The Burning Stone (Crown of Stars #3)

The Burning Stone (Crown of Stars #3) Page 337

“I say we bolt north, while everyone is confused,” Baldwin was muttering. “No one will notice we’re gone. Then we can cut back west to that village.”

Ivar checked his saddle girth for the third time. “God Above, Baldwin! It would be dishonorable to desert Prince Ekkehard now. They’ll call us cowards.”

“What do I care what they call us?” demanded Baldwin. His spear lay on the ground, rolling as he caught a foot on it and almost tripped. “I just want to get out of here before she finds me!”

“How will we escape alone? We’ll more likely just get ourselves killed, and if we’re dead, we can’t preach the True Word.”

“Why should God honor us with Her Truth if we act like base cowards?” said Sigfrid. He looked so frail and ridiculous with a spear clutched in both hands. He wasn’t strong enough to wear a mail coat, so he rode unarmored.

“Just so!” said Ivar. “We have to stay, Baldwin. At least until the battle is over. Then I’ll do whatever you say.”

Baldwin’s expression worked its way through about ten emotions, each of them equally pleasant to look upon. Ivar felt a sudden, stabbing moment of pity for him, doomed by his beautiful face to be nothing more than a mirror in which other people would see their own desires and dreams.

“Ivar! Sigfrid! Baldwin! Look who I found! It’s a miracle!”

Ermanrich stumbled out of the confusion of soldiers forming into units or running off on unknowable errands, of a troop of cavalry riding out past them and wagons pulling back to the river’s edge where, in pairs, they were being hauled over to the far shore. Weaving like a drunken man, he seemed oblivious to the army making ready for battle. He was clutching the wrist of a very filthy young woman who, like him, was weeping what were apparently tears of joy.

“It’s Hathumod!” Ermanrich cried, and it was a good thing he identified her, for otherwise Ivar would never have recognized Ermanrich’s robust cousin in this thin, ragged woman. She looked more like a beggar, even had a red sore under one nostril and untrimmed, dirty fingernails.

“Lady Hathumod!” Sigfrid looked astonished. “You were sent away from Quedlinhame with Lady Tallia. Is she here as well, the holy one who revealed the truth to us all?”

“Oh, God,” cried Baldwin, grabbing Ivar’s arm so hard that Ivar yelped. “It’s her. It’s her.”

Suddenly, armed and glorious, Margrave Judith descended the hill at the head of her cavalry, a massive force boasting more than one hundred and fifty heavily armored riding men. To her left, her captain carried the margrave’s helm tucked under one arm, and her banner bearer rode at her right hand, banner haft braced on his boot and the banner unfurling as they rode to the plain where battle would be joined.

Baldwin shrank behind Ivar, but it was already too late. Perhaps she had discovered their position by asking where Ekkehard’s party rested. Perhaps she could simply smell him, the panther who has fed once upon the flesh of a delicate yearling buck and means to finish him off.

“Ai, Lady!” cried Ermanrich. “Milo’s still holding the prince’s banner up! You idiot! We were supposed to be hiding.”

But it was already too late. Maybe they had been foolish to think they could escape her.

She lifted a hand, and her entire host clattered to a halt behind her as she turned her panther’s gaze on her prey. Baldwin fell to his knees with hands clasped at his chest and gaze lifted to the heavens as though he entreated God to bring down such a storm of wrath as would protect him from her notice.

The great ram’s horn blared again, sharp and urgent.

“The Quman! To arms! To arms!”

Cries and shouts burst like thunder all through camp and, distantly, Ivar heard a faint, fine whistling noise that sent shudders through his body. He hadn’t imagined the sound of their wings could carry so far.

“You will be punished for your disobedience, Baldwin,” said Margrave Judith, her mouth set in a satisfied line. “Do not think you will escape me.” But she took her helmet out of her captain’s hands and settled it on her head. With that, her banner raised high to stream behind, she and her cavalry moved forward toward the battleground.

Ekkehard’s boys were mounting, making ready to ride out. Ermanrich grabbed Sigfrid, whose frail figure and slight body made him seem like a boy even among such a company of very young men. “Sigfrid.” He found Hathumod’s hand and tightened her grip around Sigfrid’s frail wrist. “Go with my cousin. She knows where the baggage train is. You have to stay there.” Then he surveyed the others belligerently. “He’s just not fit for combat. You all know it’s true! He wasn’t made for this kind of war. Go on, Sigfrid!” He gave both Sigfrid and the sniveling Hathumod a shove. “Go on!” They hurried off. He wiped away tears as he swung up onto his own horse, grunted at the strain of hitting the saddle hard and, belatedly, grabbed the spear and shield he’d forgotten on the ground, which a groom handed up to him.