Singer From the Sea

by Sheri S. Tepper

  Once dressed Genevieve and the Marshal went uncomfortably by carriage to the palace at the appointed time, midafternoon, whereupon they were shown into an ease-less anteroom where they waited on hard benches for several hours. Genevieve had had the foresight to bring a book, a practice Mrs. Blessingham had recommended for any appointment made by a member of a higher class who might keep people waiting to display his superior rank, and she spent the time patiently turning the pages.

  Heretofore, however, the Marshal had only been summoned to court when needed to quell some crisis; he had never before been kept waiting; and he now reacted to this delay by growing angrier with every passing moment. By the time the footman summoned them into the throne room where the Marshal had been interviewed before, the Marshal was steaming.

  The Lord Paramount was in no such agitation. He might not even have moved since the Marshal had last seen him, for he sat as he had then, robed in purple velvet, crown tipped slightly to one side, head leaning on his right hand, eyes half shut, an untidy scatter of booklets around him on the carpet and piled to either side.

  “Marshal,” he said, slowly sitting upright and opening his eyes. “And his lovely daughter.”

  “Your Majesty,” murmured Genevieve, sweeping a proper courtesy, head bent, hair arranged high, long neck exposed. It was this exposure of the neck that conveyed subservience. One was helpless in such a position. Which the Marshal perhaps thought of, for he bowed not nearly low enough. Her stomach clenched. He might well say something irretrievable!

  “How are you settling in?” asked the monarch. “Yugh Delganor says you seem to have found appropriate lodging.”

  The Marshal, tight-lipped, said, “We were fortunate enough to do so, Your Majesty.”

  “Over on Belregard. Baron what’sits place. Good. Good. Happened to think that it was about time to decide how we’re going to occupy the young lady’s time. Have you grown bored yet, Marchioness? Being home instead of at school?”

  Genevieve assumed the question was addressed to her, though the Lord Paramount was looking over her shoulder into the air. “No, Your Majesty. Things are still rather unsettled,” she murmured.

  “Well then, we’ll give you a bit more time. Prince Delganor has asked that you be attached to his office when you’re ready to take up your duties.”

  Genevieve managed a charming smile over gritted teeth as she asked, “May one ask what that would entail, Your Majesty?”

  The Lord Paramount stared at the ceiling, as though trying to recall what exactly the Prince’s duties were. “Ah, the Prince oversees the maintenance of the palace and the welfare of its people. As you might imagine, we get visitors from all the provinces, and the Prince usually relies on a few charming young people to show the little barons and baronesses around the place, escort them through the public parts of the palace, you know. The greenhouses, the galleries, the gardens—only in summer, of course—and the royal stables. That’s a favorite, the stables. Children always like horses. So, when you’re ready, he’ll call upon you to do that.”

  She said, “I imagine I’ll need to familiarize myself with that duty, sir.”

  “Of course, of course you will, my dear, though it seems you already are, ah? Someone said you and the Lady Alicia were together in the greenhouses just this morning? Good. Good. Ask the Duchess. She’ll show you around. She used to help the Prince, when she was younger.”

  He smiled, half drowsily, and leaned his head back on his hand. “That’s all, Marshal. Glad you’ve settled in so well.”

  The Marshal bowed; Genevieve made the full court courtesy, remaining with her head bent for a long moment. There, on the carpet, lay one of the monarch’s booklets, brightly colored, full of pictures of … things. Furniture. Golden dishes. Extravagant carpets. And there were a hundred such booklets scattered near the throne. Export catalogues. Some of them from planets whose names she knew from her reading in the school library.

  Her father touched her elbow, she rose, they backed away from the presence and the tall doors were shut behind them. The Marshal took a deep breath, his face purple, as though about to explode.

  “Any servant,” he growled, as they went out into the hallway. “Any footman can escort visitors about!”

  “It’s all right, Father,” she said hastily. “I don’t mind.”

  His voice rose as he said, “To keep us waiting all that time! He could have had someone apologize for the delay!”

