by Zen Cho
“The Midsomers are one of our oldest magical families,” replied Miss Campbell. “There are ways and means for a determined female.”
Everyone at the table knew she belonged to this class, and they shared a smile in recognition of this—save Muna. For the remainder of the meal she said very little. But she was excused, for the girls had been forewarned of the dreadful tragedy that had befallen their guest, and sudden fits of melancholy were only to be expected in one who had suffered the loss of a sister.
* * *
• • •
MUNA was in a ferment for the rest of the evening. It could not be mere coincidence that, by her second day at the Academy, she should have encountered one Midsomer and heard of another, both magicians. She had been led here by an intelligence greater than her own. For the first time since she had lost Sakti, Muna said her prayers in a spirit of true submissive gratitude.
But which Midsomer was the curseworker? She puzzled over the mystery for half the night, tossing and turning in her bed.
Surely she could discount George Midsomer. He was only a painting. If he had any real power, he would be casting hexes at the Sorceress Royal, not only aspersions.
But Clarissa Midsomer sounded a mere novice magicienne. Muna could not see how she could have wrought a curse capable of confounding such a powerful witch as Mak Genggang—nor what motive either could have had for afflicting two village girls from a distant island.
Muna rose the next morning more determined than ever to seek out George Midsomer and interrogate him—but it proved difficult to gain the necessary solitude now that the scholars had arrived. Miss Edwards, Miss Campbell and Miss Pinder were anxious that their guest should not be left alone to stew in her low spirits. They threatened to attach themselves to her, and it was only by claiming a sudden indisposition, requiring a return to bed, that Muna contrived to extricate herself from their hospitality.
She stole to her bedchamber, feeling guilty. God would forgive her for telling so many lies, she hoped, since she did it all for Sakti. She waited till the hands of the clock on the mantelpiece had described several rotations before creeping to the door and looking out cautiously.
There was a bustle in the house there had not been before—the scholars’ return had brought the Academy to life—but there was no one around to see Muna leave her room. Nor did she encounter anyone on her way. But when she rounded the corner into the gallery with its rows of painted thaumaturges, she came upon a scene that threw her plan into disarray.
“Ah, Miss Muna!” cried Henrietta. “We were just speaking of you. Clarissa, this is the guest I told you of, from the island of Janda Baik. The arch-witch of that country, Mak Genggang, has done us the honour of entrusting her apprentice to our care. Miss Muna, may I present to you Miss Clarissa Midsomer? She has agreed to join the Academy as an instructress.”
Miss Midsomer dropped a brief curtsey. After a moment Muna managed to collect herself sufficiently to respond in kind.
She was too taken aback to know what to say or how to look, but Miss Midsomer did not speak either. The Englishwoman gazed at Muna with her lip curled, in a way that would have been accounted unmannerly in Janda Baik.
Perhaps she is the curseworker after all, thought Muna, though Clarissa Midsomer looked scarcely old enough to be so powerful or so wicked. She was as youthful as Henrietta, though less pretty, having a great deal of sandy hair and a skin so pale she might have been a ghost. Her eyes were of an indeterminate light shade, watery and reddish; the effect they gave was not in the least occult.
Nonetheless there was something eerie about Miss Midsomer, ordinary as she looked. For the familial resemblance was remarkable. Muna’s eyes darted towards the portrait of George Midsomer, looking disdainfully down on the three of them.
“Are you a relation of this gentleman, Miss Midsomer?” she said. “You look so much like him!”
It only struck her after the words were out that this might not be taken as a compliment, for she would not like to be told that she resembled a man so pale and sour-faced. But either George Midsomer was deemed handsome by English standards, or clan pride supplied all that was wanting in his features, for Miss Midsomer’s hauteur dissolved. She flushed with pleasure.
“Yes,” she said, “he is an ancestor of mine. One of the two Sorcerers Royal who bore the name Midsomer!”
She gestured at the painting. For the first time Muna noticed the staff in George Midsomer’s left hand. It was made of a gnarled and ancient-looking wood, and it looked familiar.
