Alveron frowned at this. “Will you be able to continue your current projects as well?”
“No your grace. It will be rather exhausting and time-consuming. Especially since I’m assuming you’d prefer I be circumspect while gathering my materials in Severen-Low?”
“Yes of course.” He exhaled hard through his nose. “Damn and bother, things were going so well. Who can I bring in to write letters while you’re occupied?” He said the last musingly, mostly to himself.
I needed to nip that thought in the bud. I did not want to share credit for Meluan’s courtship with anyone. “I don’t think that will be necessary, your grace. Seven or eight days ago, perhaps. But now, as you say, we have her interest. She is excited, eager for the next contact. If a few days pass with nothing from us, she will be disappointed. But more importantly, she will be anxious for the return of your attention.”
The Maer smoothed his beard with one hand, his expression pensive. I considered making a comparison to playing a fish on a line, but I doubted the Maer had ever engaged in anything so rustic as fishing. “Not to presume, your grace. But in your younger days, did you ever attempt to win the affection of a young lady?”
Alveron smiled at my careful phrasing. “You may presume.”
“Which did you find more interesting? The ones who leapt to your arms straightaway, or those who were more difficult, reluctant, even indifferent to your pursuit?” The Maer’s eyes were far away with remembering. “The same is true of women. Some cannot bear it when a man clings to them. And they all appreciate space to make their own choices. It’s hard to long for something that is always there.”
Alveron nodded. “There is some truth in that. Absence feeds affection.” He nodded more firmly. “Very well. Three days.” He glanced at the gear clock again. “And now I must be—”
“One final thing, your grace,” I said quickly. “The charm I will make must be tuned specifically to you. It will require some of your cooperation.” I cleared my throat. “More precisely, some of your . . .” I cleared my throat. “Substance.”
“Speak plainly.”
“A small amount of blood, saliva, skin, hair, and urine.” I sighed internally, knowing that to someone of the superstitious Vintic mind-set, this would sound like a recipe for a sending or some other equally ridiculous thing.
As I’d expected, the Maer’s eyes narrowed at the list. “While I am no expert,” he said slowly, “those seem to be the very things I should avoid parting with. How can I trust you?”
I could have protested my loyalty, pointed out my past service, or brought to his attention that I’d already saved his life. But over the last month I’d come to know how the Maer’s mind worked.
I gave him my best knowing smile. “You are an intelligent man, your grace. I’m sure you know the answer without my telling you.”
He returned my smile. “Humor me, then.”
I shrugged. “You’re of no use to me if you’re dead, your grace.”
His grey eyes searched mine for a moment, then nodded, satisfied. “Very true. Send a message when you need those things.” He turned to leave. “Three days.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE
Such Madness
IMADE SEVERAL TRIPS TO Severen-Low to gather materials for Alveron’s gram. Raw gold. Nickel and iron. Coal and etching acids. I acquired the money for these purchases by selling off various pieces of equipment from Caudicus’ workshop. I could have asked the Maer for money, but I’d rather he thought of me as independently resourceful rather than an ongoing financial drain.
Quite by coincidence, in the course of this buying and selling, I visited many of the places Denna and I had spent time together.
I’d grown so accustomed to finding her that now I caught glimpses of her when she wasn’t there. Every day my hopeful heart rose at the sight of her turning a corner, stepping into a cobbler’s, raising her hand to wave from across a courtyard. But it was never truly her, and I returned to the Maer’s estate each evening more desolate than the day before.
Making things worse was the fact that Bredon had left Severen several days ago to visit some nearby relatives. I didn’t realize how much I’d come to depend on him until he was gone.
As I’ve already said, a gram is not particularly difficult to make if you have the proper equipment, a schema, and an Alar like a blade of Ramston steel. The metalworking tools in Caudicus’ tower were serviceable, though nowhere near as nice as those in the Fishery. The schema was no difficulty either, as I have a good memory for such things.
While I was working on the Maer’s gram, I started a second one to replace the one I’d lost. Unfortunately, given the relatively crude nature of the equipment I was working with, I didn’t have time to finish it properly.
I finished the Maer’s gram three days after talking to the Maer, six days after Denna’s sudden disappearance. The following day I abandoned my pointless searching and planted myself in one of the open air-cafés where I drank coffee and tried to find inspiration for the song I owed the Maer. Ten hours I spent there, and the only act of creation I accomplished was to magically transform nearly a gallon of coffee into marvelous, aromatic piss.
That night I drank an unwise amount of scutten and fell asleep at my writing desk. Meluan’s song was still unfinished. The Maer was less than pleased.
Denna reappeared on the seventh day as I wandered our haunts in Severen-Low. Despite all my searching, she saw me first and ran laughing to my side, excited to tell me about a song she’d heard the day before. We spent the day together as easily as if she’d never left.
I didn’t ask her about her unexplained disappearance. I’d known Denna for more than a year now, and I understood a few of the hidden turnings of her heart. I knew she valued her privacy. I knew she had secrets.
