“I know it’s hard, dear. Lina’s still beside herself. She dug up every inch of the garden and took it to that place where she’s been staying.” As her mother took a sip of water, Agna sourly reflected that Lina had been “staying” in her apartment over the herbalist’s shop for a year and a half. Her parents still didn’t quite believe it, did they. It didn’t fit the plan.
Agna’s mother laced her fingers together on the table, her wedding rings on each hand catching a beam of sunlight. “But I want you to feel at home here, too. We have the guest room made up for you. If you want to take a nap before breakfast, I can tell Cook to wait.”
Agna nodded until she could get control of her words. “Yes. Thank you. I’d appreciate that.”
“All right, sweetheart. We’ll talk when you’re ready.” Leaving the glasses and pitchers, Agna’s mother swept off toward one of the closed oak doors. “Where is Raffaele with your luggage?”
“I told him to leave it. I didn’t realize I’d be staying. It’s just one bag, anyway.”
That little sigh-scoff was another thing Agna didn’t realize she’d missed. “I’ll send for it, then. Come, the guest room is this way.”
Agna straightened her skirts as she stood, and followed her mother to the unfamiliar room. She would get some sleep and a bath and some food, and she would retool her argument until it fit this world she didn’t know.
* * *
When she emerged from the guest suite, her father sat at one of the small tables in the central room, nursing a cup of tea and reading the morning paper. Agna set her grievances aside to give him a hug, covertly studying him for signs of ill health and finding nothing. He’d gained a few pounds, maybe, but he looked the same as he ever had. He waved off the beginnings of her arguments, excusing himself to dress for the day.
Agna’s mother led her out onto the rooftop garden to take in some fresh air, until their new cook finished their breakfast. “I can just make myself something,” Agna said without thinking. “I don’t mean to be a bother.”
“Don’t be silly. Cook’s magnificent; just give him some time.”
Agna ran her fingers through the soft needles of a rosemary bush and inhaled the calming scent. Was this the same rosemary that Lina had planted in this pot at home? It seemed unlikely, but Agna found herself hoping it was.
“Silvano and Alessa had their second child last month,” Agna’s mother remarked. Silvano was her brother’s youngest child, Agna’s first cousin, already nearly forty and living on the other end of the city. Agna remembered the entirety of her mother’s family, the Sivitas, as a pack of young, threadbare artists haunting the background of her parents’ holiday parties, stuffing themselves with appetizers and wine. Most of them had since become established in art and commerce, and were twice as old as she remembered, but her childhood memories held. “Alessa is a Pirci on her mother’s side, so it isn’t the best time, but they could hardly have known that nine months ago.”
“Hmm.” The Pircis were nobles, the same clan to whom Marco was related. Agna set a hand on the balustrade and looked down. Delivery wagons and servants rushed along the street, laying the groundwork for the day’s business. A sign in one of the shop windows sparked a memory. “I meant to ask — what’s going on with the succession? We’ve gotten hardly any news in Kavera, but I saw so many posters on the way in.”
“Oh, that.” Her mother’s hands brushed the subject from the air. “The king is not at his best, it’s safe to say, so it’s time to butt one another from the hill like goats.”
“Is Alessa going to be all right, do you think? And Marco?”
“Alessa is a Sivita now, so they’ve no right to push her around. Marco you’ll have to ask yourself, dear, I try not to get involved in Naire’s business. It’s bad enough to be waist-deep in your father’s dealings half the time.”
Agna frowned behind her mother’s back. Naire’s business? Marco was family now, or the next closest thing, as Letta’s partner. Certainly his position in the Nocta Agency was important, but it seemed more relevant now that he was her cousin-in-law in all but the formalities, and her own ally in the Nessinian art world. After dozens of letters back and forth, he was part of her network now, not just her aunt’s. It hadn’t occurred to Agna that the older generation might see their roles differently. They only saw Raniero’s people and Naire’s people, like opposing teams in a game.
