"Don't cry, Kiukiu," he said. Gently, he prized her fingers from her face and kissed her wet cheeks. "All that matters to me is that you're here. That you're safe. That we're together."

CHAPTER 37.

Eugene opened his eyes. He was lying on his own bed at Swanholm, and the shutters were open to let in the early morning light.

Had he been dreaming? Fleeting images flared in his memory and vanished before he could remember them clearly. There had been a girl . . . And then nothing but a muddle of confused, violent fragments: the moist, marbled red of torn flesh, the screaming of a wounded creature in pain, and then a warm, delicious, salty taste in his mouth, his throat . . .

He unlatched a window and breathed in the crisp, sweet air. The parkland was bathed in rising mists and the birds were singing. He could see a party of men with sticks and hounds on leashes in the far distance; his gamekeepers, he guessed, out searching for deer straying too far from the deer park.

"You're-you're awake, highness!"

Gustave stood in the open doorway. He was staring at Eugene as if he were amazed. And Gustave was never amazed by anything.

"I hope the noise outside has not disturbed your highness. A young servant girl was found on the grounds; we can't be sure, but it looks as if she was attacked by a wolf. Perhaps one of the Magus's Marauders has returned."

Echoes of his dream: a defenseless girl attacked and savaged by a wild creature . . .

"How long have I been asleep?" he asked. His whole body ached as if he had been sleeping rough on campaign. His back and shoulder muscles felt as if they had been strained to bursting.

"Nearly two days and nights, highness. Shall I call your valet to shave you?"

"Two days?"

"And I expect your highness will want breakfast?"

"Water," Eugene said. He realized now he was desperately thirsty. Gustave brought him a jug of water, which he drank straightaway. And as he drank, a memory pricked at the back of his mind of another devastating thirst that could not be quenched by water alone.

Had he been sick? He had no memory of the past days. A high fever would explain his memories of thirst and burning heat.

He set down the empty water jug and pensively ran a hand over his thickly stubbled chin. . . .

He looked down at his hand in amazement: The skin was smooth and unmarked. And his face felt soft beneath the two days' growth of beard. Best of all, there was no longer any pain.

A mirror. He must make certain it was not a delusion.

He gazed in the cheval mirror and his memory returned. The last time he had looked at his reflection, he had seen a Drakhaoul-daemon with wild, windswept hair and fierce eyes that gleamed green and gold in the gloom. And a horrible possibility gripped him. Was I the creature that attacked the young servant girl? And what else has happened here at Swanholm in my absence? Was I the creature that attacked the young servant girl? And what else has happened here at Swanholm in my absence?

He flung open his bedchamber door and ran down the palace corridors, not caring who saw him in his nightshirt, making for the Magus's laboratory.

Guardsmen from the Household Cavalry saluted him as he crossed the courtyard, and Lieutenant Petter came hurrying up. He looked flustered.

"What's wrong, Lieutenant?" demanded Eugene.

"It's-it's the Magus, imperial highness. It seems as if he's gone. Or someone has abducted him."

"What do you mean?" Eugene crossed the cobbled courtyard in his bare feet, Petter hurrying at his heels.

He knew instantly that Linnaius was gone. There was no invisible barrier blocking their way; all the Magus's wards had been destroyed. And the door to his rooms had been torn off its hinges. Inside, everything was in total disorder. Books and papers lay everywhere, flung down as if whoever had broken in had been searching for something in haste.

"It's worse in here, highness," said Petter, opening the door to the laboratory.

Everything that could be broken had been, and the floor glittered with broken glass.

"The Azhkendi experiment," Eugene said, casting a quick look over the scene. "Someone was after the firedust."

"And the Magus too," said Petter.

"Isn't it possible he's gone in pursuit of the thieves in his craft?"

Petter pulled a wry face. "Unlikely, highness. We found his sky craft on the grounds."

Eugene had begun to put the clues together. First, King Enguerrand's demand that Linnaius should stand trial for his heretical crimes, then the earlier foiled attempts to break into the laboratory- "Francia!" he cried, clenching his fists. Where were the rubies? The Tears of Artamon? He had given them to Linnaius on Ty Nagar. Whoever held all five rubies was entitled by ancient law to rule the five princedoms of Rossiya. "No; Enguerrand would never dare."

"Highness?" Petter glanced at him uncertainly.

"Send out to all the ports that no Francian vessel is to be allowed to sail until it has been thoroughly searched."

"I'll supervise the searches myself," cried Petter, hurrying away.

An ominous feeling of pressure was building in his head, like an ache presaging a migraine. Eugene went to the Vox Aethyria room where several undersecretaries were at work monitoring reports from around the empire. They all jumped up nervously when he came in.

"What's the latest news from our agents in Francia?"

"F-Francia?" said one. "Hasn't Gustave found you, highness? He went to look for you about ten minutes ago."

This did not bode well. Gustave only delivered intelligence of the most sensitive nature.

"I'll be in my rooms." Eugene set off, back toward the state apartments, only to encounter Countess Lovisa.

"Forgive me, highness," she said, her head bowed. Her voice was oddly constrained, as though she had been weeping. "I failed you."

"Not now, Lovisa," he said, striding onward.

"But, highness, she's gone!"

He stopped and turned around.

"Who's gone?" His voice rasped with tension. Did she mean Karila?

"The Empress," she said in a voice so soft he could hardly hear her.

