In the Ruins (41 page)

“I wasn’t there,” said Sanglant, “or it wouldn’t have happened.”

Liath pushed away from him, but she left the book in his hands. “It’s true enough, everything they say.”

“Let us not have this argument again, Liath. You are my wife, and will be my queen.”

“I pray you, Your Majesty,” said Hathui. “Listen.”

Footsteps drummed on the church’s porch as with the flowering dawn came the many nuns and monks and clerics to sing the morning service. Mother Scholastica walked at their head, attended by the great nobles of the realm: Duchess Liutgard, Duke Burchard leaning on a staff, Margrave Gerberga, Margrave Waltharia, the children of Duchess Rotrudis the four biscops, three abbots, and many more. Hugh was not among them.

Yesterday the assembly had sung the mass while, beneath, workers had prepared a place in the crypt beside Queen Mathilda. This morning Henry would be laid to rest, and the world would go on.

“Sanglant,” said his aunt as she halted in front of him. He kissed her ring. She turned to his siblings. “Theophanu. Ekkehard.” They kissed her ring in like manner as the monastics filed forward along the aisles on either side as a stream of bowed heads and folded hands.

“There is much yet to be discussed,” said Mother Scholastica. She looked at Liath but did not, precisely, acknowledge her. “But that must wait. Who will carry Henry’s bones into the crypt?”

“The great princes,” said Sanglant, “as is fitting.”

He stepped aside to allow Mother Scholastica to move forward into the apse and up to the holy altar. Hathui retreated into the shelter granted by Fulk and his soldiers. The great princes crowded up behind Sanglant as he knelt on the lowest step, Theophanu to his right and Ekkehard to his left. They were silent as Mother Scholastica raised both hands and the assembled monastics sang the morning service.

“
Let us praise and glorify God, who are Eternal
.”

Sanglant could not keep his thoughts on the psalms, which flowed past him as might boats on a river spilling onward toward the eternal sea that is God. Memories of his father spun into view and then receded from sight: setting him on the back of his first pony, giving him his first set of arms, teaching him the names of birds, sending him out to his first battle arrayed in the Dragon’s plumage, explaining somberly to him why he could not marry Waltharia, laughing over mead, repudiating and exiling Wolfhere, weeping at his injured voice, demanding that he accept his place as Henry’s heir. Henry often said that it was necessary for the regnant to give in order to get what he wanted; he had given Sanglant everything, and in the end he had gained what he wished, although he had died to obtain it. His empire was shattered, but Wendar had not fallen. His son would not let it fall.

As the others stood, Sanglant realized he still held the book. He thrust it into Liath’s hands, ensuring that all there saw the exchange and wondered at it. This, too, his aunt would mark now and question later. With his siblings and his cousins, he hoisted the box, and with incense
trailing around them and the steady prayers of the monastics muffling the sound of so many footsteps, they carried the coffin down stone steps into the crypt. Down here the bones of his Dragons had rotted until they gleamed.

No. He shook his head, sloughing off the memory. That had been Gent, and this was Quedlinhame. This weight was that of his beloved father, not his faithful Dragons, but they had all died regardless. They were not protected by the curse that left him, in the end, safe from a death that could capture others but never his own self.

Lamps shone in splendor around the open tomb into which they placed the coffin, a glass vial of holy water, the neatly-folded but still bloody clothing in which Henry had died, and a dried bouquet of red dog roses, always Henry’s favorites. There were none in bloom in Mother Scholastica’s famous rose garden, so they had pillaged the herbarium for a suitable tribute. Later, a stone monument would be carved and placed upon the marble bier, but for now a slab of cedar carved with curling acanthus and stylized dog roses was slid into place. The stone made a hoarse scraping sound, as though it, too, grieved. There were more prayers, and the lamps, one by one, were extinguished.

Before the last lamp went out, he marked Hathui’s position, close by him, in case there was trouble.

For a long while they breathed in the silence of the crypt. He rested with hands on the slab, but it was cold and dead. How deep did fire smolder within marble, he wondered? Could this dead tomb erupt into flame through Liath’s perilous gift? For an instant, shuddering, he feared her, who might kill any of them and burn down the entire town around their corpses if it pleased her. If she were angry enough. If she were wicked and listened to the Enemy’s lies.

