Child of Flame (Crown of Stars #4)

Child of Flame (Crown of Stars #4) Page 111

“So you see,” cried Alberada triumphantly. “The Enemy reveals its presence. An evil spirit has taken control of this man. This is the fate that awaits those who profess heresy.”

The bravest of Lord Dietrich’s noble companions knelt beside the afflicted man and got hold of his limbs, holding him down until he went unaccountably still. Foamy spittle dribbled from his lips. A single bubble of blood beaded at one nostril, popped, and ran down his lax cheek. He shuddered once, and then the floor darkened and a stink rose where he had voided his bowels.

“He’s dead,” said Ekkehard in a choked voice, shrinking away from the distorted corpse.

In the shocked silence, Biscop Alberada’s voice rang as clearly as a call to battle. “Take the excommunicates to their prison. None shall speak to them, for any who do so will be excommunicated in their turn. The Enemy dwells deep within. Tomorrow we will scourge those who remain, so that we may drive the Enemy out of their bodies.”

No one objected. They had just seen the Enemy at work.

The church cleared quickly. Alberada left with a phalanx of clerics at her back. Guards carried away the corpse, and servants stayed behind to clean up the mess. Hanna waited, because Sapientia did not move away immediately. The princess waited because Bayan knelt at the altar, as if praying. Somehow, Brother Breschius had gotten hold of one of the silver cups, and when the church was empty except for Bayan, Sapientia, and several of their most loyal servants, he offered it to Bayan.

Bayan wiped his finger along the lip of the cup, touched it to his tongue, and spat, making a face. “Poison,” he said softly.

There was a long silence while Hanna willed herself invisible, hoping they would not notice she had witnessed this horrible revelation. If it were even true.

“Will she poison Ekkehard?” asked Sapientia. “Should we try to stop her if we think she might?”

They had their backs to Hanna still, examining the silver cup and the sooty smudge left on the floor by the overturned candles. She edged sideways into the shadows.

“Ekkehard is not threat to us,” said Bayan heavily.

“Not now. He’s still young. But he might become a threat. And what of the church? Surely my aunt knows what she is doing if this heresy is so terrible. We must support her.”

Bayan shook his head just as Hanna touched the border of one of the tapestries. “If we not defeat Bulkezu, then are we dead or slave. This war must we finish first. Let the church argue heresy after. Eagle.”

They all leaped, all but Breschius, looking as surprised and anxious as conspirators as they turned round to see her. The tapestry could not hide her now. Bayan had known she was there all along.

“Eagle,” he repeated, now that he had her attention. “At dawn you ride to King Henry.”

“Yes, Your Highness,” she said, barely able to get the words out. She had a sickly vision of her shrunken, blackened head dangling from the belt of a Quman warrior. Was Bayan sacrificing her because of what she’d heard? Or was this only a sop to his wife’s jealousy while they hatched their plans for the succession?

“Wife.” He rose to take Sapientia’s hand. The princess hadn’t moved. One of her stewards held a ceramic lamp, a rooster crowing a lick of flame, and the light softened her expression and made her black hair glisten like fine silk. “To you, this task. Ekkehard must ride at dawn with the Eagle.”

“Is this wise?” demanded Sapientia.

“He and other prisoners must ride. We need no—what is this, Breschius, nothing to make our minds fall away from the war.”

“No distractions, Your Highness.”

“Yes, none of this thing which I cannot pronounce. Consider, how matters are desperate. The biscop is a godly woman, I know this. But she believes God come before war. Bulkezu waits not for God.” He indicated the altar and the wreath of candles burning there, the light of the Unities.

“But where do we send Ekkehard?”

“Let him go to the march of the Villams. There he can fight. There he will die or live, as God will it. He and his retinue can escort the Eagle so far, out of danger. She must to Henry go, and speak our trouble. But Ekkehard will I not have in Handelburg. That he is prisoner here makes strife in our camp. We have very bad of a situation. If King Henry send no reinforcements, if he not march east himself, then Bulkezu will burn all these lands. This is a hard truth. Maybe we can hold here for a while. If we have no strife in our army. If we have no dis—ah! No distraction.”

“It’s a good plan,” said Sapientia slowly as she considered his words. That was the great change Bayan had wrought in her; she had learned to think things over. “Ekkehard might still die, fighting the Quman, but that would be a better death for him than being executed for heresy. As a prisoner, his presence can only make things more difficult for us. Some will surely sympathize with his plight. He may still whisper his wicked words to the guards, and maybe there are some in the army who still believe him but lied about it at the trial because they did not want to get punished.”