PROLOGUE (46 page)

She shook her head. A few of the courtfolk whispered among themselves. Some snickered.

"The City of God
by Saint Augustina? Or her
De Doc-trina Daisanitia?
Jerome's
Life of Saint Paulina the Hermit?
Justin Martyr's
Dialogue with Zurhai the Jinna?"

Numbly, she shook her head and, just as King Henry raised a hand, growing bored with this display of ignorance, Hugh stood up. His audience quieted expectantly. The poor Eagle ducked her head, as any shamed creature would, to stare at the floor.

"Is it not said," Hugh asked of Sapientia and the assembled clerics and layfolk together, as a teacher addresses his students, "that the emperor of all Jinna keeps a bird which he has taught to speak human words? Have you ever seen entertainers make dogs to walk upon two legs? Such learning makes neither bird nor dog educated, however. A child trained early enough can learn the meanings of words written upon a page, and speak them out loud, but that does not mean her understanding is equally trained. I believe we have before us a curiosity." He smiled wryly but with a touch of gentle amusement such as an adult shows before an incredulous child's outrageous claims.
"Not
a prodigy. Is it not so, Your Highness? How do you judge this case?"

Thus appealed to, Sapientia nodded sternly. "Of course what you say must be true, Father Hugh. It might be a mercy, then, to take this poor creature under my wing."

Henry rose, and quickly any seated man or woman rose as well, young Brother Constantine almost spilling his red ink in his haste not to show discourtesy toward the king. "Let that be a lesson, daughter, that we are well served by wise counselors."

"And some more than others," murmured Villam so softly that only Rosvita and the king could hear.

Henry's lips quirked, and he signed to his servants. There was a sudden flurry of activity at the other end of the hall. Two servants picked up his chair and carried it over to the central place. "I think we may now sit down to table," Henry observed. He led the way.

Rosvita lingered, bitten by curiosity. The young Eagle remained kneeling. A few tears streaked her cheeks, but she made no sound, moved not at all even to wipe them away. She simply stared fixedly at the cold stone floor.

"Eagle!" called Sapientia from her seat at the central table. "Attend me!"

She rose and, silent, attended her new mistress.

A DEER IN THE I still don't like her," said Sapientia to her companion, Lady Brigida, whose status as Sapientia's current favorite gave her the privilege of combing the princess' hair in the evening before bed. "That skin of hers. It's so...so..."

"Dirty? She might wash more."

"It isn't dirt. It doesn't come off. I rubbed at it yesterday." The princess giggled. "Perhaps she's the lost sister of Conrad the Black, or his by-blow."

"Hmm. She's too old to be his by-blow . . . but perhaps not, if he bedded some girl when he was young Brother Constantine's age. Perhaps she's a Jinna slave girl who escaped her master."

"Then how would she know how to speak our language?" demanded Sapientia.

"Duke Conrad's mother didn't enter the convent after the elder Conrad died, did she? Perhaps this is her
second child
by another man." Lady Brigida had the unfortunate habit of snorting when she giggled, and she giggled a great deal, possessing ample inheritance in lands but little in wit or sense. "You wouldn't think she would have had to hide the child unless there was something
wrong
with the lover she had taken."

"I believe she lives quite retired. Still, there's something in what you say, Brigida, that she must have Jinna blood in her, for they're all brown like that. But I still say she must have some Wendish blood in her, or she'd not be able to speak our language."

"Didn't Father Hugh say any bird can be taught human speech?"

Liath endured this without flinching. Their idiocy and arrogance bothered her not one whit. At this moment, Hugh was not in the room, and after three days as Sapientia's Eagle that was the only mercy she lived for.

"Keep brushing," said Sapientia. "Whom should I marry, Brigida?"

"Lord Amalfred," said Brigida instantly. "He's very handsome and he killed a bear last week with his own hand, as you saw, as well as a dozen deer or more. I should like a husband like that. When I inherit from my mother, I'll expand her lands eastward, and I'll need a strong fighting man at my side."

"He's only the son of a Salian duchess. I must marry a man with royal connections."

"Isn't King Henry going to send for an Arethousan prince for you to marry, since your mother was an eastern princess?"

Sapientia sighed sharply and tossed her head, disturbing the smooth flow of black hair that Lady Brigida had been stroking with the comb. "Even my Eagle knows better than that, Brigida. Isn't that so, Eagle? Why can I not marry an Arethousan prince?"

In three days Liath had learned that Sapientia liked her to be stupid. "I don't know, Your Highness."

Although, in this case, she did know. But the humiliation at Hugh's hands still stung bitterly, not least because he had been right as well as wrong. It was true she read well and that Da had taught her a great deal
—but when Hugh had paraded her ignorance publicly, to torture her, she had suddenly realized that Da had taught her narrowly. She knew far more than Hugh and probably any person at court of the knowledge hoarded by the mathematici, and yet how could she judge how much Da had truly known?

She
was
young, and she had been educated on the run and in the way of arrowshots toward a hidden foe
—scattered far and wide and toward no set target. There was so much she did
not
know that any person educated in the king's schola or a cathedral school, in the convents and monasteries, would know and would be expected to know in order to be considered educated. Yet, if truth be told, she had no interest in Macrina's
The Catechetical Orations
or in the
Lives
of the early saints. The wisdom of the ancients drew her—as long as it concerned the heavens, sorcery, or natural history and the workings of the physical world. That Da had taught her to construct her city of memory, and thus she had many facts available to her stored away in that city—such as Arethousan inheritance practices—did not mean she was educated as anyone else understood the term.

