by Megan Hart
She was not alone. A figure stood in the shadows of the far corner. She didn’t need to see his face to know him. She still hadn’t learned his name.
He stayed as still and silent as she had in the chapel, not a sway or mutter to betray him. Perhaps he wasn’t praying, she thought, but as her eyes adjusted to the dim light the stiff set of his shoulders told her she might be wrong in that assumption. He was certainly concentrating fiercely enough not to have noticed her, she was fair certain of that, for not a hair twitched her way. And his eyes were closed, she could see that now by the deeper pools of darkness in his face. If he’d been looking at her, surely his eyes would have caught the light.
The common rise and fall of voices inside the chapel changed as she watched the man from the forest do nothing. The service was over. Annalise backed out of the alcove, her sleeve scraping the bricks as she did. She caught a flash of motion from his corner just as she joined the crowd spilling from the main chapel doors.
In less than a breath she was caught up in the throng, again one among many. When the man appeared in the doorway, his dark eyes searching the crowd, Annalise knew there was no way he could know she’d been the one spying on him. Yet when his gaze caught hers from across the hall, just as she was jostled and tugged along toward the dining hall by an exuberantly chatting Tansy, Annalise could tell he knew she’d been the one.
He had looked into the crowd and plucked her face from all the others as easily as he might have tugged an apple from a tree.
Chapter 7
Silence was Sinder’s Blessing and for the moment, Cassian had it in abundance. He needed it. After the incident at morning services he’d found himself sorely incapable of suffering giggles and frothy questions designed to prick at him. He’d assigned his class a lesson too difficult for them, apurpose to keep them from plaguing him, and watching the ten or so sleek heads bent over their texts, Cassian had no regrets he’d set such a hard task.
Classes in the Motherhouse didn’t run on a yearly cycle the way traditional schools did, just as he wasn’t a teacher in the traditional sense. None of the instructors here were—they were all members of the Order, or in Cassian’s case, a member of the priesthood, whose skills and temperaments had provided them capacity to instruct others. As novitiates entered and were tested, they were placed in groups according to their skill levels. As they became more proficient, they moved to different groups where they could be further challenged, or if they were not yet assigned a patron, they became instructors themselves.
Cassian had been teaching the Faith for near ten years. In a school he’d likely have been given a brass pocket watch by now in recognition of his service, but here in the Order where service itself was considered the reward, he’d merely gained a reputation.
Not undeserved, he knew, as a particularly timid novitiate looked up from her text with a yawn and closed her mouth on a squeak when she saw him watching. Yet Cassian would have challenged even one of the women he’d tutored to show proof of his temper. He knew what they whispered about him. What was said of his fury, and what had happened to novitiates in the past who’d overstepped him. But not a one of them had ever witnessed him so much as raising his voice, much less destroying furniture in a rage, or striking a wall so fiercely he put a hole through the plaster. He knew what they said about him, but he never denied it.
He liked being able to quiet a room with no more than a lifted brow or downturned corner of lip. Obedience and submission pleased him greatly. There was a reason he’d found a place here amongst the Sisters-in-Service . . . and there was a reason they allowed him to stay.
“Please, sir, if I might ask . . . ?” The timid girl, Wandalette, cleared her throat.
Cassian, leaning back in his chair with his feet propped upon the desk, flicked a fingertip at her by way of answer.
“I would like to know why the stories diverged? Why is there more than one version of the Book? Do the priests not know which is the true word of Sinder?” Again, she cleared her throat. “I mean, sir, why is the story the same until the end?”
“Yes, sir, I’d like to know that as well,” piped up another of the newer novitiates. Perdita, he thought her name was. “My grand-mother always told me the tale of how Kedalya was set upon in the forest by wolves in the form of men. They took Her virtue, and left Her for dead.”
“And when Sinder found Her so sullied,” Wandalette said, “He blamed Her for the attack and took their son away.”
