Icestorm

by Theresa Dahlheim

  “No,” Tabitha told her firmly, relieved that Attarine was jumping at shadows. “I think she knows that we are friends, that’s all.”

  “But what if … ?” Attarine’s words trailed away.

  “We can’t do anything about it,” Isabelle sent, with the mental equivalent of a shrug.

  “I don’t think we need to worry,” Tabitha soothed Attarine. “Lady Josselin was as shocked about what happened out there as we were.” Graegor had told Tabitha that. He had heard it from Lord Contare, who had also been disgusted by Natayl’s stunt at the Hippodrome, and of course Graegor himself had been quite angry about it.

  Attarine smoothed her pink skirt in an anxious gesture. “Did you tell Lord Graegor?”

  “No.” It had never occurred to her to tell him.

  That finally made Attarine relax. “I was afraid you would, now that …” Her words faded for a moment as a new anxiety rose. “I’m sorry. It’s not my place. Forgive me.”

  Tabitha withdrew her mind from both of them to avoid sending anything unkind. It was not Attarine’s place. Attarine and all the others had been very surprised when she had told them about Graegor, since she had never told them about the forced bonding and had never expressed any interest in him. Isabelle had not said a word, but the twist of her mouth had spoken volumes. The fact that he was Telgard had bothered Attarine, and Tabitha had thought that that was mere prejudice, but clearly it went beyond that, since Attarine was worried that Tabitha would tell Graegor about the pledging.

  But even if he did learn about it, he would never tell anyone, not if she told him not to. She knew that he would help her thwart Natayl however he could, because he hated the way Natayl treated her.

  Natayl would definitely have to be hundreds of miles away when she and Graegor slept together. She preferred thousands.

  There were two more weeks in the mourning period. Thank God she did not have to go to the coronation herself. Natayl planned to simply change shape and fly there, so obviously she could not accompany him. It did mean that he would be coming back after only a few days, so Tabitha intended to spend every one of those days with Graegor.

  It was so sweet, how eager he was to please her. He always deferred to her choice of which play they would see, what to have to eat or drink during the intermissions, and even which route the carriage should take back to Natayl’s townhouse. He had been a little startled, but had not objected, when she had suggested that he grow a beard. A beard and a shorter haircut would make him look more handsome, she thought, although she had been careful to not let him sense that she thought he needed to look more handsome. She did not want him to be anxious about how he looked. It was not as important as how he kissed.

  Two more magi girls came in, and the parlor room was now uncomfortably full, with all the girls except Tabitha sitting on the footstools or the divan, leaving the wingback chairs for the sorceresses. No one spoke, although Tabitha was sure that silent conversations were swirling all around her. Koren was at the tea table, stirring something steaming in a fine cup, and she turned expectantly to the door a moment before Lady Josselin appeared.

  “Good afternoon, ladies,” the Khenroxan sorceress said in Mazespaak. “Please, stay seated.” She was such a remarkably tall woman, with waves and curls of hair framing her face. She was wearing a long tan dress with white piping, and a string of jet beads around her neck fell nearly to her waist.

  But she was old. Her hair was almost all grey and frizzy, and her back was slightly bent. Her face was very wrinkled, especially around her eyes, and veins stood out on her neck. Tabitha knew all of this, had seen all of this before when meeting and talking to Lady Josselin, but suddenly, now, it mattered. Lovemaking, pregnancy, childbirth, and other things of that nature. Tabitha tried to imagine asking any other old woman about such things, and it almost made her wrinkle her nose.

  As Lady Josselin settled herself in the wingback chair opposite Tabitha, Koren came forward with the cup of hot tea she had been preparing. “Thank you, dear.” The sorceress took a sip and set the cup down on the table by her elbow. “Would anyone like more to drink before we get started?”

