Whiskeyjack

by Victoria Goddard

  This was the waking world, not a dream. This was not the Interim, when magic twisted dream and shadow and imagination and reality into strange and disturbing permutations.

  This was Dart Hall, and my oldest friend, and my problems were not the only ones looming unacknowledged in the room.

  “The candle, the water, the peacock feather, the ivy crown,” Mr. Dart said dully, the flare of anger gone, the intensity faded. The candles behind him burned brightly.

  “The four elements,” I said, the imagery clear as any poem. “That’s the sign of—”

  “Don’t say it.”

  The plea was very soft, and all the more powerful for that.

  I did not hesitate, not this time. I moved my hand to touch his, which was cold. He jumped. I said, “I won’t say anything, Perry. We’ll just say it was the spell interacting with my magic and your stone arm that caused the fuss. I’m prone to over-exaggerated gma responses to magic anyway, we all know that.”

  He stared at me searchingly. I smiled confidently, the requirements of friendship sounding out clear as the next move in a game of Poacher. I might have picked up the Grail or the Salmon of Wisdom or the Book of Secrets: in such a case one had to pretend that neither the game nor one’s understanding of the world had been upended for the third time in a day.

  Finally he nodded. Unbent enough to say, “You can tell Hal, if you think it necessary. And—Jemis—about your father—”

  I just looked at him. He flushed.

  “When you wish to talk of it, I’m here.”

  “Likewise,” I replied lightly. “Shall we go down?”

  After a moment Mr. Dart began talking about Farmer Bean’s lovesick mule, and I retorted with a story I’d heard in the bookstore about Mrs. Jarnem’s four cats, and by the time we reached the bottom of the staircase we sounded almost normal.

  And if I were Ariadne nev Lingarel, writing of the ocean?

  I knew from my studies in literary symbolism and my one term’s worth of classes in the History of Magic that a wild gift called to the four elements of old magic—Astandalan magic, drawn as it was from Zuni traditions, held there were five—such a person was not a wizard, but had the makings of a magus, and potentially one of world-shaping power.

  If, that is, he survived the learning process.

  If, if, if.

  Chapter Sixteen: Dinner Plans

  The last dinner party I had attended was the one hosted by Dame Talgarth my first weekend back in Ragnor Bella.

  I had not been invited to that party, had in fact been given the cut direct by Dame Talgarth earlier in the week, but for various reasons had ended up at it disguised as a much-powdered footman. This deception had been made possible by Dame Talgarth’s ill-fated but very deep fondness for the Late Bastard Decadent style of dinner parties. Traditionally they ended with an orgy; I had been grateful that the cult using the house to hide their wireweed and the criminal gang who wished to steal it had precipitated matters slightly before that dénouement.

  There was absolutely no reason to compare the Darts’ dining table that evening to Dame Talgarth’s. The only common elements were myself, Mr. Dart, and the fact that I was uncomfortable and out of my depth but also quite competent to the manners involved, having been well-trained at Morrowlea for any position between second footman (my position at the Talgarths’) to the seat opposite an Imperial Duke (that tonight). I had been more appropriately dressed for the former, but that, alas, is life.

  Neither Master Dart nor Sir Hamish had much truckle with the changing fashions in dining (or in anything else, for that matter, besides possibly portraiture and agriculture). They ate the way they had always eaten, with silver dishes, two removes, evening dress, and service in the old Fiellanese country style. This meant that the butler poured the wines for each remove and departed, the maids placed a round dozen dishes on the table and departed, and we were, theoretically, private. The only difference between the evening and any of those the room had held over the two hundred or so years previous was that the room was illuminated by candles, not werelights, and no magic kept the food warm.

  Perhaps it was Morrowlea or perhaps it was working as a bookstore clerk or perhaps it was spying on Dame Talgarth’s guests while waiting on them that made me so acutely aware of the eyes and ears and minds of Mr. Brock the butler and the two parlour maids whose names I didn’t know. No one else paid any attention to them, not even—especially?—Hal.

