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“Jugglers!” said Henry hoarsely. He sat and downed the contents of his wine cup in one gulp while the baby tried to climb up to his shoulder to get hold of the gleaming coronet of gold he wore on his brow—not the king’s crown of state, too heavy and formal to wear at a feast, but his lesser crown, a slender band of gold worn when circumstances called for a lesser degree of formality.
Prince Sanglant’s smile was sharp. Turning, he tossed the silver ball to the nearest juggler. The poor man jerked, startled, but his hand acted without his mind’s measure and he caught the ball. The hall came alive then, as dawn unfolds: people recalled the food on their platters; the jugglers returned to their show of skill and daring; the soldiers who had come forward to publicly and thus irrevocably mark their allegiance to Prince Sanglant rose and waited for his command. Sanglant spoke quietly to Captain Fulk, after which the good captain dispersed his men efficiently, obtained the lead lines of the pony and the goat, and, leading the two animals, retreated from the hall while Sanglant came forward to take his place at Adelheid’s left. The young cleric, Heribert, who had appeared so mysteriously in the Alfar Mountains, stuck close by Sanglant’s side. It was he who took over serving the prince, although before he had served Theophanu. The princess’ expression remained as blank as stone. She rose and went to kiss Sanglant, once on either cheek, and he caught her closer and whispered something which, amazingly, brought a whisper of a smile to her face, seen and gone as swiftly as the flutter of a swallow’s wing.
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TWISTING THE BELT
1
THE seeds of conflict bloomed at such odd times that it was often easy to forget that they had been sown long before, not risen spontaneously out of fallow ground. Rosvita of North Mark had been a cleric and adviser at court for twenty years. She knew when to step back and let matters take their course, and when to intervene before a crisis got out of hand.
Although King Henry now stood, the rest of the assembly still sat in astonished, or anticipatory, silence, staring at the confrontation unfolding before them. Even wily old Helmut Villam, seated to her left at the king’s table, seemed stunned into immobility, mouth parted and fingers tightly gripping the stem of the wine cup he shared with Princess Theophanu, which the princess had just set down.
Rosvita gestured to Brother Fortunatus to pull back her chair so that she, too, could rise. He hurried forward at once. Although like everyone else in the hall he could scarcely keep his gaze from the father, mother, and child whose battle was about to play out on this public stage, he had also been trained by Rosvita herself. There were many traits she could tolerate in the clerics who served her, but to be unobservant was not one of them.
“This is the woman we’ve heard so much about!” he murmured in her ear as she rose. “God preserve us!”
His gaze had fastened on the Aoi woman. He was not the only person in the hall ogling her. Her features were striking but not beautiful, and although admittedly her hair had the glamour of polished bronze, she wore it caught back in a complicated knot that made her look peculiar rather than regal. Her gaze was fierce and commanding, even combative. She was not afraid to look Henry in the eye, and her proud carriage suggested that she considered herself the regnant and Henry her subject.
“I come back, Henri,” she said, pronouncing his name in the Salian way with an unvoiced “h” and a garbled “ri,” “but I am not believing that you cared for the child as you promised to me you would.”
“I pray you, Your Majesty,” said Rosvita smoothly into the shocked silence that followed this outrageous accusation, “let chairs be brought so that our visitors may sit and eat. Truly, they must have a long journey behind them. Food and drink are always a welcome sight to the traveler. Indeed, let Prince Sanglant’s mother abide in my own chair, and I will serve her.”
Henry stared so fixedly at the foreign woman he had once called “beloved,” and whom it was popularly believed he would have married had he been permitted to, that finally Queen Adelheid rose with cool aplomb and indicated Rosvita’s seat to the right of Helmut Villam. It was not actually Adelheid’s prerogative, but Adelheid was neither a fool nor a quitter.
“Let a chair be brought for Prince Sanglant so that he may be seated beside me,” she said in her high, clear voice. “Let his lady mother be honored as is her right and our obligation, for it was her gift of this child to my husband which sealed his right to rule as regnant in Wendar and Varre.”
Sanglant stepped forward. “I have a child.” His voice had a hoarse scrape to it, as though he were afflicted with pain, but his voice always sounded like that. Years ago he had taken a wound to the throat in battle.
He untied a bundle from his back, uncoiled linen cloth, and a moment later held in his arms a yearling child, as sweet a babe as Rosvita had ever seen, with plump cheeks, a dark complexion, and bright blue eyes. “Da da!” she said in the ringing tones of imperious babyhood. He set her on the ground and she took a few tottering steps toward the king, swayed, lost her balance, and sat down on her rump. Lifting a hand, she pointed toward Henry and said, with despotic glee, “Ba! Ba!”
