Prince of Dogs (Crown of Stars #2)

Prince of Dogs (Crown of Stars #2) Page 228

He did not turn to leave; he did not trust them that much. He edged sideways while never letting his gaze leave them until he was at the great doors, awash in sunlight. Then he was gone.

Sanglant bolted. Lavastine started after him, but the prince ran not after the fleeing princeling but rather to the altar where lay Bloodheart’s corpse. The old priest had vanished; only the broken arrow haft remained. Sanglant upended the wooden chest and a downy spill of feathers wafted into the air as a cloudy haze. What in God’s Names was he about? He coughed and pawed through the clot of feathers desperately, finding nothing, then gave up and knelt instead beside Bloodheart’s body. With a howl, he wrenched the gold torque of royal kinship from the dead enchanter’s arm.

The five dogs, crowded at his heels and sniffing and scrabbling at the corpse, raised their heads and howled wildly in answer.

“We had best be gone,” said Lavastine. “We will head for the gates.”

“Is that … creature … truly Prince Sanglant?” asked Erkanwulf, and several other men muttered likewise.

“Quiet!” snapped Lavastine, and then they hushed of their own accord because the prince now walked toward them with his retinue of dogs nipping and barking at his heels. He now held a spear and a short sword, gleaned from the corpses. Liath could not bear to look at him, and yet she kept looking at him. She could not believe he was alive, and yet, even if he was, could that … thing … truly be the man who had fallen at Gent over a year ago?

He broke away before he reached Lavastine and his men, as if he didn’t want to get too close, and came to the huge, open doors of the cathedral. There, he stopped short as if chains had brought him up. As if he dared to go no farther.

“Come,” said Lavastine to the prince as he led his party up beside—but not too close to—the dogs. A few of the men held their hands up over their noses, those who could reach them under the nasals of their helms. The count crossed out onto the steps that fronted the cathedral. The square beyond lay empty under the hazy afternoon sunlight. “We must make haste. My son—”

But he broke off, unable to speak further. In the far distance, Liath heard the sound of horns and the frenzied shouting of Eika.

That Sanglant had stepped out from the shelter of the cathedral she knew without looking, because of the stench. But now he spoke. His voice was hoarse, as if it had grown rusty from disuse—but then, his voice had always sounded like that.

“The horns,” he said, head flung back to listen. “They belong to the king.”

2

STROKE after stroke felled the Eika. As the Lady cleaved through them, some looked into Alain’s eyes, sensing the doom that came upon them, and others simply dropped their weapons and fled. Even their savage fury could not stand long before the Lady’s wrath—and surely not without the throbbing beat of the drums, now silent.

But there were yet more of them, even in disorder, than remained of Alain’s contingent. When an Eika princeling rallied his forces and drove his soldiers back into the remaining wedge of infantry, she pursued that princeling through the thick of fighting and slew him. His forces faltered and broke and ran from her while Alain’s men howled in glee and set back to their work, but even so, Eika kept coming on, and on. There were so many, and their scaly skin so tough to penetrate.

We can’t hope to win through.

Then the call came, resounding from the last rank higher up upon the hill.

“Fesse! the banner of Fesse!”

And then they heard the horns and the thunder of cavalry.

“Henry!” cried another man, and they let out a great cheer: “The king! The king!”

With new spirit they pressed forward, cleaving and hacking at the Eika. Eika banners wavered and retreated—or fell. Eika soldiers hesitated. Some withdrew in an orderly fashion, some fought on, but slowly the hill cleared of them, and Alain struggled free of the press and got to higher ground.

It was true! There, sweeping across the field, came the banner of Fesse and the personal standard of Duchess Liutgard herself. Farther, a line of cavalry under the standard of Princess Sapientia cut wide toward the east, retreating toward the river’s shore pursued by those Eika who fled to their ships. Long shadows from the afternoon sun hatched the western road. Yet another mass of soldiers emerged from the forest under King Henry’s banner.

Alain’s legs gave out from under him and he staggered, dropped, and was only caught by the sudden flurry of hounds that pressed against him, licking him, whining. He slipped on a clod of dirt and fell hard on his rump.