  “Shhh,” she said, aware that the approaching footman had his eyes fixed intenüy on them. “As you once pointed out to me, Father, this may be in the nature of a test. To see whether we are the type of people to cause difficulties.”

  His eyes widened. Slowly the blood drained from his face, leaving his usually ruddy skin quite pale, almost ashen as he mumbled, “So I did.”

  The footman preceded them on their way out, bowing and gesturing like a mime, obviously well pleased with himself, ears all but quivering. Genevieve remarked casually, “I’m delighted with the duty His Majesty has proposed. It will give me something interesting to do, and allow me quite a bit of exercise. I was amazed at the size of the greenhouses, and the galleries must be equally large. I didn’t even know there were galleries.”

  “Nor I,” he mumbled, allowing a waiting servant to place his cloak upon his shoulders. “I’m sure the duty will be very rewarding.”

  They descended the flight of marble stairs to find their carriage waiting. Inside, as they relaxed onto the cushions, the Marshal’s face began to redden again.

  The air solidified. Genevieve saw a dim room, stone walls, a cone of light, a dwarfish man crouched over a mechanism of some kind. She heard her father’s voice coming from the mechanism: “Any footman can escort visitors about …” The dwarfish man looked up with a gleeful, vulpine expression.

  And she was back in the carriage with her father just opening his mouth.

  “Oh, Father,” she cried, laying her fingers upon his lips. “It’s so exciting! And wasn’t the Lord Paramount wonderful! Imagine seeing him in person. Quite an honor. Really, quite an honor!”

  He started to say something, but she leaned forward and put her hand sideways across his lips, gagging him, her eyes fixed pleadingly upon his own. He was at first angry, then puzzled, but at length he pinched his nostrils together, as though he smelled something unpleasant and turned away from her. She turned away also, but to search the carriage with her eyes, the corners of the joinery, the places the cushions met the frame, the buttons tufting the cushions, seeing nothing, turning back toward her father to see the angry question in his face.

  She said, with a wide, false smile. “Aren’t you excited, Father? I know you must be! Anyone who admires the Lord Paramount as you do would be.”

  After a long pause he said, “Very excited,” in a solemn, rather aggrieved voice. “Oh, very excited indeed.”

  They said nothing more on the way home, though the Marshal stared at Genevieve in a way that made her quite uncomfortable. When they arrived at the house, they drove directly to the stable yard, from which her father fairly dragged her into the desolate garden. “What possible excuse can you offer for all that?”

  “I… I just had the feeling, sir, that His Majesty might find it necessary to … listen to people he had invited to court. To hear what they said, whether they were loyal to him. I just had the feeling that … it would be a mistake to say anything at all negative.”

  “You had this feeling in our own carriage! And just how would he manage that?”

  She thought of the scattered booklets by the throne, wondering if she should mention them. No. She didn’t know what they portended, her father had paid no attention, but even he knew about doctors. Let her speak then of doctors.

  “The Lord Paramount … the Lord Paramount and some of the nobles hire off-world people and buy off-world products, Father. Medical personnel and supplies, for example. We all know that. And when you fight on the Lord Paramount’s behalf, I’m sure he gives you off-
world weapons if you need them. People near to His Majesty, those charged with his security, are no doubt also given special tools to keep track of people. You would not necessarily be told of these things, just as they would not be told of the weapons you use.”

  “Which has nothing to do with spying on people!”

  “I am sure such technology exists, Father.”

  “In our carriage?” he said mockingly.

  His eyebrows were lifted, his lips twisted in the lofty manner that she dreaded. Still, it was important that she warn him … without telling him how she knew.

  Keeping her voice as level as possible, she said, “Our carriage was there, at the palace, for several hours. And not only our carriage would be vulnerable. We had a lot of work done on this house, before our dinner party. And …”

  “Ridiculous,” he snorted angrily. “You’re like your mother! Imagining things! Making up ridiculous stories!”

  “Perhaps,” she said submissively. “But, wouldn’t it be a good idea to be careful?”

