He turned toward the next but Armine pulled him aside. "My lord," Armine whispered. "I have reason to believe my daughter is..."

"Is what?" the bishop snarled. "Out with it, man, what? Pregnant?" His voice was loud.

"No. No. Shush. Be quiet. No, I don't think she's pregnant."

"Well, what then? In heaven's name, man, what?"

"Possessed."

"Possessed? In God's name-" The bishop spat. "In God's thrice holy name, what are you maundering about? Pos-sessed, my ass-my horse's ass, my goat's ass. Possessed? In a pig's ass.

"Of course she's possessed. They're all possessed at that age. The boys, too. They are worse than the girls. At least girls are quiet about it. They are trapped in a mire of hot desire and fear of fulfillment. Yes, the boys, too. They have sex on the brain-all of them. Marry her off, you idiot. And see he is a man, you hear? A man, not a mincing fool. And she will be fine, and you will have grandchildren. You will both be happy.

Fool, lack-wit, idiot. I am ridden by a plague of fools. Not the least of which is that treacherous royal sneak that occupies the throne. Ah, what I would give to have his father back... Yes, marry her off and not to that vicious little spider of a sor-cerer Hugo."

"No," Armine said. "But I think no one need worry about Hugo any longer. I got a good look at his face before we ran to the cathedral. I think he's dead."

"Yes," the bishop said. "I agree. A fitting end for the drunken scoundrel. I, too, fear the lightning did its work well."

"Not well enough," someone said.

Armine, facing the bishop, saw his jaw drop. He spun around and saw Hugo, standing in the archway leading from the vestibule of the cathedral, just stepping into the light of the candle's fitful illumination.

"I regret to say," Hugo told the bishop with a half-savage, half-triumphant grin, "I am still alive and not even badly injured."

Chiara, who was across the aisle helping some of the women tear a shift into linen bandages, looked up and gasped. She rose to her feet, seemingly transfixed, and then moved slowly toward Hugo. He smiled at her, the same savage grin he'd given Armine. His eyes sparkled with malice and intelli-gence, and he spoke in a low voice to Chiara who was, by now, only a few feet away.

Armine felt his mouth go dry. He swallowed a lump in his throat. No! Against all reason, against the evidence of his senses, he knew that what he was looking at-whatever he was looking at-it was not Hugo.

Only Chiara heard what it said to her, heard the words spoken by Hugo's mouth, tongue, and throat.

"The way things are turning out is wonderful. Now, at last, I have a body of my own."Chiara slumped to the floor in a faint, but did herself no in-jury because, with a look of utter longing and devotion, Hugo caught her and eased her to the marble tiles, ever so gently smoothing her hair back with one hand with great tenderness as he did so.

"I wouldn't put anything past that galloping bitch," Lucilla told Dulcinia. "Of all the bad luck, to be recognized on our first outing."

"Poor planning, I call it," Dulcinia said. "You should have known you were too prominent to escape detection."

"Well, we could have landed in worse places," Lucilla said.

This was true. Ansgar was not a cruel or violent man. Lu-cilla sent the men Rufus had lent her home to Nepi well com-pensated and carrying a rueful note to the pope admitting Ansgar had detected her intentions and would not assist her in further inquiries as to the location of the Frankish queen. Otherwise, Ansgar was the perfect host. It was spring. The countryside near the town was tranquil. Ansgar's brother, the bishop Gerald, was a devoted falconer. His hawks shared the church with his parishioners on Sunday, and after mass he rode out into the cool, fresh morning air accompanied by what Lucilla guessed was about half the town on horseback and on foot while he hunted with hawks and hounds.

His was a necessary contribution to the community. Mi-gratory birds could and did devastate spring plantings. He and his fellow hunters reduced their flocks and frightened away a substantial number of the largest flights so that the crop could span the dangerous period of tender and succulent green youth to mature into bread wheat.

The daily harvest of woodcock, songbirds, rabbits, and the more slender, agile hare was prominently featured in the ban-quets that crowned almost every evening. Dulcinia sang at the banquets and, by popular and constant demand, at every other ceremony that offered even the slightest excuse for celebration of any kind: birthdays, weddings, christenings, saints' name days, all religious ceremonies, mass, te deums, benedictions, all the way down to humble funerals where the widow often found herself comforted by a magnificent rendi-tion of "Stabat Mater" or "Panis Angelicus."

