Rope chafes his wrists and ankles as he shuffles along, tugged awkwardly at intervals when the wagon to which he is tied speeds up. Once he slams into the back, not anticipating that it has stopped. Sharp rocks cut his feet, and he shifts in the hope of finding gentler ground.
A man curses him; a whip stings his backside more in annoyance than because he has hindered the line. The pain makes him flinch, but he does not cry out.
He has no voice. He cannot see. Blind and mute.
The canoe bumped up against the willow’s trunk as Stronghand threw his head back, searching the mist, but like the swamp lights the vision was already gone. Vanished.
What had happened to Alain? Where were the hounds?
He hadn’t the luxury for questions. They were vulnerable to attack here at the foot of the island cliff; a sentry moved far overhead. “What’s that light?” the sentry called.
Elafi grasped the trunk of the tree. He eased his fingers under the peeling bark and pried a piece of the trunk open to reveal a gaping hole large enough to admit the boat. The willow was rotten inside but cunningly disguised so as to seem whole. Elafi and Ki pushed them through as, above, a second sentry replied to the first.
“Swamp lights. See, that one just winked out.”
They glided under the willow’s gnarled roots and came into a chamber awash in mud and stinking of decay. Rocking the canoe, Ki leaned precariously out over the stern to close up the opening behind them.
“From here we must climb,” whispered Elafi.
They left the canoe, careful not to tip it, and waded through knee-deep sludge to a rock embankment. The air seeped like liquid into Stronghand’s lungs; the mud oozed around his shins, slurping and sucking. He had never smelled anything so vile, and he was careful to keep the standard entirely out of the muck lest some poison in the sludge contaminate its magic.
Elafi’s lamp illuminated the young man’s face as he scrambled up the embankment. He lifted the lamp to reveal a maw ridged with huge teeth. The jawbone and teeth of some huge creature, yawning, made the archway through which they must pass into a low tunnel.
“What is it?” asked First Son as Last Son grunted with surprise.
“A wyvern,” said Ki, behind him. “In ancient days the old sorcerers killed it and laid it here in the earth. A wyvern’s bones hold magic. That’s why it’s never been found by our enemies.”
Stairs made of slate slabs had been laid into the earth, braced on one side against the huge spinal column. As the creature had died, it had rolled to the right, and it was the impossibly long rib cage of the dead wyvern that gave support to the tunnel’s damp earth walls, so it seemed they were climbing up inside its belly. Only Ki and Elafi could stand upright; the RockChildren had to hunch over as they climbed the stairs by feel, since Elafi’s body blocked most of the light.
Maybe it was the magic lingering in the wyvern’s bones. Maybe it was the darkness, or the proximity of the stone crown. With each careful step up to the next slate stair, flashes of sound and sensation ripped through Stronghand.
“I don’t like the sound of that!” says one of the men—they all smell rank, that much he does know. “Move on! Move on! If we’re caught here, we’ll be slaughtered.”
His fingers slipped along a smooth rib, but he steadied himself and took another step up.
“Get up, bitch! Or I’ll kill the baby.” A woman sobs, crying for mercy.
He turns, seeking the direction of that despairing voice.
Far away, as in a dream, he hears horses’ hooves.
“Go! Go!”
“We’ll split up and meet in the town.”
He gropes, finds the weeping woman’s arm, and helps her up. A switch cuts into his ear, the one that throbs all the time, the swollen one, and he jerks back as pain roars through his head.
He staggered and barely caught himself, hand grasping at dirt, claws shicking out to scrape earth and send it spattering to the ground.
“Stronghand?” First Son sounded surprised, as well he might to see any sign of weakness.
Elafi hissed. “Hush, now! Hush!”
They waited as Elafi went ahead into the darkness, the gleam of curved bone flashing above him with each step until the young man simply vanished.
Stronghand took a step forward to follow him.
“I’ll take the woman.”