That night, we were in a small garden that ran along the very edge of the Sheer. We sat on a wooden bench looking out over the dark city below: a messy splay of lamplight, streetlight, gaslight, with a few rare sharp points of sympathy light scattered throughout.
“I am sorry, you know,” she said softly.
We’d been sitting, quietly watching the lights of the city for nearly a quarter hour. If she was continuing some previous conversation, I couldn’t remember what it was. “Beg pardon?”
When Denna didn’t say anything immediately, I turned to look at her. There was no moon, and the night was dark. Her face was dimly illuminated by the thousand lights below.
“Sometimes I leave,” she said at last. “Quick and quiet in the night.”
Denna didn’t look at me as she spoke, keeping her dark eyes fixed on the city below. “It’s what I do,” she continued, her voice quiet. “I leave. No word or warning first. No explanation after. Sometimes it’s the only thing that I can do.”
She turned to meet my eyes then, her face serious in the dim light. “I hope you know without my telling you,” she said. “I hope I don’t need to say it. . . .”
Denna turned back to look at the glimmering lights below. “But for what it’s worth, I am sorry.”
We sat for a while then, enjoying a comfortable silence. I wanted to say something. I wanted to say it didn’t bother me, but that would be a lie. I wanted to tell her all that really mattered to me was that she came back, but I was worried that might be too much truth.
So rather that risk saying the wrong thing, I said nothing. I knew what happened to the men who clung to her too tightly. That was the difference between me and the others. I did not clutch at her, try to own her. I did not slip my arm around her, murmur in her ear, or kiss her unsuspecting cheek.
Certainly, I thought of it. I still remembered the warmth of her when she had thrown her arms around me near the horse lift. There were times I would have given my right hand to hold her again.
But then I thought of the faces of the other men when they realized Denna was leaving them. I thought of all the others who had tried to tie her to the ground and failed. So I resisted showing her the so
ngs and poems I had written, knowing that too much truth can ruin a thing.
And if that meant she wasn’t entirely mine, what of it? I would be the one she could always return to without fear of recrimination or question. So I did not try to win her and contented myself with playing a beautiful game.
But there was always a part of me that hoped for more, and so there was a part of me that was always a fool.
Days passed, and Denna and I explored the streets of Severen. We lounged in cafés, attended plays, went riding. We climbed the face of the Sheer using the low road just to say we’d done it. We visited the dock markets, a traveling menagerie, and several curiosity cabinets.
Some days we did nothing but sit and talk, and on those days, nothing filled our conversations as much as music.
We spent countless hours discussing the craft of it. How songs fit together. How chorus and verse play against each other, about tone and mode and meter.
These were things I’d learned at an early age and thought about often. And though Denna was new to this study, in some ways that worked to her advantage. I’d learned about music since before I could talk. I knew ten thousand rules of melody and verse better than I knew the backs of my own hands.
Denna didn’t. In some ways this hampered her, but in other ways it made her music strange and marvelous. . . .
I’m doing a poor job of explaining this. Think of music as being a great snarl of a city like Tarbean. In the years I spent living there, I came to know its streets. Not just the main streets. Not just the alleys. I knew shortcuts and rooftops and parts of the sewers. Because of this, I could move through the city like a rabbit in a bramble. I was quick and cunning and clever.
Denna, on the other hand, had never been trained. She knew nothing of shortcuts. You’d think she’d be forced to wander the city, lost and helpless, trapped in a twisting maze of mortared stone.
But instead, she simply walked through the walls. She didn’t know any better. Nobody had ever told her she couldn’t. Because of this, she moved through the city like some faerie creature. She walked roads no one else could see, and it made her music wild and strange and free.
In the end it took twenty-three letters, six songs, and, though it shames me to say it, one poem.
There was more to it than that, of course. Letters alone cannot win a woman’s heart. Alveron did a fair piece of his own courting. And after he revealed himself as Meluan’s anonymous suitor, he did the lion’s share of the work, slowly wooing Meluan to his side with the gentle reverence he felt for her.
But my letters caught her attention. My songs brought her close enough for Alveron to work his slow, garrulous charm.
Even so, I can take only a small piece of credit for the letters and songs. And as for the poem, there is only one thing in the world that could move me to such madness.
CHAPTER SEVENTY
Clinging
I MET DENNA OUTSIDE HER inn on Chalker’s Lane, a little place called the Four Tapers. As I turned the corner and saw her standing in the light cast by a lantern hanging above the front door, I felt an upwelling of joy at the simple pleasure of being able to find her when I went looking.
“I got your note,” I said. “Imagine my delight.”
Denna smiled and made a one-handed curtsey. She was wearing a skirt, not a complicated dress of the sort a noblewoman would wear, but a simple sweep of fabric you could wear while bucking hay or going to a barn dance. “I wasn’t sure you would be able to make it,” she said. “It being past the hour most civilized folk have taken to their beds.”
“I’ll admit I was surprised,” I said. “If I was the sort of man to pry, I would wonder what kept you occupied until this most unseemly hour.”
“Business,” she said with a dramatic sigh. “A meeting with my patron.”
“He’s in town again?” I asked.
She nodded.
