Antuniet might still have been dubious, but once they were ensconced in the modiste’s shop, she fell under the musical spell of Mefro Dominique’s Caribbean-accented French, tactfully suggesting which of the newest styles would suit the maisetra best. “The young girls are all wearing overgowns of tissue and lace, but I think that would not do for you. You are too tall to be ethereal. And I remember you do not like the lace. The sleeves treillagé would be very becoming, I think. And with nothing but a bit of ribbon à chevrons on the hem.”
Jeanne did her best to keep her opinions to herself. Toneke was determined to choose always the plainest and simplest styles and that didn’t suit her own notions at all. “That might do for everyday,” she said, ignoring Antuniet’s muffled snort, no doubt contemplating that “everyday” meant working clothes. “But we’ll need something more elaborate for the end of the year.” To Dominique she explained, “Something suitable for the New Year’s court. Nothing outrageous though,” she added, thinking of the fanciful costumes that many affected.
“No,” Antuniet said firmly. “This one will do for the New Year and you may choose the fabric. For everyday balls and dinners—” She hesitated, then turned to the dressmaker. “Do you remember the last gown you made for me?”
“Yes, maisetra. The rose satin with the pleating?”
“Could you make that again? The gown was ruined in an accident and…and it was very special to me.”
Mefro Dominique turned to the girl who stood silently at her elbow. “Celeste, go look and see what we have left of the rose.” She shrugged apologetically. “My daughter knows the stock better than I do. Now for the other gown it should be velvet, I think. What do you think, Mesnera de Cherdillac? There is a dark wine color that I think might suit.”
Jeanne scarcely attended to the discussion of fabrics, assenting to whatever the other two said. Had that been meant as a peace offering over the gift? Or was it simply that the rose gown had been so perfectly becoming? It was so hard to tease meaning out of Antuniet’s words beyond the simple facts.
* * *
Antuniet’s prediction about the crush in the workshop when they began the next layering process hadn’t prepared Jeanne for the difference in mood, even from the previous spring’s work with Efriturik. Then she had felt an intimate part of the process; now she seemed to be in the way. Anna and Margerit were busy sorting out the supplies and equipment, while Antuniet explained the process and roles to their new assistant. Efriturik had brought his friend Charlin Mainek to be the double for his own role, and the presence of two young men had altered the mood of the assembly. She could hear the counterpoint as Efriturik showed off his own growing understanding of the process.
“It’s a bit like playacting,” he was explaining, “except that we become the properties of the materials, and then when we—”
“Playacting may not be the best explanation,” Antuniet interrupted, turning the instructions back to more practical matters. Charlin was listening bemusedly with an air of being introduced to his friend’s odder relatives. He was properly behaved in every way, but Jeanne suspected that Efriturik had given him a stern lecture in advance, for Charlin was stiffly and punctiliously polite in all his dealings with Anna. Still, the air was changed in subtle ways.
Jeanne shook off her mood when the working itself began. She’d hoped to partner with Antuniet as they’d done during the summer experiments, but the roles had been rearranged for the current formula. Now Antuniet and Anna mirrored Mercury as the transforming principle and she was paired with Margerit as the Queen to stand opposite to the twinned Kings. There was more interaction between the roles as well, adding and mixing the materiae with the solvents, packing the crucibles precisely with the seed crystals nestled in the mineral nourishment, all accompanied by the spoken parts that still sounded to Jeanne like a mummer’s play. But Antuniet was right. It wasn’t entirely playacting. There was a palpable change when Efriturik stepped into his role. Gone was the careless young man of the spring workings who had seemed always half-reluctant, as if his thoughts were on more active pursuits. Now when he took up the flask of solvent and intoned his lines as he dripped it slowly into the crucible, one could see the image of the prince he might someday be. Charlin’s twinned echo was just that: an echo, speaking the words and making the motions without that same essential presence. The complexity of the work made for an arduous day, and Jeanne wondered if young Mesner Mainek was regretting agreeing to what must have seemed like an idle game.