  Now that he had a target for his wrath, he exploded. “Genevieve, you’ve never given me any real trouble, as your mother did all too often, and if you are wise you will not start now. I’m sure the Lord Paramount does whatever he needs to do to keep order, but you’re ignoring who I am! I have always been one of his most faithful supporters! I have fought in his behalf, borne wounds in his behalf. Though his underlings may be thoughtless enough to waste half a day of our time on a mere triviality, His Majesty would never feel it necessary to spy on me!”

  His face forbade her saying anything more. She clenched her hands into fists and kept quiet. He went on in a more moderate tone, “You have pleased me with all you’ve done since we’ve been here, particularly since it is new to you and there is a good deal more to this business of being a courtier than I had been informed. I cannot allow you to go on in this spirit, however, seeing threats under every bush and around every corner! From now on, my dear, you will not concern yourself with your safety, or mine; you will not invent conspiracies to make me aware. I am always aware! Our covenants make the care of women the duty of their husbands and fathers. You can rely on my care and protection as you always have, and you are to set all such concerns aside. Do you understand me?”

  “Yes, Father,” she said meekly, biting her tongue. He wasn’t aware, he was blind to the dangers here in Havenor, but there was no way she could make him see. She knew he collected intelligence on the battlefield for she had heard him speak of its importance, but he ignored it here, where the battles were no less deadly. He thought the only enemies worth worrying about were the ones with weapons pointed at him, weapons he could see! How much more deadly the ones that were invisible!

  He took a deep, simmering breath. “Good. Now go change that costly, ridiculous gown while I change my equally ridiculous garb, and we’ll say no more about it.”

  Certainly she said no more about it. The next day passed simply, and on the day following, Alicia came to call. Almost defiantly, Genevieve took her into the garden, though it was probable that her father was watching. “My house has ears,” she explained. “I do not know the servants well. I cannot swear they would not repeat anything they heard in my house.”

  The Duchess stared at her. “You look … different. Why, Genevieve, you look angry!”

  Genevieve laughed without humor, shrugging helplessly as she did so. “I am somewhat peeved at Father. He considers my advice impertinent. Or perhaps he thinks I have none to give, that I know … nothing of value. As is his right. According to the covenants, I am brainless on such matters.”

  “Oh, yes, as we are all. Nonetheless, what do you know, Genevieve?”

  Genevieve bit her lip, wavering, then answered honestly, “Father and I were summoned to the Lord Paramount day before yesterday. I know that His Majesty keeps close watch on all of us here in Havenor.”

  “Ah. How does he do that?”

  “I think he probably has listening devices that he gets off-world. I think he has them planted in places where he wants to know what people are saying. So, when we go inside, I’m not going to say anything about your daughter. The matter is being arranged, and I have every confidence that someone will be on Ramspize point to meet your daughter on the fifteenth of this month.”

  “I can’t thank you enough….”

  “Oh, yes.” She made a wry face. “You can thank me enough. You’ll probably think your thanks are onerous before they’re done. I am to be assigned to Prince Delganor, as a kind of tour guide, showing visiting dignitaries around the greenhouses, the galleries, the stables. Father was furious, though he’s settled a bit by now. He feels the duties are beneath a marchioness. I don’t know what he thinks I am able to do that would be worthy of my rank! Except, perhaps, to marry someone who would be helpful to his career. That seems to be the end toward which all the female nobility is driven! Can’t they understand it’s … it’s criminal!”

  Alicia tittered, a slight, trembling sound. “Criminality has its devotees, when the rewards are high enough. Still, you mustn’t say so, dear. Not to anyone but me. When did you arrive at all this?”

  Genevieve smiled, though without much amusement. “Truth to tell, Alicia, it came upon me, all at once … like a vision.”

  Alicia peered at her closely. “Ah. Like a vision.”

  “Yes. Perhaps my cynicism comes in good time. Better I have it early than too late. At any rate, His Majesty said you should acquaint me with my new duties as you had once performed similar ones, and then he remarked on our visit to the greenhouses that morning. I only hope for your sake that he did not overhear our conversation.”