In fact, several die-hard pagans converted, simply because it gave them the opportunity to hear Dulcinia's voice during their baptismal ceremonies. Gerald, the bishop, was happy to have her sing before, during, and after mass. Next to his hawks, Dulcinia's art was his greatest pleasure. He would sit quietly while she sang, leaning back in his heavy, wooden throne at the altar, his eyes closed, with a great smile on his face.

One beautiful spring morning, Lucilla sat in the new cathe-dral, listening to her friend's voice soar and sharing the al-most ecstatic peace the bishop and his congregation radiated during her friend's performance, wondering where it all came from. Although unfinished, the cathedral still managed to be beautiful. The walls were painted with important scenes from the life of Christ by a painter who had studied in, of all places, Athens. They were done in a fantastic, wind-blown style in light, bright colors on white stucco walls. The Marriage at Cana was celebrated with Christ as a beardless youth with dark, curly hair, seated with his mother among the wedding guests, crowned with laurel. On the other side of the church he was visiting in the temple, smiling, instructing his appar-ently astonished and delighted elders. Behind the altar he was the risen Christ, his wounds not relics of mortal pain and sorrow but the ornaments of a great conqueror rising victo-rious over evil and death.

Lucilla was an educated woman, to be sure, but she'd read the ancient historians and philosophers. They told of a people, self-denying, cruel, exploitative, madly militaris-tic, addicted to savage conquests, grinding their heels into the necks of every people within reach of their armies. A people whoexterminated all who resisted their exactions and doomed the submissive to chattel slavery, enforced with the crudest and most drastic punishments. A people whose idea of entertainment was the imaginatively savage slaughter of other human beings; a people who reveled in rivers of gold and rivers of blood.

And they had come to this: sitting in a church on a fair, cool spring morning, worshiping a God who preached inno-cence, forgiveness, and love. Listening to the voice of a girl who was an abandoned child, but who could out sing the lark rising up high and higher into the sunrise. Even the simplest things are a puzzle, Lucilla thought. And the greatest of all gifts is to know how ignorant we are. To grasp the vast, dim outlines of what we do not and cannot possibly know.

Then Dulcinia's song ended. She left the altar steps and genuflected to the everlasting presence. Gerald blessed her, saying the beauty of her art contributed to the greater glory of God. Lucilla came as close to prayer as she ever did-and just as well, because the next day the pleasant idyll ended and trouble visited the city.

Ansgar rode off at dawn. The brigand Trudo, who had forced Lucilla and Dulcinia to bribe him at the ford, was trou-bling merchants journeying to the city with imported goods for sale. Ansgar decided reluctantly that he could tolerate Trudo's depredations no longer. Among the goods the mer-chants carried to the city was salt, and Trudo was insisting on being paid in this valuable commodity. Ansgar's landlocked principality had no other source, and if Trudo continued to steal it, the citizens would be reduced to dire straits.

"He has to be cleaned out once and for all," Ansgar told Lucilla in the early predawn hours as he made ready to leave.

Stella created a scene. Weeping, scratching her face, rending her garments, throwing dust on her head.

Gerald, who'd exchanged his shepherd's staff for a sword and mail shirt without visible inconvenience, stood looking on indulgently while Stella had hysterics.

"Whatever else I may have thought of her," Lucilla said darkly, "I always believed Stella a level-headed person, but this-"

Gerald shrugged. "She's been like this since they met in Ravenna. I think she believes he will not think she loves him if she doesn't take on when he goes off to fight."

"I suppose... so," Dulcinia said, "but still... my heavens-"

Ludolf, roused from his sickbed by the commotion-he'd inherited Stella's tendency to the spring malaise-came down to help console his mother. Stella fainted into a conve-nient armchair, well furnished with large cushions. Ludolf held one hand, Dulcinia the other.

Stella cried out, "Thank God my son remains here. So that if you, my darling, the strength of my soul, the light of my eyes, perish, I will at least have him to console me in the brief time I linger like an unquiet spirit in the twilight of my sorrow in this vale of tears. Oh, woe. Woe. Woe."

