The Midnight Queen

by Sylvia Izzo Hunter

  “I should like never to see his face again,” said Sophie.

  * * *

  The priest of Tamesis, presiding goddess of the River Thames, was punctual to his hour, though he seemed ill pleased by the circumstances of his summoning. Having perused the sheet of paper on which were set down the proposed terms of the marriage contract, he looked up at Sieur Germain, frowning.

  “This is a most peculiar document,” he said, disapproval in every syllable. “I find it difficult to believe that any two persons of gentle birth should agree to be married on such terms—or that their families should permit it.”

  Sieur Germain shrugged his shoulders. “These are peculiar times,” he said blandly, “and we find ourselves in peculiar circumstances.”

  “Neither of us has the least objection to the terms,” said Sophie, too anxious to be cautious about speaking out of turn.

  “Certainly not.” Gray reached for Sophie’s hand and pressed it reassuringly.

  The priest fixed his eyes on them, and his frown deepened. “And do I understand you all to be living together in the same household?” he inquired. “This also is most irregular.”

  “The circumstances, as I have said, are somewhat unusual,” Sieur Germain repeated patiently. “Miss Callender’s home is in Breizh, and Mr. Marshall’s at Oxford; as both at present happen to be resident in my home, it seemed far more sensible . . .”

  “The bridegroom is your kinsman, is he?” Sieur Germain nodded in reply, and the priest continued, “And who speaks for the bride’s family?”

  “I do,” said Mrs. Wallis, chin jutted. “She is orphaned; I am cousin to her late mother, who left her to my guardianship.”

  Again the priest looked deeply sceptical, and for an anxious moment Sophie expected him to announce his intention of refusing their request. After a moment, however, he shook his head and sighed. “These hasty love-matches are of all marriages the least likely to endure,” he remarked, “but equally there is no reasoning with their authors.”

  Pocketing the paper, he nodded to Sieur Germain. “I shall return tomorrow, an hour before sunset,” he said. “Mind you have your witnesses assembled; I do not like to be kept waiting.”

  “I thank you, sir,” Sieur Germain replied with a bow.

  The priest nodded again, curtly, and took himself off.

  “Impertinent puppy!” said Mrs. Wallis, as soon as he had gone.

  “Never mind, ma’am,” Sieur Germain soothed her. “He will do as well as any other, and we need suffer his impertinence only once more.”

  Sophie had sprung to her feet and was pacing round and round the sofa. “And if he does not come back?” she demanded of no one in particular.

  Gray rose from the sofa to plant himself in her path. “He will come back,” he said, laying a hand on each of her shoulders.

  “Of course he will,” said Sieur Germain, dryly, “because otherwise the Temple of Tamesis must forgo the very generous marriage-tithe we shall pay him; and they have need of it, to shore up their riverward wall.”

  Sophie bowed her head against Gray’s chest. At once he folded her into his arms, and she drew comfort from the steady rhythm of his heart. After tomorrow, she told herself bracingly, after tomorrow no one can part us if we do not wish it.

  “Sophie.” Jenny’s voice interrupted her reverie, and she raised her head in some confusion to locate its source. “Sophie, a moment?”

  Gray let her go, bestowing on her briefly the particular smile that spread a warm flush over her cheeks, and, turning away, she followed Jenny out of the room.

  * * *

  “I have a difficult request to make of you,” said Jenny, when they were closeted in her sitting-room. “But first I think I ought to speak to you about—”

  “I beg you will not,” Sophie interrupted hastily. “I was brought up by a healer, you know; I am not in the least need of that sort of lecture, I assure you.”

  Jenny declared herself well pleased, but still she insisted on quizzing Sophie on a long list of herbs, with their precise uses. Having thus satisfied herself that her new sister should not find herself in unexpected need of baby’s bonnets, she seemed about to speak, but at Sophie’s inquiring look fell silent, suddenly intent on the hands clasped in her lap.

  “You will think me a most contrary creature,” she said at last, colouring a little. “It is not that I have any wish to interfere in your . . . but, you see, you have both of you so much magick, and it appears that, in certain circumstances . . .”

  “Jenny,” Sophie began, now rather flustered herself, “has this . . . has what you wished to say anything to do with your pianoforte?”

  “It shames me to speak of such matters, when you are a welcomed guest in my home,” said Jenny, with a wan chuckle, “but, you see, if the house should be blown to bits around our ears, or . . . or all the windows melt—”

  “Of course,” said Sophie, “someone might be hurt.” It had surprised her that Jenny, of all people, should be discomposed by a discussion of marital relations, but that she should fear to breach the laws of hospitality was easily understood. “I believe I may safely promise you that we shall be extremely careful. I thought perhaps an interdiction—or a very strong ward—Gray and I have been reading a great deal about warding-spells . . .”

  “I thank you.” Jenny smiled gratefully. “And I hope I have not given offence.”

  Sophie smiled in return, to conceal her dismay. “None, I assure you,” she said. “But I wonder . . . might I ask a question of you?”

  “Of course you may.”

  “It is . . .” She hesitated. “It is a very personal one. Of course you need not answer, if you had rather not . . .”

  Jenny looked at her expectantly, and her courage failed her. “It is nothing,” she said instead, lamely.

  “You are not having second thoughts?”

  Sophie laughed, perhaps a trifle raggedly, but said nothing. What was there to be said?