  “The place I picked was all right,” said the Duchess. “One of the gardeners works for me as a kind of … gossip. He tells me bits and pieces, what the butler or cook says, what the footmen overhear from dinner table conversation, you know. The palace servants know there are listening devices for they are the ones who install them.” She laughed again, this time genuinely. “Though there are bought-men who actually do the listening, Aresians, I’ve heard, for the Lord Paramount does not trust anyone else. Despite that, the placement of the devices is left to the palace servants, for it is the custom that anything to do with the house is done by the servants of that house. Royals never think of their servants as being people! Lords Paramount don’t consider commoners capable of independent thought or motivation, but I’ve come to know that the palace servants are capable of a great deal. They live upon graft and influence, my dear. A little oil here, to grease the wheels, a little push there, to mitigate a decision. The servants who trade in such matters are careful to leave dead spots between the spy-ears so they and their donors can negotiate privately.”

  Genevieve shuddered with agonized relief, an emotion too painful to be enjoyed but too reassuring to resent. “Then I’m right. I’m not imagining it. Someone is listening.”

  “Oh, yes, my dear. Somehow, His Majesty finds out almost everything we say and do, no matter where we are, in our houses, our carriages, our bedrooms, including, I sometimes think, our private closets, and no doubt there are specialists who listen to our most indelicate noises in the hope of decoding a conspiracy. They are listening everywhere but out-of-doors, and, I think, sometimes even there.”

  “Father wouldn’t believe me. No, he chooses not to believe me.”

  The Duchess nodded understandingly. “I wondered about it to Gardagger only once, sounding properly foolish in case it was a taboo subject, as it turned out to be, for I was told to keep my mouth shut. Either Gardagger doesn’t believe it or, more likely, he doesn’t care. The older men don’t seem to worry about it. As though they are immune to whatever the Lord Paramount is doing.”

  “Alicia, where do the young mothers go?”

  The Duchess turned ashen. Her lips writhed back from her teeth, and she threw back her head, the long tendons of her neck stretching as though she wanted them to break, wanted her head to fly off, fly away. She trembled, a wracking
convulsion, as though every muscle was drawn taut.

  “They die,” she whispered. “While they’re nursing, they die. While their breasts are swollen with milk, they die.”

  “Why do they die?”

  The Duchess turned away, hiding her face from the house, tears flowing down her face. “It’s the fevers! So they say, all the physicians from Chamis, and the people here at court, but … I can’t believe it, Genevieve. It doesn’t happen to the servants! Not often, at least. It doesn’t happen in the little villages. It only happens in Havenor, or in the noble houses.”

  “So, if I married, if I had a child …”

  “You’d want to go to a village, Genevieve. Maybe the air is cleaner in the villages, maybe it’s in the diet they eat there, or some herb they use for seasoning, but you’re almost sure to be safe in a village. You’d want to get there before the child was born if you could, or as soon after as possible, to nurse it and wean it, quick as could be.”

  “You were a young mother. Twice.”

  “Yes. But my babies were born in County Benderly in Dania, in a tiny village where no one even knew who I was. When I was twenty, I ran off and married a commoner, Genevieve, and I didn’t tell my family where I was, not for years. Such a scandal. I am the youngest daughter of Tranquish, Earl of Rivernigh, Duke of Dania, and he and I were invited to court, like you and your father. The Lord Paramount proposed I should marry this old … boarpig of a man, father to the current Duke of Barfezi. My half-sister had been married off to an old man, and she’d had a daughter and had died while she was nursing the baby, and I’d felt a kind of warning, maybe only a suspicion, but I wasn’t of a mind to emulate her.

  “There was a young guardsman from Dania among His Majesty’s guards. I met him when I was leading my little tours at the palace, and we fell in love. He had a small holding in Dania, a good little farm. So, I ran off alone, first, so no one would suspect him. He met me later, and we hid in plain sight in Dania. It’s truth, the searchers couldn’t see past the mud on my face and the tangles in my hair! Oh, Genevieve! We sang at our work! The whole village sang! It was wonderful. We had three children, two daughters and a son, all of whom lived! Then, fifteen years after we ran away, my husband disappeared. He went hunting, up into the mountains. He never returned, no one ever found him.