The Wolf King (28 page)

“Her lover…” Bibo moaned.

“In God’s name, haven’t any of you a lick of sense?” Chiara screamed. “What is it? Are you are all maggot-brained madmen? How would I entertain a lover? We are four floors from the ground. The man would have to have wings.”

“There is,” Armine said, sounding astounded, “no one here. How can that be?”

“Her lover,” Bibo whimpered.

One of the guardsmen reached down and set Bibo on her feet and then recoiled violently as she breathed on him. “Ya, she reeks of the tavern.”

Armine leaned over and sniffed. “Drunk, by God.” He turned to Chiara and shook a finger. “This is all your doing, my girl. Were it not for these midnight peregrinations of yours, we would—”

Chiara’s fists clenched and a look of outrage began spreading across her features, but just then three things happened simultaneously.

Armine’s feet were kicked out from under him, and he landed seated on the floor as Bibo had. The shutters to the balcony slammed violently shut, casting the room abruptly into complete darkness. And—

Chiara was suddenly but thoroughly kissed.

When one of the guardsman stumbled into the hall and returned with a torch, Armine gave a wild shout of surprise. Chiara drew in her breath sharply and pressed her fingers against her cheeks; her face felt incandescent. She followed the direction of her father’s gaze and saw her bed was covered with white roses.

*        *        *

Looks like nine miles of bad road, Lucilla thought. Rome was shadowed by its illustrious past, but here and there fragments of its former glory shone even among the ruins. Here, nothing remained. On their way into the city, they passed ruined villas and a decaying Roman town on the flatland below. Only a scattering of columns and tumbled stones remained of the forum and what once had been a large amphitheater. A few of the houses were inhabited by peasants who pastured flocks of sheep and goats on the rich grass that covered what once had been shops, streets, and dwellings. Beyond the city’s ruins, the open fields were being plowed up by peasants living on the rocky promontory that towered over the valley.

Dulcinia pointed out the remains of the city and several villas to Lucilla as they made the ride up from the deserted coastal plain. “The lord of this place,” she told Lucilla, “says the city was abandoned because it flooded during the spring rains. He said the villagers sometimes dig for treasure there, and even sometimes find it, but mostly they get pieces of broken glass, pottery, and from time to time a few fragments of marble. Shepherds pasture their flocks there because there is so much stone in the soil that it can’t be plowed.”

A nearby hill crowned by some sort of stonework was newly planted with a patchwork of olive trees and vines. Lucilla pointed to the tumbled stones. “I wonder what that was?”

Dulcinia shrugged. “Who can say, but it’s a village now.”

Lucilla looked more closely and saw the outline of huts and sheds grouped under the fire-blackened cupola of an ancient building. “Might have been baths or even a church,” she said.

Dulcinia shrugged again. “I suppose so. I can’t see that it matters. What will you do, my love, try to bring it all back? Not even you would want that.”

Lucilla sighed, then chuckled. “It floods indeed. A pleasant, polite way of saying take; care, the countryside is not safe here.”

Dulcinia laughed softly, then looked back at their escort trailing along behind. The men rode negligently. Only a few wore their helmets and hauberks but most carried a businesslike assortment of weapons: swords, knives, and a powerful clubbed mace hung from every man’s saddle. Even the two women carried knives, a pair each, one long—the ugly and dangerous single-edged sax—and the shorter a double-edged utility blade. Lucilla also had a vicious half moon—shaped ax sheathed in leather under her saddle blanket.

The day was warm and clear, the sky blue; a cool breeze was blowing, and birdsong filled the air as they rode past a small copse of trees bordering the road. The two women rode astride wearing tunics, leggings, and divided skirts.

“I thought we might have had to fight at that last river crossing,” Dulcinia said. “I’m glad you’re along. I don’t know what I would have done alone.”

Lucilla’s face hardened. “Maybe we should have. He was one shifty-eyed bastard, and his threats may have been all a bluff. But I felt I couldn’t take the chance.

“Likely we’d have won; almost certainly we’d have slaughtered that contingent of scum he had hanging about the ford. But he insisted he paid dues to the local authorities—whoever the hell they are in that godforsaken place—so the threat of a minor war was unsettling to say the least. That, and he reduced the amount we would have to pay ever so quickly when he got a good look at Rufus’s men. Made me decide it wasn’t worth the risk, not over a few coppers.

