King's Dragon

Page 23

“How little you know of the church, my beauty. Sorcery is not a heresy. Indeed, the skopos is usually harsher toward heretics than toward sorcerers. Sorcery is only forbidden by the church when it is practiced outside the supervision of the skopos. I wonder what teacher your Da had. And in any case, you would be surprised how tolerant King Henry and the noble princes can be, if only the means further their aims. Where did you hide the book?”
She retreated to the door and did not answer.
He smiled. “I’m patient, Liath. Lady and Lord, what were your parents thinking, to call their child by an old Arethousan name? Liathano. An ancient name, linked to sorcery. Your Da admitted as much to me once.”
“When he had drunk too much.”
“Does that make it less true?” She said nothing. “Where is the book, Liath?” When still she did not speak he shook his head, but the smile remained on his lips. “I’m patient. Which will it be? My bed, or the pigs?”
“The pigs.”
With a lightning strike he grabbed her wrist with one hand and slapped her hard once again with the other. Then he embraced her and ran a hand up her back. His breath was hot on her neck. She stood rigid, but when he began to move her toward the bed she fought against him. Got a heel behind his ankle and tripped him. They fell in a heap on the floor, and she pushed away and scrambled to her feet. He laughed and caught her by one knee, jerked her down so hard her knees bruised on the stone and the breath was jarred out of her. Then he let her go and stood, breathing hard. He bowed in the most formal, court manner, offered her his hand to help her to her feet.
“You’ll come to my bed willingly or not at all.” He pulled a scrap of white linen from his belt, wiped her right hand clean, then bent to kiss her fingers. “My lady,” he said, perhaps mockingly. She was too dazed to interpret his tone. His golden hair brushed her hand, and he straightened. “‘She is dark and lovely, this daughter of Saïs, touched by the sun’s breath. Turn your eyes away from me; they are as bright as the star of morning.’”
She shoved her hand behind her back and wiped it against her tunic.
“Now. You will feed the pigs and the hens, sweep this room, get me a bath, and then tell Mistress Birta that she no longer need send a meal over twice a day. You can cook, I suppose?”
“I can cook. May I go?”
He stood aside so she could leave, but she had only gotten as far as the narrow passageway when he called her name.
“Liath.” She turned back to see him leaning in the doorway. Even in the semigloom of the little warren of cells, his golden hair and his combed linen robe and his fine, clean skin made him seem to shine as he watched her. “You may even last out the summer with the pigs, but I don’t think you’ll like it so well when winter comes.”
How far she would get if she tried to run away? A useless thought. She would not get far, nor would she have any means to live if she did escape from him. She had seen herself in eight years of running that there were far worse circumstances than these.
Hugh chuckled, mistaking her silence for a reply. “Tell Mistress Birta that she may tally up any food or goods you buy from her, and I’ll pay her each Ladysday. I expect a good table. And you will dine with me. Go on.”
She went. Going outside to feed the animals that were stabled in the shed alongside the storage rooms, she saw a horseman sitting astride his mount, out in the trees. It was Ivar. Seeing her, he began to ride forward. She waved him away, quickly, desperately. For there was another thing she had seen in Frater Hugh’s chamber, resting on the feather quilt. A fine, gold-hilted long sword, sheathed in red leather. A nobleman’s sword. She had no doubt that Hugh knew how to use it and would not hesitate to, even against a son of the local count.
Ivar reined his horse in and sat, watching her, while she worked. After a while she went inside. When she came out again, carrying two buckets yoked on a staff across her shoulders to fill for Hugh’s bath, Ivar was gone.
III
SHADOWS FROM
THE PAST
1
IT took five days to walk from Osna village to Lavas Holding, the sergeant in charge told Alain. The journey this spring, however, took fifteen days because the chatelaine and her company stopped at every village and steading to accept taxes or rents or a young person in service for the upcoming year. They came to Lavas Holding on St. Marcia’s Day, and Alain stared at the high timber palisade that enclosed the count’s fortress, the timber great hall built on a rise with a stone bailey behind it, these two central buildings surrounded by a smaller palisade. The village spilled out below the outer palisade, down to the banks of a slow-flowing river.