Kingdom of Ash and Soot

by C. S. Johnson

  “The one who accosted you?” Ben looked down at the Turk and frowned. “With the knife?”

  “My apologies,” the man said. He pulled out his curved dagger from underneath his cloak, presenting it before us as proof of who he was. “Yes, I am the man you saw yesterday.”

  “Why did you come here?” I asked again, my voice angry and loud. “Who do you think you are, to be here—”

  “Eleanora, that’s enough.”

  Lady POW’s voice cut through my vicious triumph, severing its full life force with the power of her words.

  I swiveled around to see her enter the library, with Harshad at her heels.

  “Lady Penelope,” I exclaimed, “this man is—”

  The Turk reached out and took my hand, squeezing it firmly. “I am not an intruder,” he interrupted. He moved quickly, standing up with my forced assistance. “I do believe I have startled Lady Eleanora.”

  “Well, you are a Turk, and I’ve heard there have been more Turkish thieves in the city of late.”

  “Eleanora, do not allow prejudices to cloud your vision,” Lady Penelope said. “Skin and race are no more proper judges of character than wealth, health, or wisdom. The devil believes in oversimplifications, but I do not.”

  I blushed at her comments, knowing I agreed with her in principle. If the man had not stolen from me, I would not have said anything at all, let alone attacked him.

  “Amir here is harmless, Eleanora, and I have good reason to trust him with nothing less than my life.”

  The Turk glimpsed over at Lady Penelope, rubbing his side where I had managed to hit him. “She has an impressive left hook, Lady Penelope.”

  “Does she?” Lady POW moved gracefully into the room, making herself home at my father’s desk, just as she had the previous night. She sat down and smoothed out her skirts. “Well, I guess some good came out of her attacking you, then.”

  I had no doubt there was befuddled look on my face as Lady POW tapped her fingers together. “Eleanora, this is Amir Qureshi, my medical consultant and confidant. He has been in my service for the last thirteen years, although we have known each other for much longer. What is it now, Amir? Nearly thirty years?”

  “Twenty-five, Madame.”

  For the first time, I noticed the small threads of silver at the sides of his temples. Before, I would have easily guessed he was in his thirties, but it was clear he was at least forty. “Enchanté,” I muttered, the barest amount above polite I could muster.

  “Amir, allow me to properly introduce my granddaughter.”

  Harshad scowled beside her. “As you might have already seen, she is Dezda’s daughter to the bone.”

  Dezda? I frowned. Was she talking about my mother?

  Suddenly, the earlier conversation Ben and I had overheard made a lot more sense. And it made me a lot more suspicious.

  “I have seen it is so,” Amir agreed, “although there are several hints of her father.”

  I sneered at his too-proper tone.

  “I’m hoping not too much,” Lady Penelope said, making me further frustrated. I hated how she talked over me, as if I was not present. “Now that I’ve found my grandchildren here, I see it was a needless errand to send a servant for them.”

  “I’ll attend to rescinding the order.” Amir turned to me. “Will you see me out of the room, mademoiselle? So you may see I am not a philistine or mongrel of sorts?”

  I glowered at him but took his outstretched arm. As we approached the doorway, he whispered, “Please, do not tell Lady Penelope about yesterday. I will explain myself at a later time, if you will only let me. You have my word.”

  “Your word means nothing to me. You took my father’s book.”

  “Your father’s book?” He frowned, and then shook his head. “Never mind. I will explain myself and my actions to you, and this I swear on the soul of your mother.”

  As he made his vow, Amir covered my hands with his, and that was when I noticed the burning white scribble seared into the skin of his right hand.

  The stark white of the scar, a large half-loop dotted with a searing square, winked at me against the library light.

  “Please, mademoiselle,” he whispered. “There is much more going on than you realize.”

  I looked into his eyes and then back down at his hand. Seeing the crispy outline of the mark against his knuckles made me soften. It was an older scar, but it hid a deeper pain. I thought the shape of it looked vaguely familiar, but I had trouble recalling where I had seen it. “Fine,” I said through clenched teeth. “But I will hold it against you if you give me any trouble.”

