Kushiels Dart

by Jacqueline Carey

Page 31

 

  I'd had little enough of it myself, but my mood was strange and sleep seemed far away. I went to my room and put Melisande's patron-gift in my coffer, mulling over the amount it contained. Then I closed the lid and sat on my bed, holding the remnants of my costume.

  It was enough. It would be more than enough.

  I had no idea what to do.

  Too much had happened in one night for my mind to compass. My gaze fell once more on my coffer. That, at least, I could learn for myself, I thought, and went down to the library.

  I'd remembered rightly. Though I had to crane my neck to see it, there was indeed a coffer gathering dust atop a high shelf along the eastern wall. I listened for sounds of stirring and heard none. Dragging the tallest chair I could find over to the shelves, I stood atop it and reached for the coffer. I lacked a good foot of attaining it. With a whispered apology to Shemhazai and the scholars of the world, I piled several thick volumes on the seat of the chair, and clambered up to balance precariously on them. My fingertips grazed the gold fretwork adorning the coffer, and I succeeded in dragging it within reach.

  Holding the coffer carefully, I dismounted from my perch and set to studying it. The rich wood was dimmed beneath a thick layer of dust, and the edges of the fretwork fuzzy with it. I blew gently upon it, raising a cloud, then examined the lock.

  There are merits to befriending a Tsingano; Hyacinthe had long since taught me to pick simple locks. I fetched two hairpins from my room, bending the end of one into a tiny hook with my teeth. Manipulating them delicately, listening all the while for the sounds of the household rising, I soon caught the tumbler inside the lock and sprang open the latch.

  An odor of sandalwood breathed into the still air of the library when I raised the lid of the coffer. Melisande had spoken truly; it held a slim volume, silk-bound and untitled. Opening the book, I saw page after page of verse in Delaunay's hand, younger and more painstaking than his current fluid scrawl, but clearly the same. Smoothing the pages open, I read the verses written in faded ink.

  O, dear my lord . . .

  Let this breast on which you have leant

  As close in love as a foe in battle,

  Unarmed, unarmored, grappling chest to chest,

  Alone in the glade

  Where birds started at our voices,

  Laughter winging airborne, we struggled

  For advantage, neither giving quarter;

  How I remember your arms beneath my grip,

  Sliding like marble slickened;

  Your chest pressed to mine

  Heaving;

  As our feet trampled the tender grass

  Your eyes narrowed with tender cunning

  And I unaware

  Until your heel caught my knee; I buckled,

  Falling,

  Vanquished; O sovereign adored,

  To be pierced ecstatic by the shaft of victory;

  Sweet the pain of losing,

  Sweeter this second struggle . . .

  O, dear my lord,

  Let this breast on which you have leant

  Serve now as your shield.

  Melisande had not lied about the book. If Delaunay had written these lines, surely he had written them for Rolande de la Courcel, who had died at the Battle of Three Princes. Rolande, whose word Delaunay had upheld, when he went back for Alcuin. Rolande, whose wife Delaunay had branded a murderess, whose father the King had ordered Delaunay's poetry anathematized.

  No wonder he hadn't dared banish him.

  A small sound caught my ear, and I spun about to see Alcuin standing stock-still and open-mouthed. Too late, I closed the book.

  "You shouldn't have done that," he said quietly.

  "I had to know. " I closed the coffer and latched the lock. "It's what Delaunay taught us to do, after all," I added, returning his gaze defiantly. "Help me put it back. "

  He hesitated, but the long bond of tutelage between us won out; Alcuin came over to give me a hand up, steadying me while I returned the coffer to its dusty resting-place. We replaced the other books and the tall chair, erasing the evidence of my trespass, then listened. All was quiet.

  "So. " I folded my arms. "Delaunay was Prince Rolande's beloved. What of it? Rolande de la Courcel has been dead fifteen years and more; why does House Courcel still traffic with Delaunay, and award him couriers and Cassiline Brothers and the like? And why does he make peace with the Due L'Envers, who is brother to his equally dead enemy, the Princess Consort?"