But Charlin, too, had hidden depths, it seemed, for when the crucibles were finally clamped, sealed and signed and positioned carefully in the furnace, he uttered a quickly muffled exclamation. After the closing of the furnace door, Antuniet asked him, “Are you sensitive, then? I hadn’t realized Efriturik chose you for specific talents.”
She likely hadn’t meant it to sound dismissive, but he took no note. “A little, but I’d been told we weren’t to be doing mysteries. What was that?”
Jeanne’s attention drifted off when Margerit joined in the explanation, comparing her own experience of visitatio with the alchemical manifestations. Would there never be time for a quiet word in private? Finally, when the men had left and Anna was dividing her time between tending the furnace and tidying the workshop, Jeanne asked, “Toneke, will your new gown be ready by the day after tomorrow? You remember Margerit invited us to the opera.”
“Oh yes,” Margerit urged. “If you have time. It won’t be a large party in our box. My aunt and uncle have another engagement and you know I never remember to invite people on my own. So only Barbara and some friends of hers. And the two of you if you can come.”
It was too much to expect Antuniet to be eager, perhaps. Having consulted the chart where the various workings were planned, she said, “Yes, I think that would be possible. Anna will be setting up for the next process but I only need to go see to the progress at the palace. Yes, that would work. And dinner first?”
Jeanne thought the question had been for her, but Margerit answered, “That would be delightful. We’ll expect you then.”
Two nights later, the performance turned out to be forgettable: another of Fizeir’s tedious histories. That was unfortunate. When Antuniet took the time from her work, how preferable if the music were worth it! But if she regretted coming, it didn’t show. They strolled out arm in arm for visiting during the interval and stopped by to greet Helen Penilluk and then to visit the Nantozes in their box, though Jeanne found herself carrying the majority of the conversation. “Whatever made you go all stiff and silent?” Jeanne asked when they once again stood before the Sovitre box. “I thought you were old friends with Ainis Nantoz?”
“I was,” Antuniet said.
Jeanne would have pursued the matter except that Tio came around the corner, accompanied both by Iaklin Silpirt and Elin…what was her name? Elin Luson. The one Elisebet had been interviewing for a post that day Toneke went to the palace.
“Jeanne! I hoped to see you here. Where have you been keeping yourself?” Tio chattered on, rehearsing all the more public gossip of the court. “And now we really must go,” she concluded with barely a pause for breath. “Iaklin, you two go on, I’ll come in a moment.” She leaned closely with a laugh and Jeanne’s hand was caught up and pressed to her bosom. “Darling, you’ve broken my heart!” she whispered with a sidelong look at Antuniet. And then she was gone.
Jeanne felt Antuniet go rigid at her side and step away from her as if burned. “Toneke, don’t…”
But Antuniet had turned away and ducked quickly through the door and out of the public corridor. Jeanne followed, grateful that the others hadn’t returned yet. “Toneke, please don’t pay her any mind.”
“You told Tionez about us?” Antuniet’s voice was shaking and she couldn’t tell whether it was anger or fear.
“Toneke, I never said a word. Tio doesn’t need to get her feet wet to know which way the river’s flowing! But she’ll be as discreet as she needs to be. She isn�
��t as foolish as she sometimes pretends. And she isn’t really jealous, that’s all for show.” Jeanne took Antuniet’s hands in hers and pulled her close, but she drew away with a look out over the expanse of the theater.
“Are you mad? We might as well be on the stage.”
“Pooh! They’ll see nothing at all improper,” Jeanne said. “You’ll attract more gossip by acting guilty than from any attention I pay you.” But she let go as the door opened and the other guests returned. “Now come sit by me and let’s hope the second act is better than the first.”
It wasn’t, and Jeanne found her comments becoming more waspish as it droned on.
As the curtain came down for the second interval, Antuniet asked, “Don’t you care for it? We needn’t stay if you don’t.”
Jeanne squeezed her hand where it lay between their chairs, hidden from sight. “I care for spending the time with you.”
“We could do that somewhere else,” Antuniet said softly. There was an invitation in her gaze.
Jeanne smiled in return. “Yes. Yes, we could.” She turned to their hostess. “Margerit, I feel devastated, but Toneke has a touch of the headache and I need to see her home. Will you forgive us?”