  “Not only your mother’s daughter, but your grandmother’s granddaughter as well, I see.” The smile on his face was a sad, rueful one.

  “Eleanora,” Lady POW called. “What is taking so long?”

  Amir’s hands slipped out of mine. “She just wanted to make sure I was feeling well, Lady Penelope,” he replied.

  “Did I ask you something, Amir? I believe I was talking to Eleanora.”

  “My apologies, Madame.” Amir’s smile turned wry as he looked back at me. “Excuse me.”

  I watched him for a long moment as he left, eyeing the small outline of his dagger from beneath his cloak.

  He had better keep his promise.

  I was intrigued, if somewhat repulsed, by the man my grandmother trusted so much.

  As I walked back toward Lady POW and Ben, I glanced over at Harshad. He was quiet and still, and he did not look back at me, even though I had a feeling he was still taking in everything from around the room.

  “Now, then,” Lady Penelope said. “To business.”

  Ben narrowed his eyes at me.

  I pretended not to notice. He had been right, but the earlier conversation we overheard only added more mystery. I was interested, even if family came after business.

  “I will start by suggesting you stay in this half of the manor for your own safety while Cecilia and I settle our legal disputes.”

  I briefly thought of Máma’s locket and Táta’s watch, still tucked away under the pantry floor. I will have to go and retrieve them soon if I want to keep them safe.

  “What happens to us after that?” Ben asked.

  “That is the question, is it not?” Lady Penelope mused. “I know I have neglected my duties as your grandmother for far too long. I know there is much hurt between us—”

  “The hurt seems to just be with us,” Ben interrupted.

  “Not all pain is seen, Benedict.” Her tone was distinctly soft, and I felt a hint of the feeling behind it.

  Whether or not I believed it was a different story, however. I knew Ben was likely unsure of her sincerity. He grumbled and crossed his arms, but he went silent.

  “I would first seek to make amends—should you choose to allow me. I have coerced Cecilia into allowing you to make that choice,” Lady Penelope said.

  I was not as interested in making amends as I was getting answers to my questions, which seemed to be accumulating by the moment. It was time to do something. “We heard you need us for something,” I said. “You said I would make a good cover. What were you talking about?”

  Harshad’s mouth dropped open, before he glared at Lady POW. She shot him a smug look before turning to me. I was expecting her to explain herself, but even though she was clearly pleased by my admission, she waved the matter aside.

  “You will see later,” she said briskly.

  Did she want me to overhear their conversation? I wondered. Or is she just happy that I did?

  Before I could ask, Lady POW turned toward a stack of papers on the desk. “Now, Lady Cecilia was kind enough not to test my patience—much. She has shown me her budgets for the last several years, and I am prepared to restore your inheritance.”

  “Thank you,” I said. “But—”

  “That will include a new wardrobe for you, Eleanora. If you are in agreement, I will make arrangements for your introduction to Society at once. While we are her
e, waiting for my man of affairs to make settlements with your stepmother, we can send you out on several social calls. It is the perfect time, too, as the Diets are in session and the elites of Prague will be ripe for entertainment.”

  “But I’m not an entertainer,” I cut in, tired of letting her interrupt me.

  “You may not be an entertainer, but you will be a sensation. I will see to your wardrobe and your manners, and then we will go out and introduce you to the town. Even his Imperial Highness King Ferdinand V will be eager to meet you once I am finished with you.”

  “What? Why—?”

  “It will be an adventure,” Lady Penelope insisted. “And we can make up for our lost time.”

  I hesitated to object; I did not want to dampen Lady POW’s spirits. She seemed much happier than she had the previous evening, and some part of me was secretly thrilled. All my years of yearning for my mother came rushing at me, and it pushed back against my fears and questions.

  “Harshad is right—you are clearly Dezda’s daughter,” Lady Penelope said, flicking another snippy gaze over at her colleague. “She was a beauty.”