  Tabitha still had most of her iced tea and so shook her head, and the other girls did the same, even those without glasses or cups. Lady Josselin smiled at them all, and it was a very grandmotherly smile. “Let me see, we have eleven guests today. I think you all know at least a little Mazespaak, and I’ll try to always speak slowly and clearly so that it’s less difficult to understand. But I will also stop and translate from time to time.” She promptly did this, repeating herself first in Khenroxan, then Adelard, Thendalian, and Telgardian. She spoke Thendalian flawlessly, and Tabitha could only assume that she was just as proficient in all the other languages. She had lived so long she probably knew every language in the world.

  Natayl probably does too, Tabitha realized. It was something else she had never asked him.

  “You all know me, of course,” the sorceress returned to Mazespaak to say. “I am Josselin fa Lairconaig, once Princess of Khenroxa, now its Lady Sorceress.” She nodded toward Koren, who was standing beside the third wingback chair with an armload of thin books that looked like volumes from the holy tracts. “Many of you know my heir, Lady Koren fa Lairconaig, another member of my ancient family who will hold this office. Lady Tabitha de Betaul, the heir of the Sorcerer of Thendalia, is also from an ancient family.” And here she nodded to Tabitha, who nodded back. “I mention these families and titles not to intimidate any of you, but because I am proud of my heritage and I am sure that these young sorceresses are proud of theirs. So should you be proud of yours, even if your father was a beggar and your mother was a thief. You are magi, which gives you nobility anywhere in the world. Among the magi, there are no lowborn and no baseborn. All that matters is what you choose to do with the talents that Lord Abban has given you.”

  Tabitha felt rather ashamed of herself for hesitating to accept Isabelle because of her cousin’s bastard birth. She was glad she had done the right thing, and had even said the same thing that Lady Josselin was saying now.

  As Lady Josselin repeated all this in each language, Koren stepped around the room and gave each of the girls, even Tabitha, one of the little leather-bound books. Isabelle immediately opened hers, and Tabitha saw that the title page was printed in Thendalian: A Guide for Magi Women. Lady Josselin’s name was at the bottom, along with a paragraph in type too small for Tabitha to read over Isabelle’s shoulder. She knew she could open her own book, but Nan had taught her that it was rude to read when someone in the room was speaking.

  Lady Josselin turned to the Khenroxan girl sitting to her right and said, “This is Maga Lily. She is from Baltiorin, where her family has lived for several generations as blacksmiths and goldsmiths.” This time she did not stop to translate, instead just smiling at the girl before looking past her to the next. “This is Maga Brigita, who comes to us from Jen Idre …”

  When she reached Attarine, Lady Josselin said, “This is Maga Attarine. She is of the house of Jasinthe and is a first cousin to the queen of Thendalia.” There was nothing in Lady Josselin’s manner or voice to hint that she knew anything more about Attarine than that. She moved on to Isabelle. “This is Maga Isabelle. She is from Ponterose, and she is a first cousin to Lady Tabitha, on their mothers’ side. Her father is a minstrel, and I understand that she has inherited his singing talent.”

  “You can sing?” Tabitha sent incredulously to Isabelle as Lady Josselin introduced the next girl. “You never told me.”

  “It didn’t seem important,” Isabelle answered, a little defensively.

  “I must hear you sometime,” she sent, not exactly knowing why it upset her that Isabelle had not told her.

  “Sometime,” was Isabelle’s quick answer, but then her mind withdrew.

  Once Lady Josselin had introduced all of the magi girls, she took another sip of her tea, then gave them another very grandmotherly smile. “Today we are going to talk about our bodi
es.”

  Some of the girls shifted in their seats, or took sips of their drinks, or looked down at their laps, but Tabitha kept still. Movement meant discomfort, and no one here should think that these subjects made Lady Tabitha de Betaul the slightest bit uncomfortable. Even if the speaker of the subjects was so very, very old.

  “The books Lady Koren just gave you cover all the topics we will be discussing today,” Lady Josselin said. “You have each received one in your native language, but if you would like one in Mazespaak as well, just ask me at the end of the party. I designed the books to look like holy tracts so that if you want to carry yours with you, you can still be discreet. There are blank pages in the back for your own notes. I have a few more little gifts for each of you as well, but we will get to those in due time.”

