by Patty Jansen
“I’m sorry that I didn’t—”
“Shhh.” He put his finger on her lips. The skin was cool. “Not a word. Talk to your conductor. I’ll bring some players for her to audition.”
She nodded, taking deep breaths. The first step had been taken. The next step was . . . registering for the council election?
At home, she went upstairs to look after Father. She had hoped that she could have another talk with him about politics of the past, but he wasn’t very good today, and started making remarks about Darma’s big tits the moment she came in the door.
So she helped him eat and washed him without saying much and then went for her own meal.
But as she was just coming down the stairs, two things happened at once. The door to the living room opened and Enzo came out in the company of Asitho Bisumar.
Also, the front door opened and Jintho came in from outside, his cheeks red from the cold.
The three men faced each other, Enzo and Asitho Bisumar on one side, Jintho on the other. The atmosphere in the hallway turned colder than outside.
Jintho’s cheeks went even redder than they already were. He balled his fists by his side.
Ellisandra realised the terrible thing. He knows.
Jintho very calmly took off his cloak and hung it on the hooks on the wall. His hands trembled.
“Still working on your idiotic shop, are you?” Asitho Bisumar said.
“Yes.” Jintho whirled around, his chin raised. “We’re going very well. Expecting to be able to employ the first workers soon.”
“You didn’t sign that permit, did you?” Asitho turned to Enzo, who looked decidedly white in his face.
Jintho replied for him. “He didn’t, but we found a way around it. Hiron’s father signed, and we expect to be fully independent and able to support ourselves soon. This will be happening. Your daughter will be joining us.”
“No, she will not.”
“I’ll leave that up to her to decide.”
“How dare you talk to me like this after what you’ve done?” Asitho’s voice was an angry hiss.
Enzo stepped between them, raising his hands. “Please, everyone, let’s talk this over.”
“There is no talking over,” Asitho Bisumar said. “Except that a good-for-nothing artist destroys my daughter’s life, and my reputation.”
“You’re much more worried about your reputation than your daughter’s life. If you cared about her, you wouldn’t force her to marry my brother. Because she does not want to marry my brother, even though he fits your ideal of a nice young man. But the choice is not yours, and her life is not yours—”
Jintho had come forward and Enzo pushed him back. “Jintho, please leave it. Don’t do anything stupid.”
“He’s already done plenty of stupid things,” Asitho Bisumar cut in.
Enzo turned to Asitho again. “Please calm down, let me deal with him.”
“No, brother of mine,” Jintho said, “there won’t be any dealing, because this has got to stop. Don’t you see how he’s trying to ruin your life as well as mine and his daughter’s? What an insufferable arsehole he is?”
Asitho Bisumar stiffened. He took in a sharp breath through flaring nostrils. His face went white. He lifted his fist and pushed Enzo aside—
Ellisandra screamed, “No, Jintho, watch out!”
She jumped off the stairs and threw herself in front of her brother.
Asitho Bisumar’s eyes widened, but he could not deflect his momentum. His knuckles, adorned with rings, hit Ellisandra’s left cheekbone.
She screamed. Enzo yelled.
Pain exploded in her face. She reeled on her feet, seeing black spots in her vision. Someone held arms around her. Jintho, she thought.
There were running footsteps of people coming through the house.
Darma yelled, “Oh, mistress, you’re bleeding.”
Ellisandra brought her hands to her face. They came away covered in blood.
Jintho said, his voice cold, “How dare you hit my sister.”
Ellisandra straightened her back. Her head was pounding and she felt decidedly ill, but pushed Jintho aside. Blood trickled from her face down into her neck.
She met Asitho Bisumar’s eyes. She did not care what he could do to her. She no longer cared about reputation, his or hers, or about council rules or unspoken rules of behaviour.
“Get out of our house.” Her mouth hurt when she spoke and blood crept into the corner of her lips.
“I’m . . . I’m awfully sorry, lady. I . . . I didn’t mean to . . .” His face had gone pale.
“Get out of our house! Don’t ever dare set foot in here again.”
Enzo said, “Elli, be careful.”
“I’m done with being careful! Jintho, run, get your girl out of there.”
Jintho’s eyes went wide. Then he ran to the door. He didn’t put on his cloak, he didn’t change out of his house shoes. He didn’t even close the door behind him.
Asitho Bisumar ran after him, but it was clear he was no match for a young man, and halfway down the yard he must have realised this, and the fact that running didn’t look dignified, so he slowed down to a fast walk.
Ellisandra staggered a few paces, feeling dizzy. She wiped her cheek and her hand came away covered in blood.
Enzo put an arm around her shoulders. “Let us look after you, sister.”
He accompanied her to the living room, where Darma brought out a box of bandages which they used for Father, and proceeded to clear the cut on her cheekbone. Riana brought a chunk of ice wrapped in a cloth, which she pressed against the wound. Water ran down her face mixing with the blood that had already seeped into her collar.
“My dress is getting dirty,” Ellisandra protested weakly.
“Don’t worry about that, mistress.” Riana rummaged in her box and held a few bandages up for size and rummaged again.