  “I do remember Táta saying so,” I whispered. I glanced over at Ben, and my resolve found itself again. “What about Ben?”

  “Yes, indeed. What is it that you want, Benedict?” Lady Penelope asked.

  Ben stilled beside me. “I will have to think about it.”

  “What is there to think about?” Lady Penelope scoffed.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Ben muttered. “If there is anything I want for sure, it’s just Nora to be happy.”

  I was touched by my brother’s concern, but Lady POW bristled.

  “Believing that your own happiness is not feasible does have a tendency to limit it. You might already know that, from what I have seen.”

  Ben scowled. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It’s easy to be altruistic when there is no real sacrifice involved.”

  “I—”

  “It’s clear that you believe your life is meaningless,” Lady Penelope said. “Is it because of your leg? Do you think you’ve become useless because of it? Or do you just want to be unhappy?”

  Ben stared at her, speechless. I tried to speak up and defend Ben, but Lady POW stopped me. She held up her hand, making me think of Tulia briefly. “Stop, Eleanora,” she barked. “This is not about you, despite what your brother thinks. This is about his pride, his damaged sense of honor, and how he can overcome his shame.”

  “I have no shame in who I am,” Ben retorted.

  “Not in who, but in what.”

  “This isn’t something you should talk about,” I interrupted. “Ben doesn’t like—”

  “The truth?” Lady Penelope turned back to me. “He doesn’t like the truth, Eleanora? Is that what you were going to say?”

  “No.” I blushed. “I was going to say he doesn’t like to talk about his injury, that’s all.”

  “If only the world could work in such a way that everything we did not like would go away if we would only cease to talk about it.” Lady Penelope threw Harshad a wry look over her shoulder. “That would do wonders for us, would it not, Harshad?”

  Harshad continued to say nothing, even though I could tell he there was nothing more he wanted in that moment than to speak up.

  Lady POW shook her head at Ben. “I am asking you to allow me to make your life better. It is time I rectify my mistakes after all these years.”

  “Mistakes?” I asked.

  Lady Penelope’s lips suddenly tightened into a twisted grimace, and I blinked in shock, realizing I had caught her slip up before she did.

  “Yes. My mistakes.”

  “Pepé, stop.” Harshad lunged forward with a speedy grace that belied his age, gripping her wrist as she reached for something at her side.

  “Enough,” Ben objected. “We already know you’re hiding something from us. If she is going to tell us what it is, I want to hear it. That’s what I want.”

  “Me, too.” I reached out and took Ben’s arm in support. “Tell us why you are here. And tell us what it has to do with Dr. Artha’s death.”

  Lady POW’s eyebrows raised, while Ben and Harshad both whirled to face me.

  “So, you know of Dr. Artha’s murder?” Lady Penelope asked.

  “I heard rumors in the city,” I said, suddenly determined to keep Ferdy and Clavan out of any of my explanations. Her causal tone was disconcerting.

  “Rumors are one thing, but truth is another.”

  “Then tell us the truth,” Ben grumbled.

  Lady POW sat down and folded her hands together in careful consideration. “Is that what you really want?” She briefly narrowed her eyes at Harshad, and I saw his face sour even more as he saw me look at him.

  “Yes,” Ben insisted.

  Lady Penelope ignored the fury in his gaze. She turned to me. “What of you, Eleanora? You will not be able to go back to not knowing, once you learn the truth. Do you still want to know?”

  Sudden fear and solid certainty took hold of me. “Yes,” I said, unsure if I had the bravery to match my sudden bravado.

  Lady Penelope cast another quick, triumphant look over at Harshad, who pursed his lips in further displeasure. A silent battle continued between them, but he stepped back.

  “Very well then, Benedict, Eleanora,” Lady Penelope said. “I will tell you the truth. But it does not start, nor stop, with me. I must tell you about your mother and the Order of the Crystal Daggers.”

  *7*

  ◊

  Lady POW clasped her hands together. I scooted forward on my seat, dreading and anticipating what she would reveal. If hearing the truth was the price for our freedom, I knew telling us the truth also required a price from her.

