“Yes.” Groping, Elene found a chair and sank into it with Berthold supporting her. Once she was sitting, he kept a hand protectively on her shoulder as she told her tale in a halting voice, backtracking often, repeating herself, and without question obfuscating where she could.
She was terrified, that was easy to see, and humiliated because she knew she was afraid. She made mistakes and revealed more than she meant to: how Meriam had demanded that her son sacrifice his eldest daughter to Anne’s cabal; how they had been shipwrecked but rescued by Brother Marcus; how Wolfhere had vanished in Qurtubah, near the ruins of Kartiako, because the others suspected he had turned against them; how a simple, illiterate brother called Zacharias had saved her from the monstrous akreva, taking the poison meant for her; how she and Meriam and their tiny retinue had crossed through the crown into the deserts of Saïs, into a trackless waste where no creature lived or breathed; how Meriam had woven the great spell with Elene’s assistance, on that terrible night.
“She died.” Elene’s voice was more croak than human and her body shuddered as Berthold patted her shoulder. She did not cry. “She needed my strength, but she sent me back at the last moment. She had planned it with Wolfhere all along.”
“With Wolfhere? Planned what?”
“That he would follow us and return me to my father. She fulfilled her vow to Anne. She knew it was right, what they did. But the Seven Sleepers failed. The Lost Ones have returned. They will kill all of humankind if they can. In Jinna lands they still tell tales of the ancient war with the Aoi. My grandmother heard those stories when she was a child. You know what Anne meant to do—to banish the Lost Ones forever, so they would never trouble us again. Why did you abandon Mother Anne, knowing that her cause was just and necessary?”
“I saw no reason to sacrifice myself when I could serve God better by surviving. Did Anne know that she and all the others would die? That the weaving would extract its own cost? Did Sister Meriam know she was doomed? Did all of them die?”
By the way Elene lowered her eyes and sagged against Berthold, Antonia guessed she was about to lie. “I could not see into the weaving. I only know …” She wept.
Berthold shot Antonia an indignant glance. “Is this necessary?” He looked so much like his father that Antonia had a momentary sense of dislocation, as if she had been thrown by means of a spell back to the days of her youth. But she had to press on.
“What do you know, Lady Elene?”
“Something terrible happened. I don’t know who fought the spell, but it broke down in the north, and then something terrible happened. White fire, and a river of burning rock. My grandmother was …” Her lips twisted as she struggled not to sob out loud. “She was gone, engulfed utterly in a blast of light. Later, a wind flattened our camp. Our servants were killed, smothered in sand. There came … a creature that dug out of the sands.” She covered her eyes with a hand. “A huge lion, but it had wings, and the face of a woman. It was going to kill me. Wolfhere came, and we escaped.”
“The ancient messengers of God.” A fire of excitement burned in Antonia’s heart. The rush of heady discovery made her giddy. “The oldest stories come to life! Is this true, that you have seen such things? One of the lion queens, the holy messengers of God?”
“I saw them.”
“What did Wolfhere do that allowed you to escape their just wrath?”
Elene grimaced and wiped her cheeks as she calmed herself. “Ask him. I fainted from loss of blood.”
“Can you mean they struck, and yet you survived?”
“Do you not believe me?”
Elene pulled her tunic up to display a length of bare thigh, supple and comely. Berthold flushed bright red and looked away, but Antonia saw the whitened scars from three cruel cuts that had torn the flesh and healed cleanly. A cat might leave such a mark, if it were very, very large.
“Very well,” said Antonia. “I believe you, Lady Elene. You will remain here in the custody of Queen Adelheid. Do not forget the galla.”
She left them, but it was difficult to concentrate on the discrete rungs of the ladder with her thoughts in a tumult. What power did Wolfhere have? He seemed the least powerful of Anne’s cabal, the one who wandered in the world to give reports back to the others because it was the only thing he could do. Yet he and Antonia were apparently the only ones who had survived out of Anne’s cabal. There might be others of Anne’s schola who had received some training in the arts of sorcery, but it was likely they had perished in Darre or cowered in fear in some hiding place. Without a strong leader, they were no more than boats set adrift without oars or rudder.
