Tracing the Shadow

by Sarah Ash

  CHAPTER 4

  “Open up! In the name of the Commanderie!”

  Klervie woke to the sound of shouting, men’s voices loud in the dark of the night. She heard the thud of fists pounding against the cottage door. Terrified, she lay still, not daring to move.

  “Hervé de Maunoir! Open up!”

  She heard her mother, Maela, whispering frantically to her father. “Slip out by the pantry window. Go!”

  “And leave you to face them alone?”

  “I’ll stall them. Just go!”

  “Break down the door.” The brusque order outside was swiftly followed by juddering blows that made the whole cottage tremble. Klervie clapped her hands over her ears.

  Suddenly the loudest blow was followed by the splintering rending of timber. The door burst open and men came running in. Klervie shrieked in terror and, snatching up her book, ran to her mother’s side.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Maela’s challenge rang out. “How dare you disturb my child’s rest? By what right do you break into my home in the middle of the night?”

  At the same time, the sounds of a violent scuffle erupted in the cottage garden, punctuated by shouts. Then came a sudden cry of pain that made Klervie flinch as if she had taken the blow herself. “Papa!” she whispered.

  “I have a warrant from the king.” A burly officer in a plain black uniform loomed over them, a folded paper in hand; Klervie noticed that it was secured with a scarlet seal.

  “A warrant? We are not criminals—” began Maela, but her voice trailed away as more soldiers appeared in the doorway, dragging a man by the arms. “Hervé!” she cried.

  Klervie flinched. Her father’s head drooped; drops of red dripped from a gash on the side of his skull, staining the clean flagstones. A horrible sick feeling gushed through her whole body; she wanted to run away, but her legs had begun to tremble and she could only stand and stare.

  “So you thought you could escape us?” The officer gazed impassively down at her father. “By order of his majesty, King Gobain, I arrest you, Hervé de Maunoir.”

  “On—what grounds?” Papa seemed to be having difficulty speaking. Klervie felt Maela’s hands tighten on her shoulders.

  The officer gave a grim laugh. “Heresy. Practicing the Forbidden Arts. Summoning daemons—”

  “What?” Maela interrupted him. “My husband is a reputable alchymist. He has never dared to practice the Forbidden Arts. He has more sense!”

  “Seize everything. Every book, every piece of writing, down to the smallest scrap,” ordered the officer, ignoring her.

  Bright gouts of lanternlight illumined the darkness as the soldiers ransacked the cottage, piling Papa’s books into chests, taking away boxes of papers. Klervie held tight to her beloved storybook, determined that no one should take it from her.

  “The wards,” Maela was murmuring. “Why did the wards fail?”

  Though Klervie did not understand what the wards were, she knew that they were there to protect them. And now Maman was saying they had let in these harsh-voiced and brutish men who were turning their home upside down. There came the crash of breaking crockery in the kitchen and Maela winced.

  “What have you got there?” The officer loomed over Klervie. His eyes radiated such stern disapproval that she shrank close to her mother, arms crossed, both hands clutching the precious book to her breast.

  “You wouldn’t begrudge a little child her book of tales?”

  “Fairy tales are a dangerous and corrupting influence on young, impressionable minds.” The officer snatched the book from Klervie and stared at it with suspicion. Then his stern expression softened. “Lives of the Holy Saints,” he read aloud, nodding. He thrust the book back at Klervie. “Not a title I had thought to find in the house of a filthy magus.” He turned away, striding into Papa’s study, barking out orders.

  Klervie gazed at the book in astonishment. In the harsh torchlight she noticed that the picture engraved on the front had changed; instead of the Faie with hair silver as starshine, her arms wound around the neck of a unicorn, she saw a haloed saint, eyes piously upraised, hands fervently clasped together in prayer. But before she could ask Maman why the picture had changed, the officer reappeared.

  “We’re all done here, Lieutenant. Take him away.”

  The soldiers began to drag Papa out of the door, his toes bumping over the flagstones, leaving a bloody trail behind.

  Maela ran into the lane in her nightgown. She caught hold of one of the men by the arm. “Where are you taking him?”

  Klervie had stood watching, mute with fear. Now she ran after her mother, only to see the man throw Maela to the muddy ground.

