Lucia MacNeill’s frown evaporated into undisguised shock.
Sophie, feeling miserably guilty, looked down at her hands, clasped tightly in her lap.
“So it is true,” said Lucia MacNeill, after a long moment. Sophie raised her head abruptly. “You are the Lost Princess.”
Sophie nodded.
“And Prince Roland’s sister.”
“Yes,” said Sophie. She swallowed around the dry lump in her throat and added, in the spirit of honesty, “His half sister, at any rate.”
Lucia MacNeill leaned forward a little, and Sophie squared her chin and looked the heiress of Alba in the eyes. They were beautiful eyes, of a calm clear blue, and fringed with long russet-gold lashes; and in them Sophie read both challenge and entreaty.
But for their colour, in fact—and the fine-drawn heart-shaped face from which they regarded her—they were Joanna’s eyes to the life.
“You are not much alike,” Lucia MacNeill remarked. “Unless the portrait I was sent is very unfaithful indeed.”
“No,” Sophie agreed, a little wrong-footed by this sudden turn of the conversation. “Roland favours his mother, and . . . I suppose I must favour mine.”
Lucia MacNeill sat back in her chair, squaring her shoulders. “I could wish that you might have told me sooner who you are,” she said. “In the circumstances.”
“I knew no more of the circumstances than rumour could tell me,” said Sophie, “until my father’s letter reached me not a se’nnight ago, and I did not like to proceed on the strength of rumour alone.”
This explanation was received with a slow, thoughtful nod, after which Lucia MacNeill tilted her head on one side, Joanna-like, and said, “I can see that with the priests of the Cailleach encouraging riots in the streets, this might not seem the best moment for such a revelation. But what I cannot see is—well—why hide to begin with?”
Sophie sighed. “If you knew what my life was, at Oxford,” she said, “you could not ask me that question.”
“Tell me, then,” Lucia MacNeill suggested, with a wry smile.
Sophie smiled hesitantly back at her, and did.
* * *
Catriona MacCrimmon called upon Sophie in Quarry Close for the express purpose of discussing the news; not (so far as Sophie was able to observe) because she suspected Sophie of being in the secret, but because she knew no other Sasunnach visitors to interrogate. Catriona’s manner was overbright and brittle—very like the evening of the Marshalls’ supper-party, when she had interrupted Sophie’s conversation with Rory on the subject of clan storehouses. Earlier in their acquaintance, Sophie might have taken it at its face value and concluded that Catriona favoured the Alban heiress’s marriage with a British prince and was eager to know all about him; now, as so often of late, she was baffled and wrong-footed, unable to deduce what Catriona might be at.
“I fear the match is not well looked upon everywhere in Alba,” Sophie ventured, testing the waters, “though Lucia MacNeill herself is so highly thought of. It seems to me a good thing—the cementing of a friendship, so that each kingdom may have less fear of the other—but perhaps you do not agree?”
Catriona smiled broadly with her lips, and not at all with her eyes.
“Can any true friendship subsist between such unequal parties?” she said. “Between a great kingdom such as yours, with its standing army and its vast lands and great treasuries, and little Alba?”
“I . . . I had not thought of the question in quite that way,” said Sophie, wishing now that she had not asked.
Catriona’s smile took on a pitying edge. “I did not suppose you had. It is the privilege of the powerful never to consider such questions from the perspective of the powerless.”
Sophie blinked.
Catriona patted her hand, and Sophie fought to control her instinctive recoil. “The stones are cast, now,” she said, not unkindly, “and what is there for the likes of us to do, but learn to live with the consequences?”
But she did not look as if she meant what she said.
* * *
The heiress of Alba might be perfectly able to keep a secret; but having told Lucia MacNeill the truth, Sophie found herself increasingly unable to justify hiding it from her closest acquaintance.
Eithne and Una were full of questions for their one Sasunnach friend, almost none of which Sophie could answer: How long has this match been in the offing? Is it true that London is sending waggon-loads of food to Alba? What does your King intend by it, and by the match itself? What can you tell us of this Prince Roland?
