Crown Of Stars - Child Of Flame Part 9

IN HASTE.

"SHE isn't at all what I remember."

King Henry stood with his granddaughter in his arms at an un-. shuttered window in the royal chambers, attended only by Rosvita, Hathui, four stewards, six guards, and Helmut Villam. Princess Theophanu and four of her ladies sat in the adjoining chamber, playing chess, embroidering, and discussing the tractate Concerning Male Chast.i.ty, written by St. Sotheris, which had only recently been translated by the nuns at Korvei Convent from the original Arethousan into Dariyan. Their voices rang out merrily, seemingly immune from care.

Queen Adelheid had escorted Alia and Sanglant outside to show them the royal garden, with its rose beds, diverse herbs, and the aviary that the palace at Angenheim was famous for. Standing beside Henry at the window, with her fingers clamped tight on the sill, Rosvita saw Adelheid's bright gown among the roses. A moment later, she saw Sanglant on his knees by one of the herb plots, fingering petals of comfrey. Brother Heribert knelt beside him and they spoke together, two heads bent in convivial conversation. The contrast between the two men could not have been bolder: n Sanglant had the bulk and vitality of a man accustomed to armor and horseback and a life lived outdoors, while Heribert, in his cleric's robes, had a slender frame and narrow shoulders. Yet his hands, too, bore the marks of manual labor. How had they met? What did Heribert know that he had not told them?

"She isn't anything like what I remember." Henry's expression grew pensive." It's as if that time was a dream I fas.h.i.+oned in my own mind." Blessing had fallen asleep on his shoulder.

"Perhaps it was," observed Rosvita." Youth is prey to fancy. We are adept at building palaces where none exist."

"I was very young," he agreed." In truth, Sister, I find it disturbing. I recall my pa.s.sion so clearly, but when I look at her now, I fear I made a mistake."

A stiff breeze stirred the leaves in the herb bed next to the prince. Laughing, Sanglant stood as Heribert leaped up, startled. The outside air and Heribert's presence had restored the prince to good spirits, yet now he glanced back toward the open window where his father stood. Had he heard them? Surely they stood too far away for their conversation to be overheard.

"Was it a mistake, Your Majesty?" She nodded toward the prince.

"Nay, of course not. Perhaps I am only a little surprised that memory has not served me as well as you have." He smiled with the craft of a regnant who knows when to flatter his advisers, but Rosvita sensed tension beneath the light words.

"You were very young, Your Majesty. G.o.d grant us all the privilege of change and growth, if we only use it. You are a wiser man now than you were then, or so I have heard."

He smiled, this time with genuine pleasure. The baby stirred, coming awake. She yawned, looked around, and said, quite clearly: "Da!" After this unequivocal statement, she frowned up at Henry. She had a clever little face, quite charming, and mobile expressions." Ba!" she exclaimed. She seemed to have no other mode of speech than the imperious.

"The months do not count out correctly," said Henry." Nine months for a woman to come to her time, and even if she deliver early, no child will survive before the seventh month. Sanglant and the Eagle left fourteen months ago, yet this child is surely a yearling or even older. But her coloring is like that of the Eagle's, if I am remembering correctly."

"Do not doubt your memory on this account. I also believe the child resembles its mother in some ways. Look at the blue of her eyes! But you are right, Your Majesty. Even if she were a seven months' child, born early, she could therefore be only seven months of age now."

"Come." Henry carried the baby out to the garden, heading for his son, but as soon as he stepped outside the beauty of the autumn foliage and late flowers distracted the child. Rosvita watched as the king surrendered to her imperial commands: each time Blessing pointed to something that caught her eye, he obediently hauled her to that place, and then to another, lowering her down to touch a flower, prying her fingers from a th.o.r.n.y stem, stopping her from eating a withered oak leaf blown over the wall, lifting her up again to point at a flock of geese pa.s.sing overhead.

He was besotted.

Sanglant had wandered to the garden by the wall where he spoke privately to Brother Heribert. What intrigue might he be stirring up? Yet had Sanglant ever been one for intrigue? He had always been the most straightforward of men.

Still, he made no move to interfere with the capture of his father: Blessing worked her will without obstacle. Queen Adelheid had gone into the aviary. Rosvita had to admire the young queen: either she was determined to turn Alia into an ally, or else she intended to divert all suspicion while she concocted a plan to rid herself of her rival. It was hard to tell, and even after months of sharing the most difficult of circ.u.mstances in Adelheid's company, Rosvita didn't know her well enough to know which was more likely.

But as Rosvita watched Henry dandle the child, her heart grew troubled.

