The Golden Specific

by S. E. Grove

  “People of the Baldlands and New Occident believe we are healers,” she said. She contemplated her palms. “But we are not healers so much as interpreters. You see how Errol can speak both the language of his people in the Closed Empire and the language of people here, in the Papal States?”

  “Yes,” Sophia said.

  “What I do is the same, only I speak not the languages of different people but the languages of different beings.”

  Errol and Sophia considered this, each imagining it to mean different things. Errol’s mind drifted to all the strange creatures—goblins, pixies, elves—of his grandfather’s stories, while Sophia thought about badgers and bears. “Do you mean beings like animals?” she asked.

  “Partly. I spoke to the horses earlier, and they told me a good deal about this Order of the Golden Cross. And Seneca, while of a reserved nature, has shared some interesting stories about Errol.” She glanced smilingly at Errol, who looked distinctly uncomfortable. “But I mean other beings, as well. In our Age—and in our history before the Great Disruption—Elodeans have always had the gift of many languages. To us, it seemed ordinary; the way of the world. It was only through contact with the people of the Baldlands and the Indian Territories—and later, people of eastern New Occident—that we realized you do not communicate as we do. This results in many conflicts, some of which you perceive and some of which you do not. The world is filled with beings with which you hold no communication.”

  “You mean the Fey world,” Errol said.

  “No, not what you believe is the Fey world, although perhaps some of those beings are the ones I mean. Consider what people call the plague here—lapena. Yes, it is an illness, much like a fever brought on by typhus or some other disease. But lapena is actually a fever of the heart. Just as with typhus, it is caused by creatures imperceptible to the eye. The tiny wanderers who cause the plague are, themselves, displaced beings; I have not understood yet from where. But they are troubled, discontented, and rootless. They take company with people in a misguided effort to make space for themselves. I speak to them, and the goldenrod blossoms give them something to cling to—like a rope thrown into the sea. They hear me, and take hold of the rope, and climb out. Yet people in the Papal States do not perceive these beings at all; they think of lapena as a kind of corruption, or a curse. The being itself goes unnoticed. So it is with other beings, too.”

  Sophia and Errol digested this. “That does not explain how you knew what was happening farther up the road,” he objected. “Or what you did with the dust.”

  Goldenrod looked up at the ceiling, her hands in her lap. “I am afraid I can say no more. I have already said too much.”

  “Can you tell us why—why you can’t say more?” Sophia tried again.

  “I can tell you this much: for some, our abilities seem a thing of power, so that beings of all kinds might be made to jump and dance and do their bidding.” Her voice was somber.

  Sophia was shocked. “The Elodea do that?”

  “No, we do not—none of us would do so willingly. But others, who have seen what we do, have tried to use us for those ends.”

  “How terrible. You mean . . .” Sophia thought through the consequences of what Goldenrod had explained. “You mean someone could tell the plague where to go, whom to make sick?”

  “Yes. And you must take my word for it that this would be as nothing, compared to the havoc that can be wrought.” Goldenrod sounded weary. She swung her legs over the side of the hammock and stepped onto the dirt floor. “I will take some night air, now that the innkeeper has gone to rest.”

  • • •

  WHILE GOLDENROD WALKED outside and Errol rested in his hammock, Sophia unrolled Cabeza de Cabra’s map. With some effort, she drew her thoughts away from the inn and rejoined the sheriff of Murtea where she had left him: the memory of reading the map that would guide him to the Eerie Sea.

  Cabeza de Cabra returned to the stone bridge, taking the middle path at each juncture, and walked back to Murtea without encountering anyone. He entered the walled village and was lost from sight.

  Sophia was beginning to understand why there were so few glass beads on the map. The city of Ausentinia accounted for many of the metal ones, but the people Cabeza de Cabra remembered were few and far between. She let the time in the map expand while she waited by the village wall; months passed. No doubt many people had come and gone, but Cabeza de Cabra had remained within, policing Murtea, overseeing his deputies, going about his day within the village’s narrow confines.