On the lower floor, Heribert still stood by the window. By all appearances he hadn’t moved at all since she had gone upstairs. His glance touched her, then flicked away.
His disinterest infuriated her. She struck with the only weapon she had. “If Prince Sanglant loved you, he would not have abandoned you.”
That caught his attention. He regarded her first with puzzlement, then with faint comprehension. “That’s what the other one said. If he loved me, he would not have abandoned me.” He tried out the words, considering the concept. It was not like Heribert to be so slow. “Where did he go? I look and look, but I cannot find him.”
“North, so it is said! Back to Wendar in search of the one he loves more than you. He never loved you.”
He shook his head as might a child, trying to shake off a hurt that would never go away. “That can’t be. He loved me. But he abandoned me to follow the other one. It’s the other one who stole him.”
His ponderous maundering annoyed her. She had done so much for him, and this was how she was repaid. She continued down to the guardroom, eager to depart the North Tower now that she had so much to think about. How far did Elene’s sorcerous abilities extend? Impossible to know.
“Be sure that none of those here leave the tower until I give further orders,” she said to the sergeant. “Not even Lord Berthold. I know he is a favorite among you for his amiability, but he must remain confined to the tower for the time being.”
“Yes, Holy Mother. But there are certain chores and tasks that my men don’t wish to be involved in. Who is to do those?”
“The servant girl can continue to run errands for you in such matters. She will not attempt to escape. Where has the old man been placed?”
“In the dungeon, Holy Mother.”
“Make sure he is chained, so he has no chance of escape. He is dangerous, although he may appear inoffensive and weak.”
“Yes, Holy Mother.”
As a mark of favor, she allowed him to kiss her ring.
Her attendants escorted her through Novomo’s gardens and open corridors to her audience chamber. The day’s supplicants had been waiting, crowded outside the chamber. Inside, Antonia stood with arms outstretched as her servants arrayed her in the holy vestments. She settled in the high-backed chair with the Holy Lance of St. Perpetua laid on a table, on cloth, beside her. The golden cup was filled with wine and placed on an embroidered tablecloth draped over a table behind her. A dozen scribes sat at a table to her right, prepared to record the petitions, the litigants, and her decisions.
Clerics opened the doors. The petitioners crept forward on their knees and one by one pleaded, begged, and made excuses.
“I pray you, Holy Mother, I have in my possession this letter granting me the benefice of St. Asklepia in Noria, but without an escort of twenty armed men I cannot risk the journey south along the coast. Without my presence, there is no accounting for the riot and ruin that may afflict the land. I cannot pay taxes into your treasury if I am not there to supervise. Pray delegate soldiers for this task….”
“Lord Atto has set his own bastard son as abbot over our monastery, Holy Mother, and this scoundrel keeps three concubines in his chamber and a pack of dogs in the chapel. We pray you, let our good Brother Sylvester be raised to become Father over the cloister of St. Justinian. Have this evil man turned out as he deserves….”
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“I pray you, Holy Mother, every last stand of ripe grain was burned and all our vineyards destroyed last autumn. I have no stores and the people in my parish are starving….”
“It’s true we are obligated to provide thirty armed and provisioned soldiers and their mounts for the skopal palace. We are hard-pressed in our own county at this time and need all those men to hold off brigands and outlaws….”
“Our biscop died last autumn, Holy Mother. We pray you, appoint a worthy successor….”