  Alcuin's gaze looked past me. "I don't know. "

  "I don't believe you. "

  He looked straight at me, then. "Believe as you choose, Phedre. I made Delaunay a promise, too. Who told you? Melisande?" I didn't answer, and he frowned. "She had no business. Would that I could tell the difference between amusement and ambition in that woman. I'd sleep easier for it. "

  "What I now know," I said, "half the peers of the realm knew already, and I think no one is anxious to kill for it. Isabel de la Courcel had her revenge, when she had his verses banned. Thelesis de Mornay told me Delaunay might have been the King's Poet, if matters hadn't fallen out differently. It's what he became instead that is dangerous to know. "

  "And do you suppose Melisande Shahrizai isn't clever enough to send you fishing for it?" Alcuin raised his brows.

  I felt a chill at the thought, and kept my silence. Alcuin had said he would tell me what he knew when I made my marque; he had promised not to speak of it before then. The long-ago prophecy of Hyacinthe's mother echoed in my memory, and I was suddenly afraid to tell him what Melisande had given me. "Will you tell Delaunay?" I asked instead.

  He shook his head somberly. "It's your decision. I'll have no part of it, Phedre. If you're wise, you'll tell him. But I'll leave it to you. "

  With that, he left me, feeling more alone than ever I had in Delaunay's service.

  In the end, I temporized.

  I told him everything, all that I could remember, except the part about Prince Rolande and the book. He made me go over the Duc de Morhban's Masque a dozen times over, at last giving up and turning his attention to the diamond-spangled cloth, turning it over in his hands and shaking his head.

  "What will you do?" he asked at last.

  I'd had a little time to give it thought, and clasped my hands together, gathering courage to voice it. "My lord," I said, keeping my voice steady. "In the Night Court, when an adept has made their marque, they may stay in the service of their House, and rise within its ranks until such time as they choose to retire. I don't. . . I don't wish to leave your household. "

  Delaunay's smile was like the sun rising after the Longest Night. "You wish to stay?"

  "My lord. " I swallowed against the lump of mingled fear and hope in my throat. "Do you permit it?"

  He laughed out loud, drew me into his arms and kissed me on both cheeks. "Do you jest? Phedre, you take enough risks to turn my hair grey with fright, but I'm the one who taught you to do it. Since you will take them whether I will it or no, I would sooner you do it under my roof, where I can safeguard you somewhat, than anywhere else in the realm. " Delaunay stroked my hair. "I'd half-thought I might lose you to your Tsingano boy," he said, not entirely in jest. "If not House Shahrizai. "

  "If the Prince of Travellers thinks I've been waiting for the moment my marque was made, that he might deem me worthy, he's sore mistaken," I said, giddy with relief. "Let him court me, if he wishes it. And Melisande is too interested in seeing how far I will run with her collar on me," I added, fingering the diamond at the end of the velvet cord, color rising to my face.

  Delaunay forbore to comment on it, for which I was grateful. "Phedre," he said instead, his tone sober, "you are a member of my household, and bear my surname. If ever you doubted it, know well, I would never, ever cast you out. "

  "Thank you, my lord," I murmured, unexpectedly moved. He grinned at me.

  "Even if
your service fills Naamah's coffers and your own, rather than mine. " He hefted the remains of my gown. "Shall I send this to a gem-merchant, then?"

  "Yes, my lord," I said, adding fervently, "please. "

  It would be some days before the whole of the transaction could be completed; with Delaunay's permission, I took a sullen Joscelin as my escort and rode to Night's Doorstep, albeit by day. Alcuin lent me his saddle horse, and though the winter air was bitter, it was a pleasure to ride on horseback rather than cloistered in a coach. My last memory of a coach had too much of Melisande Shahrizai in it, and I welcomed the cold air clearing my thoughts.

  I wore the diamond, though. I couldn't quite bear to remove it, and tried not to think too much about why.

  Hyacinthe was supervising a handful of young men, easing a battered carriage into the stables he leased. "Phedre!" he shouted, catching me in his arms and swinging me around. "Look at this. I've nigh got a full-fledged livery service now. A noble's carriage, and I bought it for a song. "

  Joscelin leaned against the weathered wall of the stable, ashen garments rendering him nearly invisible. "Then you paid a verse too high, Tsin-gano," he said, nodding at the warped wheels and missing spokes. "Stripping that fancy trim won't cover the cost of repairing the wheels. "

  "Happily, Sir Cassiline, I know a cartwright who will also work for a song," Hyacinthe said mildly. He turned back to me and grinned. "De-launay let you out of your cage? Can I buy you a jug?"