Twilight finally drove them back inside. Adelheid and her attendants came from the mews, Sanglant and Heribert from the garden. Alia lingered outside, alone, to smell the last roses. No one disturbed her. By custom, the feast would continue into the night, but neither Henry nor any in his party seemed inclined to return to the great hall. Too much remained unspoken.

Blessing went to Sanglant at once. She had begun to fuss with n hunger. A spirited discussion ensued among the attendants on the efficacy of goat's milk over cow's milk to feed a motherless child. He took her outside.

Rosvita went to the window. A cool autumn breeze, woken by dusk, made her s.h.i.+ver. Sanglant avoided his mother and settled down out of her sight on the far side of the old walnut tree.

Adelheid came to stand beside Rosvita. The queen smelled faintly of the mews and more strongly of the rose water she habitually washed in. She had such a wonderful, vividly alive profile that even in the half light of gathering dusk her expressions seemed more potent than anything around them, as bright as the waxing moon now rising over wall and treetops.

"You have acted most graciously, Your Majesty," said Rosvita.

"Have I? Do you think I am jealous of the pa.s.sion he once felt for her? That was many years ago. Truly, she looks marvelously young for one as old as she must be, but until she explains her purpose here, it is not obvious to me that she possesses anything he now desires or lacks." The young queen's tone had a sc.r.a.pe in it, as at anger rubbing away inside.

"And you do?"

"So I did," she replied bitterly." As you yourself know, Sister Rosvita, for you came with my cousin Theophanu to seek me out in Vennaci. Yet did you not just see Henry holding in his arms the living heir to Taillefer's great empire? If it is true, what need has Henry for a queen of my line?"

"What manner of talk is this, Your Majesty? Your family's claim to the Aostan throne is without rival."

Adelheid smiled faintly, ironically." It is true that no n.o.ble Aostan family holds a better claim. Certainly the skopos will support me if she can, since she is my aunt. Yet how did my lineage help me after the death of my mother and my first husband, may G.o.d have mercy on them? Which of the n.o.bles of Aosta came to my aid when I was besieged? My countryfolk abandoned me to Lord John's tender mercies. I would have become his prisoner, and no doubt his unwilling wife, had you and Princess Theophanu not arrived when you did. What would have happened if Mother Obli-gatia had not taken us in despite the hards.h.i.+p it placed upon her and the nuns in her care? What if she hadn't allowed Father Hugh to use sorcery to aid our escape?"

"What do you mean?" But trouble, like a swift, may stay aloft for a very long time once it has lifted onto the wind.

"I had no rivals before. Now I do."

"Henry has legitimate children, it is true."

"None of whom can claim descent from Emperor Taillefer. Nay, it is clear that Henry favors Sanglant, Sister Rosvita. Henry would have seen me married to Prince Sanglant, had he been given his way a year ago."

Since it was true, Rosvita saw no reason to reply beyond a nod.

"If that was his plan, then he must have hoped that by marrying me, Sanglant would be crowned as king of Aosta. It is understood, I believe, that only a regnant strong enough to claim the regnancy of Aosta can hope to claim the imperial t.i.tle of Holy Dariyan Emperor as well. Henry hoped to give Sanglant that t.i.tle. Or so I a.s.sume."

"Henry has never hidden his ambitions. He hopes to take that t.i.tle for himself."

"Certainly he is now ent.i.tled to be crowned king of Aosta because he is my husband. But Ironhead still reigns in Darre. Do you not see my position?"

Rosvita sighed. Adelheid was young but not one bit naive. Yet Rosvita could not bring herself to speak one word that might seem unfaithful to Henry." You are troubled, Your Majesty," she said instead, temporizing, hoping that Adelheid would not go on. But the one trait of youth Adelheid had not yet reined in was impetuous-ness.

"Let us imagine that it is true that this child is the legitimately born heir to Taillefer, his granddaughter two generations removed. I brought Henry the crowns of Aosta. But her claim to Aosta's throne, and to the Crown of Stars Taillefer wore as Holy Dariyan Emperor, is far greater than anything I can confer."

Rosvita glanced back into the room. Two stewards stood by the door, looking bored as they guarded the wine. Various tapestries depicting the life of St. Thecla hung from the whitewashed walls: witnessing the Ekstasis; debating before the empress; writing one of her famous epistles to far-flung communities; accepting the staff that marked her as skopos, holy mother over the church; the stations of her martyrdom.

