Scouts had ridden ahead to inform the abbess of their arrival, and that wise woman had sent her novices and nuns and monks out to line the road as a way of greeting the man who claimed the regnancy and who possessed, more importantly, the corpus of the dead king. Townspeople stood back, staring rather than cheering. They looked thin and pale. Like the wheat, they hadn’t had much to subsist on over the winter. As the army trudged between the rows of robed novices and sturdy monks, Liath peered into those faces, although she knew Ivar was long gone from Quedlinhame.

On that other adventus, so well remembered, Henry’s troops and clerics had sung triumphant hymns as a processional. That so many of Sanglant’s still breathed was a testament to his leadership, but certainly their arrival stirred no festive mood and no songs. Not yet. The songs would be written later.

No one in Wendar had heard Henry, with his dying breath, name Sanglant as his heir. In Wendar, Sanglant would have to fight with intrigue, diplomacy, and force of personality. These weapons, which he liked least, he would of necessity wield most.

It was not going to be easy.

That, certainly, became clear as soon as they saw the welcoming party arrayed in the middle of the road: two men and two women in cleric’s robes and a woman wearing the key and chain of the mayor. Liath sorted faces, and turned her attention inward in order to race through her palace of memory, marking names and features.

Sanglant was ahead of her in thought although he rode at her left hand on his gelding, Fest. She heard him mutter under his breath. The words escaped her, but the tone was sour.

“Ha!” said Duchess Liutgard, who rode to his left and was never shy of speaking her mind. “Now the game starts in earnest, Cousin. Where is your aunt? She has snubbed you by not coming out to greet you herself.”

“Is the insult worse to me, or to my father?” asked Sanglant grimly. “He deserves better state than this trifling welcome.”

A monk whose face seemed familiar to Liath came forward from the group and bowed his head. “Your Highness. You are welcome here to Quedlinhame, ancient home of your father’s grandfather’s maternal lineage. I pray you, Your Highness, let me lead your horse into the town as befits your rank.”

“You are the prior?” asked Sanglant.

“I am.”

Sanglant looked at his cousin Liutgard, and for an instant Liath felt insulted in her turn, that Sanglant shouldn’t look to her first, who came first in his heart. Yet Liutgard’s understanding of court politics so far surpassed Liath’s as Liath’s understanding of sorcery exceeded Liutgard’s knowledge of the magical arts. Sanglant, being a good commander, called for spears when he needed spears and swords when he needed swords.

“Where is Mother Scholastica?” Liutgard asked. “I am surprised she has not come to greet the regnant, as is fitting.”