Echo in Onyx

by Sharon Shinn

  “Maybe. But I’d like to know.”

  It hadn’t even occurred to me to wonder before. But now I wanted to know, too.

  Cormac and his attendants were now turning to greet Lady Dorothea, and the strange ritual repeated. Then it was Marguerite’s turn to step forward as Patience and Purpose and Prudence stood in a row beside her. All four of them offered their hands. Cormac bestowed a warm smile on Marguerite as he made some favorable remark, and she responded with a pretty smile of her own. He lifted her hand to his lips. His echoes copied the gesture. Marguerite and her echoes sank in curtseys halfway to the floor and then slowly rose again. I thought Cormac gave her hand a squeeze before he released it.

  Next, each of Marguerite’s brothers took their turns meeting the prince, their own echoes ranged alongside them; then they all exchanged light conversation for a few moments. Again, my vision blurred slightly at the almost impossibly choreographed scene below—Cormac and Marguerite shadowed by three exact replicas, the others by one or two, each set moving and nodding and laughing and motioning in concert. They looked like ripples undulating across a cornfield or starlings darting across the sky, perfectly synchronized, utterly in tune. It was dizzying to watch.

  When I was able to separate out individual actions again, I realized that Cormac was waving his hand toward a group of men who had followed him into the house. Only then did I think to look for Nico within the prince’s entourage, but I didn’t see him. And no wonder. Even I could tell that Cormac’s fellow travelers were high nobles, whereas an inquisitor would no doubt be part of the professional class; they would hardly be socializing together. At first, I thought Cormac had brought eleven companions, but then I realized that several had echoes of their own, and I had to concentrate to get a more accurate count. I finally decided he had brought five friends; two had two echoes, two had one, and one had none. The one with no echo—a burly fellow with red-gold hair as bright as a coin—looked to be loud and a little rude on top of it. None of his friends were as striking as their prince.

  Dorothea sailed up to Cormac again, gesturing to different areas of the house. By the direction her hands were pointing, I assumed she was explaining that they would all withdraw to one of the inner salons before continuing on to the dining room. Rory and the undercook had already slipped away, since their services would be called upon during the meal; but unless some disaster befell Marguerite’s wardrobe, there would be nothing for me to do until she returned to her room at the end of the evening. So I stood there a few moments longer, watching the crowd in the atrium slowly thin out as people filed through the archway that led toward the salon. Soon the big room was empty except for a few self-effacing figures that I took to be guards, valets, or other attendants brought by Cormac and his friends. They would wait there or in the servants’ hall by the kitchen until their masters were on their way home again.

  One of those unobtrusive fellows was on the move, prowling along the perimeter of the atrium like a cat sniffing through an unfamiliar space. He stayed under the overhang of the balcony and wove between pillars and tall planters as if trying to stay hidden, so it was hard to see him clearly, but after a moment, I recognized him. Nico. He was there, after all, gathering information on behalf of his prince.

  I didn’t sniff or scowl or make any sudden movement, so I don’t know how I caught his attention. But just as I decided it was time for me to quietly withdraw, Nico came to a halt and looked up at me. Not as if he’d just that moment discovered my presence—as if he’d spotted me the minute he walked in and had been glancing my way every so often for the past ten minutes, just to see if I might do something interesting. Despite the fact that I was so far away and almost entirely obscured by the railing, he seemed to realize that I had seen him. He smiled and raised a hand in greeting. I couldn’t help smiling in return as I slipped away.

  I headed one flight up so I could enjoy a couple hours of solitude in my room before Marguerite needed me again. I was still smiling as I unlocked the door, but my expression turned to surprise when I stepped inside. There was a long, narrow box lying on my bed, sealed with a wide silk ribbon tied in a bow, and beside it lay a note in Constance’s plain handwriting: This was delivered this afternoon for you. I wondered if she’d opened the box to look inside, but I thought she probably hadn’t. Constance was all about observing rules and boundaries.