“And he wanted to meet you at midnight?” I asked. “That’s . . . odd.”
Denna stepped out from under the inn’s sign and we began to walk down the street together. “The hand that holds the purse . . .” she said, giving a helpless shrug. “Odd times and inconvenient places are the rule with Master Ash. Some part of me suspects he might simply be some lonely noble, bored with ordinary patronage. I wonder if it adds some spice for him, pretending he’s meshed in some dark intrigue instead of just commissioning some songs from me.”
“So what do you have planned for tonight?” I asked.
“Only to pass time in your lovely company,” Denna said, reaching out and linking her arm with mine.
“In that case,” I said, “I have something to show you. It’s a surprise. You’ll have to trust me.”
“I’ve heard each of those a dozen times.” Denna’s dark eyes glittered wickedly. “But never all together, and never from you.” She smiled. “I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and save my world-weary gibes for later. Take me where you will.”
So we made our way to Severen-High by way of the horse lifts, where we both gawked at the lights of the nighttime city below like the lowborn cretins we were. I took her on a long stroll through cobblestone streets, past shops and small gardens. Then we left the buildings behind, climbed over a low wooden fence, and moved toward the dark shape of an empty barn.
At this, Denna was no longer able to keep quiet. “Well, you’ve done it,” she said. “You’ve surprised me.”
I grinned at her and continued to lead the way into the dark of the barn. It was full of the smell of hay and absent animals. I led her to a ladder that disappeared into the dark above our heads.
“A hayloft?” she demanded, her voice incredulous. She stopped walking and gave me an odd, curious look. “You obviously have me mistaken for a fourteen-year-old farm girl named . . .” Her mouth worked soundlessly for a moment. “Something rustic.”
“Gretta,” I suggested.
“Yes,” she said. “You obviously have me mistaken for a low-bodiced farm girl named Gretta.”
“Rest assured,” I said. “If I were going to try to seduce you, this isn’t the way I would go about it.”
“Is that so?” she said, running her hand through her hair. Her fingers began to idly twine her hair into a braid, then she stopped and brushed it out. “In that case, what are we doing here?”
“You mentioned how much you enjoyed gardens,” I said. “And Alveron’s gardens are particularly fine. I thought you might enjoy a turn about the place.”
“In the middle of the night,” Denna said.
“A charming moonlit stroll,” I corrected.
“There’s no moon tonight,” she pointed out. “Or if there is, it’s barely a slender sliver.”
“Be that as it may,” I said, refusing to be daunted. “How much moonlight does one actually need to enjoy the smell of gently blooming jasmine?”
“In the hayloft,” Denna said, her voice thick with disbelief.
“The hayloft is the easiest way onto the roof,” I said. “Thence into the Maer’s estates. Thence to the garden.”
“If you’re in the Maer’s employ,” she said, “why not simply ask him to let you in?”
“Ah,” I said dramatically, holding up a finger. “Therein lies the adventure. There are a hundred men who could simply take you strolling in the Maer’s the gardens. But there is only one who can sneak you in.” I smiled at her. “What I’m offering you, Denna, is a singular opportunity.”
She grinned at me. “You know my secret heart so well.”
I extended my hand as if I were about to assist her into a carriage. “M’lady.”
Denna took my hand, then stopped as soon as she put her foot onto the first rung of the ladder. “Hold on, you aren’t being genteel. You’re trying to get a look up my dress.”
I gave her my best offended look, pressing my hand to my chest. “Lady, as a gentleman I assure you—”
She swatted at me. “You’ve already told me you’re not a gentleman,” she said. “You’re a thief, and y
ou’re trying to steal a look.” She stepped back and made a parody of my courtly gesture of a moment before. “M’lord . . .”
We made our way through the hayloft, onto the roof, and into the garden. The sharp sliver of moon above us was thin as a whisper, so pale that it did nothing to dim the light of the stars.
The gardens were surprisingly quiet for such a warm and lovely night. Ordinarily even at this late hour couples would be strolling the paths, or murmuring to each other on the bower benches. I wondered if some ball or courtly function had pulled them all away.
The Maer’s gardens were vast, with curving paths and cunningly placed hedges making them seem larger still. Denna and I walked side by side, listening to the sigh of the wind through the leaves. It was like we were the only people in the world.
“I don’t know if you remember,” I said softly, not wanting to intrude upon the silence. “A conversation we had some time ago. We talked of flowers.”
“I remember,” she said just as softly.
“You said you thought all men had got their lessons in courting from the same worn book.”
Denna laughed quietly, more a motion than a sound. She put her hand to her mouth. “Oh. I’d forgotten. I did say that, didn’t I? ”
I nodded. “You said they all brought you roses.”
“They still do,” she said. “I wish they would find a new book.”
“You made me pick a flower that would suit you better,” I said.
She smiled up at me shyly. “I remember, I was testing you.” Then she frowned. “But you got the better of me by picking one I’d never heard of, let alone seen.”
We turned a corner and the path led toward the dark green tunnel of an arching bower. “I don’t know if you’ve seen them yet,” I said. “But here is your selas flower.”
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