He walked back to the hounds, and said, “Duke Conrad, I pray you. If you’ll spare me a dozen loaves of waybread, I’ll give them as alms to these poor beggars.”
“Come into the light,” said Conrad, and Alain did so, coming right up to the wall of shields set on the ruin of the outer wall. After a moment a soldier arrived with his arms basketing half a dozen loaves of the flatbread commonly baked by travelers on the coals overnight. These were several days’ old.
“What has happened?” Conrad pushed past the shields to stand beside Alain, alert to the noises out of the woods.
Back in the camp, Atto sobbed.
“I believe they have fled, seeing a superior force. May I now feed these poor beggars?”
Conrad laughed. “A godly man is a good ally, so the church mothers tell us. I’ll walk with you.”
“I pray to God this shall be enough to strengthen these unfortunates,” said Alain as they came among them. Conrad walked boldly, but it was clear he marked each one, looking closely at their rags and their emaciated limbs for sign of disease before he handed them a hank of bread out of his own hands. Filth and hunger and desperation did not make him flinch. Any person saw such things every day. But even a strong soul might quail at the mark of plague or leprosy.
These were only poor, landless, and starving, nothing out of the ordinary except that they had retreated so far into the wild lands and so near to the guivre’s lair. When Alain and Conrad returned to camp, Sabella scolded them.
“Now the creatures will plague us,” she said, “hoping for another morsel. You have only encouraged them. I hope they did not hear that lad shouting. I’ll not be burdened with a train of beggars.”
“Where, then, should they go?” Alain asked her.
“What concern is that of mine?”
“You are duchess here in Arconia, I believe,” he answered. “Are these people not your concern?”
“Why should they be? What if those thieves creep back and try to surprise us a second time?”
“God have given you these lands to administer, have They not? It is your duty and obligation to be a just steward of these lands. Even beggars and outlaws are among your subjects.”
“As inside, so outside, my clerics tell me. These beggars must have sinned grievously to be punished in such a manner.”
“Do you believe it is only their own sins that have brought them so low? That they deserve whatever suffering they endure?”
“Each of us faces justice in the end. I do not mean to interfere with the punishment God has ordained for them.”
“Justice must be tempered with mercy. What mercy should God show to you if you will show none in your turn?”
Conrad clucked, while the courtiers muttered their shocked outrage that their lady should be spoken to in such a manner by a man who had only the expectation of rank but no actual lands and title in his grasp.
“Do you speak so, to me?” she demanded. “Let them perish, if they have not the strength to survive. I cannot aid them, and why should I, if it will harm my cause and weaken my rule? Food given to these wretches will not go to feed my soldiers and retainers, who aid me. What matters it, anyway? These creatures are the least of God’s creation, far beneath us.”
He shook his head. “Do not say so. In birth and death we are alike. Their bodies will turn to dust, just as mine will. Just as yours will.”
Her aspect grew cold and she clenched her jaw tight before finding her voice. “This I will not endure! Captain! Bind him and cast him in the cage. He who insults me with such insolence will be first to feed the guivre.”
“Feed the guivre?” cried Conrad. “You cannot mean to feed the beast on human flesh!”
“The monster must be strong so it can defeat Sanglant. Human flesh and human blood strengthens beasts as no other nourishment can. Take him!”
Her captain waited with a dozen men, eyeing the hounds and the man, and as they hesitated Alain met each guard’s gaze in turn, looked each one right in the eye.
None ventured forward.
“Take him!” repeated Sabella furiously. “Why do you wait?”
All at once every dog in camp began barking. Only Sorrow and Rage remained silent as soldiers hoisted their shields and held their weapons ready. It was too dark to see anything in the forest, but a wind picked up, whipping the treetops into a frenzy. The beggars erupted, like the dogs, into a clamor, and crying and weeping they fled into the forest.
“It is not the bandits they fear,” said Conrad. He stepped back toward the safety of the line with his sword drawn and his head cast back to scan the night sky. There was nothing to see except the darker toss and tumble of tree-tops as they danced in the wind. Unseen, but heard, a branch snapped explosively and crashed to earth.