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“Come then, Lady. Rise. We will not march to Darre on our knees.”
“Nay, nay, we will not.” Lavinia got up at once and came forward to kiss Henry’s ring and offer him her allegiance, but it was clear that she looked first to Queen Adelheid.
“Who awaits us in Novomo?” asked Henry when Lavinia’s horse had been brought and both the lady and the queen mounted. At his signal, the royal party started forward at a sedate pace. Lavinia’s retinue split to either side of the road to let the royal party pass through their ranks, and for some while the cheering of Novomo’s soldiers drowned out any attempt at conversation.
“Who awaits us in Novomo?” Henry repeated as Lavinia’s retinue fell in behind, being given the place of honor behind Henry’s noble companions and his cohort of Lions but before the king’s clerics and schola and the rest of his army.
“Richildis, Marquess of Zuola. Gisla, Count of Placentia, and Gisla, Lady of Piata. Tedbald, Count of Maroca, and his cousin, Red Gisla. Duke Lambert of Uscar, who can bring all of the nobles of his lands if he calls them.”
“That is half of the north country,” said Adelheid. “Some of these refused to aid me when my first husband died. How can I trust them now?”
“It is true that some may be spies for Ironhead, but they have all come here to pledge their support to Your Majesties. They like Ironhead no better than I do. The drought has affected all of us, and we fear worse, because the Most Holy Mother Clementia, she who was raised to the seat of the skopos eight years ago, is dead.”
Rosvita drew the Circle of Unity at her breast and murmured a prayer for God’s mercy, just as others did, even and especially the king.
“May God grant her peace,” said Adelheid. “She is my great-aunt.”
“Truly, she comes out of a noble lineage,” agreed Lavinia. Anger lit her expression again. “Rumor whispers that Ironhead means to appoint his cousin as the new skopos, although she is not even a cleric!”
Rosvita leaned forward over the neck of her mule. “Have you heard any rumor of a Wendish frater among Ironhead’s counselors, Lady?”
“Nay, Sister Rosvita, although it is said that a Wendish-born presbyter held great influence with the ailing skopos. I have even heard it whispered that he used sorcery to keep her alive, for she suffered greatly from a palsy in her later years. No one knows whether this presbyter supports Ironhead, or defies him, although it’s said that he tried as well as he could to keep young women out of Ironhead’s rough hands. But I hear only rumor. No noble lady or lord who travels to Darre is safe from Ironhead. None of us dare go there ourselves, for fear he’ll kill us outright. You know, of course, that he gained his lands and title by murdering his half brother, and that he murdered his wife when he had no more use for her.”
“How many wait for us in Novomo?” The catalog of Ironhead’s sins had made Henry impatient. “Who else will march behind our banners? What number of milites and horsemen may we expect?”
“The wars have taken a toll on us, Your Majesty. Perhaps seven hundred.”
They rode on for a while in silence. The ring of harness serenaded them. The muted rumble of wagon wheels behind them sounded like distant thunder, but the sky remained cloudless, a hard blue shell.
“Shall we gather more support, Your Majesty?” asked Lavinia finally, as if she could bear the silence no longer.
“Nay,” said Adelheid fiercely, “let us strike hard and immediately at Ironhead, before Lord John has time to respond and build up his army.” But as she spoke, she looked toward her husband. It was his army, after all.
Henry stared ahead. They had come within sight of Novomo, its walls and towers rising where the land opened into a fine landscape of rolling hills and extensively farmed lands, fields cut by ranks upon ranks of orchards and vineyards. They had come down far enough that, looking north, Rosvita could again see the tips of the mountains touching the heavens, distant and cold.
Beyond Novomo the road ran south to the heart of Aosta. Some trick of perspective allowed her to see a distant, flat-topped hill studded with dark shapes that she first took for sheep. With a shudder of misgiving, she recognized the hilltop of standing stones. Through those stones she and Adelheid and Theophanu and the pitiful remnant of their armies had staggered over a year ago, in the spring, propelled to safety by Hugh’s magic. A spike of dread crippled her heart. Certainly they had escaped John Ironhead’s army, but they had not yet escaped the full consequences of letting a man accused of sorcery harness a most dangerous magic, one long ago condemned by the church, to help them. She could not erase from her mind’s eye the sight of the daimone Hugh had bound. She still saw clearly its writhing fury, heard the resonant bass hammer of its voice, felt the damning chill that boiled off the threads of hard light that made up its body, if the creatures known as daimones even had true bodies.
She had seen what the others had not, and yet she had acquiesced. She knew in her heart that decision would come back to haunt them all.
“A well-fitted army with horses and stout soldiers can reach Darre in ten days,” said Lavinia as they approached the gates of Novomo.
In Darre lay the key to the imperial throne that Henry had for so long dreamed of possessing.
“God march with us,” said Henry. “Adelheid is correct. We must not wait. Let us feast this night in your hall. In the morning, we will march south.”
It seemed the entire populace of Novomo turned out to greet them, running out to stand alongside the road or waiting in the narrow streets and leaning out of the windows in their crowded houses inside Novomo’s walls. Their cries and cheers rang to the heavens. When they came to the steps of Lavinia’s palace, fully two dozen noblemen and -women laid their swords at Adelheid’s and Henry’s feet.
The feast that night had the slightly frenzied spirit of a man coming down with a fever, punctuated at intervals by the distant rumble of thunder, so muted that Rosvita kept thinking she heard wagons passing by on the streets outside.
Some hours before dawn, rain broke over the town, and in the morning the army began its march south beneath a steady, light rain. God was smiling on Aosta again.
Five days’ march south they met outriders ranging through low hills, looking for them. Light cavalry chased off these scouts, but by midday the road brought them to a fine vantage point and here, arrayed in battle order, they could see from the ridgetop down onto the central plain that stretched away south until it was lost in a heat haze.
Ironhead was waiting for them. His army lay encamped across the road, its flanks stretching well out to either side, with a makeshift palisade thrown up before his lines. Ironhead had wasted no time, and it was obvious that he had assembled a larger army than Henry’s, fully two thousand mounted men or more to judge by the tents and banners, herds of horses, and horde of wagons.
“He must have had word we were coming,” said Villam. “A rider could have left Novomo and changed off horses to get to him in three days, but it seems impossible to me that he could have acted so quickly and brought his army five days’ march north from Darre in so short a time.”
“Unless he has one among his retinue who has the Eagle’s sight,” said Henry softly, glancing at Hathui, who rode at his right hand.
