Part 46 (2/2)
Adelheid glanced at Hugh, as if expecting him to go on, but he kept his gaze lowered modestly, fixed on the parquet floor and its two tones of wood, blond and ebony, spreading out from his feet in a pattern of repeating squares. Like good and evil, the warring inclinations stamped into every human soul.
”The presbyters weave their own intrigues that have nothing to do with the security of Aosta,” continued Adelheid fervently, taking Henry's hand again.” Many of them do not care to act in favor of restoring the empire. Yet those same clerics will not necessarily move against a strong hand setting the emperor in place.”
”What are you saying?” asked Henry.
But Rosvita already knew, with that sudden, sure instinct that causes dogs to shy and birds to twitter in the hour before an earthquake hits. She had heard Sanglant's testimony. It did not take any great wisdom to add two to two and count up four.” You are Sister Anne, of St. Valeria's Convent.”
”Liath's mother!” murmured Hathui, standing just behind the king.” I see no resemblance.”
Henry was not slow to catch their meaning.” Are you the woman who claims to be the granddaughter of Emperor Taillefer?”
Anne did not rise. She lifted a single hand, like a queen calling for silence.” What need have I to claim such a thing when it is truth? Why else would I wear the gold torque of royal kins.h.i.+p?”
This argument stymied Henry, but Villam could not remain silent.” Any woman or man might put a gold torque around their throat and say what they will. In the marchlands, imposters sometimes ride into villages and claim to be clerics, or lords, or heathen sorcerers with the power to make birds talk and the rivers run with gold. What proof have you?”
Anne was neither amused nor angry. Her calm ran as deep as the ocean.” What proof do you desire? Is it not obvious?” She whistled, an unexpected sound coming from that ageless, composed face. A huge black hound trotted into view, emerging from behind a carved wood screen. Servants s.h.i.+ed away, but it approached meekly enough and lay down submissively at Anne's feet.
”That looks like one of Lavastine's hounds,” said Henry, examining the hound with the keen interest of a man who keeps a large kennel and knows the names of all his dogs.” I thought they were all dead.”
”I do not know where the beast came from,” said Anne, ”only that it did come to me one day to offer its obeisance. I believe this hound is descended from the black hounds who were loyal to Taillefer. They are spoken of in poems, and I have seen them depicted in tapestries.”
”There is one carved in stone in Taillefer's chapel at Autun, faithful in life as in death,” said Rosvita, and while it was true that one might mark a resemblance, too much time had pa.s.sed between the reign of Taillefer and this day to know whether this fearsome creature was itself the descendant, many dog generations on, of the emperor's famous hounds.
”Nay, Your Majesty.” Villam crouched to get a better look, although he did not venture too close.” This is indeed one of Lavastine's hunting hounds. I recognize the look of it. The ears. The size. The breadth of its chest. It might as well have swallowed a barrel. I respected those hounds too well to forget them now.”
”What do you want?” asked Henry.
”To serve G.o.d,” said Anne.” That is all.”
”If queen and king agree, then there can be no impediment to Sister Anne's crowning as skopos,” said Adelheid.
Anne did not smile.” If I am skopos, then I cannot contend with you for the imperial throne that is rightly mine.”
Henry smiled sharply. He eased his hand out of Adelheid's grip and gestured to his servants. Two stewards had already hurried in, and they hastily set up his traveling throne, with the dragon arms, the eagle-wing back, and the lion legs and paws to support it. Sitting, he set chin on fist and elbow on knee, regarding Anne more with curiosity than with animosity.” With what army do you mean to contend for the imperial throne?”
”G.o.d's favor and the right of birth ought to be army enough. So have you put forth your own claim, I believe.”
He glanced at Hathui, who fingered her Eagle's brooch selfconsciously, her expression fixed like stone. What was the Eagle thinking? What did Henry mean to do?
Like a good commander, he attempted a flank attack.” Is it true the woman named Liathano is your daughter? Do you know what became of her?”
”No more than I know what became of your b.a.s.t.a.r.d, Sanglant.”
”Who does not trust you and spoke most d.a.m.ningly of your powers and your intent. You are a sorcerer, I believe, a mathe-maticus. There was talk of a cataclysm soon to engulf us. The return of the Lost Ones. A war, perhaps, or some other disaster.”
”I pray you, King Henry, do not mock what you do not understand.” As they had spoken, it had grown dark and the chamber dim. Wind rustled through the cypresses outside. Adelheid's banner, hung from the wall behind the couches, stirred, the cloth sighing up and settling down as though an invisible daimone's hand toyed with it. No one had lit lamps; even the servants watched in antic.i.p.atory silence as king faced cleric.
Even the servants understood that something monumental was at stake. Servants could smell the heady brew of a silent struggle for power sooner than anyone else.