  Klervie stopped, shocked to see how brutally he had treated her mother.

  “I’ll follow you, Hervé!” Maela cried, her voice shrill, close to breaking. “I won’t let them keep us apart! I’ll—”

  The sky turned white. Klervie shut her eyes, dazzled as an ear-bruising explosion shook the night.

  “Oh, no,” she heard her mother whisper. Jagged flames leaped high into the misty darkness, coloring the trees and houses a lurid orange.

  High on the hill that overlooked the village, the College of Thaumaturgy was burning.

  “Stay back!” Imri hissed, tugging Rieuk into the shadows as a troop of soldiers tramped along the lane. They were dragging a prisoner.

  “Who are they?”

  “Inquisitors.”

  “But I must warn the others—”

  “It’s too late.” There was such urgency in Imri’s voice that the protest died on Rieuk’s tongue. “Don’t you understand? There’s nothing you can do now. I’ve seen the Commanderie Inquisition in action before. They hate our kind. All you can do is hope we get away without being seen.”

  At that moment, Rieuk sensed a faint yet familiar electric tingle. Two officers of the Inquisition had stopped close by. One pulled what looked like a fob watch from his breast pocket. A crystal watch? As he held it aloft, Rieuk felt a wave of dizziness wash over him. He sagged against a wall, suddenly weak and disoriented.

  “Ugh.” Beside him, Imri staggered as if he had been kicked in the chest.

  “Look, there’s a streak of darkness in the stone,” said the officer.

  “It must sense more mage blood close by,” said his companion, raising his pistol. “Could Maunoir’s apprentice be hiding out here?”

  Rieuk’s instinctive reaction was to run like hell. But his limbs were trembling and would not respond to his will. He was helpless.

  “Maistre Visant!” came the call. “We’ve breached the college walls. Come quick!”

  The Inquisitors hurried away, and Rieuk saw not the dial of a watch face but the sparkle of a quartz on a golden chain as the officer tucked it back in his pocket.

  The instant they had gone, Imri grabbed Rieuk’s hand, pulling him along the unlit lane.

  “Can’t—run—anymore.” Rieuk dropped to his knees, trying to gulp in lungfuls of air. His throat was taut and dry and his ribs ached. “What happened back there? I felt so weak.”

  “Angelstone,” Imri rasped. “It—has to be. It negates our power.”

  “I never knew—” Rieuk broke off as the night sky flared with the lurid brilliance of the burning college. He gazed in dismay as the flames roared toward the stars. All the rare and ancient books would be incinerated in that inferno. All that precious knowledge accumulated over centuries would be lost forever.

  “We can’t stay here.” Imri’s hand pressed on his shoulder, firm yet insistent. “They’ll scour the lanes. They’ll put blocks on the roads.”

  Rieuk looked up at Imri’s face in the fire-streaked darkness and saw nothing but the flames reflected in the lenses of his spectacles. There was no way of reading the expression in the dark eyes behind those blank lenses.

  “We must get out of Francia—and as soon as possible.”

  “So Azilis is free at last.” Imri leaned on the rail of the barque, gazing out across th
e sunlit dazzle of the waves.

  Rieuk was fighting to stay in control of his seasickness. The salty wind had freshened, gusting in fierce bursts, stirring up huge waves.

  “You saw the conflagration at the college. Maunoir’s book could never have survived such a blaze. And as the pages burned, so she would have returned to the aethyr.”

  “Is that…a good thing?” The barque crested another rolling breaker and Rieuk slipped to his knees, clutching his stomach.

  Through the rising surges of nausea he heard Imri’s voice suddenly quirked with amusement. “Seasick? Silly boy. Why didn’t you say so?” Rieuk felt Imri’s hand on his head, tousling his hair. He flinched, fearing he was about to puke. And then a swift, bright current of cleansing heat passed through his body from his head to his toes. He opened his eyes and saw Imri kneeling beside him on the damp boards.

  “Better?” Imri inquired.

  Rieuk drew in a tentative breath. He could feel the barque’s timbers shuddering as it cut through the breakers, he could hear the waves slapping against the hull, but the nausea had gone. “What did you do?”

