by Jane Routley
“And before you say ‘but’ again,” said Bright, “I’ve got the money for the tickets.” He held out a fat little purse.
“Ladybless, did you rob someone?” I took the purse. It contained about ten lumins. I whistled. “Did you actually win at cards for once?”
In the background, Graceson rolled his eyes.
“No,” snapped Bright. “The commander gave me an advance on my pay. I’m her little bright-eyed boy. She loves me.”
“What, you mean you managed to make love to the commander?” The family’s problem with Bright was not only that he liked to sleep with men, but that he’d refused to be unfaithful to Graceson even with women. Since he was only a man and not important to the lineage, it was a mystery why the family had made such a fuss about it. Plenty of noble men didn’t do their duty.
Graceson had been thrown into prison on a trumped-up charge, but Bright had managed to bail him out. Despite this being perfectly legal, there had been a scandal over their relationship and the prison sentence. Bright had been given an ultimatum and when he refused to give up Graceson, he was disinherited. The family had hushed up some truly dreadful scandals in the past, so why they had to make an example of Bright was still a mystery to us. Eff said she saw Auntie Flara’s fell hand in the deed.
“What my lord is saying is that he’s the best mage in the regiment,” interjected Graceson smoothly.
“Not that that’s hard,” Bright’s round face split into a cheerful grin. “A more pathetic collection of smoke rats, drunks and arrogant shitheads too stupid to follow a mundane commander’s orders, you could never hope to find. Almost makes me believe the stuff Mother says about mages being too decadent to govern properly.”
I stared at the purse. Elayison! Even for a short time, it would be fabulous. And I might be able to save some of this money. Because, like it or not, I’d have to come back. I wasn’t going to leave Auntie Eff here on her own. Not now she’d lost all hope.
“You’ve really thought this through,” I said, touched by Bright’s planning. On the whole mages don’t do planning, even for their favourite cousins.
“Don’t sound so surprised. I’m doing my best to sort out Mother too, but that’s a bit of an uphill battle now. How is she, by the way?”
The light tone didn’t fool me. The way he was rubbing his hands together gave away his anxiety.
“She’s fine, though missing you,” I lied. No point in telling him how shattered Auntie Eff had been by his disgrace. As anyone would be if her only son had been exiled from the capital, disgraced, beaten up, and forced to join the army in a frontier regiment to make a living. Eff had been counting on her noble son to sort out her own exile, not to join her in it. “She’ll be over the sun to see you, Bright.”
Bright jumped up. “Good. Let’s get on up to the house. Back in the trunk, Shadow.”
“So his name’s Shadow, is it?” I asked. Mages often nicknamed people to suit themselves.
“No. It’s something awful... Say your name for us, would you, Shadow?”
The ghost opened his mouth and let out a long stream of sing-song sounds that sounded like swear words.
“Wha...!” I gawped at him open mouthed. “Lady! Say it again slower.”
Bright grinned. “You’ll never learn it. Their language is awful. I’ve decided to call him Shadow ’cause he’s a ghost.”
“You might as well do the same,” said the ghost. He smiled ruefully. “Cultural correctness seems to be an unknown concept here.”
“What did you say?” I asked for a second time.
“Don’t worry about him,” said Bright. “He’s some kind of scholar in his own country and I beginning to suspect he’s as big a radical as Mother. He says weird stuff all the time, but he’s pretty well behaved on the whole.” With another grin, he whacked the ghost on the back. “He’s even housetrained. Can you believe that?”
The ghost rolled his strange light eyes as he turned to climb back into the trunk. Clearly he understood Bright’s teasing; I hoped we’d understand each other.
CHAPTER TWO
“FINDING MY MOTHER is a bit of a long shot, isn’t it? Why are we really helping this ghost?” I asked Bright as we drove back to the house.