Margerit looked over in concern. “I’m so sorry. Of course—” She paused, taking the two of them in, then continued, “Of course you must go. Tell my coachman I said to take you. He’ll be back before the performance is finished. Try to get some rest.” But the last was said with an impish smile.
* * *
It was like living three or four lives at once, Jeanne thought. Not that she was any stranger to that, but between the usual course of the season, the alchemical work and the sweet, fleeting hours alone with Antuniet, she felt stretched thin, and hungry for those worlds to touch more closely. To have Antuniet there beside her at the dinners and concerts and the other pleasures of everyday life. She wanted more than a lover, she wanted…she wasn’t quite certain, but she was impatient with the scraps she had. Antuniet’s everyday life was filled with other concerns and when they met in public she seemed tense and anxious. Today they worked once more with the full crowd and there would be no time for as much as a cup of tea together. And yet she wasn’t immune to the excitement at the progress they were making.
Antuniet met her on the doorstep as she arrived at the workshop and Jeanne took her eager face between her hands for a warm kiss. “It will be all day before I can do that again.”
Antuniet drew back with a frightened look. “Not here!” she said urgently. She looked up and down the street, then hurried inside.
Jeanne left Marien to pay off the driver and followed, but the entryway gave even less privacy than the street, with the cluster of guards hurriedly rising from their dice around the small table and a gaggle of voices spilling out from the inner workroom. “Then where?” she asked more sharply than she intended.
Antuniet took her hand and led her back along the corridor and up the narrow steps to the small chamber above. “Jeanne, please, I need to be careful,” she said as the door closed behind them.
“Of the coalman with his cart and the baker’s girl? Why should you care what their sort think of you? People will find it more strange if two such friends as we are show no affection to each other. That would cause more comment.” It would be laughable if Toneke’s expression weren’t genuinely pained.
“I care if the coalman makes filthy jokes about what Anna does here all day. I care if the baker’s girl calls me rude names in front of other customers. I care if word gets back to Maistir Monterrez and he believes it. And yes, I would care if Mefro Feldin gave notice and I had the trouble of replacing her.” The pleading edge in her voice was painful. “Jeanne, you’ve surrounded yourself with your own creatures, like a warm carriage rug wrapped around you. But I could be out naked in the cold tomorrow. Everything I’ve built could crumble.”
Had she been the butt of rude remarks from her neighbors? Jeanne found it hard to imagine, but this was a different world and one where the rules she lived by might fail. The fear in Antuniet’s voice wormed its way into her own stomach. “Do you want to end it?” she asked.
“No!” Antuniet’s desperation rang true. “I couldn’t bear to go hungry again! Not now.” Truer still was the feel of Antuniet’s arms suddenly wrapped around her. “Jeanne, you’re my bread and my life. But I need to be careful.”
Jeanne felt her quivering like Iaklin’s little spaniel and held her until the shaking calmed. “Toneke, I’m sorry. I’ll try to behave, but it’s so hard to be here beside you all day without touching you.” She smoothed a wisp of Antuniet’s hair away from her eyes. “I wish we were back in summer.”
“No, you don’t,” Antuniet said, the tension fading from her voice. “Now that the season has started again there’s a glow about you. Another month of summer and you would have been screaming with boredom. We need to go down, they’ll be waiting.”
“Not yet,” Jeanne insisted. She once more took Toneke’s face between her hands and drank deeply of her lips. “There,” she said, drawing back at last. “Now it’s been done properly.”
* * *
There was little hope of Antuniet’s company the evening of a working. Even when the congelation proper was finished in good time and the furnace could be left to complete the incubation and cooling without constant care, she was loath to leave it entirely unattended. But the next day, when the matter had been quenched and only the picking over and cleaning remained, there was a chance at least for a few hours of quiet companionship.
Jeanne let herself into the outer room and nodded to the man sitting guard there. “Toneke?” she called. “I’ve come to keep company with you.” There was an answering greeting from inside the workshop as she let Marien take her coat and bonnet. “I haven’t brought any working clothes,” Jeanne said on entering the workroom. “I’m promised to Maisetra Chaplen later and I wouldn’t have time to go home to change. But I was hoping you wouldn’t mind me dropping by.”