”Very well,” agreed Henry softly.” It's true I understand practical matters better than sorcerous ones. I know that a woman may not rule as queen regnant in Salia. But if you are indeed Taillefer's granddaughter, then you might well gain adherents enough to drag Aosta into a long struggle over the crowns, which none of us desire. Your aspiration seems reasonable enough, Sister Anne, but of what use can you be to me if I support your election as Holy Mother, skopos over all the church?”
Anne lifted cupped hands. A silvery sphere of light spun into being just above her palms. Villam muttered a prayer under his breath. Adelheid sighed sharply, like a woman in the throes of pleasure. Henry remained silent, watching.
Anne raised her arms and, as a woman tosses rose petals to the wind, flung up her hands. The silvery globe dissolved into sparks of s.h.i.+mmering white light, each one a b.u.t.terfly swooping and fluttering throughout the chamber. The winged light threw the scenes carved onto ivory into relief: a lady with her falcon; the entombment of St. Asella; fair Helen on the walls of Ilios, calling the CHILD or FLAME troops to battle; the tortures of St. John of Hamby, each one depicted in exquisite detail.
Anne stood. Each white b.u.t.terfly spark bloomed with color- ruby, sapphire, emerald, carnelian, aquamarine, amethyst and rose quartz, banded chalcedony, iridescent opal-each one as l.u.s.trous as a gem. Their dance swirled around the chamber, making Rosvita's head ache at the same time as her heart exulted. Henry rose slowly, staring as b.u.t.terflies swarmed around his head to form a crown of luminescent stars at his brow.
For an instant he gleamed there, crowned in splendor.
The sparks vanished, leaving them with a steady gleam of magelight and a cool, pale woman of vast power and middling height. Whispering, half frightened and half in awe, the servants hurried to light lamps as the magelight spun itself into delicate threads and, at last, into nothing, simply fading until it disappeared.
”Illusion,” muttered Villam.
Hugh of Austra's gaze glittered just as brightly as had those dancing sparks. In his expression gleamed an unsettling hunger.
Queen Adelheid looked no different than he did, dazzled, thirsty for more.
Even Henry. G.o.d save them, even Henry.
”What do you want?” Henry asked again, his voice as hoa.r.s.e as that of a famished man who has just seen a feast laid out on the table.
Villam's hand brushed Rosvita's fingers, a signal she could not read. Nor could she speak to ask him, not even whisper, not with the silence lying so deeply around them, a cloak thrown over the a.s.sembly.
Can we trust her?
Rosvita no longer doubted Anne's right to wear the gold torque. Granddaughter of Taillefer and Radegundis, daughter of Fidelis and the foundling girl Lavrentia; a mathematicus of considerable power. One could not ignore such a woman.
Anne bent to pick up a shard of gla.s.s, as blue as lapis lazuli, off the parquet floor. She displayed it in her palm, blew on it gently, and a brilliantly blue b.u.t.terfly opened its wings and flew away, quickly lost in darkness. She did not smile as she addressed the king. A woman with so much power does not need to smile, or to frown.
”Do not turn away from me, Henry, Lord of Wendar and Varre,” she said, untroubled by the agitated currents roiling around her.” For without my aid, you will have no empire to rule.”
EVERY soul tainted by the touch of mortal earth is peppered with shadows and black recesses, caught where they are least expected: hates, loves, fears, pa.s.sions, envies and angers, lies and truths. Every soul born on Earth can never be free of them. No matter how fiercely the cleansing fire rages, she will never be pure fire.
She will always be trapped in her body.
She hit the ground running, half crouched, bow ready. Here in the sphere of Jedu, a light snow fell. She loped over a plain marked by hundreds of small outcrops, tumbled boulders, heaps of stone, irregular folds, every lump and swell concealed under a blanket of snow. Cold flakes dissolved on her lips, swirling around her naked body. The only place she was warm was along her spine where her quiver gave her skin some protection from wind and falling snow. Her toes had already gone numb from the cold; each step was agony, like walking on needles. It was a bad place not to have any clothes.
It was a bad place to be trapped in a physical body. Looking back, she saw no gate, no entry point, only her footprints, steaming as the brief warmth of her pa.s.sing was whirled away into the bitter air. She could only go forward. That was always the case, wasn't it? She could never go back.
She brushed snow from her hair, felt it tickle her eyelashes and dust the end of her nose. Flakes melted on her nipples and strung a mantle across her shoulders, rubbed clean at intervals by the leather strap of her quiver. Her ears stung. Despite the stiffness in So CHILD or FLAME her fingers, she kept her bow raised and an arrow taut. In Jedu's angry lair, anything might happen. She had to expect the worst.
It didn't take long for the worst to find her.
Thunder rolled and tumbled in the distance. Lightning flashed, sparks of brilliance on the horizon. She paused, seeing no storm clouds, only the steady gray bowl of a fathomless sky.
Not a storm at all. At first the figure looked impossibly small. In the time it took Liath to take in two sharp breaths, the creature doubled in size as the thunder of its footsteps rang in the air. As she caught in a gasp, it filled her sight, a monstrous giant.
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