“An unregistered ghost sneaking over the border and wandering about the country would make things very hard for Great-Uncle in the Great Council. The conservatives would have a field day.” Even out here in Willow, I knew how much the ghosts were distrusted by our leaders. They brought interesting inventions and trinkets, but most of the mages felt we didn’t need them. Apart from that, there wasn’t much else they had to trade for the crystal they seemed so interested in. Many mages thought we should forbid them to enter our Empire and instead trade with them in the desert outside our borders. As it was, they were limited to living in Elayison and every one of them had to be registered.
“So it’s about politics?” I was surprised. Bright had always denied any interest in such things.
“Guess I’m my mother’s son after all. We need to open up to the ghosts. Trade with them. Maybe follow your mother and travel to their land. They’re a clever folk and they have lots of good inventions we could use.”
“Radical! You are your mother’s son. Still, can’t see why you would help Great Uncle out. He didn’t help you.”
“He did help me. There just wasn’t much he could do by the time he found out.”
“Really? You didn’t tell me this.”
“Hey—you drained those fields by the river. When did you do that?” asked Bright. Apparently, the subject of Great Uncle Lucient was closed.
I told him how I’d paid the peasants a small money wage to help me with the ditch digging. “Eff’s right about that. They worked so much harder for a money wage. I wish I could persuade Impi to switch from indenture farming to money. The estate would run so much better.”
“You shouldn’t be spending your money on that. You’ll need it when you leave,”
“I’m not going anywhere. I can’t leave your mother alone. She’d have no one to talk to, and you know she’d never cope with the estate.”
Immediately I’d said it, I was sorry, because Bright flushed with guilt.
“She’s got Thomas,” he retorted. “He’s trustworthy and great with numbers. If you stay here because of me I’ll never forgive myself. Or you.”
“No, Bright. Really. I’m not staying because of you. I... haven’t decided what to do.”
This was an arrant lie. I knew exactly what I wanted to do. Just before Bright had been disinherited, I’d accepted an apprenticeship with a merchant friend of Eff’s and was already packing to go on my first trading journey along the Spice Road. My noble family would never have stood for one of their own going into trade, but Eff and I hoped that I’d be away across the sea before they knew anything about it. I’d even bought a journal, intending to write a really exciting travel book like the ones I was addicted to. The apprenticeship was still a possibility and I longed to go, but I knew I wouldn’t.
After Bright had been disgraced and left us for the frontier, Eff had gone to bed for days. Her correspondence had gone unread, her students at the peasant school had gone untaught, she’d even stopped eating. She was better now, though still inclined to wander sleeplessly about the house at night. No way was I abandoning her when Bright was so far away.
The trees opened out to reveal the final stretch of driveway up to the manor house.
“Willow-in-the-Mist!” Bright sighed. “I love this place.”
I shot him a startled look. As children, we had talked incessantly about getting away from here and going somewhere exciting.
“You’ve no idea what a lovely place this is till you’ve left it,” he said.
Willow-in-the-Mist was pretty. The original towering six-storey stone eyrie, the traditional sort of dwelling for mages, was almost seven centuries old, built in the time of Civilising when mages first settled in this country. About two centuries ago, some surpri
singly capable member of the family had added a long double storey wing so that the mundane members of the family didn’t have to climb endless flights of stairs to get to their bedchambers. She’d built a deep summer veranda along the front using similar coloured stone so that the whole place had weathered to a warm tan colour. It was one of the most graceful and comfortable manor houses in the district, enhanced by the delicate tendrils of wistful vine that covered it and the backdrop of orchards, forest and the jutting peaks of the Secret Mountains.
In the olden days, members of the family had retired here annually to escape the summer heat of Elayison, but during my lifetime they’d always preferred to go to the coast. Ladybless! At least we only had to put up with them for short, infrequent visits.
“I shouldn’t say that sort of stuff,” said Bright. “I’m still hoping you’ll come up to the frontier and join my regiment. I could get you a good position in the quartermaster’s office. We could really use someone organized. I could be Uncle when you started your family. The way we always planned.”
