“Only because I couldn’t go with him!” She reached over to lay a proprietary hand on her husband’s where it lay on the table. “Iohen is Albori’s right-hand man. He relies on him to advise Her Grace in his absence. But Iaklin has no such excuse. She needs to think of their future, not a few lonely months.”
Tio hadn’t been lonely. Not that she’d ever dipped into that kind of scandal. Jeanne smiled, recalling the harmless flirtation Tio had conducted with her to fill the time. Tio was desperately in love with her husband, but boredom had led her into scrapes that she wouldn’t care to have him know about. Iaklin had lent a hand in covering a few of those. What had happened between them?
“Perhaps the two of you should find some charitable project together,” Jeanne suggested. She saw Iohen begin to choke in laughter then cover it with a sip of wine.
It was the sort of bantering conversation that Antuniet found tedious and Jeanne had learned to let her be. But now she spoke.
“Mesner Perzin, I hadn’t thought we would have the pleasure of your company this evening.”
“Ah yes.” Iohen seemed glad to turn to a new topic. “I’d meant to travel down to Nertul on business—problems with the mill there, a bit of unrest— but there’s a debate coming up in sessions that my father wants me to track.”
He paused. Jeanne guessed that he was deciding whether the subject was of interest to ladies.
“Ehing thinks something needs to be done about all these canals,” he continued. “Thinks they’re drawing down the water levels. Total nonsense of course, but as there’s nothing can be done about the weather, there’s a faction that wants to be seen to take action. Another faction thinks it should all be beneath the notice of the upper council.”
And the Perzins fell awkwardly between the two, Jeanne knew. The mill in Nertul was an investment, not a trade, but they couldn’t afford to be cavalier about the income.
“And what does he think could be done?” Antuniet asked. “I’ve heard they want to dredge the channel around the wharves in case the river’s low again this summer.”
He nodded. “That’s what the commons are talking about. Falls within their purview, after all. But Ehing thinks the transport canals are holding water back from the Rotein. Wants a bill to keep all the locks open until the river’s normal again. I expect your cousin Saveze will have something to say to that, Mesnera Chazillen. Hasn’t she been dabbling in that field?”
Antuniet shrugged. “My cousin’s business is her own. She—”
Tio interrupted, concluding that the conversation, like the river, was in danger of becoming dry. “Speaking of Baroness Saveze, Jeanne, have you read that novel?”
Jeanne winced. Were people still talking about that? She signaled to Tomric to have the next course brought in, hoping that Tio might lose interest. “Try the cauliflower. My cook has a new way of preparing it. Very delicate.”
Tio would not be put off. “I have my own guess as to the author, of course. It’s not in Lady Ruten’s style but I hear her sister has been trying her hand at writing. I don’t know what they have against your friends, but one must admit they’ve made quite a spectacle of themselves.”
“That they have not!” Antuniet said sharply. She wasn’t usually so quick to Barbara’s defense, but she had little patience for Tio’s sharp tongue.
Iohen shifted uncomfortably. “A duel is something of a spectacle, you must admit, even at the New Year.”
“Oh come now,” Jeanne said, trying for levity. “You can scarcely say someone wrote the novel because of the duel! That’s putting the cart before the horse.”
“No, no, that’s true,” Iohen admitted. “But Baron Mazuk still carries a grudge. He lost an investor that night. And he and Saveze have been butting heads in council…”
He seemed to sense that the conversation had gone beyond what was proper for the dinner table and Antuniet had retreated into silence. But Tio would require a firm hand to return to safe ground.
Jeanne cast about for a better topic. “I’ve discovered a brilliant new soprano. That is, Count Chanturi has discovered her, but he leaves it to me to see that she takes. Tio, what program do you think would be best: old favorites or a new piece?”
And though Tio’s taste in music was not to be relied on, she was flattered enough to be asked that she took the bait.
