The Gathering Storm

A scream split the drone of the service as the ground pitched back the other way, grinding and howling. A brick fell square in the middle of the aisle. A tripod teetered, tipped, and spilled fire along the aisle. People leaped to their feet shouting and crying out in fear as Hanna stared uncomprehendingly at the spilled oil, fire running along the stone floor of the church, racing like wildfire. Bricks rained down. Dust smothered the lamps.

Chaos erupted. People bolted for the doors, yelling, as a second tripod tipped over. Fire caught the hem of a man’s tunic.

The ground had stopped shaking, but another brick fell smack onto the head of a woman clawing her way past others. She fell and was jerked up by her terrified companion. A man slammed into Hanna and shoved her aside.

“Down!” shouted Hanna, dragging Margret down beside her, using the benches as shields, cowering under them. Vindicadus had vanished. A brick hit the wooden bench right above her head and shattered into two, one half falling on each side. Dust coated her face. Screams deafened her. She saw a man tumble, crushed by the panicked crowd.

“We’ve got to get out of here!” cried Margret.

“Not that way!” It was hard to be heard with oily smoke filling her lungs when she sucked in air to speak. She kept her hand on Margret’s sleeve as she coughed. “There’s another way out past the Hearth!”

They clambered under and over tumbled benches, some standing miraculously upright, others pitched over on their sides, but when they reached the aisle, Margret fled toward the doors. Hanna stumbled through the acrid smoke and streaming dust to fetch up against the Hearth.

“Eagle!” A man’s voice. “This way!”

Her eyes wept tears, and she had to cover her nose and mouth with her sleeve in order to breathe. A firm hand propelled her forward. She tripped on rubble, went down hard on her bruised knee, and fell flat as a body slammed into her. Other hands plucked her to safety, and they stumbled out into open air. The alley was littered with debris and fallen masonry. They picked their way over mounds of bricks, slipping, staggering, hands scraped raw and clothing torn as they reached the spot where the alley opened onto the avenue. There they huddled together, a forlorn group of eight wretched, terrified souls.

Clouds of dust blotted out the twilight sky and the first stars and billowed like fog down the street. Smoke poured skyward as fires took heart from the confusion to run wild. Everywhere men and woman stampeded along the streets without purpose, running, shouting, many seeking a gate out of the city. It was hard to tell anything with dust choking their view.

“Oh, God! Look!”

Hanna’s neck hurt, but with a grunt of pain she turned. Wind had blown a gap in the dust.

The domed temple dedicated to St. Marcus the Warrior had caved in. Dust rose in clouds, drifting lazily into the sky. Moans and screams from folk trapped within the mound of rubble made a horrible chorus. A distant horn blew. Drums beat from the palace; the upper city was visible in snatches through dust and smoke. The sun bled a deep red as its rim dropped below the horizon. It looked as if the heavens, too, were burning.

Brother Fortunatus stood beside her, weeping tears of fright, or compassion, or pain.

“What did you mean,” she asked suddenly, “when you preached the parable of the child buried beneath a landslide?”

His face was streaked with dust and a smear of blood, and his eyes seemed startlingly white in contrast, like those of a spooked horse. “Are you Presbyter Hugh’s spy?”

“I am a King’s Eagle, Brother. But on my journey south to Aosta, I met one of my fellow Eagles, a woman called Hathui—”

He sank to his knees. Around him, his companions exclaimed while drums resounded and horns rang. Distantly she heard a troop of horse pounding along an unseen street. No one regarded them. A brick fell from the wall of St. Asella’s, shattering where it hit the ground not a body’s length from them.

“We are desperate, Eagle.” Fortunatus clasped her hands as though he were a supplicant and she the regnant. “Sister Rosvita has been imprisoned in the dungeon of the skopos for over two years. I pray you, help us rescue her.”

“How can it be that the king has allowed this to happen? She is his most trusted counselor. Did she turn against him?”

“Never! That night we heard only Hathui’s frightened testimony. She told us that the queen and the presbyter had conspired to control the king with sorcery, with a daimone. Sister Rosvita went away with the Eagle to seek Margrave Villam and the king. She must have seen the truth. Why else would they have imprisoned her?”