Crown of Stars (Page 150)

“It is not.” She would have grabbed him to shake him, but she could see any touch would overset his tenuous balance. “I am no weather worker. Are you all such fools to let a man like Hugh of Austra walk as your ally?”

“She was.”

The body lying at his feet was blackened and distorted, the feathered cloak reduced to wisps of bright green and gold mixing into the sodden earth. Her throat burned, and her stomach rose, and she turned away, catching a hand against her stomach. Behind her, she heard one of her companions retching. Anna bawled.

“Where is my daughter?”

“Not among the dead. The Pale Sun Dog has taken her.”

The rain lashed them. She sucked in air, but it tasted of ash and roasted flesh. She spat, but the flavor coated her tongue. She tried to catch rain in her mouth, but that only made the taste run down her throat, and she could not bear to swallow the ashes of the dead. There were at least a dozen dead and twice as many wounded. More, a hundred at least, stumbling, vomiting, mouths opening and closing with no sound she could hear, and one screaming in pain like a wounded rabbit, but the sound existed a hundred leagues from her, audible only because it was so high and so ghastly.

It was strange to discover that nothing could surprise her, not after that bolt called from the sky. She had always known Hugh capable of anything, limited only by the scope of his knowledge. While she walked the spheres, many years had passed on Earth; he had possessed Bernard’s book, and other resources besides. He had studied with Anne and the Seven Sleepers. The laws of inheritance and custom had denied him power in the world of regnant and noble. Yet it wasn’t true he had no power. He had reached for, and grasped, the only power available to him.

She touched the astrolabe tied to her belt. It was protected by a leather cover, slick beneath her fingers. Even clouds—even daylight—would not stop him from weaving the crown.

“Hai!” She turned her back on Zuangua. Buzzard Mask was vomiting, but hearing her voice he sat back, wiping his mouth although he still gagged and shuddered. She shouted. “Sharp Edge! All of you! We’ve been outmaneuvered. We’ll run for the crown and catch him there.”

“Wait!” Zuangua called.

She turned back. “Speak quickly.”

His niece’s twisted corpse held his gaze. “So briefly she came into her power. Now it is stripped from her and she returns to the earth which births us. Who will walk as Feather Cloak?” His smile was a challenge. “Will you, Bright One?”

“Don’t mock me! Go to Secha, who led your people in exile. She is not a fool.”

His expression and his smile were twisted because of the way his left side had been singed. Blisters were already forming along his arm and his cheek. “Secha has aided you. So has my brother. Some still listen to their words, but not many.”

“Nay, better yet, send an envoy to Sanglant. Let there be peace between Ashioi and humankind.”

He flicked his fingers in a sign of dismissal, as though casting away the evil eye. “I have had enough of humankind! Sanglant has made his bed among his father’s people. We know where his heart lies. This one, the Pale Dog, he will betray you as he has betrayed all others.”

“Yes.”

“He wishes to be the last sorcerer known among humankind.”

“Of course.”

“He wants you to follow him. That’s why he took your daughter.”

“I know.”

“Don’t you fear him?”

“Not anymore. Enough! I am leaving. There is nothing more you can say to me.”

“Let me go with you to avenge my niece.” He stood and took a wavering step, followed by a stronger second and third. “A hundred mask warriors, scouts, trackers. He’ll not expect you to come with a war party.”

She had no time to argue. Sharp Edge and the others were ready to go. “Agreed. But if you cannot keep up, we’ll leave you. And know this, your enemy is only Hugh of Austra. My countryfolk—Wendish and Varren—are not to be harmed.”

“A truce only. Not an alliance.”

“A truce only.” She turned to her companions. “Quickly!”

She and her retinue broke into a run. Every step hurt, jarring up through her feet. Her entire body ached and burned, but she ran. Behind, his warriors fell in at the heels of her party, footsteps rumbling along the earth. They raced up the road, and with Zuangua behind them the Ashioi army fell away and did not challenge their passage.

The rain slackened, fading to a gentler, steadier shower. The storm had outpaced them. Lightning crackled above the hilltop among the stones, a half dozen furious strikes. While they were still too far away to interfere, she saw the archway of blue light blossom above the stones, threads pulling north. They ran panting up the long slope of the hill toward the crown, feet slipping along the chalk track. Mask warriors lay stunned or dead as rain washed along their bodies, red with blood and black with ash. Here, too, he had used lightning to clear his path. The smell of their dying was awful.