"Poor thing," said the princess. "The Arethousan princes are never allowed to leave the palace, you see, my dear Brigida, because they are such barbarians that only a male can become emperor among them, and only one among the sons and nephews and cousins of the reigning emperor can become emperor after him. So if any of them get away, then they might have a claim to the throne and come back to the palace with their own army and cause a civil war. That is why there are never any civil wars in Arethousa, because once the new emperor is chosen, all of the royal princes of his generation are poisoned by his mother."

The temptation washed over Liath to correct Princess Sapientia, for if partly correct her account was so jumbled as to be absurd: The Arethousans did indeed only allow a male to be titled "Emperor," but it was the infidel Jinna
khshayathiya
who had his mother poison all those relatives who might contest his claim to the throne.

"Is that what you mean to do to Theophanu?" asked Brigida lightly.

The chill hit Liath's throat and spine at the same instant, and her hands tightened on her belt. She could not help but look toward the door, which stood half open; smoke leaked in from torches stuck in sconces in the corridor beyond.
He
came with his attendants. The torchlight made a halo around him, gilding his fine golden hair. He wore long hose, an azure tunic embroidered with sunbursts, and a cloak thrown back over one shoulder, clasped by a handsome gold-and-jeweled brooch in the shape of a panther. He looked like a noble lord just in from the hunt; only by his shaven chin could one tell he was a churchman.

Both noblewomen and all the other attendants in the chamber looked up at the same instant. Sapientia glowed. Brigida simpered.

"I beg your pardon," said Hugh smoothly. "I did not mean to interrupt you." Sapientia gestured at once and a chair was unfolded for him so he could sit beside her. Servants brought linen and water for him to refresh himself. He did not look at Liath. He didn't need to.

"We were speaking of nothing important," said Sapientia too quickly.

"No, indeed, Father Hugh," said Lady Brigida. "I heard that next we go to my uncle Duke Burchard's palace in Augensburg, and then to the royal palace at Echstatt. There's lots of good hunting."

"And a host of soldiers," added Sapientia, who always grew excited speaking of battle, "to be gathered for the attack on Gent."

"I am glad to hear it," said Hugh.

In this way they readied themselves for bed. In this guest room there were four actual beds and four additional camp beds. In every room at this time, Liath knew, an elaborate dance went on, just as it did when it came time to seat for dinner, testing rank against rank, establishing the order for who would sleep where and next to what person, so that all might know who was most privileged and who less so. Sapientia took the bed that held pride of place, centered in the room, and Hugh the one next to her. His proximity to her caused no comment
—not any more. Brigida slept on the other side of Sapientia, lesser ladies by degrees farther away on the other beds and the favored and most noble of the clerics on the remaining camp beds. Liath retreated to the door, hoping
for the chance to escape out to sleep in the stables or at least, as she had the last two nights, in the corridor.

"It is a bitter chill night," said Hugh, "and some few of my attendants have gone out to help warm the stables. All of your people may sleep herein with us, Your Highness, so that none must suffer the cold."

"Of course!" said Sapientia, always wishing to appear magnanimous, and disposition was made.

"Here, Eagle," he continued casually, "there is a place here." Hugh indicated an open space on the floor beside his bed.

She dared not object. She wrapped herself tightly in her cloak and lay down. Soon the torches were extinguished and in blackness she lay, catching now and again the wink of a gold buckle where belts or ornaments had been hung from the bed frames to wait until morning. She could not sleep, not even after the restless settling down of the twelve or fourteen people in the room had ceased and most every breath gentled into soft snoring or the long cadences of sleep. His presence and the faint murmur of his voice in a prayerlike monotone wore on her as painfully as if she lay on a thousand prickling needles. Her chest felt tight, but she could not resist peeking up at him. The shadow that was his form sat upright in bed, curved over his hands
— and threads gleamed between his fingers. He seemed to be
weaving.

As if he sensed her scrutiny, he moved, hiding his hands. "Your Highness," he whispered. "You are not yet asleep."

Sapientia yawned. "There are so many things that trouble my mind, my love. Whom shall I marry? Why can it not be you?"

"You know that is impossible, though it is my fondest wish. Were I not illegitimate
—"

"Not in my heart!"

"Hush. Do not wake the others."

"What do I care if they hear me? They know my heart as well as you do, and so shall all the court, even my husband, whatever poor sorry fool he may be. I love you more than anyone
—"

"Your Highness." He broke in gently. "It is your fate as Heir to marry, and mine as bastard and churchman to remain unwed. What God has granted us, we must endure gladly. You shall find affection and good will toward your husband in time
—"

"Never!"

"
—for it is the will of Our Lady and Lord that woman cleave to man, and man to woman, all but those who cleave instead to God and turn away from the vanities and temptations and empty pleasures of the world."

"Is that all I am to you
—!"

"Your Highness. I pray you, speak no harsh word to me, for I could not bear it. Now, what else troubles you?"

Liath dared not move, though a stone pinched her thigh. All the others breathed the even breaths of sweet dreaming.

"Theophanu."

"You need not fear Theophanu."

"That is all very well for you to say, but-
—

"Your Highness. You need not fear Theophanu."

Something in his tone made Liath shiver, and as if the . slight shift of her wool cloak on the hard stone floor alerted the princess, her voice changed.