by Zen Cho
Sir Stephen had hovered at Zacharias’s shoulder, muttering imprecations, but he was soon absorbed in the work despite himself. The task of devising a suitable syllabus was too interesting for him to refrain from commenting, however doubtful he might feel of its utility.
“I cannot think necromancy a suitable subject for girls,” said Zacharias.
“This is what comes of being acquainted only with missish London females,” said Sir Stephen, who had, not an hour ago, been inveighing against teaching women any magic, for fear it should be too much for them. “Childbirth is no very delicate process, and it is women who lay out the dead, so pray include the study of necromancy, and let us have no more argument. If you insist on instructing females it must be a comprehensive education, and no magical education can be complete without imparting a proper understanding of the darker arts.”
“I wonder whether necromancy ought not to be followed by the study of household magics,” said Zacharias musingly. “That might serve as a capital counterbalance to spirit-speaking.”
“I thought you wished to train serious practitioners,” exclaimed Sir Stephen. “If your desire is to turn out a phalanx of magical cooks, there is no need for reform. Your magical females can apprentice themselves to any village witch or wise woman—there are scores of the creatures, however hard the Society may try to pretend they do not exist. But I cannot see that their lore has any earthly relevance to a thaumaturgical education.”
“Why, as to that, the low magics may produce spells as intricate and exacting as anything by the name of thaumaturgy,” said Zacharias. “One witch, a Mrs. Hudson, showed me a spell which ensured her cooking never burnt, the principle of which was as philosophical as any thaumaturge could wish. The spell bound together time and the ideal, compelling both to meet at the desired point. An ingenious receipt, one she learnt at her grandmother’s knee. I took a copy of it.”
He rose to look for the receipt among his journals, but it was not among the books he had spread out upon the table and floor. Zacharias reached for his luggage, which sat in a dark corner of the coffee-room, but as he did so he stumbled over an obstacle he had not perceived before.
“Pray do not step on my case,” said a small, clear voice.
Zacharias realised three things:
Sir Stephen had vanished.
At his feet was a worn old valise, which was not his.
On the floor sat a young woman. She rose, moving stiffly, as if she had been sitting for a considerable time.
The room, lit by the dwindling fire in the grate, was full of soft dark shadows, and the lamp on Zacharias’s desk threw only a small circle of light. But his visitor had not relied upon the dimness of the room to conceal her presence. She still wore the rags of an invisibility enchantment, that Zacharias had torn by treading upon it.
It was a cleverly worked spell, surprisingly original in design, but it would not have so practised upon Zacharias’s senses if he had not been tired and taken up with his thoughts. He had not expected to see anything other than shadows in the corners of the room, and so he had seen no more.
Even so, he was horrified at his lapse. He gazed openmouthed at the young woman, and this was when Zacharias arrived at a fourth realisation: it was Miss Gentleman, whom he had seen that morning fending off hexes.
“Now you have seen me, please may I sleep on the chaise longue?” she said. She seemed perfectly collected, as though it were an everyday matter to her to intrude upon the most prominent magician of his generation. “It is late, and I should like to rest for the journey tomorrow.”
Zacharias was so perplexed by the situation that he let this pass without comment. “How did you contrive to enter this room?”
“I turned left before the stairs, and opened the second door,” said Prunella. “The maid’s directions were clear enough, and there are not so many rooms that one is easily lost.”
It briefly occurred to Zacharias to wonder whether the young woman was speaking a foreign language, and he had simply failed to notice it. He did not seem to be following her meaning at all.
“There must be some mistake,” he said. “How did you persuade the landlord to let you in?”
“Oh, that was no trouble at all,” said Prunella. “The Headeys have a new maid, who does not know the village. I told her I was a courtier from Fairyland disguised as a mortal female, and that I had an appointment to confer with the Sorcerer Royal. She is a superstitious creature and let me in directly, so I came up here to wait for you.”
