Lace and Blade 2

by Deborah J. Ross

  Jeanne propelled herself from the bed. She was alert and fired by independent anger. By a sort of hunger, too, that was unconnected with food.

  Hurling herself into her clothes, she found peculiar alterations there, as if suddenly nothing fitted her, despite doing so perfectly well the day before. Then she was opening the door, running down the cranky stair, expelling herself from the outer doorway and yard on to the cobbled thoroughfare to find this was no longer the street she had lived by and been familiar with for so many years.

  She stood amazed. (Indeed, the astonishment of a Monsieur Carmineau, confronted by the rising phoenix of his youthful ardour for a pretty woman, was nothing to Jeanne’s upon that alien street.)

  She had never beheld, either in ordinary reality or a painting, such a place. Yet, to be fair, very likely she might have read of one in, say, the translated tomes of Arabia, Greece or Italy.

  The byway was itself made of hard-packed earth that baked in the heat of a dry and sultry night. (The rain then was also gone.) All along the way squatted innumerable tiny shops, these mostly like caves, in which mysterious objects sparkled like eyes from the flare of various flambeaux on poles, or clay dishes of oil, each with a single tear of fire. Here and there a canopy, awning or patterned carpet hung down. There was the smell of spice and dust, oil and alcohol, perfume and incense. High above, abnormal constellations lustered in vast quantities, as if a sack of diamond sugar had been spilled all over the sky. The road was additionally full of people. Some idled, others scurried by. Tall horses, caparisoned with tassels and bells, jingled arrogantly past. Their riders, hawk-like faces muffled in hoods or other wrappings, stared with contempt on all and everything.

  Directly across from where she stood—which, turning again, Jeanne saw as in an ornately-carved stone gateway, shut by a stout black door—a tavern blared with lamps.

  This is no dream—so Jeanne thought to herself. She was by now, after all, familiar with her relocation to otherness. But unlike the pine-grown garden, this place was of a very different other time, and of another culture, too. Even another earth.

  At the same moment, she realized her unmanageable garments had adjusted themselves. Without looking down, although soon she felt compelled to do so, she grasped that now she wore the fine silk shirt, breeches and cloak of some well-off male of the environ. All was embroidered. Even the boots had been incised with silver. And at her side, (she was still most definitely a woman, as this escapade had altered her apparel not her gender) hung a light and lissom sword, with what seemed a sapphire in its pommel.

  Jeanne engaged herself by swaggering a little. She next crossed to the inn. And when a boy ran out and begged to know what she would have, she tossed him a coin from a pouch handily at her belt, and called for wine.

  No sooner had she downed the cup than she heard again behind her that voice which had intruded on her bedroom. This time, it was augmented by a sharp tap on her left shoulder.

  Sauntering around, Jeanne beheld her new companion.

  There was no doubt, this too was a woman. But clad, like Jeanne, in the exquisite garments of a wealthy male, even to boots and sword. The entire costume was of a deep sky blue leavened with more somber tones, and sewn with lapis lazuli. The hue, however, did not give over its theme. It had informed the colouring of the woman herself. Her eyes were the blue of smoke, and quite beautiful. But the lashes and brows which framed them were of a dark indigo shade, while the cascade of hair, that in the earthly room had seemed black, was itself of an even denser blue tint, smalt blue, like the glaze on a priceless plate. Nor was the woman’s skin merely pale. It was like dusk reflecting on white snow.

  “Well,” said the woman, her face cold as her glamorous colour, “what do you want, then?”

  “I?” said Jeanne, amused. “It was you yourself that called me here.”

  “I never called you. What rubbish. Go back to wherever you came from. Some lesser hell, no doubt.”

  “With you gone from it, it must be hell now,” said Jeanne. “But,” she added, “not a lesser place, if you were ever in it.”

  “Why do you pursue me in this way?” demanded the woman.

  “Oh, as to that—why do you think?”

  “You are obsessed by me,” replied the woman.

  “Body and soul,” Jeanne heard herself answer. This, now, did not confound her. She knew it to be true, just as, her initial disorientation over, she knew the woman. As though they had met every day for all the years of Jeanne’s young life, played and fought together as children, later dallied, (yes, dallied too when adults—lovers) at least in Jeanne’s many feverish dreams.