  Then, in November, there was a brief memory that appeared suddenly before her: Cabeza de Cabra led two people out of Murtea. It was clear they were prisoners. One was a man with a shaggy head of brown hair and a beard; his hands were tied. The other, accompanied by a deputy, was a girl of about Sophia’s age, who kicked and screamed so viciously the deputy lost patience and threw her over his shoulder. “Calm yourself, Rosemary, please,” the other prisoner said in English, with the unmistakable accent of New Occident.

  Sophia felt her pulse quicken. Bruno, she thought. This is Bruno Casavetti and the girl Rosemary who helped him. Cabeza de Cabra is the sheriff of Murtea.

  “No! No! No!” Rosemary cried. “He is not guilty! He is not a witch!”

  The deputy took a sharp step, jolting Rosemary on his armored shoulder.

  Sophia felt pity flooding through her—Cabeza de Cabra had compassion for this girl. “Be gentle,” he said gruffly to his deputy. “She is only a child.”

  “I beg you, Rosemary,” Bruno said, “they will only hurt you if you protest. And think of how sad that will make me.”

  Rosemary quieted, and the group moved on. Suddenly, they were gone; their path had taken them past the map’s limit.

  With some frustration, Sophia kept her finger on the map’s edge. A few minutes later, Cabeza de Cabra and his deputy reappeared. They walked back to Murtea in silence.

  In the weeks that followed, the sheriff made frequent journeys along the short stretch of road that connected the village to what Sophia presumed was the jail. Sometimes he went alone, sometimes he went with a deputy, and a few times he walked alongside a short, round man who wore a heavy golden cross. The Order of the Golden Cross had a cleric in Murtea, she realized.

  Then, in December, the sheriff visited the jail and returned with Rosemary, who, though visibly upset, did not fight him. In silence, they walked the road north, but instead of entering the village they continued to the farmhouse where Sophia had heard the song of the gray dove. She knew, then, that Rosemary had been the one singing.

  When they reached the doorway, Cabeza de Cabra paused. “I wish I could, but I can do nothing for him,” he said.

  Rosemary nodded without looking at him. “He asked me to send a letter to his friends. I do not know how to send something to New Occident. Will you help me?”

  “I will, but let it be soon, because now that Casavetti has confessed, the priest will be seeking a quick sentence.”

  “I know. I will visit him in the jail tonight so that he may write it, and then I will bring it to you.”

  “Very well.” He sighed. “Be careful, Rosemary.”

  She nodded and turned to enter the farmhouse. Cabeza de Cabra walked back to Murtea, and his footsteps felt heavy and slow.

  Only a few days later, he left the village walls once more, this time accompanied by a small crowd. The deputies and the priest were there, but so were others: grown men, old women, even a few children. They returned from the jail with Bruno in tow. He was thin and his clothes were terribly dirty.

  The procession reached the farmhouse, where Rosemary stood waiting like a sentinel, and she joined them as they walked farther north, to the stone bridge. The landscape beyond it had changed. Black trees with sharp thorns grew amid hillocks of dark purple moss. Here and there, the familiar dry grass still clung to the earth in patches.
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br />   Sophia could not understand the fierce pounding of the sheriff’s heart, or the anxiety that he felt as he untied the prisoner’s hands. Why? What were they doing to him? Bruno turned and spoke to the crowd in English: “Fear not. I know these hills and they know me. Ausentinia will protect me. I will follow the lost signs to the city. Though I may not return here, you may trust that I will find my way to safety.” Sophia heard Rosemary weeping quietly nearby.

  Bruno crossed the bridge, stepping onto a patch of yellow grass. Then, head tucked down, he ran into the hills as if his life depended on it. There was a sudden roar of wind, and a gust moved through the black trees, pulling their limbs like desperate arms. The small crowd of people stood watching. Minutes passed. It was impossible to say if the windstorm had died down or if it had merely retreated farther into the dark hills. There was no sign of Bruno.