Of course they’d see it that way, she reflected, as her mother came to rest at a wrought-iron patio table under a grape arbor. Agna herself was only Raniero’s successor. That’s why they could pull her from the other end of the world to get her marching orders. Her own plans didn’t merit consideration.
To forestall her oncoming sour mood, Agna said, “How did your show go, last month? I’m sorry to have missed it.”
She took a seat across from her mother to listen. The topic kept her mother soaring until her father arrived. Alfia Despana had been a prominent landscape artist since Agna was a toddler, and her career had become one of the pillars of the Despana Agency. Her paintings hung in Family drawing rooms and private galleries across Nessiny. And though the tempestuous political climate had tilted the market toward personal portraits and other marks of egotistical excess, Alfia’s style was too timeless to be pushed entirely out of the spotlight. Her latest gallery opening had drawn a respectable crowd, and offers for more shows and sales.
Agna had always loved listening to her mother talk about her work, even though she could never fully relate. It was easier that way, perhaps, despite the guilty trace of envy threading through her middle. Alfia’s career was an empire to itself, one that Agna was not expected to rule or follow. She could appreciate it simply as an art collector, and be proud simply as Alfia’s daughter.
Her father slid open the glass doors and stepped out onto the rooftop. He’d dressed for the day in his usual sober linen and velvet, and the saturated crimson and plum broke through the garden’s green palette even at a distance. Hearing the thread of conversation, he stayed in the background and poked about in the garden, pulling weeds and straightening stakes. Agna kept most of her attention on her mother’s story, though it had begun to wind down.
The door slid open again, and wheels rattled on the flagstones. A middle-aged Nessinian man with wavy hair pushed a wheeled cart between the pots and planters. This was the legendary Cook, no doubt.
Her father took one of the other chairs in the arbor as Cook pulled the cart alongside the table and began to lay out plates, napkins, and long two-tined forks. Agna accepted her place setting with proper thanks. It wasn’t this stranger’s fault that Tane had left. He was only doing his job. He set out baskets of bread, plates of olives and cheese and fruit, and fresh carafes of water with lemon slices and herbs.
After he vanished with the cart, her parents chatted with one another about acquaintances Agna didn’t remember. Agna watched the pattern of shadow cast by the grape leaves, which were beginning to dry at the end of the season. She seized the opportunity not to talk, and made her way through two plates of food before her hunger abated.
She’d have to bring some food home, she decided. Keifon had fretted about the rising prices since the pass workers had settled in town, and in Murio she could pick up casks of olives and oil and dried cooking herbs at a fraction of Wildern’s prices. She’d buy a sack of coffee beans for the Nessinian break room at the hospital, too. Even one trunk full of delicacies would add some sparkle to their winter. She’d already have to ship back cases of books and clothes, and whatever else she could scrounge from her old life. It would make her feel better about this trip to add some gifts for Keifon and everyone else she cared about in Kavera. No matter what happened with the agency, it would make the trip feel a little less futile.
Her father dropped his napkin next to his plate. “I thought we might look around the other properties before we get down to business.”
Agna folded her arms. “I suppose so. It would be interesting to see what’s change
d in the city, I guess.”
“You’re welcome to stay here as long as you like, sweetheart,” her mother said. “Just because it isn’t the old house doesn’t mean it can’t be your home, too.”
Agna fought off an adolescent wave of resistance. The offer was sincere. She didn’t have to be ungrateful just because she didn’t want what was being offered. “Thank you. I appreciate your hospitality.” She silenced the words that reverberated in her chest. But I still want to go home.
That phrase meant too many things. It always had, though she’d assumed that the estate tucked among the hills would be her home forever. Her room in the house where she’d grown up, the Academy’s tree-lined campus, the tent where she’d lived on the road, and now the half-empty gallery building all held claim on her heart. She recalled her advice to Keifon, turned around on herself. The places were a part of her, as were the people she’d known in each place — the Academy classmates, scattered to the wind; the other merchants on the caravan, still on the road. She would move on, and keep their memory with her. She could love Murio and be happy to visit, and still want to go back to Wildern in the end.