  The only people I could think of who might send me packages were Jean or my mother—but Jean wouldn’t bother with a bow and my mother would assume, correctly, that the stress of travel would shred a ribbon before it could arrive, so she wouldn’t bother, either. Then who was sending me presents?

  I stood beside the bed a moment, savoring the mystery, then slowly pulled at the end of the ribbon and lifted the lid of the box. Inside, nestled in a length of red velvet, were a dozen tall-stemmed white roses, their petals veined with faintest pink.

  I bent down to inhale the sweet, faint scent. Nico Burken had sent me flowers, a time-honored gesture of courtship. Not only that, he had selected the most expensive of the blossoms that we had seen at the market yesterday, remembering that they were the ones I liked best. I sniffed again at the blossoms and felt a brief inclination to fall into a romantic swoon.

  I reminded myself that this was nothing more than a flirtation. Within a few days, Nico would be back in Camarria and I would remain in Oberton, and I might never see him again in my life. But for this single moment I could allow myself to be giddy with pleasure and silly with delight. I liked a man and he fancied me; coming to that realization is always one of life’s most beguiling moments.

  I would have to fetch a vase from the kitchen—or, even better, appropriate an empty one from Marguerite’s room, since she was less likely than Constance to ask why I wanted one. Leaving the box on the bed, I turned toward the door—which was when I saw the small, folded piece of paper on the floor. Someone had slipped it under the door earlier in the day, perhaps when I had been out running errands.

  It was brief, and it was in Marguerite’s handwriting. Come to my room tomorrow at dawn. Tell no one.

  The big picture windows in Marguerite’s room showed nothing but blank, dark skies when I arrived before sunrise. Nonetheless, she was awake and perched on one of the sofas in the sitting room. The echoes were huddled around her, looking oddly unhappy. It took me a moment to realize why they seemed so strange, but then I saw it: They were still in their nightclothes while Marguerite was fully dressed.

  Or, well, sort of dressed.

  “My lady,” I whispered, because the hour was so early it didn’t seem right to speak out loud. “What are you wearing?”

  She glanced down at her rough-spun brown dress with the workaday pinafore. “Winifred used to put it on when she snuck out to meet her lover. I confiscated it one day and told her she didn’t have to indulge in such pretexts—I didn’t care that she was involved with a young man as long as she still did her job. She gave her notice three weeks later.”

  “That explains why you have it but not why you have it on.”

  “I need to leave the house in secret. No one will look at me twice if I’m dressed like this.”

  That was probably true. Lady Dorothea wasn’t the only person in the mansion who thought servants were invisible. On the other hand, all the household staff knew each other, so even servants who didn’t expect Marguerite to be masquerading as one of them would realize this woman did not belong in the mansion. Except Constance had hired extra help to manage the workload while we were entertaining the prince. Marguerite just might be able to pull this off.

  “What’s so important that I can’t handle it for you?” I asked.

  Marguerite shook her head. “I can’t explain it. I have to go. But I want you to come with me.”

  I nodded and pointed at the echoes. “And them?”

  “No. They’ll stay behind.”

  That explained both why the echoes were still in their nightclothes and why they were so distraught. “I didn’t
know they could,” I said.

  Marguerite sat straighter, a look of determination on her face. “They must,” she said.

  I was curious. “Have they ever? Been separated from you before?”

  Marguerite hesitated, then shook her head.

  “What if they follow you?”

  She held up the key to her door. “I’ll lock them in.”

  This was getting more and more strange, but we didn’t have time to argue. The blackness outside the window was starting to haze to gray, and the sun would be up before long. “Then let’s get going.” And see how far we get.

  The echoes were really uneasy as we stepped through the door and refused to let them follow. They didn’t speak, but their mouths were open and they made small, distressed sounds, like kittens or mice. One of them reached through the door, trying to catch Marguerite’s arm, and she had to shove it back with a firm, “Purpose, no. Stay here. All of you. Just wait for me.” She resolutely locked the door, then took a deep breath and said, “Let’s go.”