Ansgar hurried his good-byes, urged on by Gerald. "Let's go now and she will quiet down. The longer you delay, the worse she carries one. Come," Gerald commanded.

Ansgar left with his wife's wailing ringing in his ears.

When he was past the door, Lucilla snapped, "Oh, shut up. Save your sympathy for that louse Trudo and that pack of cowardly, badly armed scavengers surrounding him. Your husband and his men will probably destroy them the way a blaze does kindling. Your husband is a competent and intelli-gentsoldier, and Trudo is a lazy rapscallion who wants to live off the best efforts of others. He probably will never know what hit him."

Stella called Lucilla a name peculiar to the Roman argot that Ludolf didn't recognize, sat up, and demanded nourish-ment. Ludolf and Dulcinia hurried away to the big kitchens at the back of the house to find something for her.

Stella sat and stared spitefully at Lucilla. They were at the back of the rather imposing palace, in a small room adjoining an herb garden. The very expensive spices that seasoned the few state banquets Ansgar had to give were located here. Other herbs, medicinal and culinary, were prepared and stored. A short flight of steps led down to the wine cellar, a private place where Stella, the lady of the house, kept her ac-counts and oversaw the manifold and complex task of run-ning the large household.

"What did you tell him about me?" Stella asked Lucilla.

"Nothing."

Stella sniffed. "I don't believe it."

"Stella, I'm not a fool, and don't take me for one. He is your husband. You are the mother of his son. I can't think he would be grateful to anyone stupid enough to bring anything discreditable in your past to his attention. I think you under-estimate Ansgar. Yes, he's slow to quarrel, but once he does, I suspect he's extremely dangerous. I have no desire to earn his enmity. Certainly not by slandering his wife and certainly not while I'm a guest in his home, enjoying both his generosity and hospitality."

"I was afraid of you when you first came," Stella said abruptly.

"You have nothing to fear from me."

Stella frowned. "I wish I'd known that when you first came," Stella said. She avoided Lucilla's eyes.

A dreadful suspicion began to creep into Lucilla's mind. "Stella, what did you do?"

"I'm worried."

"Stella! You tell me right now-"

"I don't think he paid any attention-"

"Who?"

"Adalgisus," Stella said.

Lucilla's yell of sheer rage brought Dulcinia and Ludolf running. They found Stella vainly trying to keep the chair be-tween herself and an infuriated Lucilla, but when spectators entered the room, both women stopped, straightened their clothing, and smiled.

"We were just having a little chat," Stella said, batting her eyelashes at Lucilla.

"It's quite all right," Lucilla said. "Pay us no mind. Our discussion, while somewhat animated, is basically friendly."

Both Ludolf and Dulcinia looked as if they didn't believe this, but left and went back to the kitchen.

"Lucilla, will you please be calm?""Yes, yes," Lucilla whispered. "Be calm. You knew this be-fore you let Ansgar leave?"

Stella nodded. "I did, but I didn't think after the weeks you've been here that Adalgisus would take any notice. He is, after all, hiding out with his mistress in one of those fortified towns in the north."

"How close is the nearest town?"

"Not far. You can see the walls from the cathedral steps on a clear day."

"It's a clear day," Lucilla said. "Does it belong to the Lombards?"

"Yes, everything around here is part of the Lombard kingdom."

"Yes," Lucilla answered gravely.

"I'm tired of this nonsense. Tired and hungry," Stella snapped.

"Hysterics give you an appetite."

Stella opened her mouth but nothing came out. She drew in a deep breath. "Be grateful I'm a lady." she told Lucilla, "and don't care to call names."

"Something about a female dog? Was that on the tip of your tongue?" Lucilla asked.

"How very perceptive of you." Stella then swept out of the room.

They ate in the kitchen. Yes, Ansgar gave banquets and ate with the principal men of the city each night, and for this he used the large state dining room. But meals among the family were taken in the kitchen, a long room with the garden behind it on the east side of the house. The table was a simple plank affair set on trestles, with benches on either side. Because of the hearth fire on one end of the room, it was always warm. A double wall at the back with an inset grate carried away the smoke, and folding doors leading to the kitchen garden all along the back of the house were open in good weather for light and ventilation.