“As for the marriage arrangements, I do not believe I know much more about the matter than you do,” she said at last, helplessly. “Except that I can certainly vouch for the bride-gifts of stores against famine, for I had that news from my sister. This match must have been under discussion for some time—such things are not decided overnight, I know—but I cannot recall that any such thing was talked of when last I was in London—”
Her next words fled her mind temporarily as she took in the astonishment on her friends’ faces. She gathered her wits about her again, and went on: “I can tell you something of Prince Roland, however, because—and I am sorry not to have told you before—because—because he is my half-brother.”
Una and Eithne gaped at her.
At last Eithne said, “Then . . . it is true that you are the Lost Princess? And not Sophie Marshall at all?”
“It is not true that I am not Sophie Marshall,” said Sophie, rather more vehemently than she had intended. “I have been Sophie Marshall since the day I was married, and I cannot help what else I am besides.” She scowled, looking down at the scuffed toes of her sturdy boots. “But . . . but I was born Princess Edith Augusta; that much is certainly true.”
For another long moment, no one spoke.
Sophie raised her head at last—half wondering whether Eithne and Una had somehow vanished whilst her attention was elsewhere—and found them both staring at her as though antlers had sprouted from her head.
“You,” said Eithne, shaking her head. “I cannot credit it.”
“And why on the gods’ green earth, Eithne MacLachlan,” Sophie said, with some asperity, “should I tell you such a tale, if it were not true?”
“I wish you will not take offence, Sophie,” said Eithne, half apologetic, half defensive. “You must allow that this is entirely unexpected. And,” she added, “if it is true, then, for the gods’ sake, why have you never said so before?”
Sophie restrained herself from rolling her eyes. “Lucia MacNeill asked me the same question,” she said. “If my fellow students at Merlin College had been anything like hers, I daresay I should have felt differently.”
Una, meanwhile, had been studying Sophie intently, her head on one side.
“It’s said the Sasunnachs’ Lost Princess is very beautiful,” she remarked. “And that she can sing the birds out of the trees, and the rocks from the river-bed, like—”
Sophie’s snort of laughter at this romantical notion brought Una up short, frowning.
“You may believe whatever you like,” said Sophie cheerfully. She was rather surprised to find that this was, in most respects, true. “It makes no difference to me.”
She was entirely surprised when Una, after another long, considering look, said firmly, “I believe you.”
Eithne—ordinarily so much more credulous—still looked doubtful. “The thing is, you see,” she began, “my mother told our cousin Conall MacLachlan—the butterfly collector, you know—she mentioned to him that—”
“Eithne,” said Una, “whatever it is you have to say, will you for the gods’ sake cease trying to say it and say it.”
Eithne swallowed visibly, and nodded. “Conall MacLachlan spoke to you at the Chancellor’s dinner, he said, and concluded that he had been wrong to think you must be the Lost Princess, becaus
e you were too plain and too dull, and your singing had no magick in it.”
“Ah,” said Sophie. So Conall MacLachlan had indeed known who she was—and this must explain why he had said nothing about it thereafter. “But that is because Conall MacLachlan has forgot the other magick for which the Lost Princess is renowned.”
“What is that?” said Eithne, frowning.
“This,” said Sophie.
She closed her eyes briefly, imagined herself in her own sitting-room—seated at her pianoforte, alone with Gray—and, for the first time since leaving London, stood in a public corridor and let her native magick have its way. She could not have said precisely what she now looked like, but Gray had shown her, once (or, rather, had made her show herself), how her face grew brighter, livelier, and more colourful when she was happy, when her worries receded, when she was surrounded by the people she loved.
“Oh,” said Eithne.
“Brìghde’s tears!” said Una.
When she felt they had looked their fill, Sophie carefully resumed her plainer, soberer self—which produced another astonished Oh! from Eithne—and regarded them both solemnly.