Screaming, she fights them. Her arm is torn from his grasp but as she is hauled away, she thrusts a bundle into his arms. The wagon lurches forward and he almost loses his footing as the rope snaps tight. He stumbles forward in its wake, clutching the bundle against him, wondering what it is. Moisture leaks onto his hands through cloth. For a while he has as much as he can do to trot along behind the rolling wagon, with staffs prodding him and the others who are bound.
There were more like him once, but over the course of many days—he can’t keep track of how many—the rest fell behind or were taken away or died. He doesn’t know. He can’t see, and what he hears is often interrupted by gouts of pain that stab through his head.
He is missing something, though. He knows that much. Now and again he weeps with anger and despair.
As the wagon steadies onto a smooth forest path, the grassy track a pleasant tickle under his callused, battered feet, he pulls the cloth free and searches the bundle with a hand.
An infant. He is carrying an infant. Blood curdles in the hollow of its sunken chest.
It is already dead.
The torrent of sensation and emotion raged through him until he was overwhelmed, awash. He gasped for air as he staggered again, leaning on his staff to stop himself from falling. His feet slipped on something round and cylindrical, and he swayed as he struggled to regain his balance, to show no weakness before the others. The bone beads tied to the standard rattled softly. Stray bits of dirt spun past his nostrils and dusted his tongue.
“Careful.” Elafi’s touch on his arm came out of the darkness. “There are bones. You’ll slip, just so. Just past here.”
The tunnel debouched into a corbeled chamber, dry and dusty and crammed with neat piles of bones laid into alcoves that gleamed fitfully as Elafi turned all the way around to shine his light into each one. Stronghand straightened, as did First Son and Last Son, and stared somberly at this burial ground. Ki’s breathing sounded very loud, as if she were frightened—or awestruck.
Yet what was there to be frightened of? He glanced back at the tunnel, all but this last portion of which had been formed by the framework of the wyvern’s skeleton. The living could find uses for the dead.
“The wise ones of our tribe are buried here,” said Ki.
“This will be my resting place,” added Elafi.
“You are a sorcerer?”
The young man smiled. Dirt smudged his cheeks and nose, and his eyes seemed very dark. “Did you see a deer, out by the willow tree where we hid? The Albans did.”
Stronghand nodded. “Are you more powerful than the tree sorcerers?”
“I am not unlike them. But alone, I cannot combat them. I am the last sorcerer in my clan.”
“And it’s a good thing you have a clever warrior like me to protect you!” said Ki.
Elafi smiled as he set the lamp in the center of the chamber, under the highest point of the corbeled ceiling, and nodded at Stronghand. “From here you must go on alone. What happens then is up to you and your gods.”
“Where is the stone crown?”
Elafi gestured upward. “This chamber lies in the center, and the great stones beyond it, around it, with their feet in the earth. They chain it to the earth so the dead cannot escape.”
Did all stone crowns conceal chambers at their heart? Did the WiseMothers incubate human bones? Or something else?
Yet ever since Alain’s return, he had suspected what the truth might be. He just hadn’t decided what to do about it yet.
“Show me,” he said.
Elafi pointed to one of the alcoves. “You’ll crawl through there. The tunnel twists
and turns back on itself, but I think you are slender enough to get through. You’ll find a ladder. In ancient days it led up to the sorcerer’s house, but you’ll see that it’s long since been covered over. That’s why it’s secret now. That’s why the Albans know nothing of it. There’s a trapdoor set in place by my mother’s father’s father’s uncle. You can crawl through the old foundation. A new shelter has been built over the old one. From underneath you can look out over the stone crown without ever being seen. Or you can squeeze out and walk into the stone circle, if you dare. The Albans and their tree sorcerers fear the stone crowns. They do not venture there at night. These circle priests may be more bold.” He nodded at Stronghand. “You wear their mark yourself. Maybe you know.”
“Maybe I do.” He stabbed the standard’s sharpened end down into the dirt and fixed it there before turning to First Son and Last Son. “Guard this.”