“How long were you sitting here in the dark?” said Zacharias. He undertook a hasty mental review of his conversation. How fortunate it was that he had been engaged in a discussion of educational reform. As explosive as the Society would find his plans, they were not nearly so great a secret as the Government’s negotiations with Janda Baik, or the manoeuvrings of the Fairy Court.
“I came when everyone had sat down to dinner,” said Prunella. “I slept a while, so I was not very bored. The floor was excessively uncomfortable, however. I should much prefer the chaise longue, if you have no objection.”
Another man, surprised by a female so abandoned to all considerations of propriety as to saunter unasked into his room and demand the use of his chaise longue, might have so forgotten his manners as either to eject her without further ado, or to grow offensively familiar. Not so Zacharias. The latter course would never have occurred to him, and if the former presented any appeal, it was banished by the chatter of Prunella’s teeth as she spoke, and the trembling of her hands.
The instinct of hospitality Lady Wythe had instilled in Zacharias came to the fore. The girl must be returned to the school, it was clear, but first she must be looked to.
“Pray sit,” he said, handing her to a chair by the fire. “I will ring the landlord for tea. May I ask why I have been honoured with this visit?”
Prunella seated herself, holding the battered old valise on her knee.
“Of course,” she said. “I am coming with you to London.”
8
PRUNELLA’S FIRST THOUGHT had been to board the stagecoach to London at the Blue Boar, but the difficulties inherent in this scheme soon made themselves obvious. Chief of these was expense: she had taken sufficient funds to supply her wants for a period, but the longer she could preserve that amount untouched, the better.
If only Mrs. Daubeney were going to London! Not that Mrs. Daubeney would take Prunella along, since she was in disgrace. But if only Mrs. Daubeney had a friend who was going there, who might permit Prunella to accompany him; if only she knew anyone travelling in that direction . . .
When Prunella recollected that the Sorcerer Royal was leaving the next day, she felt that the fates had contrived to give her such a chance as she ought not to throw away. No doubt the Sorcerer Royal was travelling in his own chaise, which would save the expense of a stagecoach, besides being a vast deal more comfortable. Had not Henrietta spoken of his good nature? It seemed to Prunella that she possessed such a piteous tale as would persuade anyone who had not a heart of stone to help her.
When she arrived at the inn Prunella had every intention of employing the time till Mr. Wythe’s return in concocting a plan for inveigling him into taking her to London, but she betrayed herself. No sooner had she settled down on the floor of the coffee-room and drawn her invisibility enchantment around herself than she fell asleep, worn out by the misadventures of the day.
She started awake when Mr. Wythe entered the room, but before she could decide what to do, he began to talk. After a moment’s confusion Prunella realised he was not speaking to her. Indeed, he did not seem to be addressing anybody that she could see.
This was pleasingly sorcerous of Mr. Wythe. Prunella refrained from announcing her presence in favour of following his monologue. There is nothing so revealing of a person’s character as the manner in which he conducts himself with his nearest connection
s. His language, gestures and attitudes, what he does and does not say, all serve to give the completest illustration of who and what he is.
Prunella did not know that it was to this useful species of discourse that she listened. But it was soon evident to her that the Sorcerer Royal was, as she had hoped, precisely the sort of forbearing gentleman upon whom it might just be possible for an unscrupulous young woman to impose.
“I beg your pardon,” said the Sorcerer Royal, when she had declared her intention. “I cannot have heard you aright.”
“It sounds strange, I am sure,” said Prunella, trying to look tragic. She ought to be very good at it, she reflected, with such a model as Mrs. D constantly before her. “It must seem inconceivable that a gently bred female should lower herself to such a shift. But my desperation must be my best defence, for— Oh, sir, you are my only hope!”
She descended into noisy weeping, but not being much of a hand at acting, Prunella was forced to have recourse to a large white handkerchief, appropriated from Mrs. Daubeney’s boudoir, to conceal the absence of tears. Fortunately Mr. Wythe was so befuddled that he did not seem to observe the pretence.