  Imri helped him to his feet. “What use is an apprentice to his master if he’s lying groaning in the bilges?”

  The master of the barque was shouting orders to the crew; the wind changed as they rounded the headland and the sailors began to climb up into the rigging to unfurl more sails. In spite of the sun’s bright sparkle on the burnished blue of the summer sea, Rieuk felt as if distant storm clouds were looming, darkening the hours yet to come.

  CHAPTER 5

  A little crowd of villagers had gathered outside the cottage door. Among them Klervie recognized Hugues the baker and his wife, Gwenna, holding their daughter, Youna, her best friend, by the hand. The mayor, Messieur Brandin, stepped forward.

  They’ve come to help us. Overwhelmed by a rush of warm feelings, Klervie knelt on the window seat to wave to Youna. But Youna turned her head away.

  Above them on the hill, Klervie saw the smoking and blackened ruins of the college. The acrid smell of burning tainted the freshness of the morning air.

  “What can I do for you?” Maela stood beneath the broken timbers of the doorway, broom in hand.

  Mayor Brandin cleared his throat. “We’re a peace-loving community, as you know, Madame de Maunoir. But in the light of last night’s events—”

  “What the mayor is trying to say,” interrupted the butcher rudely, “is we don’t want you here anymore.” Murmurs of assent accompanied his words.

  “We had no idea that your husband was involved in such horrible practices,” added Demoiselle Nazaire, the schoolteacher.

  “We think it better that you and Klervie leave,” said the mayor, embarrassedly rubbing his chain of office with his handkerchief. “As soon as possible.”

  “I see,” said Maela. Klervie recognized the stiff tone of voice that her mother used when she was annoyed. “And I don’t suppose it has occurred to a single one of you that Hervé might be innocent of these charges?”

  “That’s irrelevant,” said Gwenna, her usual placid smile replaced by a pinched, disapproving look. “Heaven knows what foul and unnatural experiments your husband was conducting up at the college. You heard the explosion. Whatever he and the others were doing up there, it shouldn’t have been allowed.”

  “The others?” Maela echoed. “What happened to the others?”

  “All arrested and taken away to the capital, thank God,” said Demoiselle Nazaire primly. “All except one wretched soul, who burned to death in the fire. They say the body was so badly charred that—”

  “They’ve taken Hervé to Lutèce? Then that’s where Klervie and I are going,” said Maela, jutting her chin high as she stared back at the schoolmistress. “I thought we had friends here. But now I see I was mistaken. Come, Klervie; we must pack our belongings.”

  “Mewen?” Klervie scoured the cottage garden, calling in vain. “You bad cat! Why don’t you come?” She looked in all his favorite places: behind the geranium pots, in the herb patch, on the broken wall…

  “Hurry up, Klervie.” Maman hurried toward her and grabbed her by the hand.

  “I can’t find Mewen. I’m not leaving without Mewen.” Klervie stamped her foot.

  “The carter’s waiting.” Maman dragged her up the garden path and lifted her onto the cart, climbing up beside her. The carter shook the reins and his horse ambled off down the lane toward the bridge across the Faou.

  “Where are we going?”

  Maman looked at her. Klervie saw that her eyes were red-rimmed and she hesitated before she spoke. “We’re following Papa. All the way to Lutèce. We’re going to see my sister, Lavéna.”

  “Tante Lavéna?” Klervie could not remember her aunt. She had never left the village before, and everything she knew was receding far too fast as the cart jogged on along the tree-lined lane. Soon all she could see was the hill with the jagged, smoky ruins of the college.

  “Why can’t Mewen come with us?” Klervie began to fidget. “Who will feed him? Who will give him his milk?”

  “Lutèce is a big city,” Maman said. “Mewen is a country cat. He would hate the bustle and noise. He can’t come with us.”

  But Klervie could not understand. “I want Mewen,” she said, and burst into tears.

  “Maela,” said Tante Lavéna coldly. Klervie shrank close to Maman. “What are you doing here?”

  Maman swallowed hard before she spoke. “We have nowhere else to go.”

  “I can’t let you stay. I can’t risk it.”