One alcove contained only animal bones, arranged just like the others so that with a glimpse they looked the same as human bones. Laid there, Stronghand supposed, because it was no sacrilege to disturb them as he did, crawling past. He eased along a narrow passage that twisted back on itself twice; the second time the crooked bend was so sharp that he had to back up, unfasten his ax, and push it ahead of him. The iron head rammed against earth, but he was able to adjust the angle and shift it around the bend. Dirt made his ears itch. He pushed himself around that curve and wriggled forward over the wood handle. The axhead had come up against a wall of banked earth, and here he touched the bottom rung of a wooden ladder. It was too dark to see, and he hesitated, wondering if the visions would come again, would even cripple him, but nothing happened.
It was impossible to know what had happened to Alain. Without Alain’s sight, he, too, was blind and lost in Alain’s dreams. Yet it was still better than the lack he had suffered when Alain had vanished from Earth.
He got to his knees and slid the ax back through its loop before testing the rungs. One bent beneath his weight, but they held as he climbed. It was an unexpectedly long way up, with dirt pressing around him on all sides; the metal links of his long waist girdle scraped earth with a sound rather like a bird scratching for bugs. When he reached the topmost rung, he felt above him and after a bit found a metal latch. He fiddled with it until he identified the clasp that released it. Then he paused and listened.
He heard nothing at all.
After a while he braced his knees against the rungs, wiggled his ax up into his fighting hand, and released the clasp. He cracked it open to admit light and sound, but only darkness greeted him. Distantly he heard the muffled sounds of the camp.
It took a bit of doing to crawl out because the trap could not open fully; the ceiling above was too low and was in truth not a ceiling but a floor. The space had once been filled with dirt and debris—its film coated his hair and irritated his eyes—but one of Elafi’s forebears, perhaps that same uncle, had dug a passage through it. He felt along it, pushing his ax before him, and touched not just dirt but potsherds, scraps of -wood, two nails, and once a bit of wool cloth, all smashed down into the earth. A footfall sounded directly above him, muted by floorboards and yet another layer—rushes or yet more earth; he could not tell. He squeezed along until the slope of the ground dropped suddenly out from below his hands. Groping forward, he found himself with room to crouch and an unexpected view past warped planks to the stone crown. Torches burned, startlingly bright, but the circular ground that lay between the partially restored stones was empty.
Yet he heard voices.
“It gripes me that we are beholden to these heathens. I don’t trust them. They’re coarse and low. They’re rude and arrogant.”
“Patience, Father Reginar.” The second man spoke Wendish with rigidly correct grammar but a marked accent and frequent pauses to negotiate unfamiliar words. “As long as they control this crown by force of arms, we must ally with them.”
“You just arrived here, Brother Severus. You don’t know what they are. They are in bed with the Enemy! Such things they do—! Did you see that the queen has more than one husband? Four, at least, old and young, fawning on her. She takes a different one to bed every night, and there are even two youths to warm the bed of the ancient one. It’s sickening. I don’t think God would wish us to—” He had the petulant voice of a man accustomed to his every whim brought to fruition, but Severus’ sharp reply cut him off.
“We have no other choice. Where are their sorcerers?”
Chastened but not meek, the young man answered in a scornful tone. “They refuse to come here at night. They say it is forbidden.”
“God Above! If they refuse to come up at night, then none of them can ever learn to weave the crowns!”
“Yes, Brother. So we have discovered.”
“Well. I have greeted their queen and made talk with her about an alliance between Queen Adelheid and Prince Henry and these Albans. Prince Ekkehard should prove docile enough to make a husband for her maiden daughter, if we can find him.”
“Wasn’t my cousin offered to the church?”
“He may have been. If the skopos wishes him to serve her in this manner, none will protest.”
“No, indeed, Brother Severus. No, indeed. That she singled me out for this honor!” Only the young could fawn so enthusiastically. “That she singled me out to assist her in this great undertaking—!”
“Indeed.” The snappish way Brother Severus spoke the word silenced the other man. “Sister Abelia may prove more persuasive with the sorcerers, since they seem to defer to women. I detest waiting as much as you do, but we have no choice.”