  "I'll buy you one. " I jingled the purse at my belt. "Come on, Joscelin, it won't kill you to set foot in an inn. Cassiel will forgive you, if you stick to water. "

  Thus we ended at our familiar table in the back of the Cockerel, though with the unfamiliar addition of a Cassiline Brother seated in the corner with folded arms, steel glinting off his vambraces as he scowled at the other customers. The inn-keeper looked almost as displeased at Jos-celin's presence as he did himself.

  I told Hyacinthe most of what had happened. He fingered the diamond at my throat and whistled.

  "Do you know what that's worth?" he asked.

  I shook my head. "No. A fair amount. "

  "A lot, Phedre. You could . . . well, you could do quite a few things with the money it would bring. "

  "I can't sell it. " Remembering the cord taut around my throat, I flushed. "Don't ask why. "

  "All right. " Hyacinthe regarded me curiously, his black eyes lively with intelligence. "What else?"

  "Joscelin. " I fished a coin from my purse and slid it across the table. "Will you buy a jug, and bring it to Hyacinthe's crew in the stable, with my regards?"

  The Cassiline looked at me with flat incredulity. "No. "

  "I swear, it's nothing like the other time, and naught against your vows. It's just somewhat. . . well, you'd rather not hear. I'll not stir from this chair. " I grew annoyed as he sat unmoving. "Name of Elua! Do your vows say you have to remain glued at my side?"

  With a sound of disgust, Joscelin shoved his chair back and snatched the coin from the table, heading to the bar.

  "Let's hope we don't find him in need of rescue," Hyacinthe said, watching him go. "What is it?"

  I told him quickly about Delaunay and Prince Rolande, what Meli-sande had said, and the book of verse. Hyacinthe heard it out.

  "No wonder," he said when I was done. "So he was neither brother nor betrothed to Edmee de Rocaille after all?"

  "No. " I shook my head. "No, he wasn't avenging her, he was protecting Rolande. I think. You never . . . you never looked?"

  "I said I would not use the dromonde in this. You know why. " It was the wholly serious tone I doubted many had heard in Hyacinthe's voice.

  "Your mother's prophesy. " I glanced at him, and he nodded briefly. "Either it came to naught, or it waits the day I know the whole of it. "

  "Pray it is the former," he murmured, then recovered his spirits, flaunting his white grin. "So you'll no longer be a vrajna servant, Phedre no Delaunay! You know what that betokens. "

  "It means I can aspire to heights on my own greater than I've reached as Delaunay's anguissette" I said coolly. "Mayhap one day I'll have my own salon, which might even surpass the fame of Cecilie Laveau-Perrin, who trained me. Who knows what suitors that will bring?"

  It took the wind from his sails, momentarily gratifying, but it wasn't easy to discomfit Hyacinthe. He touched Melisande's diamond where it lay in the hollow of my throat. "You know what it will bring, Phedre," he said. "The question is, what will you choose?"

  Annoyed, I slapped his hand away. "I'll choose nothing, now! I've spent all my life at someone's bidding. I've a mind to taste freedom before I choose to give it up again. "

  "I'd put no collar on you. " He grinned at me again. "You'd walk the long road with me, free as a bird, the Princess of Travellers. "

  "The Tsingani collared your mother with shame," I said, glowering at him, "and set her to washing clothing and telling fortunes for copper pennies. And if the stories are true, they'd collar your dromonde, Prince of Travellers, and set you to playing the fiddle and shoeing horses. So don't ply your O Star of the Evening wiles on me. "

  "Oh, you know what I mean. " He shrugged, undisturbed by my ire, and plucked the velvet cord at my throat. "I'd not parade you half-naked before the peers of an entire province, Phedre. "

  "I know," I whispered. "Hyacinthe, that's the problem. "

  I don't think, before that moment, that he truly grasped the nature of what I was. He knew, of course; had always known, and had been the one person who'd never cared for what, but only who I was. I saw him comprehend it now, and feared. It could change everything between us.