“But I’ll bet his master, if he has one, sees damn little of whatever tolls he collects.”

“There, you see,” Dulcinia said. “I’d have paid the first price he asked. I’m not brave, my dear. Those outlaws he ran with terrified me.”

“Bah,” Lucilla said. “Parasites and scavengers all. He probably throws them his leavings. Not one decent scrap of armor or even one good sword among them. It’s not my business to clean out that particular viper’s nest, but I’ll make damn sure both Hadrian and Rufus hear about them. One or the other might make it his business to see their leader winds up adorning a cross.”

Just then they reached the rather steep road that led to the new town perched on the top of its rock. Quite a climb, but when they reached the top, both Lucilla and Dulcinia were heartened by what they saw. The town was still in the process of being built. The square was laid out in cobblestone, with a palace of sorts on one side, a church under construction on the other. At the end of the square was a stone balustrade where one could stand, take the air, be cooled by the spring breeze, and look out over the fertile and beautiful countryside beyond.

It was a market day and all manner of people were present buying and selling what was, considering the small size of the place, a variety of goods. Rabbits, chickens, geese, herbs, savory, garlic, thyme, mint, and small quantities of exotic spices such as cinnamon, cloves, saffron, and pepper. Mushrooms in abundance, onions, leeks, cabbage, artichokes scattered among bundles of fresh wild greens gathered by women before daybreak, their stems and roots in water to keep them fresh in the heat of the day.

The crowd in the square greeted Lucilla and Dulcinia with almost wild enthusiasm and escorted the two women and even their tough-looking male protectors to the steps of the palace. The local Lombard lord didn’t rush out to greet her. He and some of his men were already out testing—just testing, mind you—a new batch of beer. He was hustled along with respect but no fear by the laughing townspeople, and only prevented by the press of people around the palace from breaking his neck because he couldn’t see, he was so busy trying to pull a magnificent red velvet tunic down over a well-worn white shirt.

Lucilla thought he might as well have left his face covered up. One cheek was deeply scarred. He had a much-broken nose and part of one ear was missing. But his people cheered him and he bowed over Dulcinia’s hand like a gentleman.

Lucilla curtseyed to him and he replied gravely. “Ladies, you are a joy to behold. I hope you had a safe journey.”

“Tolerable,” Dulcinia said, “except at the river.”

The lord’s face darkened. “What happened at the river?”

Dulcinia spoke of being stopped and a toll demanded.

“That is my demesne and… and it shouldn’t have happened. That filthy little blackguard is back. I’d ride for the river now but—”

“He will certainly be gone, Father.”

The speaker was a young man as handsome as his father was ugly. “I am Ansgar,” the warrior said, “and this—” He gestured toward the young man. “—is my son Ludolf. When we came to this place, the filthy robber you encountered had his nest here. All the countryside around was waste, thanks to the fact that the people went in fear of him.”

The young man laughed. “Father, you weren’t married then, and I wasn’t even born.”

Ansgar looked a bit chagrined. “I’m sorry. I forget all this happened years ago. When my father died, my brothers and I divided his lands among ourselves. The eldest got the best. My other brother and I took the leavings.” He gestured expansively toward the end of the square overlooking the valley. “But I believe I got the better of the bargain.”

He was answered by cheers from the crowd in the square.

“But come, ladies. Come in. Sorry our housekeeping is a bit knockabout today, but my wife has a malaise she comes down with every spring and—”

“A song,” someone shouted in the crowd. The rest took up the cry. “A song. A song.”

The lord’s face darkened but Lucilla saw Dulcinia’s face flush with pleasure and a smile hovered on her lips. Ansgar looked ready to protest, but Dulcinia said, “No, no. Please, I would love to sing for them. Where?”

“The church porch.” Ludolf pointed across the square.

Yes, the church had a colonnaded porch and walls, no roof yet, but the scaffolding was up and carpenters were on top setting the ceiling beams. Musicians appeared as if by magic out of the assembled people: a woman with a harp, two men with flutes, and several with different sorts of drums.