“Eithne MacLachlan,” she said, “Una MacSherry, we are friends, are we not?”
“Of course, Sophie,” said Eithne.
Una nodded warily.
“Then I may rely on you both, I hope,” said Sophie, “to stand my friends still? I have not changed, you know; I am Princess Edith Augusta only when I must be, and am Sophie Marshall always, deep down.”
She would not plead—would not say, Please believe me, I have never lied to you about anything that truly matters—but she did wish, again, that she had never taken it into her head to keep this secret. Only, it had been so pleasant to be Sophie Marshall and nothing more, so uncomplicated and easy . . .
“Did you,” Una began. She paused, then began again: “Did you know—”
“No,” said Sophie at once. “Or only a very little before the news was made public here, in a letter from my father; and at the same time he insisted upon silence, so of course I could not say anything about it to anyone.”
Una’s gaze was steady upon Sophie’s face, solemn and considering. “Good,” she said at last, with a sharp nod.
Sophie felt oddly as though she had just passed some sort of test, without at all knowing in what the ordeal consisted.
“And now,” said Una, her solemn face breaking into a grin, “you must tell us all about Lucia MacNeill’s betrothed!”
In the lively discussion that followed, Eithne was oddly silent, but Sophie was so much encouraged by Una’s reaction that she scarcely remarked it.
Gray was quite right, she thought wonderingly. It is a relief not to be hiding any longer.
CHAPTER XV
In Which Sophie Loses One Friend and Gains Another
Sophie was playing something unusually mournful on the pianoforte, and Gray listening whilst reading and drinking tea, when Mór MacRury called in Quarry Close very early one January morning.
Apart from Sophie’s choice of music, none of these circumstances was at all out of the common way. It had become a settled habit for many of their University acquaintance to call upon them at all hours, for the scholars of Din Edin shared with those of Oxford a general tendency to disregard those social conventions which they found inconvenient; and such visits had become more frequent in the past fortnight, as their friends chose this means amongst others to show that, manifestations against Lucia MacNeill’s marriage notwithstanding, the Marshalls had been welcomed by the University and remained so. Goff and Tredinnick, and the various relief sentries lent to them by Lord de Courcy since the announcement of the betrothal, by now knew all of Gray’s and Sophie’s friends by sight, and so they were never hindered in their progress up Quarry Close by any inconvenient encounter with an apparent shipping-clerk or itinerant knife-mender. And Gray often asked Sophie to play for him when there was a particularly trying student essay to be read.
This one was very trying indeed, and Sophie’s melancholic humour was becoming infectious. It was with some relief, therefore, that Gray rose from his armchair in reply to a more than usually insistent knocking at the front door.
His relief was short-lived, however, for upon opening it, he beheld Mór MacRury standing on the step, wearing a heavy woollen cloak and an anxious expression.
“Is Sophie here?” she said, in lieu of a greeting. “I must speak to her—is she—”
“She is here,” said Gray, cautiously. “Mór, are you quite well?” A thought occurred to him, and he added, “There has not been some new disturbance? You are not hurt?”
He stood aside to let her in and to shut out the heavy rain.
The melancholy music ceased, and footsteps succeeded it.
“Mór!” said Sophie, with uncomplicated welcome in her voice. “Come in and sit down! Oh, you are wet through—”
Mór only stared at her, a small frown creasing her brow; she seemed not to hear Gray’s offer to hang up her damp cloak to dry, or Sophie’s of a fresh pot of tea, and Sophie at last faltered into silence.
“Sophie,” said Mór, when the silence had gone on so long as to be nearly unbearable. “Why did you never tell me?”
Gray sighed; Sophie flushed an unbecoming crimson, and looked at her toes.
“I suppose you have been speaking to Eithne MacLachlan,” she said. “I am sorry; of course I meant to tell you myself, but you were ill in bed all the past se’nnight, and it did not seem—”
“So it is true, then.” Mór MacRury’s vivid eyes were large with the aftermath of fever. “You are truly the daughter of King Henry—the Lost Princess—the sister of Lucia MacNeill’s Prince Roland. Everyone is talking of it, Sorcha says.”