* * *
Several days later, Jeanne’s thoughts returned to the note from Mefro Dominique and she sent a reply. Several more days passed before she found the time to travel down to the neighborhood near the Nikuleplaiz where the dressmaker’s shop stood. There had been just enough of a delicate hint to pique her curiosity. A favor, Dominique had said, and so not some new fabrics to be shown only to special patrons, or any of the other imaginable reasons Dominique might have to contact her.
At the chime of the bell on the door, Dominique herself came out from the back rooms to greet her and invite her into the side parlor that served both for fittings and as a workroom. Two girls scrambled to their feet at their entrance. She recognized the dressmaker’s daughter, of course, but the other girl was new. She was nothing much to look at, with mousy brown hair pulled tightly back under a linen cap, a whey-faced complexion, a long thin nose and sturdy arms that spoke of hard work, but her eyes were bright and curious before she remembered to look down.
Dominique gave them brief instructions. “Celeste, go to the front and see to anyone who comes. You may leave your work here. Rozild, do you think you can see about fetching some tea for our guest?”
Jeanne saw a flash of panic in the girl’s eyes before she nodded and slipped through the rear door to the private rooms. “A new apprentice?” she asked. Dominique certainly had the custom to support one, but usually the extra work was hired out.
“No, Mesnera, not an apprentice, though if I dared take her on, that would be a better choice.”
Dared? Well, who knew what these arrangements required. Every trade had its rules. Jeanne made a shrewd guess. “Is it possible that the favor you want has something to do with the girl who is not your apprentice?”
Dominique nodded with a glance toward the back rooms, and so Jeanne held her tongue until—after a lengthy wait—the girl returned with a tea tray that would not have passed muster in any respectable household.
“Thank you, Rozild,” the dressmaker said in dismissal. “Take your sewing upstairs until we’re done here.”
She waited until the footsteps had faded overhead before continuing. “Rozild was in service until recently. Not a parlor maid,” she said with a rueful smile and a nod toward the tea tray. “Laundry and mending at one of the houses near the Plaiz Nof. She helped out with the sewing when the Maisetra and her daughters all needed new gowns at once. That’s how I met her. She’s a good girl, quiet and well-mannered. There’s not an ounce of vice in her.”
“And yet,” Jeanne observed dryly, “she is no longer in service.”
“No.”
There were several possibilities. She wasn’t particularly pretty and she looked scarcely more than fifteen, but men didn’t always care about that, and no one would ask whether she’d been willing or not.
“Is she with child?” Jeanne felt an inward shiver. Such a fine line between respectability and shame. A girl like Rozild couldn’t bluff her way through with tales of alchemy. But why had Dominique come to her? There were charities for fallen girls.
“No, it’s nothing like that. Mesnera de Cherdillac, it’s not my business to make judgments of my betters, so I hope you will forgive me if I speak of things that are not spoken of. Rozild was accused of a…a particular friendship with one of the other housemaids, if you understand my meaning. She has no hope of being given a character.” Dominique’s hesitation seemed born, not of reticence, but of uncertainty over the right words. Her gaze was direct and without accusation. “I hoped that you might know of an employer who would overlook that particular sin.”
“Ah,” Jeanne sighed.
It had been a risk
for Dominique to bring the matter to her. If her own position in society were more fragile, she might have bristled at the thought of her amours being gossip among tradesmen. But she had survived for years by the secret smile and the discreet silence—long before Antuniet had come to complicate her life. Jeanne realized that she didn’t even question whether she would help the girl. There was an invisible bond as strong as that of a mystery guild among women who loved their own. She could no more think of refusing than she would if Ailis or Ermilint or any of the rest of her circle came to her for help.
Dominique was still waiting for an answer.
“I will see what I can do,” Jeanne said. “My own household is far too small—” Though it would need enlarging by the end of the year…but no, that was too long to wait. “How soon will the girl need to find a place?”
A shrug. “I have work enough to keep her busy, but I’m not allowed to take apprentices. Because I am foreign, you see. Not unless I have special permission from the guild. Eventually there will be questions.”