“My dear young lady!” This manner of address would have seemed impertinent in any other gentleman of Mr. Wythe’s youth and handsomeness. But his manner possessed such a splendid unconsciousness of these attributes—he spoke so much like a man who believed himself over the hill, and beyond all flirtations—that Prunella was overtaken by an irresistible fit of the giggles. She hastily contrived to bury them in counterfeit sobs.
“I beg you will be calm,” said Zacharias. “I am sure it is not so bad as it seems, whatever the trouble is. Shall I ask the landlord to summon Mrs. Daubeney?”
“No, call no one else! You are the only creature in the world who can help me, if you would,” declared Prunella behind the shelter of her handkerchief. “I knew when I saw you that you would understand. Some instinct told me that you would not support those who would oppress a female, and deny her her birthright of magic!”
Above the lace edge of the handkerchief, Prunella’s sharp eyes saw Zacharias stiffen.
“I knew that you would understand the secret I have been forced to conceal for these many years,” she continued, infusing her voice with a passionate intensity. “For you must know, sir, that I long to study thaumaturgy! All my life I have dreamt of nothing else. I had scarce means enough to attain my dream, but I learnt what little I could from our ill-stocked library and untrained mistresses. I was happy in picking up scraps and rag-ends of wisdom. But that is all at an end. Even what little opportunity I had of acquiring magical learning is beyond me now—unless you, sir, condescend to help me!”
Mr. Wythe’s defence to his invisible interlocutor of the need to educate magical females had given Prunella some notion of how to craft her petition. It was, after all, only an exaggeration of the truth. Prunella had picked up all her magic from books and indifferently taught lessons. She had learnt even more from the schoolgirls—both in getting up mischiefs with them as a child, and in restraining their inventive wickedness when she grew older—but she was not about to confess that to Mr. Wythe.
The only falsehood lay in the wish she expressed to study thaumaturgy. Prunella had no more interest in magical lore than a fish has in the philosophical properties of water. Magic as a substance, a living force, was the air she breathed and the ground beneath her feet: she would no sooner give it up than she would willingly surrender her sight or speech. Stuffy old thaumaturgy, however—by which Prunella meant magic in books, particularly the deadly tomes to which Mrs. Daubeney’s schoolgirls had access—was another matter altogether.
But the Sorcerer Royal was a scholar, and she had formulated her little speech with that in mind. Even so, she was charmed by its effect. Mr. Wythe was all sympathetic attention, his eyes fixed upon her countenance with a glowing look of interest.
“But this is extraordinary,” he exclaimed. “Fate must have directed you here. I shall certainly try to help you, to the extent that it is within my power.”
This readiness to enter into her feelings surprised Prunella. But she had not accounted for the fact that a passionate yearning to steep oneself in the principles of unnatural philosophy must seem the most natural thing in the world to a young man bred to the office of Sorcerer Royal. Nothing needed less explanation to Zacharias than a professed love of magic and a desire to know more of it.
He was not to be so easily persuaded of the wisdom of abetting an unaccompanied maiden in her own abduction, however. Even as Prunella’s spirits rose, and she began to think this business of running away very easy, he continued:
“It may take some time to convince Mrs. Daubeney of the utility of teaching women thaumaturgy, but you will be patient, I know, Miss Gentleman. My office lends me some authority, and it is to be hoped that that authority will lend weight to my appeal. The change will feel slow to one of your laudable ambition, but it will certainly occur in time. Such a foolish, unjust system as now obtains cannot long survive determined resistance. And in the meantime, there are books!”
“Books?” said Prunella blankly.
“Yes, for even Mrs. Daubeney cannot object to my supplying her library with books,” said Mr. Wythe. “Even if she disliked their contents, it is unlikely she would refuse such a mark of attention from the Sorcerer Royal. You see there is no reason to lose heart, Miss Gentleman! Much benefit may be gained by solitary application. A good tutor makes learning pleasanter and quicker, of course, but many of our best thaumaturges had no teacher but books.”
