Chapter 29: The Crow’s Message

The rain had not stopped in three days. It fell upon Lothar’s camp like a judgment, turning the meadows along the Meuse into a morass of mud and despair. Drogo had ridden through it without rest, arriving at the picket lines with his cloak plastered to his back and his horse blowing steam into the gray dawn. The sentries had recognized him—the emperor’s youngest, the fool who smiled too much—and had let him pass with a jest about princes who forgot their umbrellas.

Now he stood in Lothar’s tent, dripping onto the expensive carpets, watching his brother’s face as he produced the seal. The heavy silver disc caught the lamplight, and Lothar’s eyes went wide as a child’s at Christmas.

“You actually did it,” Lothar breathed, reaching for it.

Drogo pulled it back a finger’s width. “I said I would.”

Lothar’s hand hung in the air, then curled into a fist. His face, already lined with the burdens of ambition at thirty-two, darkened. “You presume to bargain with me? You, who have never commanded a battle or held a council?”

“I command this,” Drogo said, weighing the seal in his palm. “And I have held a council—with Father, the night before I left. He wept for you, brother. He said you were his brightest hope, and that he had failed you.”

Lothar’s jaw tightened. The words had struck true, as Drogo had known they would. Lothar was a man who could resist steel and fire, but not the weight of his father’s love, twisted into guilt.

“He said that?”

“He does not say anything else,” Drogo replied softly. “He prays for you, every hour, in the chapel where Charlemagne’s bones lie. He believes you have been led astray by wicked counsel. He believes you will return to him, and he will forgive all.”

Lothar turned away, staring at the tent wall where a map of the empire hung, stained with travel and war. His finger traced the Rhine, the Loire, the line of the frontier that had once been Charlemagne’s shield. “I do not want his forgiveness. I want his crown.”

“And you shall have it,” Drogo said, stepping closer. “But not by battle. By law. By the Ordinatio Imperii—the decree he forced upon us all. If you return to Aachen peacefully, submit to his judgment, and show yourself the obedient son, he will restore you. I have seen it in his heart.”

Lothar turned back, suspicion flickering in his eyes. “You would have me kneel? Before the man who stripped me of my kingdom?”

“I would have you win,” Drogo said. “Kneel, and rise with everything. Fight, and you may die in some muddy field, remembered as a rebel. The choice is yours.”

The silence stretched. Outside, the rain drummed against the canvas, and Drogo could hear the murmur of soldiers, the clank of armor, the lowing of oxen. An army was a hungry thing, and it had been waiting for its king to move.

Lothar made his decision. He stepped forward and took the seal from Drogo’s hand, not roughly, but with a reverence that surprised them both. He held it up to the light, studying the engraving—the cross, the eagle, the name of his father.

“You have given me the key to the empire,” Lothar said quietly. “Why? What do you want in return?”

Drogo met his brother’s eyes. “A quiet corner. A small estate, perhaps in Aquitaine, where the vines grow sweet and the wars never reach. I am tired, Lothar. I have spent my life pretending to be less than I am, and I am weary of the game.”

Lothar laughed, a short, bitter sound. “You? Tired? You have done nothing but eat and drink and chase women since you were old enough to shave.”

“Exactly,” Drogo said, and smiled his lazy smile. “And I should like to continue doing so, in peace.”

Lothar shook his head, but there was something almost like affection in his gaze. “You are a strange creature, Drogo. I have never quite known what to make of you.”

“No one does,” Drogo said. “That is the point.”

They spoke for another hour, of armies and marches, of the letters Drogo would forge with the seal to confuse Pepin’s supply lines, of the emissaries who would carry false tidings to Louis the German. Drogo fed Lothar every piece of information he had gathered, every weakness, every opportunity—and with each word, he watched his brother grow more confident, more certain of victory.

And all the while, Drogo thought of the crow that had taken flight from the palace roof. He had seen it, just before he had ridden out, and he had recognized it for what it was: Judith’s bird, carrying her message to someone. He did not know who, or what it had said, but he knew it was a thread he had not woven.

When he finally left Lothar’s tent, the rain had softened to a drizzle. A groom brought his horse, and Drogo mounted, feeling the weight of the day settle into his bones. He had given his brother the seal. He had set the trap. But Judith’s shadow still hovered at the edge of his vision, and he could not shake the feeling that he was not the only one playing a game.

He rode south, toward the Loire, toward Pepin’s army, toward the next lie he would tell. And as he went, he turned the crow’s flight over in his mind, trying to understand what it meant.

It was only later, when he stopped at a monastery to change horses, that he learned the truth. A monk, nervous and eager for news, told him that a messenger had passed through the day before, riding hard for the south with a letter bearing the seal of the Empress Judith.

“What did the letter say?” Drogo asked, keeping his voice light.

The monk hesitated. “I cannot read, my lord. But the messenger spoke of it—he said it was a warning. That the emperor’s enemies had taken the seal, and that all loyal men should be on their guard.”

Drogo’s smile did not waver. He thanked the monk, ate a piece of bread, and mounted his horse again.

So. Judith had moved faster than he had expected. She had not told Lothar that the seal was stolen—she had told the world. He was now a traitor in plain sight, his game exposed before he had even played it.

But as he rode on through the rain, he felt something he had not felt in years: not fear, not anger, but a strange, cold excitement. The board had been overturned, and the pieces were scattered. Now, at last, he would have to play in earnest.