“I’ll give you an answer by the end of a week.” Who did she know who kept a large enough staff that there would always be a place for one more? And who could not possibly object to the reason for the girl’s fall? The answer was obvious.
A few minutes later, as the fiacre rumbled over the cobbles up the Vezenaf, Jeanne composed several possible appeals in the event that Margerit rejected the first. That presumed she was at home, which could not be relied on. But the footman at the door escorted her into the parlor with a promise that the Maisetra would be there presently.
“You’re tired,” Jeanne exclaimed on seeing her. “And here I am with one more demand on your time.”
Margerit returned her embrace. “It doesn’t matter. I hope nothing’s wrong? Antuniet’s well?”
“Yes, perfectly well.” It was hard not to see suspicion in every innocent question. How would she ever last until summer! “I’ve come to ask a favor for a complete stranger.”
After refreshments had been brought and sampled, she related the whole sad tale, concluding with, “So I thought of you. I didn’t think to ask what the girl is good for beyond laundry and sewing, but no doubt she could be trained up.”
Margerit frowned in a way that was less promising than she’d hoped. She stood abruptly, exclaiming, “Does everyone in Rotenek think my house is a refuge for…for…”
“For sapphic servants?” One might as well be shocking, Jeanne thought. “No, I’m the only one to think that.”
“Jeanne, you don’t understand. I need to be very careful. Things have been…difficult.” The sweeping gesture of Margerit’s arm was vague and all-encompassing.
“Yes, yes, I know,” Jeanne guessed. “That ridiculous novel.”
“It isn’t only that. I’m still fighting with Archbishop Fereir over the Mauriz mystery, and now I have several important guildmasters challenging my appointment by Her Grace,” Margerit said. “I can’t afford to have any shadows cast over my school. I’m asking people to put their daughters into my hands. I can’t have them think—”
Ah yes, the school. That could be her fatal weakness. “And which of your students, if she were accused, would you cast off to satisfy the gossips?” Jeanne asked quietly. “What standard will you hold them to that you couldn’t meet yourself? Respectability is a fragile thread to hang your dreams on. Who will you give the power to break it? Where would you be now if you’d hesitated over what people would think?”
Margerit turned and Jeanne could see the shadows she feared, but there was an air of surrender in her voice. “Very well, I’ll see what I can do for your laundry maid.”
Chapter Thirteen
Luzie
March, 1824
Maisetra Orlin was late in bringing Mari for her lesson. It spoiled the morning entirely for other work and there were two commissions to complete before Luzie could steal time to contemplate Tanfrit’s song. Songs—really, it was growing into a small cycle. The commissions were nothing of note: a new dance for the Peniluks’ ball, a setting of a French poem for the Lozerik girls to perform. Small requests that showed she was still riding the horse of fashion. Tastes would move on soon enough. It was perilous to refuse anyone. The money was good—better than it had been at any time since Henirik’s death—but there was no saying it would last.
She needed work that would establish her reputation more solidly. She might dream of an opera someday, but that would require patronage. And yet, a month after the idea had first taken hold, Tanfrit kept invading her thoughts: a march for the entrance of the dozzures of the university, a theme that might grow into Tanfrit’s first aria. It was madness. She had no libretto, no book. The lyrics she’d penned for the song cycle were nothing of note, just something to wrap the music around. And for now there was only time to finish the second movement for the Peniluks’ dance and snatch a bite to eat before going out to the afternoon lessons.
The dinner table that evening saw all five of them together. That was unusual enough that Luzie brought out a bottle of the better wine and lingered at the table. Work could wait another hour.
“Luzie, will you join us for carnival at last this year?” Elinur asked. “Surely you can take one day away.”
She would have refused—carnival brought sad memories—but she saw a bright eagerness in Serafina’s face. Elinur wouldn’t think to invite her directly. “What about you, Serafina?” she said. “Were you here for last year’s carnival? Did it compare to the famous one in Rome?” They fell to discussing revels of the past and somehow she found herself agreeing to the excursion.
