Dhuoda regarded him impatiently, waiting for his reply. He nodded his head, and she turned away, dismissing him. Her fur-lined cloak swayed as she walked briskly toward the deacon, who had finished the hasty mass.

Alain’s hand caught on his belt, and suddenly he remembered the rose. It was not crushed. It had not wilted. It was as perfect as a budding rose just plucked from the bush. He held it in his hand all the long walk back to Osna, and still it did not change.

In the morning, he carefully bound the rose to a thin leather string and hung it around his neck, tucked between shirt and tunic where no one could see. A thicker string held the wooden Circle of Unity Aunt Bel gave him to wear as a reminder of his father’s promise to the church.

After bittersweet farewells, he slung his pack over his back and followed Chatelaine Dhuoda and her retinue out of the village, into the world beyond.

II

THE BOOK OF

SECRETS

1

IN the northernmost reaches of the North Mark of Wendar lay a cluster of hamlets and villages known as Heart’s Rest. The people here spoke a peculiar dialect of Wendish flavored with odd words and unconventional pronunciations.

Traveling fraters noted with distress that an alarmingly pagan-looking Tree figured as prominently in the wood-frame churches of Our Lord and Lady as did the Circle of Unity. The biscop of Heart’s Rest turned her gaze the other way, concerned more with the yearly increase in raids along the coast. But she did not prohibit the most punctilious of the fraters from sending reports south of this heathenish practice.

Nothing ever came of these reports. Heart’s Rest was too far north, too sparsely populated, and by no means wealthy enough to attract the attention of either king or skopos. It was a quiet peninsula, set apart from Wendar proper. People spoke softly and kept to their own business. They remained as tolerant toward the occasional outsider who washed up on their shores as their biscop remained to the lingering taint of pagan rites in the handful of churches under her watch.

Let well enough alone. People said it often, and firmly. Those outsiders who came to rest there might find peace, for a while.

It depended, really, on who they were running from, and how far their enemies were willing to track them.

“See, there,” said Da. “Setting below the trees in the west. The Rose Star, known by the ancient Babaharshan magicians as Zuhia, sun of the night, mage and scholar. What can you tell me about him?”

“The Dariyan astronomers called the Rose Star by the name Aturna, the Red Mage. It is a lesser light than the Blood Star but of a truer cast. Aturna is one of the traveling stars, also known as the erratica, or planets. It rules the seventh sphere, whose upper surface is tangent to the orb of the fixed stars beyond which lies the Chamber of Light. Its lower surface is tangent to the sixth sphere, that ruled by the planet Mok. Aturna takes twenty-eight years to travel along the path of the twelve Houses of Night.”

They stood in the clearing, trees below, the rocky verge of the hill above. The grass, growing hard now that spring had come, reached their knees. Behind, on a level terrace of ground, the cottage sat dark but for a faint red glow, the hearth fire glimpsed through the open door and window. It was a perfect night for viewing: There was not a trace of cloud in the sky.

“Name the seven spheres and their order,” said Da.

“The sphere closest to the Earth is that of the Moon. The second is that of the planet Erekes, and the third is that of the planet Somorhas, also known as the Lady of Light. Fourth is the sphere of the Sun. Then comes the fifth sphere, which is ruled by the planet Jedu, the Angel of War. The sixth sphere is ruled by Mok, and the seventh—and last—by Aturna. Beyond Aturna lies the field of stars each of which is a fire burning bright before the Chamber of Light.”

“And the seven ladders known to the mages, by which the learned can ascend as if through the seven spheres to the place of wisdom and mastery?” He turned over the book he held in his hands but did not open it. Three partridges, shot by Liath, hung on a line from his shoulder. They had been out hunting and came back late, but since they always—always—carried book and astrolabe with them, they could observe the heavens anywhere.

Liath hesitated, shifting bow and quiver on her back. This knowledge was new. She and Da had traced out the stars, fixed and traveling, since she was old enough to point at the heavens. But only last month had he suddenly begun to teach her the secret lore of mages. Last month, on the feast day of St. Oya, saint of mysteries and secrets, he had remembered—as if the turning wheel of the stars in the heavens and the progress of days on the Earth had taken a sudden, unexpected forward leap—that she would turn sixteen on the spring equinox, first day of the new year. St. Oya’s Day was indeed an auspicious day for a girl to have her first woman’s bleeding, and Da had taken her down to the inn for the traditional celebration.