“Why,” Muna exclaimed, “that is Mrs. Wythe’s staff!”
At the mention of the Sorceress Royal, Miss Midsomer froze up again. “It is the chief emblem of the Sorcerer Royal’s office,” she said stiffly, “and was held by many Englishmen before Prunella Wythe. It is not rightly her staff—it belongs just as much to her predecessors.”
“As it will belong to those that succeed her,” said Henrietta. “But Prunella is the Sorceress Royal at present, you know, so Miss Muna is quite correct to call the staff hers. Now I come to think of it,” she added, “yours is not the only family that can claim the honour of producing more than one Sorcerer Royal. There have been three Sorcerers Royal named Wythe!”
She spoke in a perfectly pleasant tone, as though she was agreeing with Miss Midsomer, but Miss Midsomer bridled.
“I wonder I did not notice the staff in the painting before,” said Muna. She paused, but there was no reason to hide the fact that she had been here already, and she wished to know why George Midsomer was so altered. Neither he nor any of the other thaumaturges had shown the least flicker of life. “Mr. Midsomer did not say he was Sorcerer Royal. No doubt that accounts for his lordly manners.”
“What do you mean, he did not say he was Sorcerer Royal?” said Miss Midsomer sharply. “Did Mr. Midsomer speak to you?”
“Yes,” said Muna. “I was never so astonished in my life! Do all your paintings speak, Miss Stapleton?”
Henrietta shook her head. “Oh dear, I ought to have warned you! These are the only paintings in the Academy that speak. They used to hang in the Society, but they made such a nuisance of themselves that—that is to say, the Sorceress Royal felt they would do better here. This part of the building is not much used.” Henrietta gave Muna a worried look. “I hope the gentlemen did not say anything untoward? I am afraid they are sometimes wont to forget their manners.”
“You might recall, Henrietta Stapleton, that my forefather is among them!” said Miss Midsomer.
“I am not likely to forget,” Henrietta reassured her. “He is the worst for abusing the servants and threatening the scholars with being turned into frogs! But I do not mean any reflection upon your ancestor. Mr. Wythe says the paintings have little of their subjects in them—the life that animates them springs from the artist, and the artist’s opinions of his subject cannot be taken as a wholly reliable guide to who they were. I am sure the real George Midsomer was much pleasanter than his likeness.”
She did not sound convinced, however, and Miss Midsomer was not propitiated. She directed a glare at Muna, as though she resented the honour Muna had received in being insulted by Miss Midsomer’s ancestor.
“I am afraid Miss Midsomer and I must discuss her duties,” said Henrietta to Muna. “We shall see you again this evening at the Sorceress Royal’s ball, but for now we must take our leave of you. May I escort you to the library, Miss Muna? You have discovered already that there are a great many surprises in this building—not all of them pleasant!”
Muna thought of the grand hall into which she had stumbled the day before, with its foreign sunshine and magical beasts outside the window. The green door was still conspicuous by its absence; in its place was a featureless expanse of gold damask wallpaper.
“Yes,” she said. But she declined Henrietta’s offer of assistance. She was very much obliged, she said, but she knew where th
e library was to be found, and did not fear any misadventure befalling her while she covered that short distance.
She parted from the Englishwomen, answering Miss Midsomer’s ungracious “Good day” with more courtesy than it merited. It was clear that Miss Midsomer shared some of her ancestor’s views on natives, but she had shown no sign of recognising Muna, any more than George Midsomer. That suggested either that Miss Midsomer was an excellent actress—or that she could not be Muna’s enemy.
Perhaps it was another Midsomer altogether. Miss Midsomer had a father, a mother, a brother . . . they might all be magicians, and any of them might be the curseworker.
Yet why should any of Miss Midsomer’s kin wish to curse Muna and her sister? What crime could they have committed against any English magician?
It seemed an impossible tangle. Still, to have met two Midsomers was progress she had scarcely hoped for before. Muna would watch Clarissa Midsomer, and pursue every clue that presented itself, till the curse was broken and Sakti restored to her.