Her parents seemed to be waiting for her to speak, sipping water and spearing berries from their plates.
She tore the edge off a piece of flatbread. “I mainly want to get on with talking about the succession plan. The particulars of which properties we control aren’t a priority for me.”
Her parents exchanged a look, and her father said, “And for the long term?”
She shrugged. “Well, that’s what the plan is for. We’ll work that out.”
“Where will you be staying, long-term,” her mother said, as though forced to spell out something that should have been obvious.
The angles of their comments came together in a shape that Agna hoped she’d mistaken. Let’s go and look at our other properties. Where will you be staying. So good to have you back. “You said I could stay as long as I liked.”
Her mother replied for the two of them, presenting that maddening united front. “And you can, but sooner or later you’ll want your own space, I’m sure.”
Something constricted in her chest. She hadn’t traveled for six weeks only to walk into a trap. “I see. Somewhere I can make my mark and feel free to be myself.” Some part of her recoiled at the bitterness in her voice, admonishing her that it would only make things worse.
“Exactly,” her mother said. “You and your sister are adults now, and we want to see you start off well.”
Her jaw tightened, though she kept her words falsely casual. “I appreciate that. You’ll be making a donation to my gallery, then?”
Her father set down his glass hard enough to make the silverware rattle. Agna crossed one knee over the other, leaning back in her chair. “The best way to help me get off to a good start is to help to get the gallery off the ground.”
“Agna,” her father said. She knew this tone. It had echoed through the corridors of her mind until it became a part of her. “We’re glad you’re showing motivation. It speaks well of your attitude toward the business. But we need to direct that motivation toward constructive ends.”
“Constructive.” It was childish to pretend that she didn’t know exactly what he meant, and part of her hated herself for playing this game. But another part pushed back. Being an adult, to them, meant doing what she was told. How was that any different from being a child?
“Constructive,” he said. The clatter of wheels on the flagstones heralded the return of their cook, and her father quieted through his deft cleanup. Agna remembered to thank him and to compliment the food. Otherwise she kept her silence, marshaling what focus she had left after her too-short nap. At least they’d get to the real purpose of her visit without going through some time-wasting jaunt through their rental properties.
The cook wheeled the cart full of dishes into the house. Agna’s mother stood with a rustle of silk and paced outside the fringe of dying grapevines.
“We’re glad you’ve enjoyed your assignment,” Agna’s father said. “It’s important to experience new things when you’re young. It helps you to place your life in context, and better appreciate what you have.”
Agna ignored the layers under his words and the unspoken suggestion that she didn’t appreciate what they offered. Not wanting to take on a role for the rest of her life wasn’t like turning away an unwanted festival gift. Her father meant to secure his legacy by trading in her chance to build her own. It wasn’t fair, and she would not quietly submit. They had not let her go to the Academy and train in healing and art history and world cultures only to copy her father’s life. She was capable of more than that, and the fact that they didn’t realize it felt like a betrayal. Did they know her at all, or was she only Raniero’s successor to them?
“However,” her father said, “eventually you need to take those new experiences and apply them to your life’s work.”
Agna held back her arguments and protests and bitter retorts, feeling like a crumbling wall. “My life’s work.”
“Yes, developing and sustaining our interests. Building on our legacy.”
“You’ve decided for me what my life’s work is.”
Her father sighed. “Agna, it’s fine to have hobby projects. I certainly had a few myself, when I was young. But we need a timeline for getting it out of your system.”
She’d traveled for two years on an Academy assignment’s curtailed salary, saved up everything she could, and poured every bit of it into buying that barn of a building. Most days she’d worked for nine hours and wrote letters to artists for two more, after doing her share of the housekeeping and cooking. She’d taken night shifts and double shifts to arrange meetings with potential backers who were skeptical that a young foreigner could accomplish this at all.
