The Spirit Lens

by Carol Berg

  Shielding the chevalier’s head, I slid my arm under his shoulder on the side opposite his injuries. “What’s happened to you, mage?” I said. “Since when is Ilario the enemy?”

  “He burst in here, threatening murder and issuing orders. I’ll not have it, no matter who he is.”

  “Did Madeleine de Cazar threaten you?”

  “Creeping aristos who dabble with secrets and sorcery break themselves.” Much as he had opined at Montclair.

  But the lady’s sudden collapse violated every expectation . . . and Dante had made a point of touching her. And of all men, I knew that he could influence the minds of others. God’s hand, he had done it.

  I helped Ilario to his feet. Expecting the cursed hornbeam to land on my own back, I guided him into the passage. Though no hand touched it, the door slammed behind us.

  Ilario cradled his left arm and gritted his teeth as I half carried him away. The moment we arrived at his apartments, I dispatched a gaping John Deune to fetch the chevalier’s physician. “What were you thinking?” I said as soon as I had him on his couch, pillows supporting his arm. His complexion was the color of alabaster.

  “Devil drove the woman mad,” he spat through clenched teeth. “Jacard saw him work the magic. Couldn’t leave it go without a word.”

  “But you knew you wouldn’t draw a sword on him, either.”

  “Never thought he’d—” He tried to shrug, a disastrous move.

  When he had finished puking up his last meal and lay wasted and trembling on his couch, he summoned a wobbling grin. “Could’ve. Could’ve taken him. Easy. Some of us have to live on could’ves.”

  The physician came and went, leaving Ilario trussed in plaster and linen. I shooed away John Deune with a promise to see the chevalier imbibed the prescribed poppy extract.

  Despite a posture rigid with pain, Ilario made it clear he would do no such thing. “Can’t,” he said. “Might blab something I oughtn’t.”

  The consequences of his chosen life seemed worse by the moment. “Can I fetch anything to help you sleep?”

  “Stay till I’m snoring,” he mumbled. “Might be tempted to throw myself off the balcony if I heave again.”

  For the next hour, I recounted the events of the trial and its aftermath. “I’d a mind to drop in on Dante after speaking to you,” I said when I’d gotten through most of it. “Thought to inquire if it was my blood he used that night.”

  “Dante’s gone rogue, Portier. He’s more dangerous than the Aspirant or Gaetana or Orviene or any of them. Geni says not to bother my head, that she has ‘an understanding’ with him. But Madeleine’s been in that courtyard seven days. Refuses to go inside. Refuses to change her garments. Sleeps where she drops. They try to coax her out of the sun, but it’s all they can do to get her to eat or drink. Curdled my blood. And my good sense, obviously.”

  “I’ve been unconscionably blind,” I said. “He has such a unique and marvelous vision of the natural world. I’ve never met a man whose passion burned so singular . . . and so bright. After Eltevire, I was certain we’d come to the beginnings of true friendship. But he was so angry when he found out I’d written that letter to the Camarilla. . . .”

  “You’re more a mush-headed idiot than my sister. Risking your lives for Maura against all evidence. Neither of you willing to condemn this villain mage. At least Geni doesn’t claim to like him.” He shifted uncomfortably, and I stuffed a silk cushion under his rapidly bruising left side. “You did not cause this, Portier. The Camarilla might have scared Dante a bit. Any sane man would get over it. And she’s no friend of mine, but Michel de Vernase’s wife is no weak-minded ninny. No strain or questioning broke her.”

  “I know it,” I said. The admission wrenched my spirit. To imagine I’d allowed such talent as Dante’s to plunge into an abyss of wickedness pained me more deeply than I could speak. But the escalating violence, breaking a woman’s mind, coldly and deliberately brutalizing a man who posed no threat to him . . . Such acts demonstrated a ruthless intent far beyond playacting—beyond healthy anger. Beyond humanity. Not even I could excuse him any longer.

  “Indeed, I’ve been the world’s greatest fool,” I said, wishing I dared down his neglected poppy extract and sleep for a year. “So tell me reasons. Why harm the contessa if he thinks to join Michel’s depleted band? Naught in her answers hinted at complicity in anything criminal.”

  Ilario raised his brows in disbelief. “You really must learn more of the wicked world, Portier. What does one do to announce one’s arrival in a new milieu? You demonstrate your power to the elite in a small, but very important way. Force them to take note of you. If the one whose attention you crave is a villain, then you demonstrate your power in villainous ways. If the elite decide you are a valuable addition to their circle, they invite you inside.”