Henry had gone with Villam into the adjoining chamber to overI O see the chess playing, Hathui sticking close to him rather like a falcon on a jess. Villam leaned with a hand on the back of the chair inhabited by one of Theophanu's favorites, the robust Leoba. Even at his age, he was not above flirting. Indeed, he was currently unmarried and despite his age still an excellent match. Leoba let him move a chess piece for her, Castle takes Eagle.

The game brought Rosvita back to the moves being enacted here and now." Surely, Your Majesty, you do not believe that King Henry would put you aside on such slender evidence?"

Adelheid had the grace to blush." Nay, Sister, do not think me selfish. In truth, I have no fear for myself. I am fond of Henry, and I believe he is fond of me. He is well known for being pious and obedient to the church's law. He will not break a contract now that it has been sealed. But if G.o.d are willing and grant us Their blessing, I will have children with him. What is to become of them?"

Now, finally, she saw the battle lines being drawn." How can I answer such a question, Your Majesty? At best, I may hope that the king hears my voice, and my counsel. I do not speak for him."

"You saved my life and my crown, Sister. I trust you to do what is right, not what is expedient. I know you serve with an honest heart, and that you care only for what benefits your regnant, not for what benefits yourself. That is why I ask you to consider carefully when you advise the king. Think of my position, I pray you, and that of the children I hope to have." She smiled most sweetly and moved away to meet Alia by the door. Beckoning to the stewards, she had a cup of wine brought for the Aoi woman.

"Was that a plea, or a warning?"

Rosvita jumped, sc.r.a.ping a finger on the wooden sill." You startled me, Brother. I did not see you come up beside us."

"Nor did the queen," observed Fortunatus." But she has observed a great deal else. Henry already has grown children who will be rivals to whatever children she bears. Yet she does not fear them as she fears Sanglant."

Rosvita set her hands back on the sill, then winced at the pain in her finger.

"You've caught a splinter," said Fortunatus, taking her hand into his. He had a delicate touch, honed by years of calligraphy.

As he bent over her hand, working the splinter loose, she lowered her voice." Do you think she fears Sanglant?"

"Would you not?" he asked amiably." Ah! There it comes." He flicked the offending splinter away and released her hand. She sucked briefly at the wound as he went on." He is the master of the battlefield. All acknowledge that. He returns rested and fit, with soldiers already kneeling before him, although only G.o.d know when they pledged loyalty to him, who has nothing."

"Nothing but the child."

"Nothing but the child," Fortunatus agreed. The privations of their journey over the mountains to Aosta and their subsequent flight from Ironhead had pared much flesh from Fortunatus' frame. Leanness emphasized his sharp eyes and clever mouth, making him look more dour than congenial, when in fact he was a man who preferred wit and laughter to dry p.r.o.nouncements. In the last few weeks on the king's progress he had been able to eat heartily, as was his preference, and he was putting on weight. It suited him." I would say he is the more dangerous for having nothing but the child. He isn't a man who desires things for himself."

"He desired the young Eagle against his father's wishes."

"I pray G.o.d's forgiveness for saying so, Sister, but surely he desired her more like a dog l.u.s.ts after a b.i.t.c.h in heat."

"It's true it is the child who has changed him, not the marriage. You are right when you say he desires no thing for himself, for his own advancement. But what he desires for his child is a different matter."

"Do you think it will come to a battle between him and Queen Adelheid?"

She frowned as she gazed out into the foliage. Wind whipped the branches of the walnut tree under which Sanglant sheltered with Blessing, although no wind stirred the rest of the garden. It seemed strange to her, seeing its restlessness contrasted so starkly with the autumnal calm that lay elsewhere. The prince rose abruptly. Heribert, beside him, asked for the baby and, with reluctance evident in the stiffness of his shoulders, Sanglant handed her over. She was splayed out with that absolute limpness characteristic of a sleeping child. The prince and the frater stood together under the writhing branches, talking together while the baby slept peacefully. Finally, Sanglant looked up arid seemed to address a comment to the heavens. Surely by coincidence, at that very instant, the breeze caught in the branches of the walnut tree ceased.

"What does Prince Sanglant know but war? Did Henry not fight against his own sister? Why should we expect otherwise in the next generation?"

"Unless good counsel and wiser heads prevail," murmured For-tunatus.

Behind them, voices raised as the company who had been seated in the adjoining chamber flooded into the one in which Rosvita and Fortunatus still stood. Rosvita moved away from the window just as Hathui came up to her.

"I pray you, Sister Rosvita," said the Eagle, "the king wishes you to attend him, if you will."

"I would speak with you in private council," Alia was saying to Henry as she looked around the chamber.

