Child of Flame (Page 361)

“Is it possible that all I have ever been taught is wrong? That the outer seeming does not reflect the inner heart? Can it be that you have stolen from some more worthy soul that handsome and modest aspect which you wear as though it was given to you by God? Do so many trust you because of your beauty and your clever words while darkness eats away at your heart? Do you not fear the judgment of God and the terrors of the Abyss? Can it be that you have corrupted the queen and the Holy Mother both, with your bindings and workings? What would your mother say were she to stand before us now, seeing what I saw?”

“Enough!” His anger, sparking suddenly, died swiftly as he got control of himself. “‘The purified and serene mind has forgotten the passions,’” he said, as if to himself, as if reminding himself of a lesson he had not yet learned and wished devoutly to comprehend.

“‘Virtues alone make one blessed,’” retorted Rosvita.

He sighed and moved on.

“What must we do with her, my lord?” asked one of the guards.

“Take her to the dungeon. I’ll deal with her later.” He and Henry descended the broad steps and soon the lamp he carried was lost to view.

The chief guard made no effort to speak to her, merely gestured with his spear. She saw no reason to fight them. They led her back the way she had come, along the walkway, to the guards’ staircase that spiraled down into the palace and farther yet, into the bowels of the hill where lay the dungeons in which those wicked souls were confined who had come afoul of the church. The dank air caught in her lungs, but even when she was marched down a dark corridor, thrown into a cell scarcely wider than her outstretched arms, and left in blackness to sit on moldy straw, she did not, entirely, despair.

Ai, God, Villam was dead, murdered by some trick of Hugh’s.

King Henry had become a puppet dancing to another man’s strings, possessed by the very daimone Hugh had freed from the stone circle at St. Ekatarina’s Convent.

But in those last moments, caught by Hugh, and on her trip down to this dungeon, there had been no sign of Hathui.

6

DUCHESS Rotrudis was dying. The cloying smell of her sickness made her bedchamber almost unbearable. Sanglant stood as close as possible to the window although, even so, no freshening breeze stirred the air inside the room. Even with torches burning to give light and with incense set in three burners around the chamber, it stank.

Her dutiful daughters argued by her bedside, ignoring the half-conscious woman moaning faintly on the bed.

“Nay, I was born first. Deacon Rowena will confirm it!”

“Only because you’ve offered her the biscopry once Mother is dead! Everyone knows that because I have the birthmark on my chest, it means I’m firstborn.”

The two young women looked ready to come to blows, and their respective attendants resembled half-starved dogs preparing to fight over a juicy bone.

Lord Wichman sprawled on the duchess’ chair, legs stretched out in front of him and arms crossed on his chest, wearing a smirk on his face as he watched his older sisters shriek and quarrel while their mother suffered unregarded beside them. He hadn’t even kissed his mother’s hand when he’d come in the room; he hadn’t looked at her at all except for a single grimace as he took in the shrunken body of the once robust woman.

“I pray you, Cousins,” said Sapientia, attempting to step between them, “this dispute avails you nothing. Surely your mother knows which of you was born first. Surely a midwife attended the birth.”

“The midwife is dead, poisoned by Imma!”

“Liar and whore! We weren’t more than five years of age when the old woman died. I had nothing to do with it. But you’ve never answered how the deacon’s record came to be burned up six years ago.”

“Oh! As if it wasn’t you who had the idea to do it, Sophie!”

Wichman had paid more attention when his brother Zwentibold was brought in on a litter to be placed by the hearth, where he, too, was now dying, from wounds taken on the field. Zwentibold remained silent except, now and again, when a tormented groan escaped him and the pretty young woman who was evidently his current concubine hastened forward to dab his lips with wine. It was easy to let the gaze linger on the curve of her body under her light gown, hiding little, promising much, and easier still to notice that Wichman never took his gaze off her.

“How can it be you don’t know which of you was born first?” demanded Sapientia, looking from one sister to the other. The two looked alike mostly in their broad faces and ruddy complexions, big women with years of good eating behind them. Imma had her mother’s nose, while Sophie bore the red-brown hair that had, evidently, distinguished their dead father. The innocent question unleashed a torrent of abuse and accusations, hurled from one to the other.