Lord Berthold lifted his chin as if he’d been rocked back by a blow. “How came you to see this?” he demanded imperiously. “Tell me!”
“Just up here, by the crown up on the hill here. But the monks, and Father Ortulfus, did not believe our story and sent us as prisoners to Autun. It’s a long story. I could as well ask you, how came you here, and at this time?”
“Who are you?”
“Ivar, son of Count Harl of the North Mark.”
“God save us! Sister Rosvita’s young half brother! Can it be?”
“You know Rosvita?”
“I was one of the noble youths on the king’s progress. She taught me letters.” Berthold’s gaze turned intent as he stared at Ivar. His voice trembled. “What news of her? Everything is all gone tumbling. All the months have fallen like so many sticks scattering. I scarcely know where I am or what has befallen us. So many are lost, and only the remnants found.” Ivar had a difficult time following this chatter, and anyway, Lord Berthold had already switched streams, turning to the Quman youth. “Where is Brother Heribert?”
“Still at the well, he looks, my lord,” said the man in accented but comprehensible Wendish. “The old wolf, at the fire-worker’s hearth, he waits. At the smith.” He considered the word and said it again. “The smith. Of horses, the holy men keep none.”
“Maybe we should go on, on foot,” said the second lord, and the other two looked at him as if he had suggested they walk on their hands to get where they were going. Then they all laughed. Such a bond grew out of shared adversity. It could not be woven on any other loom.
“Where have you come from? Where are you going?”
“Strangely,” said Berthold lightly, “we ride north from Aosta, which is where we found ourselves.” His expression darkened, and he clenched his jaw and, with an effort, made himself smile, although it gave him a bitter edge. “We’re going to Kassel. We hear that all the dukes and ladies and princes become king ride that way. We have news, and edicts, and many things to tell, and we have come to much trouble to get here in order to tell them.”
Ivar felt silenced by this passionate, angry speech. As the son of a count, he was this man’s peer, certainly, although of course Villam’s son must outrank the child of a borderland count who rarely attended court to bolster his position. He knew himself an outsider, judged and found wanting.