Antuniet rose from the workbench, holding her hands up in caution. “I’m absolutely filthy. Be careful.”
“Not all of you,” Jeanne said as she set a kiss on her fingertips, then pressed them against Antuniet’s lips. Antuniet gave a brief glance at the corner where Anna was working, but her head was bent closely over her workbooks. “I’ll just sit myself here,” Jeanne continued, “and keep out of the way. What is Anna working on that you have to pick through the matrix on your own?”
“Planning for the next multiplication,” Antuniet answered as she turned back to work. “I thought it was time to see how well she can manage the whole process. And for the simpler workings it’s best if she can carry on if I need to be elsewhere. We’ll be adding another layer to this set of stones.” She indicated the crumbled lump of slag and dross before her. “With the two cibations and the additional fixation between them, I think more than half the stones in each batch will be usable.”
Jeanne picked up one of the cleaned emeralds already laid out on a cloth. It seemed enormous, almost the size of a pea. “This isn’t large enough?”
“That one, yes. It was the best of the lot. Of course, it will be cut down for setting. If the stones were perfectly pure and flawless they could be smaller. It’s purity that gives them their strength.”
A mischievous smile crossed Jeanne’s lips and she leaned closely to whisper, “Purity always seemed more of a weakness to me.”
Antuniet looked blankly at her until she realized it was a joke. “Even so, I don’t know how I’m going to fit all the stones needed for each ring. Too small and the properties have no power, but two of the gifts call for at least eight different properties. It has to be something the recipient is willing to wear!”
The green stone lay darkly against her skin as Jeanne pressed it to her finger and imagined the rest. “Why a ring? Most of the gifts are for men, aren’t they? Wouldn’t it be better to set them in a watch-fob or even the head of a cane? Something with more space?”
/> Antuniet frowned a little in thought. “When the stone’s properties are meant to aid the bearer, it works best to be in contact with the skin. For those that affect those around you, it’s less important but the strength must be greater. A cane might be worth considering, but one doesn’t carry it all the time. A ring is the surest method. The gifts for women could be more varied; a pendant would work just as well. But I’d prefer to make them all similar.”
The morning passed too quickly, but Alis would be expecting her. Best not to disappoint. “Will you be free this evening?” she asked on rising at last.
“Free to be with you or free to go out?” Antuniet asked without looking up from the work.
“Either.”
Now Antuniet met her gaze. Perhaps she had heard the thread of longing that couldn’t be suppressed. “I can come after Anna goes home, but I don’t have the time for primping and dressing if we’re going out to dine. Did you have invitations?”
“Yes, but I could send my regrets,” Jeanne offered.
“Don’t stay home on my account. Tomorrow would be better. I’m free for any of your plans tomorrow.” Antuniet smiled invitingly and all the impatience melted away.
“Tomorrow then. Dinner with the Penilluks before the concert. I promise you, you’ll enjoy this one. A new German composer who can pull the heart right out of your breast.”
“Do you ever tire of all the concerts and opera parties?” Antuniet asked.
“To be tired of music is to be tired of life,” she intoned with a dramatic gesture. “What would you prefer?”
“Only promise me that you’ll make time for Akezze’s next lecture. I want to see how she’s being received.”
“Of course.” Jeanne said goodbye with another finger-kiss and reminded herself to beg Helen Penilluk for space for another guest. There was never any predicting when Toneke could make time to join her, but Helen wouldn’t mind the short notice.
* * *
The alchemy days were coming more closely on each other’s heels now. Jeanne found she had misjudged: two days after dinner at the Penilluks’s should have been another easy schedule, but Antuniet sent a note scribbled in haste that she would be working late to prepare for the next day’s process. Jeanne crumpled the note with a frown. At least that process would be only the smaller group. What had it come to that three or four people now seemed intimate! But when she arrived at Trez Cherfis in the morning, it was only Anna there to greet her.
The Mystic Marriage Page 36