In darkness, doubts crept into the heart.

“Enough,” he said roughly, pushing away from the tomb.

Someone at the back of the crowd snapped fire to a wick. He hoped it was done naturally and not by Liath’s sorcery, but no one muttered in surprise or made a sign against the Enemy. He saw the faces of his companions
surrounding him. Liutgard of Fesse was frowning and pensive, lines graven deep around her mouth, and he supposed she was thinking of her daughters. Burchard of Avaria had his eyes shut, while Waltharia watched Sanglant expectantly. Theophanu seemed cast of the same marble as the effigies around her; Ekkehard looked bored. Gerberga, like Waltharia, studied Sanglant; meeting his gaze, she nodded to acknowledge him, to show that she had received his answer via Ekkehard. She had very much the look of her mother about her but without the cruel line of mouth that had betrayed Judith’s essential nature: every creature under her power would do exactly as she wished or be punished for disobedience. Yet Henry had often said that Judith was a good steward for Austra and Olsatia; those who obeyed her, flourished.

Wichman was scratching his neck and eyeing Leoba, who was drawn tight against the shelter of Theophanu’s presence. Wichman’s sisters, Imma and Sophie, spoke together in whispers, a miniature conspiracy caught out by the unexpected light. The church folk stood together as a united group behind the formidable presence of his aunt.

Hathui, marking his scrutiny, nodded.

Liath stood behind him and to his left. He could feel her but not see her. It was as if she did not want to be seen.

“Nephew,” said Mother Scholastica. “If you will assist me.”

She did not need his aid to ascend the steps, but she desired to show the assembly that they acted in concert. In the church they remained for the brief service of Terce, and when the monastics had filed out to return to their duties about the cloister, he retired with his aunt and his most intimate noble companions and kinfolk, just a few, not more than a dozen or so, to her study.

She sat in her chair. The traveling chair, the royal seat carried into Aosta and back again, was unfolded for Sanglant, and benches drawn up in ranks for the rest. He was only prime inter pares, first among equals. Yet Liath remained standing behind him after the others sat. She still held the book. One of its corners pressed into his back. Hathui took up a position by the door. Fulk and the rest of the guard had places outside, guarding all the entrances.

Mother Scholastica lifted an owl feather from her desk. The point had been trimmed to make a quill. She wore clothing rich not by ornamentation but because of the quality of the dye and fineness of the weave. The golden torque that signified her royal kinship shone at her throat; the golden Circle of Unity that marked her status as a holy abbess hung from a golden chain; she displayed only two gold rings on her hands, needing no greater treasure to advertise her high rank both as the daughter of a regnant and as God’s holy servant, shepherd over the most holy and important cloister founded and endowed by the Wendish royal house. She controlled so many estates and manor houses spread across so wide a region that half of Saony might be said to be under her rule.

“Very well, Nephew,” she said. “You have the support you desire. None here will speak against you, and your army. You have brought Henry’s remains home to be buried, which is the action of an obedient son and, perhaps, of a righteous ruler who has served God and his regnant honestly. In three days’ time I will anoint you. Then you will commence your king’s progress through Saony, Fesse, and Avaria so that the lords and clerics and common folk can see that order has returned to our land.”

He said nothing. She had not attacked yet. He was waiting for the first strike.

“You have proved your fertility at least twice over, according to reliable reports,” she continued, “although we know that one child is deceased and the other most likely so.”

The book, against his back, shifted so that a corner dug painfully in against one shoulder. He wasn’t sure if Liath was only startled, or if she’d done it on purpose.
Twice over
. He did not look at Waltharia.

“Yet there must be heirs. Among the Wendish only those who wear the gold ring—” She touched the torque that wrapped her neck. “—may become regnant. It’s true you wear the gold ring, but before this no bastard child has contested for the right to rule. Many protest that an illegitimately born child has no right to the throne. Custom argues in their favor. Yet I have studied certain histories in
the last two days. One alternative is to allow you to rule as long as you designate as your heir a child legitimately born to one of your siblings.”

Margrave Gerberga smiled and glanced at her young husband.

“I have no husband,” said Theophanu, “and Sapientia is lost.”