That old dream.
“Thanks for the offer, cousin dear, but to be honest, burying myself in some dusty little military outpost isn’t my idea of seeing the world,” I said.
“You’re sure that’s what it is?” he asked. His face was pinched and the phaeton jerked to a stop and thudded to the ground as he turned to me. “Your sons would be perfectly safe. I’m not what they say.”
“Bright, how could you even think such a thing?” I was shocked and hurt. Then understanding dawned. During the scandal and the disinheritance, family members had said outrageously horrible things about him. Clearly they’d said them to his face as well.
“I’d never... Of course I trust you,” I put my arms around him and gave him a good hard squeeze and a kiss on the cheek. “Look, I could ask for no better Uncle for my children, but I want... I’m not ready to settle down. And don’t say you’ll wait for me. If you find someone else who wants you to act as Uncle, go ahead.”
My words seemed to reassure him. The phaeton rose into the air and continued its onward course.
“I can’t see that happening,” he said, smiling wryly. “Not to me. Now look, promise me you’re not staying here. They’re never going to pay you, you know. As long as you run this place for free, Impi will let you. You ought to stop. Let the place go to pieces. Go on strike the way Mother’s friends are always saying people should. They’d have to hire someone and they’d stop taking you for granted.”
“Oh, Bright, you know I can’t do that. The peasants rely on the place. I couldn’t bear to see them go hungry.”
“Well, promise me...”
“I promise, I promise. Give me time to work something out.”
“If you start your family here, you’ll get stuck and you’ll always be at their mercy,” muttered Bright darkly, as we reached the house.
Servants had been hanging out of all the windows watching us come up the driveway. As we reached the stairs, a couple of footmen ran down to meet us. They looked remarkably fine in the tight trousers and low cut jackets of their Blessing uniforms.
“Hmm, nice,” murmured Bright, appreciatively. “Graceson, see to the luggage, will you?” A couple of flustered-looking stablehands rushed round the side of the house dragging a chariot cart. Clearly they’d been caught on the hop without enough time to harness horses to it.
“Take it away,” called Bright. “I’m not staying long. Merely a flying Blessing visit.” He climbed out of the phaeton. As he landed on the ground, he staggered and slumped back against the blue side panel with a huff of exhaustion. His face gleamed with sweat.
“Bright, how long have you been driving?”
“All night.”
I was impressed. For a lone male mage to carry himself and a phaeton for so long was quite a feat. No wonder Bright was exhausted. Mages, especially males, usually marshalled their power by sharing a long journey with another mage and taking regular rest breaks.
“All night! Why didn’t you bring someone else?”
“Whew, what a journey! I’m done for,” he cried, ignoring my question. He struck a pose and waved imperiously at the footmen on the step. “Bring my mother to me and let her feed me cherry cake and wine,” he cried, quoting from an old poem of war and heroism.
“I think I can hear her now,” I said, listening to the hubbub that had arisen in the house. Eff’s exuberant voice carried a long way. “She sounds almost pleased. What can she see in you, I wonder?”
“My genius, of course,” laughed Bright. “Carry the trunk up to Marm Shine’s room,” he told the hovering footmen. “Graceson, see to it. Now Shine darling,” he added loudly, “I’m trusting you to dole out only two of the books in that trunk to Mother every week. Otherwise she’s going to get through them too fast.”
He winked at me and I managed to nod and smile without looking too mystified. “Quite the intriguer, aren’t I?” he whispered, so that I finally realised that we were supposed to be pretending that the trunk was full of books. Well, that would stop the servants snooping, I supposed; Eff’s favourite books were powerfully dull tomes about politics and peasant rights.
Bright turned and shambled away up the stairs as Auntie Eff came bursting out of the front door and rushed down the steps, laughing and extending her arms.
As usual, her white hair was coming loose from its bun and sticking out in a wispy halo around her face. She had both sets of spectacles on again. Today her work tunic and pants were covered in flour. I loved Auntie Eff, but no one could ever call her elegant.
