She raised both hands.
The wind came up just then, as though she had called it, and possibly she had. Or maybe it was just the night wind rising off the cooling ground. There was a hint of salt in that air, a fine hissing spray carried in from the sea. And another scent as well, a witching smell that made her ears itch.
The prisoners fell silent. The blood knives covered their faces and prayed. With a puzzled frown, Feather Cloak lowered her hands.
The Pale Sun Dog opened his eyes and, without letting his gaze rest even for an instant on the other Pale Dogs, he scanned the heavens and then the surrounding slopes, the tender grass in its pale splendor and the thorny shrubs that lay along the slopes as strands of darkness. A nightjar whirred. An owl who-whooed.
The night breeze was cool, teasing her hair, kissing her cheeks. That salt breath of the sea faded, and now after all it was only a common night, cloudy, cool, and filled with the crickling of nocturnal insects.
Feather Cloak spoke. “Among the Wendish there is a saying: ‘the luck of the king.’ If the king’s fortunes fail him, then no warrior will follow him. ‘A prince without a retinue is no prince,’ which means that without followers, he cannot rule. If we are not strong enough to defeat Sanglant and shatter his army, then we need only cause such devastation in his country that his people cry for a new feathered cloak—a new regnant—to save them. There are others who claim the right to lead. It matters not which one leads, or which one claims. Best if they fight among themselves, because that will weaken them. Destroy Sanglant’s support, destroy the trust his people have in him, and you have destroyed him even if you have not killed him.”
“He is your son,” said Zuangua, looking a little disgusted.
“He turned his back on his mother’s kinfolk. He swore allegiance to the Pale Dogs. He can’t be trusted.”
Zuangua shrugged. “No one distrusts the Pale Dogs more than I do. Yet if your son can’t be trusted, then neither can this one. For it seems to me that he has done worse by turning his back on his kin and his kind, all and together. At least your son keeps faith with those he has sworn community with. This one is no kind of trustworthy ally.”
“I did not say I trusted him. But what he offers, we can use. We will learn as much as we can from him, and after we are done, we will kill him. We will let the blood knives have him, if they can bind him. We will kill all of the human sorcerers, those who know the secret of the crowns. Then the sorcery of the looms can never again be used against us. For this reason, I will accept his alliance.”
The blood knives nodded eagerly. The mask warriors stamped their feet and barked and howled and shrieked approval. The prisoners huddled close to the priest-woman in her long robes, and even she with her words of power looked afraid. The flickering light made a golden mask of Feather Cloak’s face.
Zuangua nodded thoughtfully. “Yes. We must kill all the human sorcerers. They are the most dangerous of all.”