“I am obliged to you, but books will be no earthly good to me,” said Prunella firmly. “For I cannot stay at the school. That is why I must come with you to London. There is nothing here for me!”
Zacharias had already begun to devise a suitable reading list, but this returned him to earth with a thud that knocked all the titles out of his head.
“But what is the matter?” he said, looking at Prunella with concern. “Have you disagreed with Mrs. Daubeney? Is it possible that I might assist in resolving the conflict?”
Prunella had not expected this solicitude. To her astonishment she felt tears burn her eyes. She blinked furiously, looking away: Prunella might have no compunction in indulging in a show of weeping, but she had far too much pride to give way to real tears in the presence of a stranger.
She thought suddenly, I could tell him about the treasures. Mr. Wythe was kind; he seemed honest; and he would know, if anyone did, what to do about seven familiars’ eggs locked by an enchantment. The mere revelation of her secret must guarantee what she most desired: an escort to London.
But the memory of Mrs. Daubeney’s perfidy stopped her. If Prunella could not trust the one creature in the world she had known from her infancy—the one soul who remembered her father—what reason had she to trust a stranger?
“I have parted from Mrs. Daubeney forever!” said Prunella, and she did not trouble to suppress the tremor in her voice, since it served to reinforce the impression she wished to give. “She thinks me too magical, and has ordered me to give up all enchantery. I may not even devise illusions to amuse the children, or soothe them to sleep with charms! I could not endure such a life. Sir, you are a friend to magic. If you deny me, I do not know where I shall turn.”
Mr. Wythe looked at her with pity. Speaking gently, but with an immovable resolution, he said:
“You are distressed, Miss Gentleman, and not without reason, but if you were to reflect upon your request in a calmer spirit, I am persuaded you should see it would not do. Besides, I am headed not for London but for Fobdown Purlieu on the morrow. I would advise you to return to the school. I can see that with your ability you must find it a sadly restrictive environment, but even such a system as Mrs. Daubeney’s will give you more exposure to the theory of magic than if you were anywhere else.”
“Not more than if I were in London!” said
Prunella bitterly.
She had hoped to work upon Zacharias’s sentiments by appearing as a weeping, clinging, trembling creature in need of aid. Mrs. Daubeney was always saying pointedly how little gentlemen liked pushing females, whose tongues were never still, and who had a stomach for anything.
But her lack of success made her reckless. Speaking with real candour, Prunella said:
“I beg you will put yourself in my position, sir. Someone owned you as a son. There were those who had a stake in your success. But if you were me—with no family, no one upon whose charity or affection you could depend—would not it seem to you that there was no place in the world for such a one as yourself?”
Zacharias looked at her in surprise. But he could not fail to understand her meaning. Prunella was not nearly so dark as he—perhaps Sultan Ahmad would not recognise her as anything but a European—but to Zacharias, and more importantly, to any Englishman or -woman, it was evident that she was not—could not be—altogether English.
“Someone owned me, indeed,” he said slowly. It was not an inaccurate assertion, though it was long since he had been emancipated. Sir Stephen had got around to signing the necessary papers when Zacharias turned thirteen—a curious birthday present for a thirteen-year-old boy. “I should like to help you, Miss Gentleman, but consider, would you be any better in London? How would you live? The city is no kinder than the country to those who have no place in the world. Here, at least, you have food and shelter, even if you have fallen out with your mistress.”
Prunella flushed, remembering her last encounter with Mrs. Daubeney. To be obliged to her any longer was intolerable!
“I think I may seek better than to be beholden to the likes of her for food and shelter!” she said. But the Sorcerer Royal was not listening.
He said nothing, but his countenance altered all at once. He put a hand to his forehead, reaching out with the other, as though he sought support. But in fact he was only fumbling for the clock on the mantelpiece.