“Darling mother, you’ve lost weight,” cried Bright, hugging her. Thank the Lady—he didn’t know the half of it.
“Pish! I could say the same for you, horrible boy,” cried Eff, laughing, kissing him all over his face and surreptitiously wiping her eyes. With a painful flutter in my chest, I realised that it was the first time I’d seen her laugh since Bright’s disgrace. “And stop quoting poetry. You know there are no cherries at this time of the year. Come on. Tell me everything you’ve been doing. Oh, you’re filthy. Come, you must have a bath while you tell me what you’ve been up to.”
Cherry cake may have been absent, but there was wine and Bright was soon being plied with all sorts of other dainties that had been prepared for the Blessing party. I left them alone and ran upstairs to my room. I met Graceson coming down.
“Want to come back and hide in my room?” I asked, knowing that he would be trying to avoid Auntie Eff, who blamed him for Bright’s inversion.
“I’ll wait for him in the stable,” he said.
“Stefan,” I asked, as he turned to go. “Do you ever hear from your brother?”
“Still in the army, I think,” said Graceson. “I don’t know where. If I see him, I’ll give him your best wishes, shall I?”
I went up the rest of the stairs, filled with curiosity and trepidation at the thought of dealing with the ghost on my own. Also excitement. I loved to hear about new places, and nowhere was as unknown as Ghostland.
The trunk was sitting open and empty at the foot of my bed.
“Outlander,” I called softly as I closed the door behind me. “It’s me, Marm Shine.”
“Here,” called a voice and the ghost slid out from under the bed, clutching a little orange and blue backpack that was definitely of foreign make. He slid right into Katti, who had been peering under the bed at him.
“Sha, Sha, Sha,” he said in his funny language. “She’s huge.”
He smells very fearful, thought Katti. I fear I am too magnificent for him.
Smug old Katti. I refrained from reminding her of her terror when the ghost had first appeared. Cats have very sensitive pride.
“Don’t worry,” I told the ghost. “She’s big for a hunting cat, but she’s very friendly to people. She won’t hurt you unless you hurt her first. Or me. I’m her cub as far as she’s concerned. I’m afraid you may be spending a lot of time together.”
I helped him up off the
floor. He was my height, bigger than the few outlanders I’d glimpsed before. The strangest thing was his hair, which was the colour of straw.
He must have known cats, because he politely offered Katti his hand to sniff, before tentatively reaching out to stroke her head. He wore rough cotton miner’s clothes. I brushed the fluff and dust off his back. He had lovely muscles, but the pale skin... Argh!
“You have not got anywhere better I can hide? In case someone comes in?”
“Looks like you’d be safe under the bed. Clearly no one ever goes under there. And Hilly promised me they’d swept everywhere. But come...”
I pulled aside a screen to reveal a wardrobe built in to the wall and pushed aside the clothes. “There’s this.” I opened the narrow secret cupboard in the wall behind the rack.
“This is nice,” he said, looking at the little seat.
“It’s a lover’s hide.”
“A what?”
“Lots of these old houses have little secret cupboards for lovers in the wardrobes,” I said. “I don’t know how ghosts are, but Empire men get can be very tiresome about each other, so sometimes it’s simpler that they not meet. Saves all that pointless chesting and fighting.”
The ghost stared at me wide-eyed. Then he shook himself and said, “So anyone looking for me would guess this cupboard was here?”
“Possibly. Probably,” I conceded.
“Do you have anywhere else?”
“Why would anyone come looking for you?”
“Your cousin didn’t mention that we were attacked on our way here? Someone wanted me dead so badly that they set on your cousin’s phaeton. Bright’s co-driver held them off while we escaped.”
That explained why Bright pushed himself so far and so fast, without another mage to take turns at propelling the phaeton. But would the attack have been personal? The roads were full of bandits and rogues.