  “Justice has been served,” the priest declared, putting his hand upon the golden cross that hung from his neck.

  The crowd, with seeming reluctance, turned to go. There was some grumbling, as if for most of the spectators disappointment, rather than justice, had been served. Rosemary remained where she was, and Cabeza de Cabra approached her. “Come. There is nothing to see.”

  “He will return,” she said quietly, still watching the hills.

  “It is not likely.”

  “He said he would find Ausentinia. He may not be hurt.”

  “And what if his soul is taken by the Dark Age? If his face is stolen, as the sentence intends? What then, Rosemary?”

  The words emerged, as if from her own mouth, and Sophia felt a sudden fracturing within herself.

  The part of her in the Gray Pigeon knew that Cabeza de Cabra was speaking of the Lachrima, and the realization set off a sudden avalanche in her mind, a torrent of fragments that made a comprehensible whole: the letter sent to her parents; their disappearance; the vanished existence of Ausentinia and the lost signs. She understood everything that had happened as surely as if she had seen it.

  At the same time, the shock of understanding left her numb. She lost awareness of herself lying in the cool room of the roadside inn. She was no longer Sophia; she was only something that moved and thought as Cabeza de Cabra. It was as if she were truly living in the map, and nothing else existed.

  Rosemary stared fiercely at the bridge. “If he returns, I will take care of him.”

  Cabeza de Cabra rested his hand on her shoulder. “I will come back for you at sunset and take you home.”

  After that, he went to the farmhouse at least once a week to see that she was well. Later in the month, he approached the farmhouse and heard her singing a song of a gray dove, pierced by an arrow and felled. His heart was heavy, and not only because of the mourning girl. There were worse things.

  After Bruno’s sentence had been carried out, the priest condemned others to walk the stone bridge. The crowds that came to watch grew larger. The second prisoner, a young woman, was dispatched more to the priest’s satisfaction. She stepped into the tall grass near the bridge and stood, trembling. The roar of wind gathered, and the ground beneath her feet changed, transforming into black moss. Everyone could hear her terrible screams, and when she stumbled back onto the bridge, Cabeza de Cabra recoiled. Her face was gone. She had smooth skin where her face had once been. And yet from that absent mouth came terrible cries—wails that shredded their ears.

  Two other prisoners were sentenced to the same fate in February.

  And then, in March, five strangers were taken to the jail: a man and woman, explorers from New Occident, and their plague-stricken guides. Cabeza de Cabra felt curiosity and sorrow in equal measure at their arrival: they had brought lapena and, with it, a bundle of troubles. At their sentencing, he felt a stab of sympathy. The woman was fierce and determined; when the priest pronounced their sentence at the stone bridge, she looked at him as if studying a viper. Her husband was patient, with not an ounce of malice or resentment even as Cabeza de Cabra cut his bonds and explained the priest’s words.

  “You are condemned to enter the Dark Age where it has overtaken the roads that lead to Ausentinia,” he said. “Should you manage to escape, you are never to return to Murtea. You may speak your final words.”

  The priest and much of the town stood watching. The woman reached into her skirts and took out a bundle of papers and a watch on a long chain. She handed the papers to Cabeza de Cabra. “Will you please preserve these?” she asked quietly.

  “I will.”

  She handed the watch to her husband. “Shall we try Wren one last time, Bronson?”

  He smiled. “I suppose it can’t hurt.” He opened the timepiece and pressed his finger against something inside, then closed it. They stood looking at one another.

  “Tell them their time is up,” the priest said harshly.

  Cabeza de Cabra was silent.

  “Shadrack will take care of her, Minna,” Bronson said.

  “Yes. I know he will. He loves her as much as we do, doesn’t he?” She gave a small laugh that caught in her throat. There were tears in her eyes.

  “He does,” Bronson agreed quietly. “Now we do here as we did on the Kestrel.” He took the long chain of the watch and circled it around his wife’s wrist, and then his own. “Wherever we go, we go together. Whatever else we may lose in those hills, we will not lose each other.”

