His mouth said that. His face, his stance, his phrasing were all screaming, “Not Constable Kavarskas!” And yet Kavarskas was his superior! His other men’s expressions flickered, but there were too many for Anton to read individually. He registered only that even the garrison had doubts about their commander.
Four men came running out and sped off down the hill, two of them carrying blankets and poles to rig a stretcher. Anton had done as much as he could for Wulf. Meanwhile he must make a choice. Lady Madlenka was certainly tempting, but he would have to delay the pleasure of that meeting.
“…to the seneschal,” he said. It was he who had sent the report to Cardinal Zdenek.
At least a dozen more Cardice troopers had appeared in the barbican, while in the shadowy background lurked a trio of very different warriors, resplendent in the spectacular garb of landsknechte. Otto and Vlad often entertained landsknecht friends at Dobkov. These three were observing, not participating. Their leader would want his own reports on anything that happened at the gate.
“Llywelyn!” the sergeant said. “Take your squad and escort His Lordship to the keep and find the seneschal for him. You are under his orders.”
Llywelyn was a man of around fifty, with a lethal, case-hardened look to him. He lined up his squad behind him with a few sharp words in another accent altogether, then indicated that Anton should head toward the far side of the barbican. He had enormous arms and shoulders; no doubt his armor was hiding a twisted spine.
“You’re no crossbowman,” Anton said. “The English longbow’s your weapon.”
Llywelyn beamed at this display of expertise. “It used to be, my lord.”
Baroness Pavla had died when Wulf was born, so all Anton’s life the table talk at Dobkov had been of military matters-from Father and his guests, and later from Ottokar and Vladislav. Anton had known an arquebus from a halberd and a ravelin from a trace Italienne before he wore his first pair of shoes. It couldn’t hurt now to demonstrate that he was wise for his years.
“Can’t manage a hundred-and-fifty-pound pull now?”
“No, my lord. I plays with crossbows now, see. Like toys, they are.”
“Tell me what’s happened since Sir Petr was killed by the boar.”
Llywelyn drew a deep breath and spewed out a torrent of singsong that sounded somewhat like, “That was Saturday see and the count may God have mercy on his soul died on Monday see so they were buried side by side on Tuesday see and the Heavens wept for it and they say the poor woman hasn’t stopped lamenting ever since and this morning the count of Pelrelm him they call the Hound of the Hills came a-calling and there’s rumors that he’s brought a son to marry the child Madlenka see and be the next keeper begging your pardon my lord.”
“Good report, Sergeant.” So Havel Vranov was-
“Sarge?” said one of the bodyguards at Anton’s back. “I heard just now that they’re gone to St. Andrej’s.”
Anton spun around, walking backward so he could look at the rest of the men. “Any of the rest of you heard that?”
“Aye,” said two.
“A church?”
“The cathedral, my lord.”
Anton completed his rotation. “To St. Andrej’s, Sergeant. At the double.”
CHAPTER 12
A sort of universal gasp of dismay filled the cathedral and then was instantly suppressed. Even the bishop stood slack-jawed and speechless. Madlenka and her companions spun around to locate the speaker. The congregation-which now filled the rear two-thirds of the nave-parted to clear a passage for him as he casually strolled forward, spurs jingling and sollerets tapping like hammers on the flagstones. He was smiling, evidently enjoying the sensation he had caused.
He was bareheaded, with curly dark hair, a pretty-boy face, and a stringy mustache, but the first thing Madlenka noticed was how tall he was, because he was clearly visible over the crowd. As the last of the congregation moved out of his way, she saw that he was wearing full armor, carrying his helmet under one arm. His surcoat was emblazoned with a clenched gauntlet, and he wore a golden baldric slanted across it, crossed by a leather strap supporting a satchel. He bore no sword, but there were streaks of blood on his shoulder and chest. He came striding forward in a clank of metal shoes and a jingle of spurs. How far back had he been standing? He must have very sharp ears to have heard the banns, or very quick wits to have guessed what the bishop was doing.
At first sight he might be just any man-at-arms with his rations in the bag on his shoulder. At second glance he certainly wasn’t. His armor was superb, tailor-made. He was nobility. The jeweled baton he carried said so and the sash of honor across his chest shouted it. Most of all, though, it was utterly beyond belief that any commoner in Christendom could match that youthful haughtiness, or the impregnable arrogance of his mustache, twirled up like a water buffalo’s horns.
Kavarskas and Dalibor Notivova moved as if to block him. He handed his helmet to Kavarskas as he might to a varlet and the assurance in that gesture was enough to make the constable fall back out of his way all by itself.
The newcomer bypassed the principals to reach the bishop, dropped briefly to one knee to kiss his ring, and bounced up again. From his bag he took a scroll bearing a red wax seal the size of a man’s palm, which he handed to Ugne.
“If you would be so kind as to read this out, my lord bishop?”
The townsfolk were whispering like wind in a forest. That was no ordinary wax seal. Count Stepan had not used a seal near that size.
Madlenka tore her eyes away for a second to look at her companions. Marijus had flushed a deep red color; his father’s face was pale with fury, and she felt a surge of relief that stole her breath away. Whatever scheme the Pelrelmians had been plotting had not included this intruder, this slender youth with the boar’s-tusks mustache. Whoever or whatever he was, he was not a Vranov imposter.
Bishop Ugne glanced at the seal and looked up with shock. “Of course I shall… my lord?”
The newcomer smiled. “Just read it.” He watched as the bishop strode over to the steps, where people would see him better.
Then the boy turned his smile on Madlenka. He beckoned her to him, so she went. “Your brother,” he whispered, “told the king that you were both a hellion and a great beauty. I think he was guilty of two counts of criminal understatement.”
Oh!
She gaped at him like a landed fish. He came from the king?
Already? But how…?
“This is a proclamation,” Bishop Ugne proclaimed, “issued by our beloved sovereign, King Konrad the Fifth, may God preserve him.”
The congregation responded automatically: “Amen!”
He read it out in Latin, then translated it into the vernacular. Everyone was staring at the newcomer, and he was looking down at Madlenka. He winked. She hastily lowered her veil to hide her blushes. Better a boy sent by the king than any son of Havel Vranov, but she had not expected anyone like this.
“…royal command… the said Madlenka Bukovany… in holy matrimony
…”
Anton Magnus, a count, a companion in the Order of St. Vaclav, no less! And she was to marry him, by the king’s command.
“…under our hand in our capital of Mauvnik, this eighteenth day of September in the year of Our…”
Madlenka Magnus? Countess Madlenka.
What had she expected? Love? Like a princess in a troubadour’s romance? He was little older than herself, she judged; handsome, she supposed; perhaps witty, or even charming, judging by his first two sentences to her.
“And now two more, if you please, my lord bishop.” Magnus handed the bishop another scroll.