Enzo sat by the hearth, fidgeting and letting out nervous sighs.
Ellisandra pushed away Darma’s hands. “Really, it’s only a cut. I don’t need all that stuff.”
“But this is going to be a bad bruise tomorrow, mistress.”
She was probably right about that. “I don’t care, Darma. You’ve done well. Go and put Father in bed for me, please.”
“Certainly, mistress.” Darma bowed and left the room, leaving behind a woolly silence.
Ellisandra waited for Enzo to speak, to offer his apology, but he didn’t, so she said, “There is no way you are marrying Sariandra. There is no way he will ever set foot in our house again, or that he’ll give you any kind of job—”
“Elli, you have no idea what’s going on.”
“Then enlighten me, and I want no more of this women-are-not-interested-in-politics nonsense.”
He nodded, once. “He’s got us by the throat. He’s got me, and he’s got Jintho. He’s got a lot more power than you think. He’ll probably fire you from the theatre for being incapacitated or some stupid thing.”
“Let him try. The performance is two days from now. We’re ready for it. Let him try to find other actors, or another committee and get this play performed to the standard that the council expects, or lose his face.”
“Do you really think any of the actors and the committee will be brave enough to walk out if he dismisses you?”
He had a point there. Sariandra would, but Tolaki wouldn’t, and Aleyo certainly wouldn’t. Keldon would like to, but he could ill-afford to lose his job, and Tameyo would be too frightened. But the rest? Probably not. Too many people had gotten into too much trouble for speaking out, or even for buying the wrong things.
Enzo sighed. “He has his claws in all of us. The whole council has its claws in us, especially those of us who still have power. They monitor us, they record what we say, they check what we spend money on.”
“The whole thing started because we’re a Foundation family, right?”
He nodded and stared at his hands.
“What have they promised you
in return for your vote in favour of abolishing the laws that give us the power to stop them?”
To be honest, she had never seen Enzo like this. She got off the chair and crawled over to his chair, looking up into his down-turned face. “Hey, Enzo. Courage, remember how Father used to tell us this? You remember when he took the library home when the council was going to discard it? He stood by his principle.”
“And suffered for it. He was never promoted into a position of influence in the council.”
And that was true.
“I’m afraid, Elli. Asitho Bisumar knows that he needs the support of the Foundation families to change the law. We’re the only ones left. He was going to offer me a high position in exchange for our support. A high position meant that I could carefully influence the high council. We’re young. Asitho Bisumar and Nemedor Satarin will retire or become too old to function in the High Council. That is when we can make things better. I can’t say no, and I can’t go back, because they’d do the same to us that they’ve done to every family they wanted to get rid of. And they do want to get rid of us. Or they want us to be in their immediate influence. I’d prefer to stay in Miran.”
“It’s like the nomad woman in the markets said and I’ve been thinking about since. Everyone is frightened into silence in this place. Father’s generation of people travelled to Kedras and Damarq. We’ve closed the borders and progress has passed us by. What are we doing, Enzo? We’re the younger generation. It’s up to us to kick Miran back into life. To stop this decline into fear.”
“It’s easy for you to say.”
“Why? Because I’m a girl and I have no influence anyway?”
“No, because no one has influence over you.”
“Is that how you see it?”
“Yes, because if you want to do something, I have to sign. I will because even if you don’t believe I do, I love you. If I want to do something, other people hold power over what I can do.”
“Then stop letting them have that power.”
“Can’t, Elli. Can’t. If I do, I’ll lose all my friends. I need their support.”
Somehow, she didn’t have much confidence if Raedon Tussamar was going to be one of those friends. “Wouldn’t the solution be not to give up our position as Foundation family? When the changes of the law are being voted in, we vote against. Do we still have the right of veto?”
He shook his head. “Only for those in possession of the Foundation stones. Anyway, if we voted against, they’d kill us or drive us out.”
He let a long silence lapse. The fire popped and crackled in the hearth. The wind whistled past the window. There would be snow again overnight.
It didn’t look like he would say any more, so she rose, stiff-legged, from her uncomfortable position on the floor. “I’m going to get something to eat.” She reeled. Ouch, her head.
He said nothing.
Ellisandra walked to the door.
“Elli.”
She turned.
“I know you’ve been wondering about this: go to Father’s room. Open the window. You’ll find it on the outside windowsill.”
What the hell was he talking about?
“The thing that Father was so upset about a little while back. Don’t tell anyone that I told you, all right? You found it because Father wanted the window opened.”
Father, of course, was already asleep. Ellisandra went to her room, found the emergency light, went downstairs, got her cloak and crept into Father’s room. It was pitch dark with the curtains drawn, and she bumped into a chair. Father was a deep sleeper and his hearing was not what it used to be, and he didn’t wake up. She pushed aside the curtains and put the emergency light on the windowsill where it spread an eerie white glow. As quietly as she could, she lifted the latch on the window. A flurry of snowflakes drifted in. Great. More snow. And damn, it was cold. Using her bare hands, she scooped freshly-fallen snow off the windowsill and found that in the far corner, some impressive icicles hung from the sill. In this spot, her icy fingers met a spot of warmth, where the snow had melted. On the very edge of the sill sat a little device. Ellisandra yanked at it, and the glue that had been used to attach it came loose. The little object felt warm and metallic in her hands.