“But this text here,” Perdita pointed out, “says that Kedalya betrayed Sinder of Her own accord, and the commentary states that it was the Invisible Mother’s fault the Holy Family split up. Which is the truth, sir?”
Perhaps the lesson had not been too difficult for them to understand, after all. Cassian let his boots thump to the floor and leaned over the desk. “The version I gave you is the correct text.”
Wandalette and Perdita exchanged glances. Perdita shrugged and bent back to her book. Her fingers smudged with ink, she carefully copied a passage into her small parchment booklet, the one that would attend her during her entire time of service to the Order. Wandalette did not copy the passage, but sat back at her desk and thoughtfully flipped through the pages of the text.
Cassian waited for another challenge from her, but she seemed sated by his answer, and he allowed the silence and heat of the room to lull him into a near doze. He’d slept unwell the night before, dreams of old plaguing him for reasons he wished not to explore. Now with the soft scratch of pens on paper and the occasional low sigh, he let his eyes drift shut.
“Your mercy,” said a voice he hadn’t known long enough to be so familiar. “I was told to report here for . . . instruction.”
Again his boots thumped to the floor, this time hard enough to rattle the inkpot upon his desk.
Annalise tilted her head, a smile in her eyes but not yet upon her lips. “Your mercy, sir. Perhaps my greeting was . . . unseemly?”
Ten pairs of eyes flickered back and forth between their instructor and this stranger. Annalise was easily six years older than the oldest of them—a woman grown, and well aware of it, too. She was out of place in this group, who’d been placed together mostly because of their youth and inexperience.
Unless, of course, it had been determined she knew too little of the Book to be placed with any other group.
“We meet only until the next chime,” Cassian said. “There’s scarce enough time for you to attend today’s lesson.”
“I don’t mind.” She smoothed her skirts as she took an empty seat at the back of the room. She folded her hands atop it and fixed him with a steady gaze. “It’s been a good long time since I was in class. I think I should seek to gain as much from the experience as possible. Don’t you?”
Ten mouths gaped. Cassian shifted in his chair and linked his fingers together as he stared at her. She’d been in the alcove this morn, he was fair certain of that. Watching him. But to what purpose? More importantly, to what impression?
“You’ll need a text to read. And something to write in and write with.”
“Such as this?” She reached into her pocket and pulled forth a leather-bound book the size of her palm, along with a pen carrier of folded felt. “They gave me this already.”
Their eyes locked. Her smile had faded even from her eyes, and she met his gaze with naught but seriousness. Her look did its best to unmake him, and Cassian did not like this. Not at all.
None of the novitiates were required to share texts, as they might have done in a school. The Order used its funds wisely for provisions. Cassian had a stack of books ready for dispersal in the storage closet.
“Wait,” he said and returned in a few moments with a text for her. “Today we’re studying the final four chapters.”
Before he even had the chance to sit back at his desk, Annalise had flipped through the pages and looked up at him, her brow furrowed. “This book is unacceptable.”
Nobody said a word, but the sound of their shock
nevertheless echoed throughout the room. Cassian himself swallowed a grunt of surprise at Annalise’s calm tone. He turned.
“Is it?”
She held it out to him. “The binding has cracked, the pages are bent. Should not a copy of the Book, even one meant for regular study and not holy translation, be kept in better condition? I thought texts in condition such as this were burned.”
He took the text from her. She was right, though not a single other woman in the room would’ve known it. He set the book aside and looked ’round the room at the other novitiates, none of whom were daring to look back. When his gaze settled upon Annalise, she smiled.
“Or so I recall being taught by the priests at home.”
In silence, Cassian went to the storage closet and brought forth another text. He set it in front of her and, this time, didn’t turn away. He watched her look through it. When she looked up at him, those pale-ice eyes jabbed him someplace deep inside.
“Your mercy, sir,” she said quietly. “But this text is in no good condition, either.”
“Perhaps,” he said tightly, “it would benefit you to choose the text for yourself.”