“Sapientia does have a child,” said Gerberga. “Hippolyta. A girl not more than six or eight years of age now.”

“And related to you as well,” said Waltharia with a sharp smile.

“Hippolyta is unsuitable,” said Mother Scholastica. “She is a bastard, like Sanglant, and born for another purpose. She has been installed in a convent and will remain there. Do not argue this point further, I pray you. As for you, Theophanu, husbands can be found.”

“So they tell me, but I have seen no evidence of it yet.”

“Henry’s children are not the only ones descended from the royal line,” said Liutgard. “I have one daughter left to me. Ermengard is legitimately born.”

Scholastica nodded. “It is something to consider. There is another course. That Sanglant marry a noblewoman whose rank and lineage will bring luster to his court, and support to his kingship. Waltharia of Villam, for instance.”

“Impossible,” said Gerberga. “Such an alliance would give the Villams too much power. However, I have a young sister, still a maiden, who has sufficient rank and lineage on both her mother’s and father’s side to become queen.”

“I might then raise the same objection,” said Waltharia. “But be assured, Gerberga, that I do not wish to marry Sanglant.”

“I would object to either alliance,” said Liutgard.

“I am already married,” said Sanglant, who was growing tired of this maneuvering. They were like dogs circling and growling around a fresh carcass.

“If you must put her aside in order to gain the throne, I’ll gladly take her into my own bed,” said Wichman.

Liath coughed, and someone in the chamber tittered.

“I was just joking,” said Wichman suddenly, sounding strangely nervous.

Waltharia, whose face Sanglant could see, looked ready to laugh.

“I am already married,” he repeated.

His aunt was not done. “Married under the old custom of bedding as a wedding, a union not even blessed by a simple deacon. Married to a woman born into a lineage whose highest aspiration was to install one of its sons in the Dragons. She brings no noble connections, no treasure, no dowry, no lands—”

“She—”

“I am not finished, Nephew!
And
she is excommunicated. She cannot become queen in this state. If she does, all of Wendar will be placed under anathema.”

Each of the biscops nodded in turn. Scholastica had arrayed her allies carefully.

“Is this what you wish, Sanglant?” asked Henry’s half sister, Biscop Alberada. “That no mass may be sung? That no soul receive burial in holy ground? All for the sake of one woman?”

“Who will enforce this anathema?” he demanded, knowing that his temper was fraying and that he was pressing forward recklessly. “The skopos is dead.”

Scholastica set the owl feather onto the desk and folded her hands to rest on that surface. She had relaxed, he saw, believing the fight won.

“The skopos is never
dead
. St. Thecla lives in every skopos. God still rules Sanglant, or had you forgotten that? It is true I am abbess here because your grandfather Arnulf the Younger placed me in this position, as befit my birth. These good abbots rule their institutions because of their good names and righteous ways. But each of these holy biscops received her mantle with the blessing of the skopos in Darre. They are her representatives here in the north, and there are others, besides, who have not had time or opportunity to meet with you yet. We—all of us—will enforce the anathema if you disobey us.”

He fumed, but he was outarmed and outnumbered, and while it was all very well to live with Liath and ride with his army and ignore that distant excommunication brought
down years ago in Autun, it was quite another thing to condemn the entire realm to spiritual exile.

“The accusation and sentence were unjust,” he said at last. “She is innocent.”

“The excommunication is valid until lifted.”

“Then lift it!”

They watched him. One abbess, four biscops, and three abbots, most considerably older than he was and well versed in the intrigues of courtly power, presented a daunting force. As Mother Scholastica had so kindly pointed out, these were only the ones who had arrived here in time. More would come, and it was likely they would bow to Scholastica’s authority, not his.

“There is a second, and greater, objection,” continued Mother Scholastica, “brought recently to our attention. She is accused of being a heretic as well. It is said that she is concealing secret texts which teach the most wicked heresy of the Sacrifice and Redemption. Even now the church struggles against the Enemy’s minions, whose whispers have infected the countryside and towns with this infection. We have long wondered how the plague of heresy first came into our land. It has been suggested that this woman has possession of a book, a forgery out of the east, that is the source of the disease. As you can imagine, this is a serious charge.”