  Whatever explanation Hal had given for the magical alarums and my sheets seemed to land on my clumsiness and general propensity to mayhap. Sir Hamish asked after my health, then started teasing when I declared myself well.

  “Come, now, Hamish,” Jack growled after a rallontade in which my sneezes figured prominently. “Leave him be.”

  I flushed at this rescue. “Oh, I am well used to it,” I assured him, “my life is one odd episode after another. Why, last week all the gossip was split between whether anyone besides Mr. Pinger saw the twa-tailed vixen in the commons and whether I might contrive to—what was it again, Mr. Dart?”

  “I believe it was a matter of wagering as to whether you’d be able to see out Winterturn at the bookstore.”

  “What are the odds?’ Ben asked, leaning forward intently. He was dressed in what must have been clothes borrowed from Sir Hamish (who was closer to his size than the Squire), and with his chin clean-shaven and hair combed and pomaded he looked now like the old politician in a comic play.

  Mr. Dart laughed. “Two bees he’ll end up in the Woods, four in the Forest, five up before the king, and a gold Emperor both ways for destroying the store or staying on.”

  “Roald?” I asked, not having heard this last.

  “Who else? He must do something while they wait to hear about the inheritance law. He doesn’t seem all that interested in the whiskey tax.”

  “He’d do better to do something other than simply waiting,” I muttered, taking the plate of macerated fruit I was offered and then staring at it blankly. I supposed I did have to eat something, to show willing. I put a small spoonful on my plate, where it did not look likely to go all that well with the wood snipe.

  “Did you hear about that, Jack?” Master Dart asked, giving Mr. Dart a slightly reproving glare which Mr. Dart entirely ignored.

  “The liquor tax? Everyone’s talking about it! And talking about the efforts of the kingdom’s gentry to avoid it. Not that you would know anything about that, Tor.”

  The Squire snorted. Sir Hamish laughed. “Ah! There’s the Jack I remember. Tor has hopes he’ll be a Justice of the Peace come the end of the Assizes. Naturally our cellars are fully in order.”

  “I spent a week in August moving all the contraband to the stables,” Mr. Dart agreed cheerfully, then quickly added, before his brother could say anything, “About the inheritance bill. It’s not going to get through, surely, after all this time. The king ...”

  The king has inherited over his older sister, I finished silently, and would hardly want to cast doubts on his own legitimacy.

  “Ah, but the Duke of Ronderell’s son is simple,” Hal said, “and his daughter one of the most competent leaders in the four duchies. Fiellan’s always permitted ruling duchesses, so there’s no trouble there, and the Earl of the Farry March appears to be a supporter of the idea, though I’m not entirely sure why unless it’s a true conviction of its merits.”

  Mr. Dart set down his fork so he could reach for his wine. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he were doing it to spite our baron. Baron Ragnor forbade a marriage between his daughter and the Earl on account of the Earl’s magic—and if the new law passes, she’d inherit over Master Roald.”

  I wondered whether this prospect actually bothered the Honourable Roald Ragnor. Once I might have known, but even if our social classes had not diverged in the way I’d believed a month ago, we were no longer friends. Sometimes I regretted that, but I knew my weaknesses, and I did not wish to become intimates with a man whose major—perhaps even sole—occ
upations were gambling, drinking, and hunting.

  Drinking had taken my grandfather, hunting had taken my uncle, and gambling had more than once very nearly ruined the estate.

  The maids came in to clear dishes and bring the second remove. I watched them take my plate in surprise. There were remains on it, so I had eaten, but I could not name what I had taken and not tasted. I could not even say what liqueur the fruit had been macerated in. Quails, rabbits, wood snipe, sweetmeats, trout, and even a few vegetables went by in their sauces, all of them equally mysterious.

  As was the Darts’ custom, the second remove consisted of cheese, nuts, fruit, and various sweet offerings. When Mr. Brock had given us all our choice of dessert wines, port, and coffee, and ghosted out again, Master Dart said: “Now, let us make some plans.”