A shallow porch with a colonnade pro-tected the room in the summer from the worst of the day's heat and in the winter from the rains that drenched the countryside.

All in all, Lucilla thought, it was the most beautiful room in the house. She was looking out over the kitchen garden.

Early greens, chicory, turnips, and carrots were waving their feathery foliage over the furrows; the last onions were in bloom and the garlic heading up. Hardy rosemary was covered with blue flowers, and thyme perfumed the walks between the vegetable beds. The flowers on the tiny, creep-ing plants-which ranged from white, purple, blue, to deep mauve-were drenching the still rather bare garden with early color and fragrance. The sage had not yet come into its own, but a few of the gray stems bore early violet flower spikes. Along the walls espaliered pomegranates were cov-ered with the fiery orange buds that would open to begin the fine, tart, succulent crop of autumn.

Stella sat at one end of the long table in intense consulta-tion with the cook over the night's menu and the future cele-bration when Ansgar should return. Dulcinia sat with Lucilla. They ate fresh cheese, bread, onions, and bacon.

"I need to talk to you, Lucilla," Dulcinia whispered. "Alone."

"We are about as alone as we will ever be," Lucilla said snappishly. "Stella's not paying a bit of attention.

What's wrong?""Ludolf," Dulcinia whispered.

"I did notice he was sticking like a bad burr. Is he making himself obnoxious? "

"No," Dulcinia said, still speaking softly but sounding strained. "The reverse. Yes, the reverse is true."

Lucilla shrugged. "You're a serious artist. He's a hand-some, young man. Have a fling. Because, make no mistake, that's what it would be-a fling."

Dulcinia shook her head. "That's what I thought at first, but-" She still sounded strained. "But, well, you see, I'm late... and... but-"

"Please, please be clear," Lucilla said between her teeth. "You know I have lived a harsh life. What? Are you afraid of shocking me? If you're pregnant, girl, there are medicines. If you care to bear the child, Ansgar will, no doubt, be happy even with a little by-blow. He can afford to support it and, by the by, so can you. Chrispus is very generous, and he won't give a tinker's damn who the father is."

Chrispus was Cardinal Chrispen Mantleck, collector of mu-sical instruments and occasional musicians, Dulcinia being a case in point. "By the way, does he know about Chrispus? I hope you haven't been keeping a secret, too," she added under her breath.

"Oh, yes, he knows. He knows about my birth and parent-age, or rather lack of known parentage, and even my early upbringing before you rescued me. I didn't keep any secrets from him. I do believe I'm pregnant, but that's not the problem."

"And so-" Lucilla spread her hands in a gesture of help-lessness. "Tell me, what's wrong?"

"He's talking marriage," Dulcinia answered softly.

"My God, that is a problem. He can't-"

Dulcinia nodded. "I know."

"You won't-"

"Oh, yes, I would," Dulcinia said fervently.

"Oh, damn, you're-"

"In love," Dulcinia said softly. "Wildly, madly, and ever so hopelessly. Yes, I am in love."

"God, what a mess."

Then she became aware that Dulcinia was weeping open-eyed, silently, the tears running down her cheeks. And, as if from nowhere, it came to Lucilla that Dulcinia was as much her child as the two she'd carried in her womb, and she loved the singer perhaps more than those children of her own flesh and blood. And she was prepared to love Ludolf also. She knew little about the boy, except that he did have a fair face, and that when Dulcinia had confessed her pregnancy, he'd had the good taste to talk marriage. He seemed an honest young man.

"Where is he now?" Lucilla asked.

"He really feels bad," Dulcinia said. "He has the sniffles the way his mother did when we came here. I believe he has a fever. He went to his room but wants me to come up and read to him in a little while."Lucilla rose. "Come."

They returned to the rooms on the upper floor. Now Lucilla was hurrying. She began pulling her divided riding skirt and boots from the cupboard.

"What's wrong?" Dulcinia asked. "What's the matter? You're acting as if something terrible is about to happen. What are you doing?"