  This is exactly what I had set Dante to do, only we had purged the palace of its villains. But perhaps that was not the circle he aspired to. “That cannot explain this particular villainy,” I said, feeling the sealed testimony of the day begin to rip open. “This will not endear him to Michel. If Michel wanted her silenced, he could have done it any day this past year.”

  Ilario drained his cup of wine and passed it to me to refill. “Ah, you see, Dante’s act will only gain attention if Michel is a part of the circle he wishes to join. Its nature just tells us that Michel is not the sole part of it.”

  My conclusion followed immediately. “And not the most powerful part.”

  “He’s made a bid to join them, Portier.”

  I returned to my apartments profoundly troubled. I could not disagree with either Ilario’s premises or his conclusions, so clear and obvious when I looked back at the days since Eltevire. Why had I held such fierce certainty in Dante’s character? I must be the world’s purest idiot. Recalling the mage’s pitiless face as he splintered Ilario’s bones shook my very soul. What could drive a man to such a reversal of character?

  Loyalty and causes, no matter how noble, meant nothing to Dante. His mutilated hand testified of pain as wretchedly familiar. For a man of his talents and will, I doubted any physical danger could coerce. And certainly no personal ties could be used to force him to some behavior unwillingly. Family was anathema, and he recognized no friends. Which left desire.

  What Dante loved and desired was magic. He had been willing to sacrifice his physical well-being to delve deeper into sorcery. Had something he’d seen or heard in the Bastionne convinced him he would learn more on this divergent course? Certainly scruple would not restrain him in its learning or its use. What Sabria had seen on the night of the Exposition had likely been but the first hints of his delving.

  Father Creator. I had brought him here. I was responsible for whatever he wrought.

  But so was one decision made, at least. I sat down and penned an answer to my cousin.

  My gracious lord:

  You have honored me as kinsman and servant, in no wise more than by today’s most generous offer. Your trust humbles and gratifies me. Forgive me, sire, but I cannot accept the position. My search for honorable service necessitates a different path. In concern for my fellow agentes confide, I would ask that no tale of this investigation—a nd no defense of me— be released beyond what is already public. My deeds and prayers ever seek your welfare and that of our beloved Sabria.

  Your kinsman,

  Portier de Savin- Duplais

  ON THE TENTH DAY AFTER his queen’s release from Spindle Prison, Philippe de Savin-Journia returned to his Presence Chamber to conduct his public business and welcome a troupe of traveling players who would present a masque in celebration of his birthday. To the surprise of his courtiers and the pleasure of the king—and all gossips—Queen Eugenie graced the audience with her presence. Her pale rose gown trailed behind her like shredded clouds as she made her obeisance.

  I had never seen such a genuine smile on my cousin’s face as when he raised her up. Open, illuminating, transforming, that smile explained a great
deal about Philippe’s soldiers’ and subjects’ affection for him.

  The king led Eugenie to her chair across the dais and one step lower than his own. She whispered in his ear. He kissed her hand. The chamber rang with cheers and joyous applause.

  I stood in the mass of courtiers along one side of the Presence Chamber observing this happy evidence of reconciliation. Gossips would note that Queen Eugenie’s household had taken on a new shape this day. Certainly Lady Antonia was there, as always, her browless eyes scrutinizing the assembly. Ilario stood close, as well, in a rakish, feathered hat and his most outlandish doublet of yellow brocade, skirted to his knees and rife with silver beadwork that rivaled Eugenie’s gown in elaboration. Bands of beaded silk strapped his shoulder and arm, broken in a riding accident, so rumor had it. The colorful crowd of acolytes and adepts was reduced to a pale, subdued Jacard and the queen’s new First Counselor, the gaunt, dark-browed mage at her right hand. Gaetana’s and Orviene’s place was now Dante’s alone.

  Retaining him made sense. Naught had happened to change Eugenie’s desire to feel her mother’s hand and ensure the happiness of her dead children. The dread I had carried since the Exposition, reinforced at the sight of Madeleine de Cazar’s madness, settled deeper in my belly.

  “It is our delight that our queen joins us today in the business of the realm,” said the king, now returned to his chair in front of the great planetary. “Before we welcome these visiting players, she wishes to announce an appointment. My lady . . .”