  Then he flashed his irrepressible grin. "So?" he asked and shrugged, miming the crack of a whip. "I can learn to be cruel, if that's what you want. I'm the Prince of Travellers," he boasted. "I can do anything. "

  At that, I laughed, and took his face in my hands and kissed him; and caught my breath when he returned it, kissing me back with unexpected skill and sweetness—they'd taught him well, the married noblewomen with whom he dallied—until Joscelin's mail-backed fist slammed my change onto the table and both of us jumped, guilty as children, to meet the Cassiline's dour gaze.

  Riding homeward beside him in the gloaming winter twilight, I glanced at Joscelin's forbidding profile and ventured to speak of it. "I told you there was no harm in it, and no concern of yours," I said, irritated by his silence. "My marque is made; I've no bond to betray now. "

  "Your marque is not yet limned, Servant of Naamah," he said stiffly, and I bit my tongue; it was true. He looked straight ahead. "Anyway, it's naught to me where you bestow your . . . gifts. "

  Only a haughty Cassiline could have summoned that much contempt for the word. He set spurs to Delaunay's saddle horse and left me scrambling to keep up, detesting him once more.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  In due time, the deal with the gem-merchant was concluded, each tiny diamond assessed for its quality and worth, and when all was tallied and counted, I was presented with a goodly sum of money.

  With Joscelin's rebuke still stinging, I wasted no time in arranging a final appointment with Master Tielhard. I confess, I looked forward to the day with no small excitement. Like most Servants of Naamah, I had made my marque in slow, agonizing inches; to have it done in one blow, as it were, was a coup indeed.

  Alcuin had done it, of course, but Alcuin had forced his patron's hand to it, and done penance to Naamah for it. Melisande's gift, whatever motivated it, was genuine. Whatever strings were attached to her gifts lay in the one about my throat, and not the one to be limned on my back.

  Until the day of my appointment arrived, I dwelled in a strange hinterland, neither bond-servant nor free D'Angeline citizen. For once, though, I did not chafe at my confinement, but strove to make sense of all that had happened, not the least of which was my last encounter with Hyacinthe. I had a strange longing then to see his mother.

  I wish, now, t
hat I had seen her; Delaunay would decry it as superstition, but there was a grim truth in her prophecies. Perhaps things might have fallen out differently, if I had.

  The wisdom of hindsight is always flawless. I know, now, that I should have told Delaunay the whole of what had befallen between Melisande and I; I should have told him that I knew about Prince Rolande. Indeed, I should have guessed it for myself. Of all the shadows that darkened De-launay's soul, that had always been foremost among them: the Battle of Three Princes.

  Rolande had fallen; Delaunay had failed to save his liege-lord. I had thought that was all it was. But now, I looked at him differently, remem bering the words of his poem. O, dear my lord, Let this breast on which you have leant, Serve now as your shield. He had loved Rolande, and failed him. "Rolande was always rash," Delaunay had said, his voice bitter. "It was his only flaw, as a leader. "

  I should have known.

  So I think, and doubt, and second-guess myself. But in truth, would it have mattered? I cannot know. I never will.

  The day of my final appointment with Master Tielhard dawned cold, crisp and bright. Delaunay, half his mind elsewhere, was expecting a visitor; he agreed unthinking to the loan of his horse and Alcuin's, so my surly Cassiline companion and I rode to the marquist's shop.

  Master Tielhard was not a greedy man. He was an artist, and no question about it. But artists, no less than other mortals—and betimes more—aspire to heights unreached by their peers, and I saw his aged eyes glimmer at the sight of the gold I offered, and the prospect of an anguis-sette's marque fulfilled. I was the first, in his lifetime.

  We spent a fair amount of time in the stifling-hot back room of his shop, confirming the design and the lineaments of my marque. I could see Joscelin through the curtain, waiting with outstretched legs and folded arms. Well, then, let him wait; I was not about to rush the completion of my marque upon a youthful Cassiline's impatience.

  I had only just disrobed, and felt the first blow of Master Tielhard's tapper pierce my skin, when the commotion arose in the front room. As it was no business of mine—so I thought—I remained upon the table while Robert Tielhard sent his apprentice to investigate.