She quickly shut the window, put the light in her pocket and retreated behind the curtains in the darkness of the room, where her breathing sounded loud in comparison with Father’s soft snores. Ouch, her hands stung from the cold. Her head pounded. She tiptoed back across the room, found the door and went back into the corridor. By the orange glow of the oil lamp against the wall at the end of the corridor, she could see that the object was a box with a little microphone at the top.
21
SO THAT WAS the state of affairs. Asitho Bisumar had placed a spying device on the windowsill not to spy on the house next door, but to eavesdrop on Father’s conversations.
What did they think they could learn from a forgetful old man?
Nothing from him, Ellisandra realised, but they could learn from what she said to him about the theatre, about the council’s choice of play, about the other people in the committee, heck, even about the council.
What should she do about it?
Tell someone?
If she went to the guards, they’d report it to the council.
If she went into a council sitting . . . who knew what would happen. Most of the council were Endri heads of families in support of the current High Council. A third of the council were Nikala who probably couldn’t care less about Endri spying on Endri, or just didn’t care about Endri full stop. They cared about their businesses and any upset in the status quo damaged their sales and any favours they had won from people higher up the decision-making slope.
And she was only alone, only a woman, and was likely to be dismissed by the major heads of families as deranged. They would have to deny her allegations, lest the same thing happen to them, because to fall out of favour was their worst fear.
They feared the truth.
They feared the High Council.
They feared each other.
She put the device on the little table next to her bed. Of course she made sure that she’d taken out the tiny little energy pearl inside and blocked the microphone of the thing with a piece of tape just to make sure.
She crept under the blankets and lay there looking at it. She had no illusion that she would fall asleep. Her heart was racing, her mind was racing, and now that the shock of what had happened was worn off, her face hurt like hell. But most of all, she hurt inside. She worried about Jintho, because he hadn’t come back home yet. Maybe Asitho Bisumar had hired thugs to look for him. She worried about Sariandra, who would be scared. In her condition, she should not be sleeping on the hard ground in cold cellars. She should not be running from men hired by her father to bring her back. She wished there was a way to contact him. If the High Council hadn’t been stupid and backward for so many years, then there would be a local network . . . actually, there was Sariandra’s device, which she would probably not have taken with her.
And there was Vayra’s machine.
Ellisandra might have slept briefly, but it wasn’t long before she jolted awake with a shock. Between the curtains, the sky was starting to go blue. She sat up, and almost yelped with the pain. Her head throbbed. She raised her hand to her cheekbone. Her fingers met warm and swollen skin. The edges of the cut felt rough and tender.
She stumbled out of bed and checked in the mirror. One half of her face was swollen. Her eyelid had gone puffy and burst blood vessels in outer corner of her left eye socket made for a momentous black eye, with areas of blue, red and purple spreading down her cheekbone.
Very pretty.
She dressed herself and went downstairs. Riana’s eyes widened at the sight of Ellisandra’s face.
“Oh my, mistress, you look terrible. Does it hurt?”
“Only when I smile. But I shall not be doing too much of that today.”
“You’re not going to w
ork like this, are you mistress?”
“I sure am. Jintho come back yet?”
“No, but a young man brought a message from him.” She handed Ellisandra a folded-up note.
Ellisandra unfolded it and read. Safe. Will probably not see you for a few days. Sariandra will come to work if possible. Don’t try to look for me.
Well, that was something at least.
Eating soup hurt, and she didn’t even try the bread. Riana protested, but she left the house not much later, with her head throbbing dully, but with plenty of determination.
First, she went to the markets and looked at the stalls for baby clothing. She chose a little jerkin, a romper suit with feet attached, a tiny hat and fur-lined booties. They were so cute, she couldn’t stop smiling. But smiling hurt her face. Ouch.
She gave them to the merchant. “Put them in a nice box. It’s a present.”
The merchant gave her a strange look. “You don’t look too good yourself, lady.”
“No. Asitho Bisumar hit me.”
His eyes widened.
“I was trying to protect my brother, because he’s been blackmailing both my brothers. Do you know that the council intends to abolish all the powers held by Foundation families?”
The man was too stunned to reply.
Ellisandra went to a few other stalls. She bought a cake for the theatre people, a bottle of pills for the pain and a handful of pens, which she really didn’t need. Everywhere she told people her story, whether they asked or not.
A fairly large group of people followed her around, mainly out of curiosity.
Eventually, some people started making comments, always carefully looking around, probably for guards or anyone they didn’t know and found suspect.
I’ve heard rumours about how he used to hit his first wife.
He probably hits his second wife, too.
I always thought there was something odd about him.
We should write a formal complaint to Nemedor Satarin.
“Do you think he doesn’t know?” she said to the maker of that last comment.
The man looked taken aback. Others raised their eyebrows.