  “It is my pleasure to name the new administrator for my household,” said a beaming Eugenie, ignoring the chill that spread like hoarfrost from her First Counselor’s grim countenance. Strong and determined, her voice carried all the way to the back of the Presence Chamber. “Someone to bring order to my frivolous life and see to the comfort of my dear ladies and valued counselors. A gentleman of quiet demeanor and superior skills—and excellent family connections.”

  Suppressing a sigh as I noted the hard twitch of Philippe’s brow, and a shudder as Dante’s gaze speared me with green fire, I made my way forward to kneel at my gracious lady’s feet.

  EPILOGUE

  MIDSUMMER

  The Midsummer Fete was quiet this year. All celebrations pale after the Grand Exposition, a mere six months ago, and the public notice of Michel de Vernase’s trial and conviction. The traitor is not yet found; nor, thank all benevolent angels, is Maura.

  My work in the queen’s household is satisfying, and I am fading into bureaucratic anonymity—as I intend. But I am free of business for the evening and so wander into the Great Hall and Rotunda for my nightly visit, a habit I took up on the night I finally admitted Dante had turned. It is here I’ve found confirming evidence of my fears.

  Until Ilario’s Grand Exposition, and excepting the occasional coronation or royal wedding, the Rotunda and Great Hall had stood quiet and empty for more than three centuries. No longer.

  Sitting on a bench placed for viewing the great pendulum, I watch wisps of light dance over my head. The glimmers are not sunbeams, for the sun failed more than an hour since. Nor are they some reflection of the passage lamps kept lit for the pendulum engineer and guards making rounds. Those lamps are few and hooded so that their weak, steady light falls on the floor.

  No, these floating threads of blue, purple, and green can be seen everywhere in the Great Hall and Rotunda, though chiefly in the dome, occasionally illuminating a saintly hand or angel wing or dark-rimmed eye. Staring will not capture them, as they manifest themselves just as the eye gives in and blinks.

  The whispers are just as elusive. I’m not sure anyone else has heard them, though every palace conversation since Prince Desmond’s deathday speaks of palace hauntings. No one comes here alone anymore except for me, and even a companion’s breathing would drown them out. But after so many nights, I know they are getting louder. I dread the day I’ll be able to distinguish words.

  What disturbs me more is the smell: cedar and juniper, dry grass and old leaves, touched with moisture and laced with a faint tinge of rot. I cannot find a source for it save in my memories of Eltevire and dying.

  Dante has caused this.

  One evening as I sat here, sensing these changes, watching the lights dance in the vault and spread into the Great Hall, I recalled something he had said just after the Exposition: “I’ve always considered lenses more fascinating than prisms.”

  And so I considered lenses. Which led me to think of spyglasses. And of spectres and of perimeters that might identify those who crossed. But magical perimeters could also serve as an enclosure for spellwork—a great circumoccule—a boundary. And if magic rose from every aspect of nature and not solely from the blood of a practitioner, then how much power could be derived from the keirna of seven hundred onlookers opening themselves to magic in a temple that had witnessed a thousand years of the human and divine?

  Thus I began to think of the Rotunda as a great lens, and all of us who’d sat here on that night as peering through to see . . . what? Splinters fractured from the world we knew, as the rainbow colors of the Royal Astronomers were fractured from white light? Or had we been given a view into another place altogether?

  These ruminations but affirm my decision to remain at Castelle Escalon and discover the truth. To keep watch on the one who made this happen. In the queen’s service I can stand close by her mage. And if Dante and his allies are lulled into believing my uncomfortable service to the king finished, all the better. No matter that my inerrant perception of righteousness is flawed, I see now what I am. I believe I am destined . . . meant . . . to stand against those who seek chaos. Against him.

  Reaching into my boot, I pull out a heavy disk of silver and flip it high overhead. The coin catches the light of the lamp as it spins, twirling, glinting, displaying its two faces. For the span of a few heartbeats it hangs in the air, then drifts slowly to the floor.

  Saints watch and guard us all.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Carol Berg is a former software engineer with degrees in mathematics from Rice University and computer science from the University of Colorado. Since her 2000 debut, her epic fantasy novels have won multiple Colorado Book Awards, the Geffen Award, the Prism Award, and the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult Literature. Carol lives in the foot-hills of the Colorado Rockies with her Exceptional Spouse, and on the Web at www.carolberg.com.