Sanglant swept her up, strode forward and, by leaning over the feasting table, deposited her in Henry’s arms. The king did not even resist. Many yearling babies would have shrieked in rage or fear, but the tiny child merely reached up, got a bit of the king’s beard between her fingers, and tugged.
“Ba!” she exclaimed, delighted.
“Jugglers!” said Henry hoarsely. He sat and downed the contents of his wine cup in one gulp while the baby tried to climb up to his shoulder to get hold of the gleaming coronet of gold he wore on his brow—not the king’s crown of state, too heavy and formal to wear at a feast, but his lesser crown, a slender band of gold worn when circumstances called for a lesser degree of formality.
Prince Sanglant’s smile was sharp. Turning, he tossed the silver ball to the nearest juggler. The poor man jerked, startled, but his hand acted without his mind’s measure and he caught the ball. The hall came alive then, as dawn unfolds: people recalled the food on their platters; the jugglers returned to their show of skill and daring; the soldiers who had come forward to publicly and thus irrevocably mark their allegiance to Prince Sanglant rose and waited for his command. Sanglant spoke quietly to Captain Fulk, after which the good captain dispersed his men efficiently, obtained the lead lines of the pony and the goat, and, leading the two animals, retreated from the hall while Sanglant came forward to take his place at Adelheid’s left. The young cleric, Heribert, who had appeared so mysteriously in the Alfar Mountains, stuck close by Sanglant’s side. It was he who took over serving the prince, although before he had served Theophanu. The princess’ expression remained as blank as stone. She rose and went to kiss Sanglant, once on either cheek, and he caught her closer and whispered something which, amazingly, brought a whisper of a smile to her face, seen and gone as swiftly as the flutter of a swallow’s wing.
“Go to Princess Theophanu,” Rosvita said to Fortunatus in an undertone. He hastened away to stand behind the princess’ chair so that she would have a person of fitting rank to serve her now that Brother Heribert had, evidently, defected to her half brother.
Sanglant turned his attention to charming Adelheid while Henry had his hands full of clambering, enthusiastic baby. Something fundamental had changed in the prince in the fourteen months he had been gone from the king’s progress. Rosvita had seen battle joined on the field, and she had seen skirmishes played out in the subtler fields of court, but never before had she seen Sanglant maneuvering, as he obviously was now, in the political arena. Of course, before he hadn’t had a child and a wife.
Where was Liath?
“You I will be thanking, woman,” said the one known as Alia, who came up beside her. “You are one of the god-women, are you not?”
It took Rosvita a moment to translate the strange phrase. “Yes, I am a cleric. My service is devoted to God and to King Henry. I pray you, Lady, sit here, if you please. Let me pour you some wine.”
But the foreign woman remained standing, examining Rosvita with a stare that made her feel rather like what she supposed an insect felt before the hand of fate slapped down upon it. She was shorter than Rosvita and powerfully built, with the same kind of leashed energy common to warriors forced into momentary stillness. Alia did not smile, but abruptly the tenor of her expression changed. “You spoke in the way of an elder,” she said abruptly, “when you rose to offer guesting rights. For this short time, there will be no fighting between Henri and his son.”
“So I hope,” agreed Rosvita, but in truth the observation surprised her. She did not know what to expect from the Aoi woman. She did not know anything, really, about the Aoi except for legends half buried in ancient manuscripts and tales told around hearths at night in the long halls of the common people. Like many, she had begun to believe the Aoi were only a story, a dream fostered by old memories of the ancient Dariyan Empire, but it was impossible to deny the evidence of her own eyes. “Sit, I pray you.” At times like this, one fell back on basic formality. “Let me pour you wine, if you will, Lady.”
“To you,” said Alia without making any movement toward the chair, “I will give my spoken name, because you are wise enough to use it prudently. I am known among my people as Uapeani-ka-zonkansi-a-lari, but if that is too much for your tongue, then Kansi-a-lari is enough.”
Rosvita smiled politely. “With your permission; then, Lady, I will address you as Kansi-a-lari. Is there a title that suits you as well? I am unaccustomed to the customs of your people.”
“Kansi-a-lari is my title, as you call it.” With that, she sat, moving into the confines of the chair with the cautious grace of a leopard slinking into a box that might prove to be a cage.
