Crown of Stars (Page 189)

There walked Brother Fortunatus. Safe! She wept to see him, to see others she knew. Behind them flew the proud standard of the Lions.

“Hanna! Hanna!”

But it was not their voices calling her. Their gazes, as all gazes, were pulled to the center of the whirlpool. To the dead man.

She looked west, and saw a figure hobbling at an awkward canter, waving to catch her attention.

He was filthy, as though dragged through the mud, and sopping wet with bits of vegetal matter and slops and drips of slime shaking off him as he ran. But despite the muck, anyone could see the startling flame red of his hair as he lunged up onto the roadbed, grabbed her elbows, and stared at her in disbelief. He had grown taller, his shoulders had gotten broader, and altogether he was a different person in stature and expression, but he was still the same rash, stupid boy she had grown up with.

The one she had always loved.

“Hanna!” He gaped at her as if the sight of her baffled him.

To her surprise—and manifestly to his, for he still looked dazed—he pulled her close and kissed her for a very long time.

“I pray you, excuse me.”

They stumbled apart, Ivar blushing and Hanna reeling. The weather had changed, or the world had. She wasn’t sure which, but it had gotten hot all of a sudden.

There was a man standing beside them with two huge black hounds, although in truth the hounds were cringing as they gazed at the approaching wagons. One whined, and the other whimpered, tail and hindquarters tucked tight like a dog that fears it is about to receive a whipping. The man knuckled their heads affectionately with one hand, but regarded Hanna and Ivar apologetically as he brushed the back of his other hand along his chin, the gesture a man makes when he feels a little sheepish.

“I pray you, forgive me,” he said. “But are you not an Eagle, called Hanna? The one who knows Liathano?”

She blinked. She knew she was gaping. Her lips were warm.

Ivar was still staring at her like a madman, with wide eyes and slack mouth. He appeared not to have heard the question at all. Only he said, without looking at the other man, “You’re the one who was named heir to Lavas.”

“So I was. I’m called Alain.”

“Liath is lost,” Hanna cried. “She’s missing.”

“She lives.” He said it so calmly that she believed him. “I have a favor to ask of you, Eagle. Ride west along the path that leads from here to Hersford Monastery.”

“I know it,” said Ivar.

“Why?” said Hanna. “What of the Eika?”

“An Eika staff will grant you safe passage. Although I think with that hair you’ll have no trouble with the Eika, for they will believe you to be kin to them.”

“What do you want?” she said.

“Liath is coming to Hersford. It seems likely she will ride this way afterward.”

“Ai, God.” Hanna looked at the corpse.

The banner of Saony had reached the road, and the crowd parted to let Princess Theophanu pass through. She stopped dead beside her brother’s body, gazing at him with such a lack of emotion that all at once Hanna felt grief rip straight into her ribs.

“She hides what she feels,” remarked Alain. “But the currents run deep in that one.”

“Ai, God,” said Ivar. “Liath doesn’t know!”

“I’ll go.” Hanna had thought nothing could be worse than reporting to Sanglant that Liath was missing, but now she knew that wasn’t true. There was something much worse. “I’ll go,” she repeated, because it was better this way, that Liath not ride into Kassel unknowing.

“If you arrive before she leaves Hersford Monastery, convince her to stay there, if you can,” Alain added. “I’ll see you get horses, and that staff. I pray you, wait off to the side.”

“What of Sorgatani?”

“What do you mean?” he asked, turning back.

“The Kerayit shaman. In the wagon. She may be injured.”

“I’ll see she is cared for.”

“Nay, you don’t understand! She is bound by a terrible sorcery. To look on her will kill you, or any man or woman. They fear her, those who came with us. But she is no threat to us! She must be cared for. Only I can do it.”

He touched the back of his hand to her cheek. He had dark eyes, and an implacable stare that pinned her to the ground. She did not draw breath. “Hanna. Listen to me. I will see she is safe and cared for.”

She nodded dumbly, and he moved off, and after a moment she shook herself and walked off to the place where he had told her to wait for horses.