Mak Genggang might not have taught Muna magic, but the witch’s conviction that the world had meaning, and that time was a pattern that God understood, was one Muna shared. All that had happened in the past two days was a reminder that nothing was impossible, even to one as powerless as Muna. She had not felt so hopeful since she had arrived in England.
10
THE MAIDSERVANT SARAH came to Muna a few hours before the Sorceress Royal’s ball, her arms heaped with muslins, silks and satins of every hue of the rainbow. No one could have been kinder or more attentive: Sarah took infinite pains over Muna’s appearance, curling Muna’s hair before winding a turban around her head, and helping her into the dress they chose for her, a green silk gown with puffed sleeves and ruffles along the hem.
Nonetheless the maidservant left Muna woefully uncomfortable. Sarah had introduced a horrific invention called “stays,” and though what she had done to Muna’s hair was not unbecoming, the turban was in a rather more spectacular style than Muna would have chosen. She wished she could have kept her own sarong and jacket.
But Mak Genggang would say that it was proper for her to be dressed, here in England, as the other women were. At least Sakti was not there to make faces at her, she thought ruefully.
Mrs. Wythe’s carriage was to be sent for Muna, Miss Midsomer and the scholars at eight o’clock—one could walk to the Sorceress Royal’s quarters from the Academy, but the young ladies would hardly wish to do that in all their finery, said Sarah. Mrs. Wythe was already there, making the final preparations for the evening, and Henrietta had taken herself off earlier that day—she would be attending the ball with her family, for it was an occasion of sufficient importance that Mr. Stapleton had deigned to overlook his disagreement with the Sorceress Royal.
At half past seven Muna ventured downstairs to wait for the carriage. She was passed on the stairs by an agitated Miss Campbell, trailing a cloud of fragrance, her toilette only half-finished. But in the hallway there was a lone female, already dressed and waiting.
“Miss Edwards,” said Muna, for from the woman’s height she thought it must be the eldest of the scholars. But then the woman turned and the words died in Muna’s throat. The face was the last she had expected to see here, in a strange land. It was as familiar to her as her own.
She had never known gladness could be so piercing that it could make you weep. Her chest seemed to open out with relief. Tears sprang to her eyes. She reached out her hands to Sakti.
“Adik,” she cried. “I have been so worried! But the polong said you were in the Palace of the Unseen. How did you come here?”
“I beg your pardon?” said the woman.
All at once Muna’s vision cleared; the world reordered itself. In Sakti’s place stood Miss Clarissa Midsomer, pale and English. She was frowning as though she suspected Muna of insulting her, for of course Muna had spoken Malay. No one less like Sakti could be imagined—and yet for a thrilling, wonderful moment, Muna had seen her sister’s face in the Englishwoman’s.
Her conviction had been so strong that she could not immediately reconcile herself to the error. She passed her hand over her eyes, disappointment a hard knot in her throat. It was necessary for her to swallow twice before she could speak.
“I—I am sorry, Miss Midsomer,” said Muna. “I mistook you for another. It is this dim light, no doubt.”
Miss Midsomer inclined her head, still frowning. She was got up very fine for the ball. Her dress was simple, a white gown with flowers embroidered in pink and green silks across the front, but around her neck she wore a gold chain with a remarkable pendant. It was in the form of a snake with rubies for eyes and a blood-red tongue flicking out to taste the air. The scales covering its body were made of turquoise. For all its splendour, the shape of the snake was curiously inelegant—the serpentine coils ended in an incongruous stubby tail.
“What an extraordinary necklace!” said Muna, grateful for an excuse to change the subject. “I have never seen anything so beautiful in my life.”
The compliment did not seem to give Miss Midsomer much pleasure.
“Thank you,” she said in a forbidding tone. “It was a gift from my brother.”
