Or left to wither beneath the sun
I know that my Redeemer promised to be my guide and my teacher
That in his care I will grow again some day in the Lord’s garden,
Which is Heaven,
Among green things and by clear waters . . .
“Simon?” she called. “Are you here?”
“Yes, my dear. You need not rise for Her Majesty, Jeremias, because you’ll tip me over.”
As her vision improved she made out her husband standing with one foot on a weapons chest while Sir Jeremias knelt at his feet, fastening the buckles of a greave. Simon was mostly armored, but his chest plate, the one Miriamele had thought was only for public show, still leaned against the tent wall. Two squires stood at wide-eyed near-attention behind the king, and Bishop Putnam, senior of the priests traveling with the royal party, was kneeling not far from Jeremias so that he could use the light of the candles to read from the Book of Aedon. “What, precisely, are you doing, husband?” the queen asked in what she hoped was a measured voice “And you, Lord Chamberlain?”
Jeremias looked up at her, and for a moment he might have been the guilty boy she had first met. “If the Lord Chamberlain is p-present,” he said with the hint of a stutter, “it is his duty to dress the king.”
And His angels sing in sweet voices
Of the goodness of our God.
And the song they sing is this,
‘Because you have heard the Redeemer’s voice,
You need fear no foreigner, no barbarian, no beast
Who flee the Lord’s sight and carry evil in their hearts.
You need fear no storm, no thunderbolt, no wrack of earth
Because that which is in you is His, and He knows you always
Be you surrounded by enemies, be you ever outnumbered.’
“Just so,” Simon said. “And dressing the king ought to include armor, don’t you think?”
She could now make out the high color in his cheeks, as though he had been drinking. “It’s only another sort of thing to wear,” her husband said. “And it seems good sense when there may be fighting.”
“It’s more than that, Majesty.” Jeremias spoke with such emphasis that the bishop hesitated in his recitation. “The king’s armor is a sacred thing. A holy thing.”
After a pause, His Eminence Putnam continued.
Because you have set your love on Him, therefore will He deliver you.
He is enthroned on high that He can see your heart, and that by the hand
Of His redeeming Son it has been cleansed,
And you will hear His mighty call when it comes,
That will on some day, perhaps this day,
Summon you home.
Putnam’s droning irritated her. She wanted to speak to her husband, but what could be worse than interrupting a prayer at a time like this? But this cantis was a prayer she had never liked because it made death in battle seem somehow a victory. Miriamele had seen too many dead, especially too many she had loved, for the thought of Heaven’s mercy to soothe her much. Those who fell might find a holy welcome with their Father and His son, but that did not make it easier for those left behind. Those who would have to go on alone.
“It may be a holy thing,” she said, moving closer to her husband so she could lower her voice. “I do not pretend to such wisdom. But it is certainly a foolish thing. Simon, you cannot take such a risk. There may be nothing like the rumored five hundred, but Irwyn says these Norns killed Sir Jubal with an arrow from a great distance. If you fight, you will be their chief target.”
“I don’t intend to fight, Miri,” the king told her, but the way he looked away told her it was at least half a lie.
That is the way men speak when they think we don’t understand their cursed pride, Miri thought, but this time the ancient frustration frightened her more than it angered her. “Then what are you going to do, husband?”
To the Lord all praise! the bishop intoned loudly, as if to cover the sounds of royal discord.
To His son all praise!
To the garden that is Heaven where you shall live,
All praise!
Putnam then repeated the words in Nabbanai to complete the cantis, but did not immediately rise, as though he continued with silent prayer of his own.
Jeremias carefully fastened Simon’s other greave, then did the same with the poleyns that would protect the king’s knees. “Most of our men have never fought against the White Foxes,” Simon said as he watched. “Now they must face them, perhaps within the hour. They are afraid—superstitious and afraid.”
“As they should be. You and I know all too well what those monsters can do.”
“Just so, Miri. But the men know that I have faced them, as has Eolair. We can show them not to fear just by being there with them.”
“Just by being in bowshot for some Norn assassin to strike you down, you should say. Just by risking your life needlessly. You are the king, Simon!”
“And you are the queen.” He smiled. His bottom half was now covered in plate, and he lifted his arms so Jeremias and the two young squires could buckle the two sides of his cuirass into place. Simon’s arming shirt was embroidered, lovingly if not skillfully, with the Holy Tree—Miriamele remembered stitching it years before, in a time when she had reason to hope it would never be worn in an actual battle. Seeing it now brought a pang. For a moment the gleam of Simon’s broad white forelock, the streak the dragon’s blood had burned in his graying hair, stood out as though it shone with its own light. She caught her breath. Her heart was beating swiftly.
Oh, Simon, she thought—don’t throw your magic away on trifles! She was not exactly sure what the thought meant, but a grim foreboding had clutched her. “I wish you wouldn’t do this,” she said. “I am afraid.”
“You? The bravest woman who ever drew breath?” He smiled at her, and for a moment was nothing more than her jolly, maddening husband, the one she had loved for so long and through so much. “Come, now. I will not let anything harm me. I would not dare, my lady.”
She knew she could not stop him without a furious argument, and she also knew that the demands of Man’s Pride might seem foolish and dangerous to her but were real and important among men, especially for a king. “Promise me at least that you will stay in the back, then,” she said at last. “Promise me you will not ride up to the front where one of those demons can see you and shoot at you.”
He gave her a look—the always-love, but with a hint of grievance. “If you insist.”
“I do. Even if there are hundreds of Norns up there, it will not be worth your being killed. Remember the things we have still to do, Simon. Remember your promises to Isgrimnur.”
He nodded briskly. “I know. Don’t shame me, Miri. I remember. I remember all of it.”
She went to him then and kissed his cheek, felt the tangle of his beard scratching against her cheek. Just the smell of him, of his neck and hair, made her ache with desire. “So do I, husband. Every bit of our story. And I want to share the rest of it with you, not mourning you.”
He watched her leave the tent. She had known him so long that she knew exactly what his gaze felt like, even from behind.
Nezeru brought Saomeji water. He let her pour it into his mouth without a word or even meeting her eyes, as though he were a dying animal.
“By your skills you have saved us, Singer,” she told him, and her gratitude was not feigned. Saomeji did not answer but only lay back against the stone, breathing regularly but shallowly.
Their hiding place had at first seemed like no hiding place at all, a great split stone the size of a barn that sat near the top of the hill, broken in two halves like a dropped melon. The massive sections stood several paces apart, and anything between the two halves should have been visible from a long distance. But the Singer had used a skill that he called “stonesinging,” and now Nezeru’s entire company, including the mortal Jarnulf, their horses, and even monstrous Goh Gam Gar, sheltered between the rough hemispheres, apparently invisible to all searching eyes—at least those of mortals. Nezeru had watched a company of armed men search for them less than a bowshot away, oblivious to their hiding place, although Nezeru could see the mortals clearly, as if through no more than a faint mist.
“What do they see?” Jarnulf asked quietly as another trio of mortal soldiers blundered past, clearly unable to understand how the Norns had managed to vanish on a surrounded hilltop. Late afternoon was now fading into twilight; the growing darkness turned the mortals into clumsy children, stumbling and bumping into each other, unable to find safe footing in their heavy armor, even as their quarry sat observing them from only a few paces away.
“They see only stone,” said Saomeji, still laboring for breath. His eyes were as reddened as if he had just stepped out of a violent windstorm. “Just as they hear us no better than were we surrounded by the stone they imagine is there. But you still must keep your voices low.”