  She took another sip of tea. “As I said, we are going to talk about our bodies. This is by no means forbidden knowledge, or scandalous knowledge. It is knowledge every woman must have.” After translating, she continued. “Despite my great age, I never cease to be appalled at the ignorance in which women are allowed to remain, or forced to remain, in most parts of the world. Not only are women rarely taught letters, math, history, or other disciplines, but they are not even taught the facts about their own bodies, not even by other women. Without knowledge of your body, and more specifically your menstruation, you can’t control your childbearing. When you girls return to your homelands to serve your people as magi, no matter if you have the healing gift or not, this is what the women will be asking you most frequently: how to avoid, or achieve, pregnancy. As you might expect, there is a medical obelisk from the Arrival that devotes an entire side to this topic, and as you might not expect, there are sections of some holy tracts devoted to it as well. You will study all these works and others, including some of my own books, during your time at the Academy. For your reference, there is a list of these books in the back of the book you are holding now.”

  Nan had never said anything at all to Tabitha about menstruation. Beatris had ended up being the one to tell her and Pamela everything, since Nan had died before Tabitha had first bled. Possibly Beatris would have ended up being the one anyway.

  Lady Josselin launched into a discussion of what she called a woman’s “monthly cycle”. She peppered her instruction with, “You’ll learn more about this when you take the class,” and nearly everything she said matched what Beatris had told Tabitha and Pamela years ago. Beatris, or maybe Mistress Cortille, might have read Lady Josselin’s books. The sorceress talked about the onset of menstruation and how a girl could take several years to settle into a predictable rhythm. She also said that magi girls, and particularly sorceresses, might always have irregular cycles and even frequently skip a month. Tabitha had to smooth from her face a reaction to this bit of information. So that was why it had taken two months for her to bleed after Alain.

  Don’t think about Alain. Alain never existed. Nicolas never existed. Nothing that happened before matters. Only Graegor. He is the only one.

  Lady Josselin talked about what happened in each week of the cycle, from bleeding to dryness to discharge to dryness and bleeding again. As Tabitha had learned from Beatris, it was only for one or two days in the month that a girl could get pregnant. Each girl was different, and each month could be different, and while most women were fertile on the fourteenth day of their cycles, many women were not. “So, ladies, the best way to determine when you yourself are fertile is to take note of any discharge on your underclothes, and to take your temperature every morning when you wake up.”

  Koren was moving around the room again, giving each girl another leather-bound book, but these were printed only with a grid pattern on each page. She also passed out glass thermometers in padded metal cases. Tabitha had never used one since she had never been sick or feverish, but she had seen Mistress Cortille use one before, and Beatris kept one among her personal things. Some of the other girls obviously had never seen a glass thermometer before, and they held the narrow tubes gingerly, peering at the etched numbers and tick marks.

  “The liquid inside the tube is called mercury,” Lady Josselin explained. “When exposed to heat, the liquid expands. In the tube, it reaches levels marked on the outside. Healers use these to check patients for fever. But you can use it to detect the day that you will be fertile. As you know, the waking bell at the dormitory sounds once, and then a second time a few minutes after the first. When the first bell wakes you up, put the thermometer in your mouth like this, under your tongue.” The sorceress demonstrated with the stirring stick from her tea. As she continued her explanation about how the girls should read and record their temperatures, Tabitha had to wonder how many Academy girls actually did this. She wondered how many of them actually had to worry about getting pregnant.

  “A benefit to this method,” the sorceress said, “is that it can be taught to any woman, magi or not, and it can be used to avoid or to achieve pregnancy. Obviously, some women will still have difficulty getting pregnant when they want to, and some will still become pregnant when they don’t want to. Nothing is foolproof, but this is a good guide, and a good place to start.”

  Lady Josselin took another sip of her tea, and Koren started around the room yet again, this time skipping Tabitha as she gave each girl what looked like a necklace. Tabitha peered at Isabelle’s and saw that it was a long, thin silver chain with a small round pendant.