She rose smoothly. “Perhaps it would.”
He could not feel her breath against his back as she followed him, but he imagined he did. He imagined, too, the weight of ten gazes following them. He did not imagine the low hum of conversation that began the moment he and Annalise entered the closet.
Lined on both sides with shelves stacked high with texts, translations, and commentaries, the only light coming from a narrow window at the far end of the room. A low desk had been pushed against the wall there, with a single, straight-backed chair. Nobody ever sat there in study, but it had been that way when he’d inherited the room and he’d never changed it.
There was plenty of room between them, so much not even the hem of her skirt needed to brush his boots as she turned to look at the shelves. They weren’t touching, but he felt her. More so when he looked away and knew she’d cast her gaze upon him.
“You choose,” he said hoarsely.
“Many of these texts look unkempt,” she said. “I’m sure their wear is from their use in study—”
“Of course it is,” he bit out. “Think you I’d have them ruined for sport?”
“Your mercy,” Annalise said, though he doubted she meant the words as sincerely as they sounded. “I meant only that constant use would make it difficult for anyone to have attempted their upkeep.”
Though he ought to have done, was the unspoken but understood end of her sentence. And again, she was right. The books they used here weren’t sacred by any means, but they were copies of the sacred texts, of the Book itself, and though they’d not been anointed, they were due respect nonetheless.
Moreover, it was his duty to do so, and he’d ignored it for a long time. Not because he hadn’t been aware of the task, but because nobody else had ever seemed to know, and because he simply hadn’t cared. Now he looked at her. She didn’t shrink from him.
“You might choose your own copy,” he told her. “And set those aside you deem . . . unacceptable.”
Her mouth looked soft, especially when she smiled. “You would trust my judgment?”
“It would seem you know enough for that to be sensible.”
She shifted, titled her head, cast a look up at him from lash-shaded eyes. She was flirting with him. The sight of it set him back a step, against the shelf where the sharp edge of a book dug between his shoulder blades.
“By calling me ‘sensible,’ sir, you prove you don’t know me overwell.”
“I don’t know you at all.”
One sleek brow lifted. “Yet of all the people I’ve met here at the Order, you seem to be the one with whom I’ve had the most interaction.”
“That will change.”
“Will it?” She studied the stacks of texts and ran a finger down their spines, then met his gaze again. “Now that I find myself compelled to attend your tutelage, sir, I believe we will but spend all the more time with one another.”
“You will have other instruction,” Cassian said. “And I, many other students.”
At this, her eyes narrowed. “Indeed.”
She gave him her back and made as though to choose a text. Cassian, released from the snare of her pale eyes, relaxed. He knew, now, how to keep her at a distance from him.
She would not ever be the same as all the others, but he must make her believe he thought her so.
For a fortnight, Annalise did as she was told. Go here, sit there, eat now, and sleep then. It was easier than she’d expected, to bend to the instruction of others. To obey.
Not that the Mothers or Sisters-in-Service ruled the Order with fists of rock. Not at all. Unlike many of the other religious orders or guilds, the Order of Solace didn’t indenture its novitiates. Though a few, such as Tansy, had families who contributed to their keep, the Order ran solely on the proceeds of the fees it charged patrons for the service of its Handmaidens. Sisters who wished to leave were free to do so at any time, and return if it so suited them. Novitiates not yet entered into the Order were required to attend appropriate instruction and work toward the time when the Mothers above them determined them ready to Serve—but Annalise could discover no time limit as to how long this could take.
“How do the Mothers-in-Service decide when a novitiate is ready to become a Sister? And how long past that time does she take a patron?” Annalise asked the question into darkness from her narrow bed, with Tansy across the room and the third bed yet empty between them.
“The Mothers know best.” Tansy didn’t sound sleepy, though the tenchime had just sounded and the fivechime would wake them even before the sun. “They always do.”
“But how do they know?”