Stronghand wiggled one of the planks until it shifted, and he turned it sideways and squeezed through, then paused, lying up against the building as the two men walked out of the house not three paces from him, down a pair of steps, and onto the grass, still talking.
“Was it a difficult journey, Brother Severus? The dangers are many in these times.”
“We had a delay, a detour. I had an errand to run for the skopos to the monastery at Hersford, but we had swift riding after that and our crossing from Medemelacha went smoothly.”
Hersford. Alain had sojourned at Hersford. Memory niggled Stronghand like the annoying whine of a dog. Had he heard Severus’ sour voice in his dreams?
“The war is going badly for the Albans, as you may have seen,” continued the younger man, pleased with his tidings. “The queen’s uncle and brother march to bring aid, but we’ve not heard yet from him, although there’s a rumor now that his army was utterly destroyed by the Eika. Who can be worse? These Albans, with their pagan rites, or the godless Eika?”
“Our task is clear, Reginar. How God choose to punish the heathens matters nothing to us unless it interferes with our undertaking. It’s true there are many dangers afflicting us, Albans and Eika, heretics and civil war. We avoided the Eika ships on the crossing, thank the Lord. I had to raise a small illusion—”
“But you taught us to detest the illusionist’s skill as a tissue of lies, Brother! Unworthy of our talent and serious purpose!”
“So it is. But while one should rightly detest a lowly bard who sings for his supper and entertains the common folk with bawdy tunes unfit for cultured ears raised on the Heleniad and the Philologia of St. Martina, it is understood that God have created every creature with a purpose, however vulgar it may be.”
“I have met a few such base creatures in my time!”
“Indeed. It is our task to rule and theirs to serve. In any case, on our journey the Lady’s justice traveled with us, or we would not have made it this far and in such good time.”
“That is a blessing, Brother.”
“So it is. Yet matters remain unsettled. There is much to do and less time than we need. We have little hope of sending anyone north, if the seventh crown lies in Eika territory, as we believe it must. And although our brethren have found the Salian crown, the civil war there grows desperate. I fear Sister Abelia will not be safe when she travels
there to supervise the others. Their work on restoring the crown goes slowly. They are having a difficult time finding workers willing to toil when they are always in fear for their lives.”
Stronghand felt a very human urge to laugh. Truly, at times, it seemed forces far greater than he were at work, smoothing his path.
The two robed men crossed to the grassy sward lying within the great circle. The flickering torchlight weirdly shadowed the upright stones. Of the seven monoliths, four had yet to be raised. A third figure appeared, hurrying toward them past one of the fallen stones.
“Brother Severus?”
“Sister Abelia.” They were mostly shadow, despite the torches; Stronghand could distinguish them by height and the distinctive way each one moved. Severus had arrogance, while the younger man, Reginar, moved with more boldness and less discipline. The woman had determination, at least; she was farthest from him and most difficult to see. “How have you fared?”
“Poorly, Brother Severus,” she said with obvious disgust. “It is as Father Reginar says. They will not enter the stones at night, no matter what argument I offer them. They say it is forbidden to them. I think they are craven.”
Stronghand rolled up to his feet and padded forward as the two men absorbed her words. He marked one sentry, a stocky figure mostly hidden behind a straggle of brush; an arrow’s shot down the hill lay tents. Otherwise, they were alone.
The wind gusted, and a misting rain hissed across the grass, gone as quickly as it had come. The young man pulled up his hood, but the old one took no notice. He seemed to be fuming, rubbing fingers over his balding pate, impatient to get on with their task and put annoying obstacles behind him.
Stronghand walked right up behind them, testing the ax’s heft in his hand. The feel of the handle gripped in his palm always gave him a sense of well-being.
“What will we do, Brother?” asked Sister Abelia.
Seeing the shadow of Stronghand’s movement, she gasped and clapped her hands to her face, too startled to flee.