  THERE WERE SEVEN US at table and three days before the anniversary. It seemed fitting that we come up with seven tasks to accomplish. We were not quite so symmetrical as to contrive one task each on each day, but life does not always imitate poetry—which is probably just as well, for those sort of symmetrical deeds are usually found in terrifyingly logical ballads about fairy curses.

  Over the course of our fruit and cheese and whatever else was on the table, we decided first of all that Master Dart would speak to Sir Vorel about who had laid the allegations on me. When I mentioned that Mrs. Etaris, as the wife of the Chief Constable, might also be of assistance, the Squire looked astonished and a little affronted that I would suggest speak to a woman of her class.

  My father shook his head. “You’ve grown into a great snob, Tor. Her father was a physician, you know, and she’s always struck me as an intelligent and sensible woman.”

  “May the Emperor defend me from intelligent and sensible women!” Master Dart replied, but he did desist from further comment.

  “That should take care of your little problem, Jemis,” said Ben.

  I forbore stating that I trusted Mrs. Etaris’ intelligence over my uncle’s in every conceivable respect. Whether she had more sense than his sensibility was a slightly different matter. I smiled gratefully instead and inwardly promised myself I’d ask her for what she’d heard, whether from her husband or the Embroidery Circle. On the whole I’d put my money on the women.

  “I’ll undertake to spread the gossip of your mysterious disappearance,” Sir Hamish said cheerfully.

  “Do you really think it’s best to tell the truth?”

  Mr. Dart laughed at me. “Still unconvinced? Come, Mr. Greenwing, someone enchanted or drugged you to cause memory loss. If Hamish goes around decrying the state of affairs on the public highway, why, your enemy will be reassured.”

  I remained unconvinced of the wisdom of this tactic. Jack was scowling, for a different reason: “And everyone else will think him half-cracked.”

  That surprised a chuckle out of me, to his evident surprise. “Oh, that will surprise no one, sir.”

  Sir Hamish nodded and poured himself more port. “Indeed, there is nothing anyone likes better than discussing young Mr. Greenwing’s affairs and trying to guess what calamity or good fortune will land on him next.”

  “Why, he is already becoming known as a great eccentric.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Dart.”

  “Oh, it’s entirely my pleasure, Mr. Greenwing.”

  Third was the question of my mother’s letter. I was to ask Mrs. Kulfield about it; privately I decided to involve Mrs. Etaris in this as the rest. The Embroidery Circle contained Mrs. Henny the Post, after all, with her twinkling eyes and her hidden talents at Poacher and her iron grip on the last forty years of the mail.

  Those three tasks sorted, or at least began to sort, my major concerns. I wouldn’t have focused on any of them except for the looming spectre of the Winterturn Assizes and the knowledge that my shames no longer redounded solely on myself, but also on my father.

  I stole a glance across the table at him. He was talking to Master Dart about some adventure they’d shared in their university days, and as he laughed, for a moment uplifted, I felt a shock of recognition expand through me.

  He still looked the rough piratical stranger, but his laugh sounded now my father, the papa of my cherished memories, with a sore throat from shouting too much the time he’d come home from the Yrchester races with a bad cold.

  He turned his head so he could see to refill his wineglass. His good eye caught mine as he did so, and I smiled. His expression faltered, flickered, then something fine and tentative started to blossom.

  The haze of unreality, of dream-sodden fear, finally lifted. I leaned forward to say something, I knew not what—perhaps about the vision or dream I’d had of the ship, perhaps to say I had his book of haikus at the flat, perhaps simply to call him by name—and then Hal, reaching inattentively to a bowl in the middle of the table, knocked against the candlestick. I reached to right it; something singed sent up a thin column of black smoke; and I sneezed and was once more back in the muddled world.

  Hal said: “Can we go over this burglary idea again, please?”

  I sighed, and sat back, and found a handkerchief, and retreated hastily into a mood more appropriate to planning the restoration of my father’s good name and legal standing, which were the next four tasks and probably much more important.