  I figured some of the staff would already be up, so it was safer to take the public hallways than the back corridors, and we boldly made our way down the main stairs and across the atrium. A startled footman opened the door to the front entrance for us, too bemused to ask why servants had picked that exit, and we were out of the house with no trouble.

  “One hurdle down,” I said under my breath. “Where are we going?”

  “The temple.”

  I nodded. I should have guessed that. “Follow me, then. If we’re walking, there’s an easier way to go than the road you take in a carriage.”

  We moved quickly and mostly without speaking through the nearly empty streets. The brighter the skies grew, the more people we found on the road with us—bakers opening their shops, dairymen delivering their goods, day workers hurrying toward their jobs. Marguerite seemed edgy and ill at ease, pulling an old shawl closely over her shoulders, sticking as close to me as she could, and constantly glancing over her shoulders.

  “I don’t think anyone followed us from the house,” I said at last.

  “What? Oh. No. I keep thinking—I’m so used to having the others with me. I keep looking for them. It’s so strange.”

  “I imagine it is. But if you were trailed by three echoes, anyone who saw you would instantly know who you were. You had to leave them behind.”

  Her voice was so soft I almost didn’t catch the words. “That’s not why I did it.”

  The sun was up, but still very low on the horizon, by the time we arrived at the temple. As usual, I paused at the fountain to dribble my fingers in the water and make a silent prayer. I didn’t know why these representatives of the goddess seemed friendlier to me than the ones inside.

  “You stay here,” Marguerite said.

  I looked up, my hand still in the spray of water. “But—”

  “I’ll come out when I’m done,” she said firmly, turning away from me. I watched her push open the heavy door and disappear inside.

  A moment longer I just stood there, staring after her, then I shook my hand dry and looked around for a place to wait. There was a rigid metal bench situated under one of the triple-paned windows, so I made my way over to it and sat down. It was just as uncomfortable as it looked. I squirmed for a minute, trying to find a better position, then just gave up and slumped against the hard back. My body was as relaxed as I could manage, but my brain was working feverishly.

  What in the world had brought us here in such a clandestine fashion? Although nothing untoward had happened so far, I couldn’t help but feel we were running terrible risks and that to be discovered would be disastrous. But why? A respectable lady had come to visit a temple, very properly escorted by her maid. What fault could anyone find with that?

  And yet the air of ruination lingered. I could imagine only two reasons Marguerite might want to come to the temple in such secrecy that no one, not even her echoes, could bear witness.

  The first, and most likely, explanation was that she was meeting with her lover, the one she had been corresponding with in secret. That made it even more ironic that she was wearing Winifred’s clothing, since she had urged the maid not to hide her own romance. I had to assume that the message I had brought to the temple a few days ago had set up the time and place for this assignation. My supposition was that she would exit through a back door where her lover’s carriage was waiting. I was tempted to creep around the side of the building to try to get a glimpse of him, but I did not want Marguerite to catch me spying on her.

  Besides, I could be wrong. She might not be carrying on a forbidden romance after all; she might be here to meet with the abbess in charge of this temple. I had not forgotten the small, pretty triple goddess statue that Marguerite kept in the far corner of her room. Every day when I arrived, I found that she had scattered fresh flower petals at the feet of the women offering justice, mercy, and joy. My first day in the mansion I had wondered if Marguerite was a passionate follower of the goddess. The only times I had seen her truly at ease were when we were inside the temple.

  Did she want to become a priestess, then? Was she desperate to throw off all the trappings of a noble life, to escape the attentions of the prince, to refuse to play the pawn in the king’s attempt to reconcile the warring provinces? My guess was that—if Marguerite did not end up married to the prince—her parents would rather have her become a priestess than take a lover, as that course of action would bring significantly less disgrace to the household. But maybe not. Nobles survived scandals all the time. A woman caught with a lover might be repudiated by royalty, but she could still catch the eye of a man who would overlook such irregularities in favor of her family connections. Whereas a woman who dedicated her life to the goddess might as well be dead if her only value came from her potential as a bride.