  But at the declaration, the blue woman drew her sword with a practiced air.

  Jeanne felt no misgiving. A tide of delirious abandon went over her. (It was comparable, perhaps, even if she did not then compare them, to those times when Angeval had swept her up in his strong arms, spread her before him, mastered her and ridden with her through the golden spasms of exploding moons.) This was surrender of another order. Yet, like the other, it had the most feared, longed-for, bitter-sweet taste in it of death.

  “I must kill you, I see,” said Jeanne’s beloved foe, “to be rid of you.”

  “Kill me if you wish. That won’t do it. I’d rise from any grave to haunt you. But then, naturally, we are pre-supposing you might succeed.” And she drew also, her blade with the sapphire.

  The street had cleared. Since their meeting, all passers-by seemed to have withdrawn themselves. Maybe they still watched intently from hidden apertures. Or else, the essential privacy of the duel between Jeanne and her opponent conjured its own supernatural exclusivity.

  Only the lamps and torches now, to see, the secret gleams that were not eyes, and the many billion stars.

  The swords smote on each other, sent up lightnings, crossing and recrossing. Jeanne became aware that both she and the woman fought—seemingly—with lethal intent. As if one of them must surely kill the other.

  In spite of the prelude, perhaps Jeanne was taken aback. She had discovered herself well-versed in sword-play, which in her ordinary life she had never been. Versatile she, as did her adversary, translated their match into an elegant and witty spectacle, which even the stars might be enthralled to spy upon. But in the instant of realizing where it would lead, this choreography, Jeanne lost her concentration. Only a moment. Enough.

  She felt the woman’s blade pierce all through her with such minimal difficulty, Jeanne’s own body must be like a green stem—without bones—though not lacking blood, because now blood sprang from her, copious, like wine.

  The world darkened. Stars, lights, fading. The sapphire sword dropped miles off with a tinsel sound. As she sank, the other caught her. Jeanne did not know if she were dying, not even if the blade had struck her heart. There was no pain.

  But the woman with blue hair held her; this was all that mattered. She had the scent to her of open skies, of sand dyed blue with evening. “Listen,” the dark voice breathed in Jeanne’s ear, across the sea-song of faintness or death. “I love you. I love you. I will always be with you. You’re mine.”

  And in Jeanne’s last conscious second, she felt the pressure, the divine invasion of this lover’s ice-smouldering kiss. Then through the black door in the gateway Jeanne drifted. And fell back, woundless and whole, into the wretched reality of her own world.

  ~o0o~

  Jeanne named this daemon Lalise. Jeanne did not have a reason for the name, did not select it. Like the events of their first meeting, the name occurred, and was.

  To begin with, nevertheless Jeanne believed the first meeting might be the only one. Or would it, as with Jeanne’s first sight of Angeval, not be repeated until some years had passed? This was not to be the case. Her female daemon returned only a few nights later, at the end of the very day, in fact, that several gifts arrived from the elderly suitor, Monsieur Carmineau.

  Thereafter, Jeanne met as often with Lalise as with Angeval. And her meetings with
Lalise never altered in their main component of flirtatious, adoring, delicious dread. Just as the times with Angeval never changed their tumults of fulfilling passion, their glorious and uncomplex joy.

  With Angeval she made love. With Lalise she made a loving and lascivious hate. To the heights of ecstasy Jeanne ascended in each scenario, never disappointed, although the dramas, and their climaxes, were so unlike each other in content and form. Honey and opium. Kiss and steel. Lace and blade.

  A week after her wedding, folded in previously unknown comforts, (and only a night or so after her full consummation with Angeval) Jeanne and Lalise duelled to the death, as so frequently they did. Yet the outcome was not always fixed. It varied. As did the venue, which was sometimes again the street of shops, or inside the tavern, or sometimes in an open square with fountains, on a night road walled by grasslands, in the nave of some huge building like a cathedral. And Lalise might spurn the duel and turn mockingly away—or else seize Jeanne, embrace her with an incinerating flare of desire, only then to push Jeanne from her with, “You? Oh, most others will find you appealing. But to me, you’re nothing.” Even, once or twice, Lalise would appear in female garb, her midnight hair piled intricately on her head with combs of turquoise. And Jeanne, still clad as a man, would woo her as a man would, attempting Lalise’s seduction—and agonizingly almost achieve her goal— then lose, lose all, as always she must, since Lalise, in breeches or petticoats, was her master, and Jeanne an abject slave.