"Astasia?" He came back along the corridor toward her. "What do you mean, gone? Gone where?"

"The whole palace was in an uproar. It seems the Francians-"

"The Francians kidnapped my wife?" Surely they would never dare touch his wife?

"No." Lovisa's pale blue eyes widened with fear at the rage in his voice. "It seems she may have sailed for Francia of her own accord. She is thought to have boarded a Francian ship with a dark-haired young man."

"What?" Eugene said, his voice low and dangerous. Had Astasia betrayed him after all? He caught hold of Lovisa by the wrist, pulling her close. "Was he the one at the secret assignation? Who is he, Lovisa?"

"We-don't know for sure," Lovisa said, "but several people who saw them at the quayside remarked on the striking likeness between them. And one said she called him 'Andrei.' "

"Her brother?" Eugene let go of Lovisa, who retreated, rubbing her wrist. He had expected to hear of a lover. Not this. "But it can't be. It can't be . . ."

He hurried back to their rooms, all the time trying to make sense of this information. So Andrei Orlov was still alive? What had he told Astasia, to make her leave with him? Or had she seen him return in Drakhaoul form, and been so terrified that she had simply fled?

He flung open the doors and started to search for clues. Here was the romance she had been reading, abandoned on the chaise longue. He picked it up and the card she'd been using to mark her place in the text fell out. He bent down to retrieve it and saw it was a little calendar, decorated with a colored engraving of a wreath of flowers to symbolize the seasons of the year. And then he saw that dates were encircled in pen and little numbers had been added under each month, one to nine, ending in late autumn.

"Could she be? . . ." he said out loud. "Is that why she has been so?"

He sat down heavily on the sofa. He had been so busy with his own concerns of state that he had never thought to ask Astasia if all was well with her. He had seen her laughing in the company of Celestine de Joyeuse and he had assumed she was happy. And now she had fled, carrying his unborn child, to Francia.

Bitterness overwhelmed him. Even though she was gone, the room still smelled faintly of her fresh, light perfume. He found himself lifting her lilac silk robe, left draped over a chair, and stroking it against his cheek. Everything here reminded him of her, from the slim volume of Solovei's latest verses to the little pot of violets on her dressing table. He had sent her violets before they were married. . . .

"Highness!" Gustave came running down the corridor, waving a dispatch. "Thank God I've found you!" He handed over the paper and then bent double, clutching his sides, trying to catch his breath.

Eugene snatched the paper and opened it, wondering if it were some communication from Astasia, but it was an intelligence report from Francia.

The Francian war fleet has set sail. Heading northward up the Straits . . .

Eugene staggered as if someone had just punched him hard in the stomach. "Toward Tielborg?"

An undersecretary came hurrying down the corridor, another paper in hand.

"We've just received this communique from the Francian court!"

"By Vox Aethyria?" Eugene gave Gustave a frowning glance. "We were not aware the Francians had access to our communication devices. They are all individually tuned, aren't they, Gustave?"

"Well, yes, highness," said Gustave, wiping his brow. "But you recall the time Gavril Nagarian used our own device to contact us . . ."

Eugene put out his hand to take the communique.

To Eugene of Tielen,We have in our custody the heretic scholar known as Kaspar Linnaius. He will stand trial before the ecclesiastical courts for heresy, soul-stealing, and daemon-summoning.Know also that we have in our possession the five rubies known as the Tears of Artamon. Ancient law decrees that whosoever holds all five stones is entitled to govern all five princedoms of Rossiya. We therefore assert our right to be called Emperor and impose our holy law upon all five princedoms, as well as Francia.Enguerrand of Francia, Commander of the Order of Saint Sergius and the Francian Commanderie.

Eugene slowly let the hand holding the paper drop to his side.

"What order shall I send to the fleet, highness?" said Gustave.

Eugene looked at him. For the first time in his career as military commander, he was utterly confounded.

"Stand by," he said mechanically. "And call the council."

"Stand by to defend the empire?"

"With whatever means we have left at our disposal." He would never give in to Enguerrand's demands. He would never let the religious fanaticism of the Francian court destroy the enlightened ideas that shaped Tielen life and philosophy. He no longer had the Magus's skill with alchymical weaponry to help him defend his people. And now that he knew too well the terrible price he would have to pay if he called on Belberith to aid him, he did not want to risk using his daemonic powers. Not yet. He would just have to rely on his skills and experience as a commander.

He let out a long sigh of resignation that shuddered through his whole body. He squared his shoulders.

"Use me, Eugene," breathed the voice of his Drakhaoul. breathed the voice of his Drakhaoul. "Let me help you." "Let me help you."

"Gustave," Eugene said, ignoring Belberith's seductive tones, "get my old uniform ready: Colonel-in-Chief of the Household Cavalry. Let the Francians come. I'll be ready for them."

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.

Sarah Ash, who trained as a musician, is the author of four fantasy novels: Lord of Snow and Shadows, Moths to a Flame, Songspinners, Lord of Snow and Shadows, Moths to a Flame, Songspinners, and and The Lost Child The Lost Child. She also runs the library in a local primary school. Sarah Ash has two grown-up sons and lives in Beckenham, Kent, with her husband and their mad cat, Molly. She is currently at work on the third book of the Tears of Artamon.

Also by Sarah Ash

LORD OF SNOW AND SHADOWS.

Book One of the Tears of Artamon

PRISONER OF THE IRON TOWER.

A Bantam Book / August 2004