Elliott, Kate - Crown of Stars 1 (57 page)

"Can you not go to the cathedral?" she asked. "The bishop has allowed many of the refugees to camp in the nave and I believe she tries to feed them as well."

"I have tried," he said, hope dying in his eyes, "But there are so many. We were turned away even before we could reach the steps. The mayor's guard beat us back."

She took her Eagle's ring off her finger and held it out. "Take this," she said, trembling, "to the palace and ask for entry to the stables. Tell the Dragons there that I mean for you to have employment from them. You can care for horses, can you not?"

He swallowed. "I had sheep and goats and chickens, but never a horse."

"Chickens, then," she said recklessly. "Take your daughter. This will gain you entrance. You must do it, for I need the ring back and so I will fetch it from you there."

"Da!" whispered the girl, and then coughed.

The man began to thank her so profusely she was
king's dragon
afraid he would draw attention to them, even here behind the midden. She could not save them all.

"I must go," she said. "I have an errand." She fled gratefully into the rain and cried the whole way to the armory and back.

Werner kept her busy for the rest of the day, and that night, to assauge his fretting, he called for a lavish feast which she had no appetite for. Afterward she took a turn on watch late into the night and then lay down to sleep just before dawn only to sleep fitfully and then be woken midmorning by a distressed servant. He begged her to come to the hall at once.

"Eagle!" Werner paced in his hall, frantic. "Have you heard? Have you seen?"

"I beg your pardon, Mayor Werner," she said. "I have just woken. I was on watch last
—

"Lady and Lord! What have we come to!" He threw up his hand and called for a tray, popped a sweetmeat into his mouth as if that could comfort him in his distress. "I have already sent Wolfhere and the other Eagle down to the tannery, so now what shall I do? What shall I do?"

She waited as he snapped at a passing servant. That seemed to calm his nerves enough for him to speak coherently. "A crowd of people has gathered outside the gates. Outside these gates, as if / were their enemy! What a calamity this is!"

"Have they said what their purpose is, Mayor Werner?"

"Bread and beans!" he snorted. "Bread and beans! The good citizens of Gent would never act this way if these country people were not acting as a bad influence upon them. There is at least one deacon who
—imagine this!—has inflamed them with tales of feasting here in my own hall going on while their children starve! No child starves within the walls of Gent. The biscop sees to that. They are calling me a glutton and say I feast while their children starve! Imagine! Can you imagine?"

She waited, but unfortunately he appeared to expect

an answer. Carefully she said, "I am here to serve you, Mayor Werner."

"Someone must go out and placate them," said Werner, eyeing her with a mixture of craftiness and doubt.

"They are asking for
you,
my lord." said the steward cautiously.

Werner smoothed down his fine wool tunic nervously, twining his fingers into the soft leather belt. Its gold buckle was studded ostentatiously with lapis lazuli. "I can't
—it would be too dangerous—" His distracted gaze caught again on Liath and his expression brightened. "Eagle, fetch Prince Sanglant. He will attend me. After all—" He began twisting the rings on his fingers, a habit Liath had seen him indulge in before. They were stunningly beautiful rings, one set with tiny rubies, one with an amethyst, one with an engraved stone of lapis lazuli of a particularly intense blue; the fourth was a thin circle of cunningly-worked cloisonne so delicately done Liath could not imagine how human fingers could have wrought it. "After all he is here to protect Gent, and if the crowd were to grow angry or vengeful, or to threaten me . . ."

She nodded obediently and withdrew from the hall. Outside, the sun shone. From the safety of the great courtyard, bounded by the palace and great hall on one side, the kitchens and outbuildings on the second, the barracks and stables on the third, and the palisade gates on the fourth, she could hear the crowd that had gathered on the other side of the palace compound gates. They spoke in many voices, but their murmuring was edged with fury and with that kind of desperation past which there is nothing left to lose.

Werner could not afford to have riot within and siege without; abruptly she realized what the artisan in the marketplace had meant by the inner beast. She straightened her tunic and twisted the end of her braid in a hand, then cursed herself for caring what she looked like. Perhaps it was true Prince Sanglant looked at her now and again, but he looked at every remotely attractive woman he came within sight of. Liath only noticed because she would watch him, and try not to watch him, when they were in the hall at the same time or passing in the courtyard or around the stables.

But this was not time to reflect on such trivial concerns. As Da always said,
"No point in worrying at a loose thread while the sheep are being eaten by wolves."

She steadied herself and strode to the stables and then down the long dim passage. She saw no sign of the man and child she had tried to help. Beyond the actual stables, but within the palace stockade, was a stableyard with its own gate. In this yard the Dragons took their ease in the fine spring sun or
—most often—practiced with sword and spear. So did they now.

She paused at the doors, brushing straw dust off her nose and trying not to sneeze. Two men sparred with staves. Several of the younger men pounded dutifully on a sturdy wooden pole set upright in the ground. An older man sat on a bench, repairing a pair of boiled leather greaves that had been oiled to a fine brown sheen. Sanglant laughed.

His laughter was so sharp and bright that it rang on the air. She found him half hidden behind a line of laundry hung out to dry in the warm morning sunlight. He came out from the shadow of the laundry, head flung back. Sweat beaded on his forehead. He held a sword wrapped in cloth in one hand and his teardrop shield painted with the black dragon device in the other. He wore not his mail but only the padded gambeson that went underneath armor. After him came two others
—the woman and a young man with light hair and a yellow beard—similarly armed; they had obviously been at sword practice.

Sanglant wiped the sweat from his face and turned to look directly at Liath, across the stableyard. He lifted a hand. All activity ceased and every Dragon there turned

to look at her. She bit down a sudden impulse to flee, lifted her chin, and walked across the yard to the prince.

