The Gathering Storm (Crown of Stars #5)

The Gathering Storm (Crown of Stars #5) Page 225

Sorgatani nodded gravely. “It’s true she earned her name, and in the end the Horse people suffered because of her ambitions. They never recovered their strength after losing so many in her campaigns.”

“But Azaril was a male, wasn’t he? He took female prisoners hostage and forced them to marry him. There’s a famous story about a saint—”

She faltered as Sorgatani chuckled.

“Is it said so, in the tales made by your people? Perhaps they saw what they believed must be true. I can only tell you what I know. Not all of the Kerayit tribes live beside the Horse people. We have grown more numerous than them. The remnants of the Horse people have retreated to their most ancient pasturelands as their strength wanes. I was sent away from my tribe to be the apprentice of the Holy One, so now I have lived among them and know some truths about their kind.”

Liath could guess the rest: the centaurs had left their males behind to guard what was most precious, their homeland and the core of the herds. It seemed obvious now, but Sorgatani’s expression made her think there were things left unsaid.

“Are you glad to study with the Holy One?”

“It is the greatest honor. She is eldest among the Horse people. She is a powerful shaman.”

“Do you ever wish you could go home to your tribe?”

Sorgatani shrugged, saying nothing, although a tear glistened on her cheek.

2

AT sunset Liath rode back into the Wendish camp. Her Jinna servants ran up. One took Resuelto; the other offered stew and mare’s milk while deftly opening a camp chair so she could sit.

“Where is Prince Sanglant?” she asked as Captain Fulk hurried up to her.

“He sleeps within the shelter of the tent, my lady.”

“My daughter?”

He frowned, the gesture furrowing a shadow between his brows. “The same, my lady. The healer has certain arts. She has managed to sit Princess Blessing upright and work a bit of broth and honey down her throat.”

“Showed she no sign of waking?”

“None, my lady.”

The griffins gleamed in the darkness, their wings faintly luminescent. With their heads set on their foreclaws they seemed to be slumbering.

“Have the griffins eaten anything? If they become hungry, they’ll become more dangerous.”

“Prince Sanglant has already seen to that, my lady.” Fulk’s tone held a hint of reproach. “Two deer were brought in this afternoon.”

“Ah.” She should have known Sanglant, even as injured as he was, would not forget.

She ate mechanically, knowing she must eat to keep up her strength. The stew was hot but its flavor bland. Only the fermented mare’s milk had bite enough to make an impression. Captain Fulk and the servant hovered, and the Jinna man took everything away when she was finished.

“Have you aught you wish to say to me, Captain?” she asked.

“My lady,” he said. That was all.

He walked with her to the tent where her husband and daughter slept. She did not know him—she could not tell whether he wished to speak and kept quiet because he feared her or whether he was content with circumstances as they stood. This was Sanglant’s army, Sanglant’s people, all of them loyal to Sanglant. She was simply not accustomed to moving within a mass of hundreds of people—as many as a thousand, she guessed, measuring the circumference of the camp. Sanglant lived and breathed this life; it was the one he knew best and loved most. He had never been happy in the isolation of Verna.

Even inside the tent there were a dozen souls present, half of them asleep and the rest chatting idly or finishing up their work before snuffing the flame from the precious oil lamps. They glanced at her but said nothing as she set down her weapons and her cloak. She knelt beside Blessing and stroked the child’s lank hair, matted from being pressed against the mattress, but although her daughter breathed, she was unconscious to the world. The Kerayit healer sat at the foot of the bed.

Liath took off her boots, and lay down beside Sanglant. There was just room enough on the traveling pallet to squeeze in beside him. The warmth of his body was a comfort to her. Because she had only left him a few days ago, by her reckoning, she had never got used to sleeping alone after those long months at Verna sleeping always beside him.

He slept deeply, his breath steady and his body still. He did not stir as she rested her head alongside his shoulder. He was warm and solid, and he smelled good.

She woke at dawn to see one of her Jinna servants curled up at the foot of the pallet like a faithful dog. The other crouched at the entrance, keeping watch as attendants moved in and out of the tent.