  But I wished I hadn’t lost the opportunity to say whatever it was I had wanted to say.

  Chapter Seventeen: Hollow Ways

  Our first order of business for Sunday was to burgle Arguty manor.

  We’d decided that we needed to find out if the letters about Loe still existed and acquire them if they did. My uncle being the prime suspect for everything, this required a stealth mission into Arguty manor, and that had to be under my father’s auspices.

  That was the first task.

  The second was to find out who had been the witnesses for the suicide, and figure out why they had said what they had.

  “Your mother wasn’t called to the identification?” Sir Hamish asked me, frowning. “I always thought she was. That was why I didn’t make a fuss when I came back.”

  “You weren’t here?” Jack asked.

  “No, I wasn’t.”

  “I should remember,” he said apologetically, “but I wasn’t in the best of minds then, I’m afraid.”

  Sir Hamish shook his head, smiling ruefully. “Jack, my friend, you need not apologize. I was in Kingsford and Fillering Pool, painting his grace here, actually, and his sister, for their sixteenth birthday.”

  I had entirely forgotten that Hal’s birthday was coming up. I frowned at him; he seemed unconscious of the hint. Was he not turning twenty-one? Should there not be some sort of coming-of-age ball planned for him back home? He had been duke since he was seven ... and his sister wished to marry an unsuitable party ...

  I wondered briefly what I could possibly give him. When were students at Morrowlea our own efforts at learning new arts and crafts had been sufficient and welcome. To a Duke Imperial on his twenty-first birthday ...

  Plants, I thought, plants were always welcome to Hal. I’d make the time to go to the Woods and talk to Mr. White the innkeeper, whose friendship I wished to cultivate and who would know the gardeners of the village. Perhaps I could pot up a sapling of a Tillarny lime for Hal.

  By the strange chains of reflection and association in the mind, thought of the Woods opened up a memory connected with the Forest.

  “Hagwood,” I said aloud.

  “The Arguty factor?” Mr. Dart said politely after a moment.

  “Yes. He’s—he was involved. He was the one who came to tell us ... the news.”

  “Hagwood would never betray me,” Jack said.

  His confidence was so absolute I could think of no reply. Hagwood had been the one to tell us, my mother and me and Mr. Buchance, that my father had been found hanging in the Forest. I had not consciously remembered the expression on the factor’s face, but now I did, how he had been grey and sweating with nerves, his eyes white around the rim like a frighten
ed horse’s.

  Sir Hamish had none of my qualms. “Like your brother? Jack, someone did identify the body to your family as you.”

  And my mother had believed him; but not believed it was suicide; but let me believe it was suicide, that my father had taken that route out of his disgrace. In some places and times and situations such an act would have been considered noble, even praiseworthy; not here, and then, and in such a collocation of circumstances.

  I cleared my throat against the burgeoning cough. “This sounds a task for myself. It will be more or less understandable if I go asking about the story.”

  “It would have made more sense to do so when Hal came with the story of Loe, or you came first back from university,” Mr. Dart objected. “Why now?”

  “Because too much happened that first fortnight I didn’t have a chance to think about it, and now it is the anniversary coming up. And perhaps I read something about it in a book at the shop,” I replied promptly.

  “We’ll come with you,” said Mr. Dart.

  Hal smiled with a disquieting edge. “Yes. No more opportunities for mysterious disappearances until the first one is cleared up.”

  To that I could not voice my objections, which were mainly along the lines of injured pride and a desire to go on long solitary runs with only my thoughts for company. My thoughts this week would not be very good company, I thought with black humour. “Very well. And the order of things?”

  Ben had not spoken much through the course of our deliberations, instead leaning back with his eyes closed as if half-asleep. I saw the occasional glance he exchanged with my father, however, and knew he’d been listening, and considering, and weighing our plans with the experience of a lifetime as one of the noted generals of the late Astandalan army. He leaned forward, and immediately gathered all our attentions.

  He chuckled. “I was only reaching for a piece of cheese ... No?”