  “But why not? I’m your sister.” Maman sounded on the verge of tears again, and Klervie squeezed her hand sympathetically. She felt like crying herself; her feet ached from walking over the hard cobblestones and her throat was dry and tickly from breathing in the city dust.

  “My sister, who married against our father’s wishes,” Tante Lavéna said. “Did you think we hadn’t heard the news of the arrest?” She was looking up and down the street, over their heads, as though afraid they were being observed. “If I’m seen letting you in, I’m sure to be reported. And I can’t risk tarnishing my husband’s reputation. He’s standing for councilor for our quartier.”

  “The little one’s exhausted. Could you just give her a drink?”

  “You don’t understand, do you, Maela?” said Tante Lavéna in vexed tones. “Your husband is accused of the most heinous of crimes. You’re the wife of a criminal.” And she shut the door in Maman’s face.

  “Tante Lavéna?” Klervie piped up. Why had her auntie not asked them inside?

  “There’s nothing for us here. Come, Klervie.” Maman picked up their case, slowly turned away from Tante Lavéna’s doorstep, and began to trudge back along the dusty street the way they had come. The afternoon sun burned hot onto the backs of their heads. Flies buzzed over a pile of stinking refuse lying in the gutter. Klervie was so weary now that she could hardly put one foot in front of the other.

  “It smells bad,” Klervie said, trying not to cry. “I want to go home, Maman. I want Mewen.”

  “My very own sister,” whispered Maman. She seemed not to have heard what Klervie had said. “Now what shall we do? What shall we do?” Klervie heard the despair in her mother’s voice and bit back her tears. They reached the end of the street and Maman’s pace almost slowed to a stop.

  “Madame!”

  Maela wearily raised her head. A pigtailed servant girl in a drab grey dress was hurrying toward them over the cobbles, waving frantically to attract their attention.

  “You dropped this by our doorstep.” Breathless, the girl thrust a cloth purse at Maela. “My mistress told me to return it.”

  “Your mistress?”

  “Madame Lavéna Malestroit.” The girl bent over, touching her toes. “Ooh—I’ve got a stitch in my side.”

  “That’s not your pur—” began Klervie, confused.

  “Your mistress is very kind. Please send her my thanks.” Maela closed her fingers around the purse. />
  “You’re welcome, I’m sure.” The girl straightened up and ran back the way she had come. Maela stood gazing after her in silence.

  “Maman?” Klervie tugged at her sleeve. “Maman, what’s wrong?”

  But all Maman said, her voice choked, was, “Thank you, Lavéna.”

  Day after day, Maman left Klervie in the care of the sour-faced concierge of their rented room. Klervie hated the old woman, who made her scour the battered, greasy pots and pans until the skin on her fingers was shriveled and sore. In return, she fed Klervie a bowl of watery soup for lunch with a few shreds of leek or mushy carrot tops floating in it, and a hunk of dry bread. The concierge’s apartment was dark and smelled of stale soup and mothballs. Klervie bore all this without complaining because Maman had told her she must be a good girl. Yet all the time she was aware of a nagging ache inside her that was not hunger.

  She missed playing with Mewen. She missed stroking his soft fur and hearing him purr. But most of all she missed Papa.

  Every day Maman returned looking more pale and exhausted than the day before. Klervie came to dread Maman’s going.

  “Please don’t leave me.” She clung on to Maman’s dress, winding her fingers into the soft cloth.

  “Klervie, I must go. It’s for your papa. You can’t come with me.”

  “Why can’t I come with you? I want to see Papa.” The indefinable ache inside her found words. “More than anything.”

  “He’s…” Maman hesitated. “He’s in prison, Klervie. He and the other magisters are all in prison.”

  “But Papa is not a bad man!” Klervie burst out. “He’s not a thief.”

  A sad smile briefly lit Maman’s dulled eyes. She smoothed Klervie’s hair with one gentle hand. “Chérie, your papa is a brilliant man. But he has made enemies. Powerful enemies. And I fear—” She broke off, biting her lip. “Well, we must stay strong. For Papa’s sake.”

  “Wake up, Klervie.”

  “Not yet,” murmured Klervie, burrowing under the blanket. But Maman gently pulled the blanket away, leaving Klervie blinking sleepily in the milky light of dawn.