tendrils of hair stuck to her neck, pasted there by sweat and grime.

They walked on, leading the horses, until the moon set and they had to catch what sleep they could alongside the path with sentries set to watch before and behind. Rosvita dozed fitfully and dreamed of Brother Fidelis' book.

The opening lines of the
Life
of St. Radegundis burned in her mind as if they had been set afire, lines of flame on shimmering, unearthly vellum.
"The Lord and Lady confer glory and greatness on women through strength of mind. . . . One of this company is Radegundis, she whose earthly life I, Fidelis, humblest and least worthy, now attempt to celebrate. . . . The world divides those whom no space parted once."
There was more, but it was not from the
Vita
at all. It was a scrap recalled from a florilegium which she had read years ago before the words made sense to her, but she could not now remember where, only that the words swam to the surface of her mind in the way of such thoughts, a shoal of minnows darting along the shore.

"In this way the mathematici read the past by means of that ancient record we can comprehend through the uniform movements of the heavens, which God have left as their record book, which hides nothing from the scholar who has learned the secret language of the stars. All that has happened may be read there, and all that will happen, and she who masters this language may find revealed to her even the most ancient hidden knowledge of the Lost Ones who vanished off this earth long years ago by means of powers beyond our understanding."

The burning words flashed with sparks as bright as stars falling to earth like angels fleeing God's justice, and she heard a voice in her dream, completely unfamiliar and yet as clear as if she had heard it yesterday:
"And they called that time the Great Sundering."

She woke suddenly, shivering. Ai, God! What had happened to the book? What of Brother Fortunatus and poor, ill Brother Constantine? Had they died in the conflagration? Had Ironhead taken them prisoner? Had he tarnished the book? Had it burned? Had it been lost, and the copy so painstakingly made by Sister Amabilia lost with it, all of Brother Fidelis' knowledge, his
Vita
of the blessed saint, obliterated in a flash of lust and greed?

Without the moon to dim their light, the stars shone with the brilliance of a thousand fiercely burning lanterns. The River of Heaven spilled westward, brimming with the souls of the dead as they streamed toward the Chamber of Light. A horrific fit of certainty overtook her: Amabilia was dead, lost to the world. Her soul flowed overhead in the great river, one of those myriad sparks of light.

She wept a little, and weeping, shifted her seat on the cold rock. Her back flared, hot pain that made her wince. Sparks of light shivered in front of her eyes, only to vanish, then reappear, then vanish again into the hazy distance.

She heard whispers, abrupt and intense. Around her, the company readied to move, although it was still night. The inconstant lights resolved themselves and became will-o-the-wisps and then, with a shudder of fear, she realized they were lanterns carried along the trail.

"Sister!" Brother Amicus knelt beside her, more felt than seen. "We must move quickly."

She could not rise by herself. Two soldiers had to hoist her up, and every least movement sent an agony of pain lancing through her back.

"I can't walk!" she whispered. She almost begged them to leave her, but she heard a sharp challenge, words exchanged, and a blessedly familiar voice.

Joy can ameliorate pain.

The parties mixed, melded, although there were few enough of the Wendish. She fought her way to Theophanu's side and kissed her hand repeatedly.

"Your Highness!" She was aghast to hear what a croak her voice was, sanded away almost to nothing. "How have you come here?"

"These good Aostan soldiers led us on your trail," said Theophanu. "My most valued teacher!" She kissed Rosvita on either cheek. It was too dark to see her expression, but her grip was strong, even passionate. "I feared you were lost, like so much else."

"Sister!" From out of the darkness she heard Brother Fortunatus' voice, rather wheezy but wonderfully real. "Sister Rosvita!"

They were separated by the press of the crowd as Adelheid came forward to greet Theophanu, as whispered commands raced through the company and they made ready to leave. Somehow she found her horse and, with the aid of an Aostan soldier, mounted, giving the reins into his care. Perhaps it would have been better to walk. She gripped the saddle and prayed; each least shift in the saddle made her back burn; she became quite light-headed. After a long while she realized that she could see the countryside in the gray light of early dawn.

They came to a forking of paths. Rosvita had somehow gotten to the head of the line. She heard a great deal of discussion behind her, and she desperately wished to look behind, but each time she tried to turn in the saddle so much pain tore through her back and shoulders that she literally could not move, and she finally gave up and just sat hunched there, enduring the pain and the awful curiosity, not sure which was worse. At last they moved on, but she could hear at her back a party moving off away from them.

After a while, Brother Fortunatus drew up beside her. "Are you well, Sister?" His expression betrayed his anxiety. "You are not wounded?"

"It is only the infirmity of age, Brother. I'm not accustomed to riding in this rash manner. My back is all a knot."

"I have a salve that should help you, Sister."

"What have you saved from the camp?" she demanded. "Where is Brother Constantine?"

He looked too tired to cry. "Brother Constantine took a turn for the worse after you left, Sister. I believe—I
must
believe—

that the worst was over, that he was recovering, but he was simply too weak to be moved when—" Now he faltered. "We had to leave him behind. But I trust that Aostans respect the church and will care for him as God wish Their servants to be cared for." He pressed a hand against the dust-coated saddlebags draped over the mule's back, his only possession besides the robe he wore. "But I have your
History,
Sister, and the
Vita
of St. Radegundis, and Sister Amabilia's copy. Such salves and ointments as were near at hand, and your eagle quill pen, neatly wrapped. Everything else we had to abandon."