The commissions should have come first when Luzie rose from the table, but she took up the pages with her Tanfrit sketches instead and continued tinkering. Issibet and Charluz lingered in the parlor with mending when the others had gone up to bed. There was always mending. Eventually Luzie found herself alone and set all the compositions aside to play whatever her fingers called up. A bit of waltz. A difficult piece by Fauvel that she had been trying to master. When she heard restless footsteps from Serafina’s room overhead, she moved into the tune written for her. It should have a name, but nothing had offered itself yet. The footsteps stopped, then descended the stairs.
“I didn’t mean to disturb you,” Luzie said without looking up from the keyboard.
Serafina settled onto the bench beside her and Luzie paused for a moment to make room.
“You didn’t disturb me, but I thought you might be calling me.”
“Perhaps I was.” Composing always seemed more joyous with Serafina there, even when she only listened. “I don’t know about this Tanfrit work. It’s all so—” She wasn’t even sure where the difficulty lay. “I keep trying to write something small, but it wants to be big. And there’s so little to work with. She was a famous philosopher and no one knows anything about her. She taught at the university or maybe she didn’t. She died for love and lived to an old age. How do I find a story that will make sense in two or three songs? Where do I even begin? I need—”
“Two or three songs?” Serafina asked. “I thought it was to be an opera.”
Luzie shook her head and stared down at her hands. “That’s beyond me. Most operas begin with a play, or at least a novel. I have nothing but gossip.”
“We have more than that,” Serafina offered. “There are bits and scraps scattered throughout Maisetra Sovitre’s books. Margerit says that every thaumaturgist of the age was in correspondence with her. ‘We are the threads in the web God weaves, even a weak weft can make strong cloth.’ Gaudericus wrote that she said that to him when he was in despair. And Lorenzo Valla mentioned in a letter that he met her in Rome just before she returned to Rotenek and that she encouraged him to visit. There’s more like that in the lives she touched. Baroness Saveze says there’s an old ballad about her and the flood when she died. That’s where the story about her suicide came from. ‘Let the waters rise up…’ I don’t remember how the rest of it goes.”
Luzie reme
mbered hearing it as a child, but she’d forgotten any connection to Tanfrit. Let the waters rise up and wash away my sorrow. The phrase caught at her imagination and she lifted her hands to the keys. A torrent of notes spilled from the words into her fingers. She heard Serafina’s sharp intake of breath.
“Yes! Use that.”
After a few more repetitions to set it in her mind, Luzie found her pen and set it down on paper for later. “So. Now I have three motifs. But still no story. And I can’t well go digging through Maisetra Sovitre’s library!”
“I could.”
“What?”
“I spend half my time there. And Margerit is too busy planning her college to work with me most days. I could copy out all those bits and scraps for you. If you wanted me to.”
“Would you?” Luzie asked eagerly. “Then I’ll know if there’s enough story to be found.”
“Enough for a whole opera?”
Did she dare to dream that far? No need to voice it yet. “Enough for two or three songs, at least.”
* * *
The carnivals of Luzie’s youth had been filled with music and dancing—that was no surprise. The city’s mystery guilds drove the festivities and Rotenek’s musicians were well represented. The itinerant players who were little better than beggars claimed rights to play among the tents and booths out beyond the Port Ausiz under the patronage of Saint Iulin. At the other end of the city, the more staid revelry in the Grand Salle was overseen by the Guild of Saint Sesille, whose membership was by private invitation. Falling between the two, all manner of performers from the theaters and concert halls gathered under the name of Saint Chenis. It was primarily a social guild and Luzie still paid the fee to stay on the rolls. Her father’s membership had given her that right.
When she’d married Henirik and come under the ambit of Saint Nikule, they had enjoyed the smaller celebration held in the Nikuleplaiz, rather than traveling out the east gate to the larger revels. Saint Nikule’s festivities still had a wild and raucous air—the nearness of the wharf district on the opposite bank saw to that—but the crowds were smaller. It felt more like a village festival.
Mother of Souls: A novel of Alpennia Page 21