  I supposed there might be a third reason Marguerite had indulged in such a charade, but I couldn’t come up with it.

  I sat there perhaps an hour, trying to still my chaotic thoughts, trying to look like someone who was perfectly happy to sit on an unyielding metal bench and watch the world walk by. There was slow but constant traffic in and out of the building, as some visitors concluded their devotions and others arrived to begin theirs. A few people cast curious glances my way, but no one seemed very interested in me. I maintained my abstracted expression.

  Just as I had begun to wonder if Marguerite would ever rejoin me, she emerged through the temple door, pausing a moment to let her eyes adjust to the light. I was on my feet and at her side before she had time to look around for me.

  “Ready to go?” I asked quietly.

  She simply nodded, and we headed back toward the mansion at a brisk walk. As we strode along, I stole a few quick glances at her face and thought she looked decidedly more peaceful than she had at any time since I’d known her. That still didn’t provide a clue about what she’d been doing while she’d been out of my sight.

  “What’s the plan for today?” I finally asked.

  “My father will take the prince on a tour of the city. My brothers will accompany them, but I won’t. There’s to be a light luncheon, and then tonight is the ball.”

  I knew about the ball, of course. Aunt Jean had told me that every woman in the city had prayed to be invited. Marguerite and I had spent days debating what she should wear, while Lady Dorothea had offered her own decided opinions about Marguerite’s wardrobe choices.

  “So—two different outfits. Two different hairstyles?”

  Marguerite nodded. “Simple for the luncheon, ornate for the evening.”

  “You’ll look beautiful.”

  She glanced over at me. Behind her calm exterior, deep in her blue eyes, I saw sadness and resignation. “It doesn’t even matter.”

  I could hardly contain myself. “Lady Marguerite—”

  She lifted a hand. “Don’t ask.”

  “But if there is something I can do—”

  “You’re doing it.”

  I
spread my hands. “I haven’t done anything!”

  “You’ve been my friend.”

  I didn’t even know how to answer that. Finally I just said, “Always.”

  When we arrived at the mansion, people were already coming and going through the front doors. There was no way to avoid being seen. “I think the back entrance is our best bet, but we’ll surely run into servants who recognize you,” I said, frowning.

  Marguerite shrugged. “I don’t mind if people realize I left. I just didn’t want anyone to stop me from leaving.”

  “Some of them might carry tales to your mother.”

  A faint smile touched her lips. “Then that will be interesting.”

  Indeed, as we went in through the kitchen door, we encountered no less than nine staff members, from Constance to the undercook. Each one first stared, then dropped into a hasty bow or curtsey, then gave me a sideways look of astonishment. But everyone knew by now that I wouldn’t spread stories about Marguerite. They might ask me later what she meant by the servants’ garb and the secretive arrival, but they wouldn’t expect me to tell them.

  We made it to her room without encountering any family members—not entirely a surprise, since it was still early in the day for nobility to be about. The echoes were clustered at the door when we walked in, as if they had stood there the whole time we were gone, and they fell on Marguerite with inarticulate gladness, patting her arms and shoulders and shoving their faces close to hers, as if inhaling her scent. Or—I don’t know. Inhaling her very breath as it escaped her body. As if they had almost asphyxiated in her absence because she wasn’t there to breathe for them.

  She seemed just as glad to be back among them, wrapping her arms around all of them at once and drawing them in for a communal embrace. I saw her close her eyes—saw all of them close their eyes—and for a moment a different kind of peace smoothed Marguerite’s features. She was home. She was whole. She was in balance. I marched past them toward the dressing room to start sorting through Marguerite’s closet. I didn’t belong at that reunion.