  “Yes, Bronson,” Minna said. Their wrists bound by the watch’s chain, they held hands and walked over the stone bridge. They stood for a moment at its far edge and then stepped forward, deliberately and with certainty, as if they knew exactly where they were going. The wind lifted up and howled and stormed in pursuit. Just as Bruno had vanished, so did Minna and Bronson, and after several minutes the crowd began to lose interest and drift away in disappointment.

  “I think we can be confident that the sentence was carried out,” the priest said to Cabeza de Cabra. When the sheriff did not respond, he added, “Do you not return to the village?”

  “I will remain here until they emerge,” he replied, still looking at the stone bridge.

  “Suit yourself.” The priest shrugged and walked away, and Cabeza de Cabra was alone.

  “Two of the faces will be empty,” he said softly to himself. “The third face, which binds the other two, will have twelve hours. Follow the three faces wherever they lead you, across the many Ages, for your search lies with them.”

  32

  Waging the Campaign

  —1892, June 22: 14-Hour 00—

  Well into the nineteenth century, the Remember England Party continued to frame a national policy around the memory of that lost imperial power, Britain. The party gradually but decisively lost what little credibility it had ever claimed. All but the most nostalgic residents of New Occident recognize that closer relations with that part of the world now called the Closed Empire would be a costly, dangerous, and no doubt depressing enterprise.

  —From Shadrack Elli’s History of New Occident

  KNOWING BROADGIRDLE HAD forced Shadrack into an agreement, and knowing that agreement was partly to protect him, Theo felt a kind of reckless fury that rose and fell in the MP’s presence. It seemed that everyone in Boston was lying, and they were lying because of Broadgirdle. Shadrack had concealed Broadgirdle’s coercion. Bligh had concealed Broadgirdle’s crime. And of course Theo himself was lying to find the explanations for the greater lies with which Broadgirdle had concealed his coercion and his crimes.

  Worse still, he realized now that his ability to lie, that comfortable talent which he had cherished as a skill, was no ability at all. It was a malignancy planted there long ago by Graves himself. Graves’s lies were a contagion. A lie from Graves engendered fear, and the fear engendered another lie, and soon the way of telling truth was entirely lost. Theo had never considered the point in his life when his own deceitfulness had begun, but now he saw clearly that it beg
an with Graves.

  As the days passed, he plunged into the labyrinth of memories that made up those two years of his life, trying to find the first instance. He could not be sure. He recalled a moment when a concerned woman at a horse ranch accused him of being underfed. Theo had lied without considering the alternative and without considering what it signified to defend Graves. By then I was already sick with it, he thought. By then I already lied without a thought.

  He hated the lies now, including his own. He hated that he had lied to Nettie about who he really was. He hated that he had lied to Mrs. Clay about his job at the State House, and he hated that he had lied to obtain the job in the first place. He hated that Shadrack, who told the truth by instinct, had been made to tell lies as well. When Broadgirdle was absent, he raged at the injustice of it, telling himself over and over that Graves would pay—for Shadrack, for Bligh, for all of it.

  When Broadgirdle was near, looming over Peel’s desk or writing speeches in his office, the rage seemed to grow cold and still, like an ember trapped in ice. Then Broadgirdle would swagger out of the office and the rage would return, slow and silent and tormented by its powerlessness. The reckless fury made Theo more audacious in his search. He examined files when Peel left the office; he asked questions whenever they could be construed as even tangentially work-related; he observed every detail he could for its possible relevance, knowing Winnie was also watching beyond the State House.

  But, to his frustration, he had learned nothing new. A week had come and gone, and he was no closer to leaving with proof than he had been on the day of his interview. He could find nothing pointing to the location of the Weatherers; he could find no explanation for why Broadgirdle was working with the Sandmen; and he found nothing directly tying the MP to Bligh’s murder. Moreover, the revelation of how Shadrack had been pressured only made things more confusing: if Broadgirdle wanted Shadrack’s help, why would he frame him for Bligh’s murder?