  With the golden lover, consummation was essential and certain and could never fail.

  With the azure lover, resolution must never be reached. As it never would be.

  ~o0o~

  Approaching the chateau, Jeanne walked slowly. Like a wild beast of the woods, she scented dawn. She was wonderfully tired out from the pleasures of Angeval’s attentions, yet vaguely felt a foreshadow of Lalise, even in the dew that coolly startled her feet. Jeanne sighed, replete, but not sated.

  And precisely then, she glimpsed the dark animal she had seen earlier, racing across the distant lawns, its coat spangled with dew. What could it be? Some big dog, perhaps, from a neighbouring farm? Her instincts still honed, Jeanne knew it meant her no harm, although she sensed too it saw her, as non­human creatures always did, while her fellow humans, unvisited themselves by daemons, never could.

  Reaching the lower door, Jeanne paused. She aligned herself again with her role of wife. And her thoughts turned to her old, naive husband, Carmineau, with great fondness.

  She would, she thought, rather suffer on a rack than hurt him. But she never could hurt him. There was no one else who could rival what she had. No human lover would ever tempt her.

  Jeanne knew, as few are given to know, will and vow and mean it as they may, that she would not be unfaithful to her husband. At least, amid the concrete reality of mankind. Which was all that counted, was it not, in the mortal world.

  ~o0o~

  Two loves I have of comfort and despair,

  Which like two spirits do suggest me still;

  The better angel is a man right fair,

  The worser spirit a woman coloured ill.

  —William Shakespeare, Sonnet 144, 1609

  Epilog. Amethyst

  He woke, some faint unusual noise woke him. Leaving his bed, Monsieur Carmineau went to the long window and looked out on his park. He wondered if he would see Jeanne out there, on one of her nocturnal jaunts, and smiled a little, thinking of her, and of that. He did not grudge her, any more than he grudged her the luxuries their marriage afforded. She was a lovely girl, his Jeanne, and he had long wished for a pretty wife to adorn his house. In any event, it was not Jeanne he saw, there in the mauve hour before sunrise. It was the dog! By the stars, the black hound of La Tupe, Petit—who had been borne home in the carriage hours back, and doubtless locked indoors as ever. But now Petit was rushing over the lawn towards the woods, with a rabbit in his jaws. Except, of course, the rabbit was abnormally large, and silvery, and not really a rabbit. Instead, it would be Petit’s daemon of a rabbit, which no doubt he always successfully caught, and in vast quantities. And what other daemons, Carmineau curiously wondered, did Petit possess? A paramour...?

  Who would have thought it? How splendid! That a dog too might live another life, while back on his cushion Petit’s big furred body seemed to lie, the simulacrum twitching in sleep. Yet Petit was out there. As Jeanne probably was. While he, Maurice Carmineau—

  Ah. Monsieur half turned, and saw the phantom shape that now occupied his bed. It was old and grey and it snored softly, poor old man. While he, obviously, he stood at the window.

  Carmineau glanced down at himself. He was twenty-five years of age, his hair the deep brown of polished wood, his skin smooth. Quite muscular, yet very slim. An attractive young man and see, dear me, already erect.

  Because, without the whisper of a lie, he knew what came next. What always came next.

  It did, too.

  The panelled wall had melted. And there he stood as well, the other young man. Oh God, so beautiful, in his amethyst silk coat of over a hundred years ago, and his black hair worn unpowdered and long, to tantalize—as it did, oh it did—and his shirt undone and—such an abundance. Such eagerness so visible, even though the pale handsome face was grave.

  “Why, Maurice. How is you are so selfishly out of bed? Well then, dear friend, you’d better come with me to my bed, hadn’t you? Before I perish of lack.”

