Vlad tried to whistle around a mouthful of blood sausage.
“It’s all done in absolute secrecy, of course, and only very rarely for money. If you need your heir cured of smallpox, then you must give up your threat of war on-” The old woman sat up straight. “He’s back!”
“Wulf?” three voices said.
Anton added, “Where?”
The Satanist hesitated, then said, “He’s talking with your wife.”
Anton uttered a sort of bark and shot out of his chair, heading for the door.
Otto cried, “Wait! Anton, you told him that you wouldn’t… That you would ask the bishop…”
Anton paused with his hand on the door handle and looked back, his face a cockpit of conflicting emotions. “I was only going to tell him that we must speak with him.”
“Let him be, lad! He’s out on his feet. Even if he sleeps in your bed, I don’t think you need have any fear of being cuckolded tonight.”
Vlad rather doubted that, remembering the fires of youth with nostalgia. He had no time to comment-he was planning to guard his tongue for once, anyway-before a section of the plastered wall shimmered and faded away. In walked a nonthreatening, almost tubby little m an wearing the dark robes and pectoral cross of a priest, under an oily, professional smile. Behind him loomed two much larger and younger men in garish blue and orange livery, each armed with shiny pike, sword, and dagger. They made the little room very crowded. The gap in the wall healed behind them.
“Anton,” the priest said, “I have urgent business with Wulfgang, your brother. Will you take me to him, please?”
Looking as if he’d been clubbed, Anton just nodded.
The priest smiled down at the Speaker. “You promise not to interfere, Justina?”
She sighed. “I promise, Father.”
Anton opened the door and led the way. ='0ont›
CHAPTER 28
Countess presumptive Madlenka had never known a worse day. After gathering up wounded in the morning, she had spent the rest of the day in the madhouse of the infirmary. When her mother became both exhausted and distraught by all the horrors she had witnessed, Madlenka took over and sent her off to rest. She was probably the youngest person there, but leadership was what nobility were for. She ordered the blood-splattered floor washed and the unneeded beds tidied away, and she cleared out all but a necessary minimum of medics, sawbones, and priests.
Anyone with a chance to live had already been bandaged and returned to his family. Eight wounded remained. By nightfall, two had died and another had gone home to do so.
She spent most of her time with Radomir. A year younger than she and the son of a palace guard, he had been a childhood friend of Petr, her brother. Now he was a smith’s apprentice, a husky, happy young man. He had just carried a building stone up to the roof of the north barbican when a Wend arrow had gone right through him. There was no way to stitch up bowels. He was bleeding inside, and if that didn’t kill him soon, fever would later, so he had been given extreme unction. He writhed in agony, but the town was out of poppy, mandrake, mallow root, and all other known painkillers. It was even short of honey for dressing wounds.
He seemed to find Madlenka better company than the muttering priests, so she sat by his bed, held his huge, rough hand-twice the size of hers-and spoke of the golden days of long ago. She helped him sip water and she wiped away his sweat. Now and again he would speak. Sometimes the one remaining doctor or priest would come by to check on him or ask her permission to do something or other. The rest of the time she just talked, and at times she managed to make him smile. News of the Wends’ destruction by a thunderbolt from God arrived, and she was passing on the wonderful news to Radomir when she realized that his eyes were no longer moving. She called the doctor over to confirm that he was dead. Then there was nothing to do except wait for the rest of the patients to die, so she left the priest in charge and went to her room to mourn.
After a while she rang for a light supper and water to wash her face. She knew she must try to get some sleep before Anton came, because she might not get much after. She asked for Giedre, but she had gone out celebrating.
Madlenka had just finished eating when Wulf appeared-not close, over by the bed. She gasped and glanced at the door. There was a bolt on it, but what possible reason could she have to lock her husband out of their bedroom? Then she took another look at Wulf.
“What’s wrong? You’re hurt?”
He forced a smile and held it. “Just tired. No sleep last night and not much for two nights before that. I’m about to fall over and disappear until morning, but I want to ask a favor…” He leaned against the bedpost as if he needed the support. “A big favor.”
Her eyes kept sliding back to the door. “Wh='0on#x2ere’s Anton?”
“In the solar, with Otto. That’s really what I came to tell you. Anton’s going to ask the bishop to annul your handfasting.”
She leaped off the stool and went to him, gripped his arms. “You’re serious?”
“I’m ecstatic, but how do you feel?”
“Ecstaticker! Oh, Wulf, darling! This isn’t his idea of a joke?”
“No.” The smile had faded. Golden eyes solemn… “You won’t be countess.”
“I don’t want to be countess. I want to be your wife.” She decided he wasn’t going to kiss her, so she tried to kiss him.
He turned his face away from hers but he did join in the hug, strong arms tight around her. “Wait, please! We can’t. I’m doomed. It was me destroyed the Wends’ army. I set fire to their powder wagons.”
“I wondered if that was your doing. Oh, I’m so happy!”
“I killed thousands of men, maybe even the duke himself.”
She thought of Radomir’s agony. “I wish you’d killed every last one of the rats.”
“I may have come close.”
“I don’t care. I love you. The war was their fault. You did right.”
“But the Church will not say that, even if the men were schismatics. I killed a priest. The Inquisition may take its time to plan its campaign, but it can always find me. There is nowhere I can run.”
“You don’t believe that! There must be a way out!”
“Well, maybe. But it’s a very thin chance…”
Sudden brightness, and they were not in her room anymore. They were in… nowhere. Not truly bright, but not dark; all silent and empty, a sort of shining fog. Nothing in sight anywhere. She cried out in fear.
“It’s all right.” His embrace tightened even more. “You’re perfectly safe. This is limbo. It’s very hard to spy on us here, that’s all. There’s a legion of people after me, not just the Church. King Konrad is dying, so Cardinal Zdenek wants me, and I think he’s up to no good. Even the Orthodox Church may send Speakers to hunt me down for killing Vilhelmas. Our life together may be very, very brief. There is one, very faint hope.”
“Tell me!”
“There’s a group of Speakers calling themselves the Saints. They say they’re honorable. They say they can protect me from the Church, in return for my loyalty. They even promise a priest who will absolve me of my sins, although I don’t know if the pope himself could do that now. Speakers are only human, and the Saints believe that we cannot be trusted not to abuse our talent. I have a wickedly quick temper, as I’m sure Anton has told you.”
She chuckled. “Several times! You laid him flat with one punch, I heard.”
“Two punches. He deserved both of them, but that was fists, not talent.”
“What do you mean by ‘talent’?”
He hesitated so long, just looking at her, that she thought he wasn’t going to answer at all. Then he whispered, “The ability to speak to the devil and get him to perform evil miracles.”
“Wulf! No! You’re not that, not a Satanist!”