Every day except Ladysday she heard such cases, or ones so similar that without the record of the clerks she might have gotten confused when a competing group of brothers from the same monastery of St. Justinian arrived to press a claim for the very bastard son whom they said had been slandered by evil men and who was in truth a most pious and learned shepherd who would be happy to offer a generous donation to the papal treasury to prove his worth. Folk would shirk their tithe, and then turn around and beg her to take various foundlings and wastrels into foundations she controlled, but she knew it was only an attempt to fob off extra mouths onto others more willing to feed them. Still, she did not turn away the unwanted. They could always be put to work, and they would be grateful to be alive. The cleverest among them could be trained to act as servants in her growing schola, the least could clean out stables and sweep streets, and the queen always had need of the wicked to toil in the mines. The strong would survive; the rest would smother under the weight of their sins.
For now, she and Adelheid had to rule carefully to gain that measure of authority which would allow them to expand their sphere of influence. That Darre had fallen confused the multitude. Daily, refugees staggered in from the south with tales that scalded a man’s ears—rapine, devastation, looting, buildings torn apart down to the last foundation stone by desperate folk seeking to rebuild elsewhere, pirates along the shore, robbers along the road, and children dying with flies crawling over their eyes and mouths. It was necessary to act ruthlessly to establish preeminence against the many forces rumbling and boiling throughout the stricken Aostan lands. She had no authority save that of God, but of course the authority conferred on her by God’s will was higher than all others.
Every day, therefore, when the last of the petitioners had been heard, when all were gathered in the hall to gain her blessing before setting out on their journeys back to their own lands, when Queen Adelheid arrived from her own audience chamber to share a final benediction and prayer, a statement was read out. Antonia had compiled it herself from such writings as had been rescued from the skopal palace in Darre and from her own understanding of necessity and truth. The assembly would hear, and they would carry news of it back to their homes.
The skopos can be judged by no one;
The Dariyan church has never erred and never will err until the end of time;
The Dariyan church was founded by the blessed Daisan alone;
St. Thecla the Witnesser was the first skopos;
The skopos alone can depose and restore biscops;
She alone can call councils and authorize holy law;
She alone can revise her judgments;
She alone can depose emperors;
She alone can absolve subjects from their allegiance;
All princes and noble vassals must kiss her feet;
Her legates, however humble, have precedence over all biscops;
An appeal to the skopal court supersedes any other legal appeal;
The skopos is undoubtedly made a saint by the merits of St. Thecla.
Every day Adelheid, queen and empress, bent her head and listened in apparent humility. Like Antonia, she knew they had nothing but God’s authority on which to rebuild what had been lost. Therefore, God would succor them, and they would do what was right by God. Wicked folk would hate Antonia for her fidelity to God, but she knew that the Lord and Lady had brought her to this position because They wished all those who stood in the Circle of Unity to obey her. St. Thecla had risked all to witness. Antonia could do no less.
“There will be more tomorrow,” said Adelheid when the audience hall had cleared and they sat in a pleasant silence with only the scratching of pens and the gossiping of Adelheid’s servants to distract them. Lamps were lit. Lady Lavinia excused herself to attend to four relatives, one a holy presbyter, who needed to be settled in before the evening’s feast.
“There will always be more, Your Majesty.” Antonia admired her clerics as they worked industriously on codicils, grants, and letters. “As we govern wisely, our influence increases.”
“Yes. More come every week.”
“They fear the Enemy. Therefore, they come to us for rescue. Soon we go in to supper, Your Majesty. It is necessary we discuss Duke Conrad’s daughter and the Eagle. The girl is a sorcerer, trained by her grandmother. She is dangerous.”
“Because she is a sorcerer, or because she is not loyal to us?”
“I recommend you kill her at once. Be certain to strike when she least expects it, or while she sleeps. She may have weapons at her disposal that will make her difficult to kill.”
Adelheid regarded her in silence. One by one, lamps were lit in the hall, casting shadow and light according to God’s will: skopos and empress in pools of light, and the rest in the growing shadows each depending on their nature.
“What of the Eagle? Henry never trusted him.”