She would not be drawn to say any more, though Muna heaped admiration upon the pendant. Muna was not sorry when they were joined by the scholars, ready for the ball and bubbling over with excited chatter. Even Miss Midsomer’s evident resolve not to enjoy their society or the evening’s merriment could not quench the girls.
“I was persuaded that Miss Campbell would prevent our leaving in time,” said Miss Edwards, once they were rattling way in the carriage. “She could not decide on which dress she meant to wear, though she had only two to choose from. She kept throwing one off and picking up the other, and then when we had got her into that dress she would insist the first was the best, after all. I had made up my mind that we should only arrive when the ball was nearly over, covered in disgrace. Mrs. Wythe hates unpunctuality.”
Forgetting the dignity of her fourteen years, Miss Campbell stuck her tongue out at Miss Edwards. Muna was laughing when Miss Midsomer surprised them all by bursting out:
“‘Hates unpunctuality’! When Prunella Gentleman was never early for anything in her life!”
“But she is Sorceress Royal, you know,” said little Alice Pinder. “People of consequence may be as late as they like. When I am a sorceress I shall never rise before ten o’clock.”
“Slugabed!” said Miss Campbell. “Why not sleep till noon?” She and Miss Edwards were delighted by this naked ambition in their young schoolfellow, but Miss Midsomer turned her face to the window with a long-suffering air.
They were none of them surprised when Miss Midsomer decamped upon their arrival at the Sorceress Royal’s quarters. She paused only to say:
“I must ask you to refrain from addressing me or claiming my acquaintance this evening. My mother and father are present and they would prefer me to limit my association with the Academy to no more than is strictly necessary for the discharge of my duties.”
She did not wait for an answer before vanishing into the crowd. The scholars gaped after her.
“She is very disagreeable!” said Alice Pinder, with the unhesitating judgment of childhood.
“Hush!” said Miss Edwards, but Miss Campbell said indignantly, “As though we wished to claim her acquaintance! I wonder why Mrs. Wythe agreed to take her.”
“Shall we look for the Sorceress Royal?” said Miss Edwards to Muna. “I am sure she will wish to see you.”
Muna had scarcely paid attention to Miss Midsomer’s ill breeding in her amazement at her surroundings. The Sorceress Royal’s quarters, decorated for a ball, showed her Britain in a new light. As she followed the scholars through the crowd, she felt as though she had strayed into yet another world—a world far more glamorous than the cold, shabby Academy. Surely the Palace of th
e Unseen itself could not boast a brighter blaze of lights, richer furnishings or more beautiful people, expensively dressed?
Save for one or two of the men, who were garbed in the same gorgeous uniform, she could not help noticing that everyone present was white. Muna was conspicuous among them for the darker hue of her skin, and she was sure she was not imagining the heads that turned as she passed.
After her first thrill of embarrassment, she flung her head back, meeting the eyes of the women who stared at her, until they looked away. Sakti would not have been afraid of being stared at; she would not have worried about being deemed provincial or ill-bred. She would have been confident that all she did was right, since it was she who did it. If Muna was to recover her sister, she must have her sister’s own courage. She could not be so feeble as to falter on account of a mere party.
She heartened herself enough that by the time they found the Sorceress Royal, Muna was able to greet her with a tolerably convincing smile. Mrs. Wythe was standing with Henrietta and Mr. Wythe; they received Muna and the scholars with delight.
“How magnificent you are!” said Prunella, admiring Muna. “That is precisely the gown I should have chosen for you. And that turban! You have just the complexion for that shade. How clever of Sarah!”
Muna was able to return these compliments, for Mrs. Wythe was looking very well. She wore a pale lilac robe trimmed with gold embroidery and her dark curls were caught up in a fillet. In one hand she held a delicately carved ivory fan; in the other, the staff of the Sorcerer Royal—the same staff that George Midsomer held in his painting.
“It looks odd to bring this to a ball, I know,” she said, when Muna glanced at the staff. “But thaumaturges are mad for all articles of the kind—pomp and pageantry—and I do not omit anything that might encourage them to be civil.”