Tansy shuffled in her blankets before answering. “I don’t know how, Annalise. They just do. It’s their purpose to know, as it will be ours to serve when they decide we are ready.”
“Purpose and place.” Annalise mouthed the words she’d heard so often since her arrival. “And pleasure. But what of the pleasure, Tansy? I’ve yet heard little of that part of it.”
“Do you not gain pleasure from the learning? Each new skill I master brings me great pleasure!”
That wasn’t what Annalise had meant. She shifted, too, down deep into her covers. “I speak of a different sort of pleasure. The sort that nobody has yet spoken of to me, yet I know must exist within service to a patron.”
“Oh.” Tansy cleared her throat, then giggled. “You mean the pleasure between a man and a woman?”
“Between two people, yes.” Annalise thought of Jacquin and his penchant for the company of his own gender. “Handmaidens are always female, but they’re not always assigned to men.”
Tansy drew in a sharp breath. “We are assigned to patrons to whom we would be best suited.”
Amused, Annalise turned her head on the pillow to look at the dim shape across the room. “And for you that would always be a male?”
“Well, yes,” Tansy replied hesitantly. “I do believe so. I’m fair certain the Mothers wouldn’t give me to a woman who expected . . . that.”
“Lovemaking?” Annalise asked, just to make her roommate blush, even if she couldn’t see the pinking cheeks.
“Oh, Annalise!”
“What? Surely you know there are those who do so prefer the company of their own sex. And though nobody’s said as much to me since my arrival, I also know it’s a Handmaiden’s duty to provide solace to her patron in any way necessary, and I know that often includes . . . intimacies. Everyone knows that.”
“And many believe that’s all a Handmaiden does,” Tansy retorted.
Annalise herself had heard the tales and was therefore much astonished at how long she’d been in the Order without anyone instructing her on the etiquette of orgies. She laughed at the sound of Tansy’s outrage. “And yet I daresay to those who matter, those who have actually sought the company of a Handmaiden, such stor
ies are of no import. Anyone who is granted the service of a Handmaiden has been well-instructed in her function, yes?”
It had been one of the first things they’d discussed, the lengthy process by which patrons were assigned their Handmaidens. Mother Complacence had spent the better part of two chimes with the group of young women gathered in her classroom, Annalise the newest among them, but the others there no more than a week ahead of her. Mother Complacence had shown them the files every patron was required to complete, including full medical, financial, and personal histories. Thick binders of information that would take hours, if not days, to complete.
And yet nothing comparable was kept for the Sisters-in-Service, nothing concrete that could be used to match them to a patron.
“How do they do it?” Annalise asked again, more for her own musings than from hope of getting an answer from Tansy. “How do they know how best to match them?”
“Perhaps when I am a Mother-in-Service, I might tell you.” Tansy sounded a little breathless, though still not sleepy.
Annalise yawned. “Seek you that honor?”
“The Mothers are well-loved and well-respected. Why wouldn’t anyone wish to become one?”
“Mothers-in-Service no longer serve patrons, that’s all. I’d imagine you’d wish to perform the function for which you so long trained. Especially when it does seem to take such a long time. Longer than I’d expected.” Not that she minded. The longer it took for her to be considered patron-ready, the better, in Annalise’s opinion, as she had never intended to actually enter service.
“I hadn’t thought of that. Why are you so wise, Annalise, when I am not half so bright and yet have been here for so much longer?” Tansy sounded sad.
“You said yourself, they know best. I’m sure your time is coming, Tansy. You’ve accomplished much, have you not?”
“Oh, yes. Of course. But I’ve not yet been taken for my final testing before being granted the title of Sister. I fear . . . I sometimes think . . .”
Annalise waited, but Tansy had shut up tight, and sometimes it was better not to pry. If Annalise pressed her, Tansy might confide her deepest griefs, and then Annalise would be expected to do the same. Or at the least, comfort the other girl, and Annalise felt in no position to offer such a service.