  And Maurice left the window and the pre-dawn light, the dog, and his wife, and crossed to his lover, kissing and kissing him, and cupping as he did so the excellent greeting already evidenced, through the purple clothes.

  “I missed you, Pierre. Three days and nights since we met.”

  Writ of Exception

  by Madeleine E. Robins

  Madeleine Robins is a former fencer, a lifelong Anglophile, a parent, a New Yorker, an administrator, and a student of cake decorating. She is also the author of nine books (including Point of Honour and Petty Treason), the mother of two daughters, the person who throws the ball for Emily the Amazing Air Dog. She blogs occasionally at deepgenre.com and all the time at madrobins.livejournal.com.

  About this story, Madeleine writes, “When offered the chance to write another swashbuckling tale, I could not resist the opportunity to return to Meviel, a very new world which seems to bring out my fascination with playing with gender roles and expectations. The first line or two of the story come directly from my research on the meaning of family in medieval Europe; if you take the idea that marriage is for the preservation of property, then maybe it doesn’t matter who marries who so much as what property they join and protect. Voila: ‘Writ of Exception’!”

  “Don’t be stupid, girl. Marriage is for the consolidation of wealth and property. Romance is for diversion. And love—” Deira do Morbegon’s tone was derisive. “Love is for poets.”

  “Mamma, I know better than to speak of love and marriage in the same breath. But this—even if I liked it, what good would it bring? There can be no children—”

  “When our families are joined, one of you will get a child from somewhere.” Madam do Morbegon shrugged as if children might be bought at the Actenar bazaar. “You may take lovers now and then. Discreetly.”

  For a moment, Madam do Morbegon appeared to soften; she sat on the unmade bed beside her daughter and took her daughter’s hand in her own. “If your brother had not died, he would have married her. Evida do Caudon and I have schemed since we were girls to unite our families, even before she married the Cindon. Your father meets with the bishop today to get a Writ of Exception; such marriages are uncommon, I grant you, but—I was at court when Prince Ebuen wed Prince Beqis, and Meviel annexed his principality. When the property is important...”

  Madam do Morbegon reflected for a moment upon the importance of the Caudon holdings. “Ellais, she inherits all. You will be Cindiese one day, or at least the consort of a Cindiese. It is an excellent match except in one little way.” Sh
e rose from the bed, pulling her hand from her daughter’s. “Now get dressed. You will wish to look well for your betrothed.”

  It was a command. Madame do Morbegon left before her daughter could protest anew. Ellais heard voices, low, outside her door, and then Lilsa, her body-maid, entered the room, almost invisible behind a pile of dresses.

  “Madame says we’re to be turned out nice for visiting,” she said around the fabric. “I thought the green, or praps—” Lilsa made the error of meeting her charge’s eyes. “Is he very bad, sweet?”

  “You don’t know?”

  “How could I? Madame set her maid to watch at the door while she talked to you.” Lilsa sniffed aggrievedly. “But she did say betrothed. Who is it? Is he old? Rich, at least?”

  “Rich,” Ellais agreed. “And young. But not he. They’ve betrothed me to Taigna me Caudon.”

  “Taigna—”

  Ellais nodded. “Papa is meeting with the bishop about a Writ of Exception for the Marriage. Mamma and the Cindiese have scheduled the wedding in six weeks—just long enough to prepare two sets of bride clothes. The Cindon and Papa are delighted with the settlements. My wishes count for nothing, and Taigna—God alone knows what she makes of this. Mamma has made it plain I have no chance of refusing. Married I will be, to a girl I’m on no better than speaking terms with.”

  “Praps the bishop will say no to the Writ,” Lilsa suggested dubiously.

  “I wish I thought so. But it’s all money and property; there’ll be talk, but Papa is wild to have the Caudon properties in the family, and the Cindon is apparently just as interested in our money; between the two of them, they’ll bend the bishop to their will. I’m sure of it.”

  “Well. What can’t be cured must be endured.” Lilsa spread the dresses she held upon the bed in a colorful fan. “Madame said you was to be ready to make a call within the hour. I think the green, don’t you?”