"Mayor Werner wishes you to attend him," she said boldly and clearly. "There is a crowd
—

"Ah, yes," said the prince interrupting her. "I was wondering when Mayor Werner would send someone to fetch me. They've been gaining in numbers since dawn." He seemed more amused than angry or worried. He handed sword and shield to the woman, got a spear in exchange, and gestured for Liath to precede him. No one else came, only him. As they walked back through the stables, she felt his gaze on her back.

He said, "I've never seen you use that bow. It's of Quman make, is it not?"

"It is."

"It's a strange pattern, the deer who is vanquished and yet whose antlers are giving birth to griffins."

The observation startled her, but she dared not slacken her pace or turn around.

"You have such brilliantly blue eyes," he added, as if it was an afterthought. "Like the heart of fire. Or that fine lapis lazuli stone on Mayor Werner's finger."

Her cheeks burned. She did not know what to say.

They passed out through the stable doors into the courtyard to find Mayor Werner and a number of palace stewards and serving-folk huddled together in an anxious band.

"Open the gates," said Sanglant, striding past Liath.

"But
—!"

"Open the gates!"

Werner could not bring himself to give the order until he had been helped to the safety of the palisade wall, out of reach of the ravening hordes should they decide to swarm inside. But once on the parapet, he could be seen by the crowd beyond. Liath climbed up after him and saw people below. They were, indeed, country folk and poor people, frightened, thin, and desperate
—the same sort of people she had pressed through yesterday. Seeking's dragon
ing the mayor above they began to call out, some with anger, some pleading, some cursing. One man lifted a tiny child above his head as if willing the mayor
— whose round red face clearly betrayed that he never wanted for food—to see the hunger on the child's face. A few had staves or scythes, and these shook them angrily while Werner tried to shout out a few conciliatory phrases but got nowhere; nor could he be heard above their noise.

The gates opened. Sanglant walked out, spear in his left hand, right hand raised, open, and empty. He had no escort. Suddenly nervous, Liath got out her bow, nocked an arrow, and drew down on the prince so she could get the first shot in if anyone assaulted him.

He glanced up as if he had heard the creak of the string rubbing against the bronze caps as she drew it back. He smiled
—his charming smile—up at her, as if her protection amused or flattered him, and for an instant she forgot where she was and what she was doing there. Then he looked away, out into the crowd, and lifted his spear. The people moved restlessly, their attention shifting suddenly from the mayor to Sanglant. He waded out into their midst, obviously unafraid; he was easy to follow because he was half a head taller than the tallest person there. They parted to let him through, and at some point he found a box or a block of stone to stand on and with this platform he held the spear up over his head and with his right hand gestured for silence. To Liath's amazement, the crowd quieted. "Oh dear, oh dear," murmured Werner, and then, suddenly, realizing Sanglant was not about to be set upon and rent limb from body by the mob, he stopped muttering.

"You must pick three of your number," said Sanglant without preamble, "and they will be brought before the mayor to speak your grievances. Choose them quickly and do not argue. The rest of you must go to your homes or to wherever you are staying. I will request that the biscop mediate." He paused.

His voice sounded so hoarse Liath was astonished it carried so well, but his voice always sounded like that. He shifted, and the sunlight caught on his gold torque, winking. Liath lowered her bow. She could not concentrate, not looking at him. Did not the ancients write that desire was a curse? She found that her hands were shaking, and she let the arrow go slack. The prince was in no danger.

Although perhaps she was.

"Let me tell you," he went on, "that Gent is a city under siege. The enemy who waits outside the walls is more implacable than your hunger, for there are stores enough in this city if they are rationed fairly but there is no mercy in his heart, if he even has one. We cannot fight among ourselves, for that way lies death for everyone. You are within your rights to demand food if your children are hungry, but none can expect feasts
—

"The mayor feasts every night!" cried a woman in a shrill but carrying voice. She wore deacon's robes.

"Then you, good deacon, may come before him and tell him what you think of that. You are the first. Let two more be chosen."

His brisk command stilled the crowd. Already the people on the fringes were drifting away. After a brief flurry of talk, two men came forward with the deacon, and they followed Sanglant inside. Liath recognized one as the artisan who had aided her in the marketplace. The gates closed behind them; only then did Werner venture down from the parapet. Once brought inside the great hall, the three commoners appeared subdued, perhaps cowed by the mayor or
—more likely—by Sanglant's imposing presence.

"Eagle," said Werner, "you will find and bring the biscop to me. Beg her to attend me, that is."

Sanglant moved, and almost Liath thought he was going to offer to escort her. But he did not. Instead, with a sigh, he went to sit in the chair beside Werner. Ai, fool! She cursed herself as she hurried away. The
king's dragon
gates were opened to let her out, and this time the folk dispersing from the square parted to let her through as she jogged from palace to cathedral. Maybe Da had been right; he usually was.
"Are you so vain?"
he had asked her. But he had been speaking of Hugh, and she had been right about Hugh. Da had not understood what Hugh truly wanted.

But she did not want to think of Hugh now. She never wanted to think of Hugh again.

Gent's biscop was a woman who wasted little time; Liath was sent back with a message that Werner could expect her within the hour and that a solution to this difficulty would be found before nightfall or else she would impose one.

When Liath returned to the hall, the deacon and artisan had, evidently, spoken already. Now the third representative, an elderly man in the good linen tunic of a person of wealth, regaled the mayor at length about the positions of the stars in the heavens and the fate they foretold for Gent in general and the mayor in particular. Werner listened with such rapt attention that he did not acknowledge
—or perhaps he did not notice—Liath's return.