  “My Eleanor, your mother, was a member of an elite, secret society once known as the Order of the Crystal Daggers,” Lady Penelope said. “Before she died, she handled several delicate assignments on behalf of certain kingdoms and governments.”

  Ben and I only looked at her, torn between reactions, as we waited for her to go on.

  What could I really say? Máma had died many years ago. I remembered her the way one might recall a strange and vivid dream; sometimes I would forget about her for days at a time, and then I would smell a familiar scent, or recall a certain memory, and I would long for her embrace. Before Cecilia came to the manor, I would walk past the portrait Táta had commissioned of her, truly seeing her face stilled in the dried oil; at those moments, I would be caught back in that feeling of wondering where she was, and how I missed her.

  To imagine her as a government worker, as someone who did not spend her days taking care of our family or seeing to our needs, was not beyond my capability; it just seemed beyond believability.

  It seemed to be beyond Ben’s, too.

  “Otec never mentioned anything like that,” Ben said. “And I never saw anything to indicate you are telling the truth.”

  “Your father was part of her last assignment,” Lady Penelope said. “She was supposed to come down here with some others and take care of King Ferdinand V during the Revolution of 1848.”

  Ben and I exchanged glances. From his eyes, I could tell he was frustrated—and afraid. I was surprised to realize I was, too. The beautiful lady in that portrait had always been a loving, maternal memory, and it was troubling to hear she had led such a contrasting life prior to my birth. My childhood innocence had long been gone, thanks to Cecilia’s callousness and my father’s death, but I felt a secret pillar of my heart splinter as my memory of my mother, a relic born of ignorance and illusion, began to crumble.

  “This was not an unusual task for a member of the Order to handle,” Lady Penelope continued. “The Order goes back several hundred years, starting with the warriors of Constantine. When he converted to Christianity, there were several more threats on his life from those in the kingdom he had displeased. Everyone from the pagans to the Jews were upset at his conversion and his success as a l
eader. There were others, of course, who were upset with him long before that.”

  “Saint Constantine?” I asked, briefly recalling the church’s Latin rites. “That is who you mean, correct?”

  “Yes. Forgive my confusion. The Church of England does put a barrier between me and Catholicism. But Constantine had a particularly sharp intuition for betrayal,” Lady Penelope said. “Under his rule, the Byzantine Empire commissioned a small, secret group of elite members to protect him. As time went on, and the empire collapsed in on itself, the last of the rulers, in a desperate attempt to gain allies, pushed the Order to protect more allies of the surrounding nations. The group decentralized, and loyalties shifted. Today, the Order itself spans many nations. Queen Victoria herself sent us out here to investigate the situation and keep the status quo.”

  “Why is the British Empire sending you out here?” Ben asked.

  “Her Imperial Majesty wants to ensure the safety of the trade routes to the Orient and the Indies.”

  “Many consider her to be a powerful ruler, even in my home country,” Harshad added. “Her vocal support has kept these lands, and others, stable during growing political divides. But not all are happy with her support.”

  “Is that who sent Máma out here the first time?” I asked. “Queen Victoria?”

  “No.” Lady Penelope shook her head. “Back then, it was the papal state government, under His Holiness Pope Pius IX himself, that requested aid, for Savoy’s sake.”

  “Empress Maria Anna,” Ben said. “King Ferdinand’s wife.”

  I thought of the lady I’d only seen in small pamphlets, the one who had once ruled as my country’s queen as well as the Empress of Austria and Hungary. She was rumored to be devoted to the church and her husband, with her only other love reserved for traveling throughout Bohemia during the summer and decorating Prague Castle in abundant Christmas decorations every year.

  Briefly, I thought of the half-torn invitation to the Advent Ball Ferdy had handed me. Despite all the confusion of our present situation, I could not stop wondering if I would be able to go to the Empress’ ball, now that I had the chance to be free from Cecilia. I clasped my hands together tightly, trying to keep the sudden excitement inside of me to myself.