“Yes,” said Sophie, almost inaudibly. “And Eithne MacLachlan, it seems, cannot forgive me for it. That, I suppose, is the source of the rumours, for Lucia MacNeill I am sure has said nothing to anyone.”
Ah. That explains the melancholy music. Sophie had told him very cheerfully that Lucia MacNeill and Una MacSherry had taken the news in good part; why had he not remarked her (in retrospect, obvious) omission of her other close comrade?
Gray crossed the small sitting-room to stand behind her, laying a protective hand on each of her rounded shoulders. “Sophie is the Princess Edith Augusta through an accident of birth,” he said, frowning down at Mór MacRury, “and lost because her mother loved her too well to give her up to be raised by the Iberian Empress.”
His left thumb stroked the soft curve of Sophie’s neck, skin against warm skin to draw strength and to give it. “She is Sophie Marshall through her own choice and promises, and a member of this University—if only a temporary one—on her merits as a scholar. I should hope, Mór MacRury, that you are a woman of sufficient sense, and stand enough our friend, to judge rightly which of these titles best reflect her character.”
As Gray’s speech proceeded—his voice, despite his best efforts, growing rather edged—Sophie’s left hand had come up to her shoulder to grip his fingers, and Mór’s astonished gaze had transferred itself from Sophie’s bent head to his face.
“I am sorry,” she said, low. “I meant no insult, Sophie. Only—”
Sophie straightened her spine and raised her head. “I beg you will think no more of it,” she said, with fragile dignity. “It is my own fault, for being so stupid as to attempt concealment.”
“Sophie—”
“Please, Mór.” Sophie’s fingers tightened painfully around Gray’s; he gently pressed her other shoulder, and at once she loosened her grip, glancing up in mute apology.
Mór dropped into Gray’s chair and sat very still, studying her clasped hands. Gray nudged Sophie gently in the direction of her own chair, which faced his; when she had taken the hint and sunk down into it, he came round one side and, keeping one hand on Sophie’s shoulder, per
ched on the upholstered chair-arm, both feet flat on the threadbare carpet beneath. Sophie leant briefly against his side.
“What do you mean to do now?” Mór asked, raising her eyes at last.
Sophie sat up straight. “I beg your pardon?” she said. “What should I mean to do, but what I came to Din Edin for?”
Mór MacRury frowned at Gray as though to say, Surely you understand what I am driving at? “If I were your father,” she said, turning her gaze back to Sophie, “I should not be at all easy in my mind as to your safety in Din Edin at present.”
“She is not unguarded,” said Gray, bristling a little. “His Majesty is not so careless, and nor am I.”
“Ah.” Mór MacRury’s expression cleared a little; she looked speculatively at Sophie, who looked away. “They must be very discreet, these guards.”
“They are,” said Gray; “I daresay you have seen them dozens of times, without recognising them as such. Sophie does not like to feel . . . hemmed in.”
“In any case, Mór MacRury,” said Sophie, “I hope you do not think we shall be chased out of Din Edin by a few malcontents chanting slogans!”
“Sophie, if Mór thinks it truly dangerous—”
“If you have guards always by, that does put a different complexion on the matter,” said Mór MacRury. “It may well be that this present unrest is only a maelstrom in a millpond. I will say, on that head, that I have lived in Din Edin nearly half my life, and seen many public scandals come and go—I should not be greatly surprised if this one were no different.”
“There, Gray,” said Sophie, looking up at him.
Gray was not altogether persuaded; he did not choose to continue the dispute before an audience, however, and therefore shut his mouth until Mór MacRury had gone away.
* * *
“Eithne MacLachlan?” said Gray, when the front door had closed behind their visitor.
“Do you remember the Chancellor’s dinner party?” said Sophie, à propos of nothing which Gray could divine.
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