Dulcinia strolled across the square, smiling, greeting and being greeted by the townsfolk. She looked uplifted, Lucilla thought, by the prospect of performing for the people.
Yes
, Lucilla thought, and she remembered the day outside of the tavern when she’d first spoken to the eight-year-old child scrubbing pots almost as big as she was. The little girl was sad, filthy, and malnourished, but when Lucilla asked her to sing, the glow that suffused her face was magnificent, and then and there, before the child opened her mouth, Lucilla had decided she must be rescued from her brutal fate. No matter what her voice sounded like. Of course, once she sang… oh, that God-given, heavenly voice… Dulcinia had reached the church steps and she had a few moments to consult with the musicians.

Another man hurried up. He held a huge viol. They put their heads together for what seemed like a long time, the occasional squeak, ping, hoot, shout, gush of notes escaping from among them. Then Dulcinia and the rest stood on the church porch. Two of the drummers dropped out but one produced a horn and the other a strip of leather with bells. Dulcinia raised one hand and every voice in the square hushed as she began to sing.

It was a very simple lyric about a lover who compares his sweetheart to a rose, or rather a variety of roses, white, red, pink; even the supple canes and autumn rose hips were mentioned. A sprightly song, even just a little funny. It drew the analogy out a bit too far to be taken quite seriously and ended with a bit of vocal ornamentation that was rather pretty. This drew cheers from the crowd and cries for another song, but Ansgar clapped his hands and said, “Enough is enough. The ladies have come a long way and need to dine and refresh themselves.”

One of the carpenters swung down from the church roof, donned a black velvet robe, and greeted them. He was, it transpired, Gerald, Ansgar’s brother and the first bishop of the newly created diocese. Ansgar and his son conducted Lucilla and Dulcinia into the palace. Beyond the doors was a wide reception hall lit by glass plugs in the roof. Outside, standing in the sun, it had been warm, almost hot; here it was cool, even where the sun struck long shafts of light through the translucent but not transparent skylights.

“Here we dine,” Ansgar said, “and receive visitors.”

“State visitors?” Dulcinia asked.

Ansgar chuckled. “I believe you may be the first.”

The hall ended at a double stair, one on either side leading up into the palace beyond. Someone, a woman, was descending, speaking as she came.

“Why didn’t you tell me they were here, my love? You know—” This sounded very reproachful. “—you know I wanted so badly to meet the finest singer in all of Rome… and—”

“My wife,” Ansgar said. “She suffers from a malady, seasonal in nature, that—”

“What he means to tell you is that every spring and fall I am a martyr to my damned nose. My eyes water, sting, and burn, and this nose runs like a damnable fountain, and I must—”

Just at that moment Dulcinia and Lucilla stepped into a pool of misty sunshine generated by the skylight above. The woman who had now reached the foot of the stairs paused, took a good, long careful look at them, and shrieked.

“Lucilla, as I live and breathe. Lucilla! What in God’s name are you doing here?”

Ansgar’s fist closed like a vise on Ludolf’s arm. “Shut the door quickly,” he snapped. “Now! And drop the bar. Now! Do you hear? Now,” he repeated.

Ludolf was already moving, drawing his sword as he went.

Lucilla peered into the gloom near the stair. “Stella,” she gasped. “How… ? What?”

“Ah, well,” Dulcinia murmured. “So much for disguises.” *        *        *

Regeane was Dorcas’s guest the night after the meeting. The two women repaired to the top of the tower house. Dorcas lent Regeane a woolen bedgown and a pair of socks. The room had four windows. One had glass and allowed a view of the courtyard below. The other windows bore curtains— embroidered white gauze—louvered shutters, and then heavy, solid oak shutters that could be bolted from the inside.

The room was lit by two candles, one on either side of the bed. The large bed was the centerpiece of the room, but around the walls, beneath the windows, were large chests for clothing and other linens. They did double duty as benches, as they were topped by soft, fragrant, downy cushions, very comfortable to sit on.

Dorcas lifted one and fluffed it for Regeane. “Itta helped me make these. She procured the goose down,” Dorcas said, then stood for a time silent, her thoughts turned inward, looking as if she’d forgotten both Regeane and the room she stood in.

But then she came to herself with a start. “I’m sorry,” she said, and placed the cushion on a bench for Regeane. “It’s just that I cannot quite believe I will never see her again. But tell me,” she asked, “are you one of those afraid of the night air?”