“Kill him, too, if you wish it, but he may yet be of use to you. He knows the secrets of Anne’s power. He knew her longer than anyone. He has power of his own that I do not yet understand.”
“Where have they come from? Why are they here? Is it not important we learn these things?”
“I have possession of her story. Anne is dead.”
“How can the girl know this for certain? Where did they come from?”
“From the deserts of Saïs. I will tell you the whole later, after we have eaten.”
“How could they have crossed the Middle Sea when such monstrous waves destroyed every shoreline?”
“How and where they crossed I do not know. Only the Eagle can tell us that tale.”
Adelheid’s gaze skimmed the audience hall, noting each person and what they were doing or to whom they were speaking, noting what soldiers guarded the door and which shutters were open and which closed. “What power have I here, Holy Mother? I have your power, as skopos. It has served us well. So far.”
“Do you not trust in God, Adelheid?”
Her expression was wary, and her tone sharp. “It is men I do not trust. A powerful lord—and there are still some in Aosta, especially in the west where they were spared the worst of the cataclysm—may choose to raise another biscop or holy deacon to high office. She may claim the skopos’ throne, and that family will therefore gain support for their own faction.”
“Their claims would be false.”
“So we would argue.”
“You have seen God’s hands at work here on Earth. How can you doubt Their power?”
“I have seen destruction raised by a great working, raised by human hands. All I know of God’s power is that They chose to spare me from death while killing Henry. I have one child who lives, and another who will soon die.” The shadows had touched her, but she went on without faltering. “I have few supporters from the noble clans who rode south and east to support Henry’s empire. Darre is in ruins, uninhabitable. What remains of southern Aosta I do not know. I have marched through the eastern lands myself. They are devastated. Must I go to the Arethousans for help? Sanglant will not aid me. He intends to become regnant in Henry’s place. Yet now Elene of Wayland falls into my hands. With her, I might buy cooperation from Duke Conrad. He has ambitions of his own. She is more valuable to me alive than dead.”
“She is dangerous.”
“Are you not more dangerous still, Holy Mother? ‘The skopos can be judged by no one.’ This is a powerful spell.”
“It is no spell! The skopos is obliged to govern all peoples who reside in the Circ
le of Unity.”
“Then is the emperor, or empress, your servant?”
Antonia nodded. “As above, so below.”
“You have other servants, scourges whose touch is death.”
“I have the tools I need.”
“You are well armed for the coming war. Let me keep Lady Elene alive, as a hostage, a companion piece to Princess Blessing. As for the Eagle, I care not. Do with him as you wish. If his death would save my daughter’s life, I would tear out his heart with my own hands!”
“A heathen desire, Your Majesty. And yet,” she added kindly, seeing how Adelheid set her jaw and clenched her hands upon the arms of her royal chair, “spoken out of a mother’s desperation. I have no healing powers of that kind. My gift is to restore God’s realm on this Earth.”
“So I pray,” murmured Adelheid.
Antonia smiled, knowing that her first battle had been won.
XII
WHERE THEIR FLIGHT TOOK THEM
1
HE did not like it at Quedlinhame, and he liked it less so many days later at Gent when, for the second time, she rose before dawn and drew on a penitent’s robe.
“It dishonors you,” he said, watching her.
“It does not dishonor me to pray. It does not dishonor me to ask forgiveness for my sins. I am stained with the blood of many men.”
“As am I!”
She was dressed like any humble pilgrim in a robe of coarse, undyed linen, with head and feet bare despite the cool spring weather and damp ground. “You killed them cleanly. I did not.”
“We can all pray in the church for forgiveness, Liath. This …”
“This shows the church mothers that I am not afraid to stand barefoot before God even though I am a mathematicus and—the manner of creature I am. I am not a heretic. I am not afraid to be humble before Them. It’s the proud who won’t kneel before God’s truth. It’s those who fear to question who are the ones who don’t truly believe. God do not fear our questions. Otherwise why would They have made the world with so many mysteries?”