Crown of Stars (Crown of Stars #7)

“Hey!”

The shout turned her around to stare at the bonfire burning at her back, beyond the crown, about forty strides away. A sentry staggered back, a hand clapped to his right shoulder.

“’Ware! ’Ware! I’ve been shot!”

Sentries called out. A pair of men grabbed sticks and lit them out of the fires to create swift-burning torches. She ran to the cursing sentry. By the time she got there, the captain and Sergeant Ingo were standing beside him, examining the arrow. It was a shallow wound. The arrow danced up and down each time the man winced and swore.

“Where?” she asked him.

“Don’t know,” he said through gritted teeth. “Aih! Either pull it free or stop touching it!”

“Back here so I can see if the point is barbed,” said Ingo, and hauled him away.

“Silence!” she said, as the camp roused around them, men calling to each other, swords thudding against shields and mail giving its distinctive slinky rattle as men armed themselves.

“Silence!” roared Thiadbold.

In that silence, quickly fallen, she heard a twig snap, straight ahead, in the trees. She needed no bow. She bent her will to the crown of the trees and called fire.

The forest flashed into a ghastly bright false day as treetops caught fire, revealing a dozen raggedly dressed men armed with spears and sticks and bows. They ranged just out of the halo of light given by the bonfires, under the shadow of the trees, but with sparks and ash raining down over them and the flames blazing above, they fled into the darkness. Arrows skittered after them, until Thiadbold called the cease. The Lions cheered and hooted to see their foe routed.

“That’s a neat trick,” said Thiadbold somberly, studying the flames, “that might turn a battle or two. Yet I wouldn’t try it in dry lands. Will it spread?”

“I hope not.”

This was no white-hot anger, no blast of fear, to create a wildfire. It was a bigger fire than she had intended, scorching six trees altogether, but with some effort she managed to pinch off its edges so it would burn itself out. The sentry had taken only a slight wound, quickly bandaged. The men settled down as the captain set out a double guard for the rest of the night.

Even so, Liath could not sleep. Only when the fire had died completely did she lie down, and even then whenever she closed her eyes she saw burning men, their flesh melting off their bodies.

Is this why Da had sealed her off from her own magic? Had he only been trying to protect her from herself? But this question struck her as impossibly naive. Da’s motives could not be so easily divined, nor were they simple. Da was not stupid, even if he hadn’t had the strength of will necessary to combat Anne.

Without the stars to mark the passing of time, the night dragged on as if forever, but at length the air lightened and a bird chirped. The sound made her jump. A bird! She rose, unsteady on weary legs, and listened hard and peered into the surrounding foliage, but she did not see it or hear that call again.

5

THE outpost had a name, Freeburg, and a population of some four-score wary persons housed in an impressive walled holding consisting of five thatched longhouses, a dozen or so smaller buildings and, remarkably, the blunt spire of a tiny chapel. One lonely cottager lived outside the walls, just where the path emerged from the forest, but it wasn’t clear if this spry old fellow had chosen his exile or lived close by the protecting palisade on sufferance. He watched their company march past without saying a word and turned back to clearing his garden. Six beehives lay within his fence.

The gates lay open. Folk worked in the fields and women washed clothes in the sparkling river. Meat dried under fenced-in shelters, ready to be brought in and cured. The ring of a blacksmith’s hammer surprised them; smiths, like gold, were usually found in more exalted settlements.

Folk paused to watch them. A dozen young men stood along the palisade rampart armed with bows.

“They’re not trusting,” murmured Liath to Thiadbold, but he only nodded thoughtfully and led the Lions right into what might be a trap, crossing over the ditch and through the open gate. The Lions halted inside the gate, in an open area with enough space for arms practice, or a market, or foot races. Soon they were surrounded. The council of elders met them.

“We heard news of you along the road,” said their spokesman, a genial man with silver hair, silver beard, and a twisted smile from a palsy afflicting the left side of his face. He looked otherwise hale. “I’m called Master Helmand.”

“I’m called Captain Thiadbold. We’re on the regnant’s business—my Lions and these three Eagles—on our way to St. Valeria’s. If we might bide one night within your walls, we’d be grateful. We were attacked by bandits last night. One of our men got hurt, but we drove them off.”