Henry merely gestured to the small group of courtiers and n.o.bles and servants attending him, no more than twenty-five people in all." My dear companions and counselors Margrave Villam and Sister Rosvita are privy to all my most private councils." Deliberately, he extended a hand to invite Adelheid forward. She came forward to stand beside him with a high flush in her cheeks and a pleased smile, quickly suppressed, on her lips." Queen Adelheid and my daughter, Theophanu, of course will remain with me." He glanced up then, looking around the room. He marked Hathui with his gaze. She needed no introduction nor any excuse; she simply stood solidly a few paces behind him, as always. The others slid back to the walls, making themselves inconspicuous, and he ignored them." If Sanglant chooses to hear your words, I am sure he will come in from outside."

"You have changed, Henri," Alia replied, not with rancor but as a statement of fact." You have become the ruler I thought you might become in time. I am not sorry that I chose you instead of one of the others."

He rocked back on his heels as at a blow. Adelheid's small but firm hand tightened on his." What do you mean? Chose me instead of one of the others? What others?"

She seemed surprised by his outburst." Is it not customary among humankind to be making alliances based on lineage, fertility, and possessions? Is this not what you yourself are doing, Henri?" She indicated Adelheid." When first I am coming back to this world, many of your years ago, I go seeking the one whose name is known even to my people. That is the man you call Emperor Taillefer. But he is dead by the time I am walking on Earth, and he has left no male descendants. I cannot be making an alliance with a dead man. It is to the living I must look. I am walking far in search of the living. Of all the princes in these lands it is in the Wendish lineage I am seeing the most strength. Therefore I am thinking then that your lineage is the one I seek."

Henry had color in his cheeks, the mark of anger, but his voice betrayed nothing of the irritation that sparked as he narrowed his eyes." I seem to have misunderstood our liaison. I had thought it was one of mutual pa.s.sion, and that you were gracious enough to swear that the child you and I got together was of my making as well as yours. So that the child would seal my right to rule as regnant after my father. Do I understand you instead to say that you had another purpose in mind? That you actively sought me or any young prince of a n.o.ble line and chose me over the others because of the strength of the kingdom I was meant to rule?"

"Is it different among you, when you contract alliances?" Alia seemed genuinely puzzled." For an undertaking of great importance, are you not sealing bargains and binding allies who will be bringing the most benefit to your own cause?"

Henry laughed sharply." Had you some undertaking in mind, Alia, when first you put yourself in my way in Dane? How well I recall that night!"

She gestured toward the garden, dark now except for the light of moon and stars. Inside, the stewards had gotten all the lamps lit. St. Thecla's many figures on the tapestries s.h.i.+mmered in the golden light; her saint's crowns had been woven with silver threads, and the lamplight made them glimmer like moonglow.

"What other undertaking than the making of the child? Was this not our understanding?"

"Truly, it was my understanding. I understood why I needed to get a child, even if the getting of the child came second to my pa.s.sion for you. But never did I understand that you wanted a child as well." He spoke bitterly." You abandoned the two of us easily enough. What could you have wanted a child for if you were willing to walk away from him when he was still a suckling babe?"

She walked forward full into the light from the four dragon-headed lamps that hung from hooks in the ceiling to illuminate the center of the chamber. Despite her tunic, she could not look anything but outlandish, foreign, and wildly unlike humankind." In him, my people and your people become one."

"Become one?"

"If there is one standing between us who carries both my blood and yours, then there can be hope for peace."

Fortunatus stirred beside Rosvita, and she pressed a hand to his wrist, willing him to remain silent while, around them, Henry's attendants whispered to each other, puzzling over her words.

How could Alia's people seek peace when they no longer lived on Earth, and perhaps no longer lived at all? Of all their fabled kind, Alia alone had walked among them once, some twenty-five years ago, and then vanished utterly, only to reappear now looking no older for the intervening years.

But the years had not left Henry unscarred. He pulled out a rust-colored sc.r.a.p of cloth and displayed it with angry triumph. Alia recoiled with a pained look on her face, as if the sight of the sc.r.a.p physically hurt her.

"I held this close to my heart for all these years as a reminder of the love I bore for you!" In those words Rosvita heard the young Henry who, coming into his power, had not always known what to do with it, and not the mature Henry of these days who never lost control." You never loved me at all, did you?"

"No." His outburst might have been foam flung against a sea wall for all the impact it had." I made a vow before the council of my own people that I would sacrifice myself for this duty, to make a child who would be born with the blood of both our peoples."

Finally, as if his voice had at last reached his ears, he schooled his expression to the haughty dignity worthy of the regnant." For what purpose?"