A hobby project.
“How about the rest of my life? How’s that for a timeline?”
Her mother threw her hands up. “Can you please be an adult about this?”
“Can you treat me like an adult? My goals are not cute little vanity projects. I have a chance to do something real for that city. Something that no one else has ever done. And it could be done in our name.”
“Which would be fine, if you weren’t our only interested heir,” her mother said, fidgeting with one of her wedding rings. “It leaves us to force your sister to take over the company when we’re gone. I think you know how well that would go.”
Her father spread his hands to head off Agna’s building retort. “Lina is an intelligent and capable girl. She’s just very… stubborn.” And she isn’t the only one, his tone suggested. He rose to his feet, leaving Agna alone at the table. “I have business to attend to. We don’t need to address this today. Get some rest, and we’ll talk tomorrow.”
When you’re ready to listen, Agna translated. She pushed back from the table. “Fine. Good business today, Papa. I think I’ll go and visit Lina, then. I’ll see you later.”
She could still meet him for a hug and a light kiss on his cheeks. Damn everything, she always loved her family, no matter how crazy they made her. Someday they would see reason. Until then, she would do what she could.
Keifon: Evening Plans
Lulu was suspiciously silent in the crate. Shadow made soft grumbling noises, as though he wanted to be sure that Keifon heard it, but only just.
Keifon cradled the crate against his chest and fumbled in his pocket for his key. “Not too much further, kids. All right?” He patted the tail tip that protruded between the slats and got a claw-punctured finger in return. “Mmmph. I guess I earned that. Hang on…” He set the crate on the ground, extracted the key and unlocked the door before hefting the wooden crate full of two sullen half-grown cats.
Their overnight visit had been uneventful, the priest had reported, despite Keifon’s account of their unhinged behavior on the way to her office. So they didn’t hate the veterinarian, or even being treated. They just hated being carted around town. At least it wasn’t a lo
ng trip. He’d found a Tufarian priest willing to treat cats and dogs only a few streets over, and she had performed the kittens’ respective spaying and neutering for a minimal fee.
Eyeing the front stairs, Keifon set the crate on the landing. He closed and locked the door behind him and pulled the lid off the crate. Two furry heads poked out and then turned into scrabbling streaks up the stairs. The empty crate was easy enough to carry, and it didn’t complain.
Shadow groomed himself frantically under the kitchen table. Lulu tore off to take refuge under the couch. Keifon set the crate on the kitchen floor and dished out their food. They’d recuperate in their own time.
Picking up the cats had completed his errands for the day. Dr. Rushu had dropped hints that she and Mirie were tonight’s hosts for another dinner party for her group of Yanweian expatriates. Thinking about namelessness and disappointment, he had wished her a good time.
When Dr. Rushu had first invited him, he’d half-considered it. But then he would have had Agna at his side. Someday, he told himself, he would cave to Dr. Rushu’s and Agna’s suggestions. He could focus on introducing Agna to his culture, to the food and the social niceties that she knew only second-hand. She would be his distraction and his anchor. Alone, he wouldn’t hold up for long. If it were cowardice to admit that, so be it.
Keifon filled a pitcher with unboiled water and pushed open the windows into the chilly, bright autumn air. The herbs he’d planted in their windowboxes unfolded small green leaves. The frost hadn’t come yet. He watered the boxes outside the kitchen, then moved on to the other rooms one at a time. Even the long boxes outside Agna’s studio were full of herbs. He couldn’t bring himself to venture into Agna’s room, but otherwise every west- and south-facing window had been put to use.
The Benevolent Union and the earthbreakers’ guild imposed thorough safety procedures on their work crews, but plenty of workers had come into the hospital with muscle strains or dehydration. Demand for pain-relieving and muscle-relaxing compounds had soared, and the city’s herbalists needed more growers to meet it. Fliers with drawings of plants that reminded him of Agna’s work had begun to appear in the hospital’s break rooms.
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