The Gathering Storm (Crown of Stars #5)

The Gathering Storm (Crown of Stars #5) Page 246

“If I’d discussed it with you when we were alone, you’d have persuaded me otherwise. I couldn’t have done it. This way, there is no going back.”

“Ai, God. I can’t bear to think of leaving you when we might never … If I die, Sanglant—”

“Hush. Hush.”

They hushed for a time, but eventually the lady composed herself. “I’ll need perhaps fifty troops to protect me. That should be enough to move swiftly, enough to provide a real shield, but not so many that they’ll be at risk when they cross through the crowns.”

“Yes, twenty-five men and horses and twenty-five of the centaurs, and a few pack animals. You must take Breschius. For a captain … Wichman is daring and bold.”

“Scarcely better than a savage!”

“Then which other?”

“Bertha seems competent and even-tempered.”

“She’s not even-tempered, but she knows when to stay cool.”

“And won’t be raping every comely girl her retinue passes by, I should think.”

He chuckled. “As to that, if rumor is true, I can’t say.”

Liath made a sharp, disgusted sound and there was a flurry of movement beneath the cloak. “It’s nothing to laugh over. How can you think it funny?”

“Forgive me, my love. You’re right. Wichman’s behavior is nothing to make light of.” He bent his head and for a while, as Anna stared, knowing she ought not to, he kissed his wife. She couldn’t really see them clearly; there wasn’t enough moon, but she could see shapes and she could feel that kiss through the air, as though it were a live thing nudging against her body.

After a while they disentangled, if not by much, and Liath spoke cautious words as delicately as if she were walking on ice.

“I know you were alone for many years, yet it chafes me, a betrayal.”

“Who betrayed whom first?”

“I did not abandon you! I had no choice.”

He was silent. The night lightened as the gibbous moon drifted free of clouds. Its silver ran on the waters.

“How many lovers?” Liath asked.

“How many? Ah.” He hesitated, then sighed. “Well, first—”

“Nay, I didn’t mean you must detail each one.”

“Then why did you ask?” He got up, leaving her wrapped in the cloak, and paced to the river, where he scrabbled among the stones on the shore for a rock to toss into the rushing water. The plop of its splash was heard, not seen. “Not enough. Too many. And none of them were you. I hated you for leaving me.”

And well you should have! Anna wanted to shout.

What woman could bear to abandon such a man? It was all very well to prate about necessity and duty, but if you really cared for a person that much, you would never leave them behind, no matter what.

Not unless they asked you to.

“Ai, God, Liath. This hurts more than any injury I’ve ever suffered. I can’t bear to leave you again.”

“I know. I know. But what choice have we, my love? We are prisoners of power. If we survive, we will be reunited. Now come. Don’t stand so far from me.”

“Hsst! Anna!” The whisper made her leap right off the ground because it came so unexpectedly and from directly behind her. “What are you doing out here?”

“I beg pardon, Captain Fulk! Just, um, just coming out to pee.”

“If you’re finished, you might want to go back into camp. It isn’t wise for anyone to walk beyond the sentry line.”

He pointedly did not look toward the river or the two figures now embracing. He waited until she sighed, and turned, and followed him back into camp.

The stone circle stood on what had been an island before the river had eaten a new channel. Now it lay on a point with one flank washed by the flowing waters. The old secondary channel had filled in at one end, creating a rock-strewn earthen bridge between the land and the low hill where the crown was erected. Soldiers led the horses to drink by turns in the Slough while the prince, his wife, and the old shaman investigated the stone crown together with a dozen attendants.

There were few trees in this part of the world, and even the brushy scrub along the riverbanks was scoured low by the winter winds and heavy snow, so the crown was easy to see. The stones shone golden where the weltering sunlight washed across them; a few glinted, light catching in crystals embedded deep, as if the stones were chiseled from granite or marble. There were nine in all, arranged not quite in a circle but in a figure that bore more resemblance to an oval. Two of the stones listed, and one stone stood perilously near a low bluff where the current wore away the earth. The grass between the stones had been trampled, revealing a hummock in the center.