The Burning Stone (Crown of Stars #3)

The Burning Stone (Crown of Stars #3) Page 35

Ai, Lady! They all looked at her. She wished abruptly that she had never spoken such rash words to Sapientia. But Sapientia, if young and foolish, had promise if only someone bothered to give her practical advice, and Hanna had a store of practical advice harvested from her own mother.

“Wise counsel,” said Margrave Judith with a gleam in her eyes that made Hanna exceedingly nervous. “What do you say, Hugh?”

Hugh had a certain quirk to his lips that betrayed irritation. He smiled to cover it now. His voice remained as smooth as honey, and as sweet. “It is God’s will that sister love brother. For the rest of us, we must treat weak and strong alike with equal compassion.”

“Still,” mused Judith, “I had not considered the possibility of a marriage for Prince Sanglant. I will propose to Henry that he marry Sanglant to my Theucinda.”

“You would marry your own legitimate daughter to my bastard brother?” asked Sapientia, astonished.

In her mind’s ear, Hanna could hear her mother’s voice commenting. She knew exactly what Mistress Birta would say: that Margrave Judith, a wise administrator, was merely gathering the entire flock of chickens into her own henhouse.

“Theucinda is my third daughter, just now of age. Gerberga and Bertha have their duties, their estates, and their husbands and heirs in Austra and Olsatia. Theucinda can serve me in this way, if I think it advantageous.” She drained her cup, still watching her son. “But I do not concern myself as much with Sanglant’s marriage. Do not forget that Henry may marry again.”

“As you did,” said Hugh stiffly, glancing toward Baldwin and as quickly away as if embarrassed to be caught looking.

Judith chuckled. “What is this frown, my pet? I must have my amusements.” By not glancing toward Baldwin she called attention to his presence because everyone else then looked at him. The poor boy was, truthfully, the prettiest creature Hanna had ever seen; as was now commonly said among the servings folk, he had the face of an angel.

Hugh seemed about to speak. Abruptly he moved forward to take his mother’s empty wine cup and have it refilled. When he returned it to her, she touched his wrist as lightly as a butterfly lights on a flower to sip its nectar, and for a moment Hanna thought that something passed between them, mother and son an unspoken message understood by what could be read in the gaze and in the language of the body. But she did not hold the key to interpret it.

When Judith left, Ivar was hustled away together with Baldwin, and Hanna could only catch his eye as he crossed the threshold. He lifted a hand as if in reply, and then was gone. For the rest of the day, preparations for the wedding feast consumed her attention. Mercifully, Hathui pressed her into service to escort two wagons to an outlying farmstead where stores of honey and beeswax candles had been set aside for the regnant’s use as their yearly rent.

She loitered at the farmstead, talking to the old beekeeper while his adult children and two laborers loaded the two wagons with casks of honey and carefully wrapped bundles of delicate wax. His youngest son eyed her with interest.

“Ach, the king himself!” said the old man, whom Hanna quite liked. “I’ve never seen King Henry. It’s said he’s a handsome man, strong and tall and a fine general.”

“So he is.”

“But I have seen Arnulf the Younger with these own eyes, and that sight I’ll never forget. He came here by this very farm when I was a young man, with his escort all in rich clothes and with such fine horses that it nearly blinded a man to see them. I remember that he had a scar under his left ear, somewhat fresh. He rode with an Eagle at his right side, just like you, a common Eagle! Only it were a man. Strange it were, to see a common man riding next to the king like his best companion. But he died.”

“The Eagle?” asked Hanna, curious now.

“Nay, King Arnulf. Died many a year ago and the son come onto the throne for the elder girl couldn’t bear children and it isn’t any use to have an heir if she can’t bear children in her turn, is it now?” He glanced toward one of the adults, a tired-looking woman who had an angry lift to her mouth. A number of small children helped—or hindered—the labor, but none of them ran to her. “Ach, well, they say Henry has children of his own and a fine son who got him the throne, who’s captain of the Dragons, they say.”

“That would be Prince Sanglant.” They all looked at her so expectantly that she felt obliged to give them a quick tale of the fall of Gent and its retaking.

“Ach, now!” exclaimed the old man when she had finished. “That’s a story!” He gestured to his youngest son, and the lad brought a mug of sweetened vinegar so tart despite the honeyed flavor that Hanna could not keep from puckering her mouth while her hosts laughed good-naturedly.