  “You have probably seen these, or heard of them,” Lady Josselin said. “I call them ‘women’s charms’. Men call them ‘love chains’ or ‘free rides’, which I personally find obnoxious. These are thaumat’argent, which is of course the best metal for holding spells. Gold works very well too, as does silver. You can even use copper, but it is not as effective, and it can leave a discoloration on the skin.”

  Tabitha tapped Isabelle’s mind, and her cousin lifted the charm she held for Tabitha to see more closely. The coin-sized circle had wide ridges at the edges and a vague imprint of a teardrop on each side, just like most other charms Tabitha had seen.

  “Now, these charms can be used by magi women or ordinary women, but obviously only magi can set the spell. They are more effective for you, as magi women, because you can reset your own charm every day instead of once a week or once a month.”

  The charm Tabitha had given her father would have no chance to be reset at all. The merchant had told her that it did not need to be. She should not have believed him. All spells needed to be reset.

  Lady Josselin continued. “You wear the charm around your middle, low on your hips so that the pendant rests below your navel. Every day, hold it in your hand and recite a simple spell to reinforce the idea that you don’t want to be pregnant. Most women use phrases like ‘plant no seed’ or ‘no child now’. All the usual rules for spellcasting apply, which, of course, you’ll learn in your classes.”

  “My lady,” someone said, and every face in the room turned to her. She could not blame them for being shocked, Tabitha thought. No one else had dared speak a word the entire time. The Adelard maga’s cheeks turned bright pink at the sudden attention, and she bowed her head. Her brown hair was so thin that Tabitha could see the pale skin of her scalp.

  “Maga Samari,” Lady Josselin said kindly, and then said something in Adelard. The maga swallowed and spoke without looking up, gesturing to the charm. Lady Josselin answered, and they had a brief conversation before the sorceress turned back to the rest of them. “Maga Samari says that her mother told her that only whores need these charms.”

  By the careful silence that met this, Tabitha suspected that other mothers had also told their daughters that. Lady Josselin continued. “Here is my answer. Despite arguments to the contrary, teaching girls how to avoid pregnancy does not make them promiscuous. It makes them not pregnant. It is absurd, and insulting, to believe that girls who know their fertile days will feel free to go to bed with boys on other days, or that girls who wear these charms are ready to sleep with any boy who asks.” She repeat
ed this in Thendalian, Khenroxan, and Telgardian, and then said, “Do you all understand?”

  “Yes, my lady,” they chorused.

  “As for anyone’s mother,” the sorceress went on, “I hope you will be able to tell her that you are doing what you feel is right for you. You are not required to track your cycle or wear a charm. I am giving you these items so that you have the option of using them or not. It’s no one’s business but yours.”

  “Yes, my lady,” several girls murmured.

  “Regarding taking your temperature each morning,” the sorceress said, “I had a student once ask me if the dormitory headmistress would be angry if she knew about it.” She paused to take another sip of tea. “She won’t. With its other benefits, tracking your monthly cycle allows you to know when you’ll bleed. As we all know, bleeding can be very inconvenient, and the cramps can be painful. It’s good to know when to expect it, and be able to plan around it.”

  A curly-haired Khenroxan maga raised her hand. When Lady Josselin nodded to her, she asked, in decent Mazespaak, “My lady, how did you discover all of this? Was it on the obelisks?”

  Lady Josselin smiled. “I ‘discovered’ almost none of this. My contribution to the understanding of human reproduction is limited to small refinements of existing knowledge. Other sorceresses have done work in this area as well. You are correct in that some of it was originally written on one of the obelisks.” She then nodded at Tabitha, then at Koren. “Sorceresses can’t become pregnant. This is well known. Sorceress Khisrathi of the fifth generation conducted extensive experiments and studies on this, since she feared she would die before her time and leave Telgardia without a sorceress. She did not succeed in bearing a child, and she did die before her successor was born. But her research was meticulous and extremely well documented, and it is the foundation of my own.” Here Lady Josselin smiled. “Unlike her, I did not try to become pregnant. But I used her findings to conduct my own research with ordinary and magi women in order to understand fertility and infertility. I have written two books on the subject and hope to finish one more.”