"For an alliance. A child born of two peoples has the hope to live in both their tribes. We are hoping that the boy will be the bridge who will be bringing your people into an alliance with mine. We knew you would not be trusting us. That is why I left him with you, so that you and your people would come to love him. I was thinking he would be raised to be the ruler after you, in the fas.h.i.+on of humankind. In this way our task would be made easy. Now I return and I find him as an exile. Why were you not treating him as you promised to me?"

"I raised him as my own!" cried Henry indignantly." No man treated a son better! But he was a b.a.s.t.a.r.d. His birth gave me the right to the crown, but it granted him nothing save the honor of being trained as a captain for war. I did everything I could, Alia. I would have made him king after me, though everyone stood against me. But he threw it back in my face, all that I offered him, for the sake of that woman!" He was really angry now, remembering his son's disobedience.

Sanglant walked in from the garden. Folk parted quickly to let him through their ranks. He came to rest, standing quietly between the king and the Aoi woman, and all at once the resemblance showed starkly: his father's forehead and chin and height, his mother's high cheekbones and coloring and broad shoulders: two kinds blended seamlessly into one body. But he had nothing of Alia's inhuman posture and cold, harsh nature. In speech and gesture he was entirely his father's child.

"Liath is the great granddaughter of the Emperor Taillefer." Without shouting, Sanglant pitched his voice to carry strongly throughout the long chamber." Now, truly, my father's people, my mother's people, and the lineage of Emperor Taillefer, the greatest ruler humankind has known, are joined in one person. In my daughter, Blessing." He indicated Brother Heribert, who had come in behind him carrying Blessing." Is that not so?"

Henry lifted a hand, a slight movement, and his Eagle stepped forward to answer the prince." What proof have you that the child is born of Taillefer's lineage?" Hathui asked.

"Do you accuse me of lying, Eagle?" he asked softly." Nay, Your Highness," she replied blandly." But you may have been misled. Sister Rosvita believes that a daughter was born to Taillefer's missing son. Any woman might then claim to be the lost grandchild of Taillefer."

"Who would know to claim such a thing?" He shook his head impatiently." This is an argument that matters little. If proof you will have, then I will get proof for you, and after that no person will doubt Blessing's claim."

"Son." How strange to hear Alia's voice speaking that word. It made Sanglant seem a stranger standing among them, rather than a beloved kinsman." It is true that I was hoping when first I crossed through the gateway into this country to make a child with a descendant of Taillefer. But it was not to be. That you have done so-" She had a fatalistic way of shrugging, as if to say that her G.o.ds had worked their will without consulting her." So be it. I bow to the will of She-Who-Creates. Let proof be brought and given if humankind have no other way of discerning the truth. But proof will be mattering little if all of you are dead because of the great cataclysm that will fall upon you."

Most of Henry's retinue still seemed to be staring at Blessing, who had stirred in Heribert's arms, yawning mightily and twisting her little mouth up as she made a sleepy face and subsided again.

But Henry was listening." What cataclysm do you mean?" He regarded her intently.

"You are knowing an ancient prophecy made by a holy woman among your people, are you not? In it is she not speaking of a great calamity?"

Rosvita spoke, unbidden, as words came entire to her mind. ;' 'There will come to you a great calamity, a cataclysm such as you have never known before. The waters will boil and the heavens weep blood, the rivers will ran uphill and the winds will become as a whirlpool. The mountains shall become the sea and the sea shall become the mountains, and the children shall cry out in terror for they will have no ground on which to stand. And they shall call that time the Great Sundering.'"

"Are you threatening my kingdom?" asked Henry gently." By no means," retorted Alia with a rare flick of anger." Your people exiled mine ages ago as you know time, and now my people are returning. But the spell woven by your sorcerers will rebound against you threefold. What a cataclysm befell Earth in the long ago days is nothing to what will strike you five years hence, when what was thrown far returns to its starting point."

"Like the arrow Liath shot into the heavens," said Sanglant in a soft voice. He seemed to be speaking to himself, mulling over a memory no one else shared." Shot into the sky, but it fell back to earth. Any fool would have known it would do that."

"What mean you by this tale?" demanded Henry." What do you intend by standing before me now, Alia?"

Alia indicated her own face, its bronze complexion and alien lineaments." Some among my people are still angry, because the memory of our exile lies heavily on us. After we have returned to Earth, they mean to fight humankind. But some among us seek peace. That is why I came." She stepped forward to rest a hand on Sanglant's elbow." This child is my peace offering, Henri."

Henry laughed." How can I believe these wild prophecies? Any madwoman can rave in like manner, speaking of the end times. If such a story were true, then why do none of my studious clerics know of it? Sister Rosvita?"