  Leaving her chair, Jenny sat beside Sophie and took her hands. “Sophie, you need not take this step if it makes you unhappy. We will find some other way to—”

  “I am not unhappy, Jenny, truly,” said Sophie, anxious to make herself understood—to herself as much as to Jenny. “If I must marry someone, I can think of no other who—but—” She paused, feeling wretched. “I had not thought to marry so young . . . nor in such haste.”

  To her surprise, Jenny gave her hands an understanding squeeze. “Of course not,” she said. “Your life has been turned quite upside down, and I cannot wonder that you feel harried. But, Sophie, listen. My brother is . . . he is an unusual man. He will certainly not expect you to sit at home and embroider baby-clothes, if you do not wish it. If you had rather study ancient languages, or go out riding every day—he will be very happy for you to do so, I know.”

  Sophie could not help but smile at Jenny’s way of putting things. “You do not seem so very unhappy to be embroidering baby-clothes,” she ventured.

  “No, indeed.” Jenny returned the smile. “But, you see, I have everything I want, more or less.” Releasing Sophie’s hands, she gestured vaguely about her. “I have never expected to go about having adventures, you know, or to be a great mage or a great scholar. Had I indeed expected it, I should have been greatly disappointed, I think,” she added with a laugh, “small as my talent is for any of those pursuits. But yours is quite a different case, is it not?”

  “Because I am a princess, you mean.” Spitting out the hated word with bitter emphasis, Sophie rose abruptly from her seat and began to pace about the small room.

  “Not at all,” said Jenny mildly, “though that must have some bearing, certainly. I only meant, however, that you are very much cleverer than I, and very much more talented. And then, to be so much in love as you appear to be . . .”

  At this reminder—however little intended—of her mos
t recent magickal disaster, Sophie’s cheeks burned, and she cast a guilty glance in the direction of the drawing-room. She hardly knew how to express what it was that frightened her so: that they would all be soon involving themselves in mortal peril, and she could not bear to think what the end of it might be, if all their preparations should prove insufficient. If I cannot protect him—or if he will not let me.

  But all this would be equally the case, whether she married him or no.

  “Jenny,” she said, finally coming to the point, “do you—please forgive my asking—do you love your husband?”

  Jenny’s smile grew a little rueful. “He loves me very much,” she said. “Not, perhaps, as my brother loves you—but very much, in his own way. And I am very fond of him. He is a good and an honourable man, and he has been very kind to me.”

  “And to all your odd acquaintance,” Sophie added. She had not at first been much disposed to like Sieur Germain de Kergabet, but for her—as perhaps for Jenny?—he had improved upon closer acquaintance.

  “Indeed,” Jenny laughed, “though that, I fear, is rather a recent development. From his behaviour to all of you here, one would not guess that only this summer he was annoyed that I should insist on corresponding with a brother whom my father had very reasonably thrown off.”

  “But he trusts you,” Sophie persisted, rather shocked. “He was reluctant to take us at our word, but yours convinced him at once.”

  “Yes, he trusts me.” No trace of mirth now remained in Jenny’s voice. “I could not have agreed to marry him else. I learnt early—at my mother’s knee, one might say—a lesson I hope you shall be spared: We should both be miserable, could we not trust one another.”

  “Jenny, do you think—do you think I do right, to marry for love? You do not think I shirk my duty to my father, or to the kingdom?”

  Jenny was silent for a time, her face very still. “I can only tell you,” she said at last, “what I have already told Gray: that not one pair of lovers in a thousand is given such a chance as this, and I should think you a fool to disdain such good fortune.

  “No: I shall tell you one thing more. It was given to me once, long ago, to have my prayers very clearly answered for the good of one I loved, and I have long prayed for my brother’s happiness in marriage, as I am sure he once prayed for mine. I do not presume so far as to call you the Great Mother’s answer to my prayers; yet I cannot think how they might be better answered.”

  Sophie flushed, and knew not where to look.

  “I shall pray, also,” she said after a moment. “I shall beg the Lady Juno’s blessing on my wedding day—that is most proper, is it not?”

  “Most proper, indeed,” said Jenny, smiling.

  CHAPTER XXVI

  In Which We Witness the Making of Promises

  Breakfast on the morning of the wedding was a hurried affair, every member of the household having some pressing task. Sieur Germain had gone out very early, despite a settled rain; the moment they had eaten, Jenny and Joanna whisked Sophie away to try on her wedding-dress, while Mrs. Wallis disappeared to join Mrs. Treveur in the kitchen.

  Gray alone wandered the house in search of some occupation. Too restless and distracted to read, and disinclined for conversation, he yearned to escape the house. Instead he paced and fretted, until at last he was waylaid by his brother-in-law in the corridor outside the drawing-room.

  “I have discharged your commission,” Sieur Germain said cheerfully, handing him a small paper packet, slightly damp and sealed with the mark of a renowned family of goldsmiths, “and I believe that Jenny has something to show you, also . . .”

  “Has she?” he said. “Where shall I find her?”

  “She is in the morning-room, I believe.”

  “I thank you,” said Gray. He started down the corridor in the proper direction, only to turn back, the little packet clasped in one hand, to cry, “And I thank you, a thousand times, for— for—”

  “Another time,” Sieur Germain replied, waving away his thanks. “The gods grant you many more years in which to discharge all debts of gratitude.”

  “The gods grant,” echoed Gray.

  Jenny received him in the morning-room—where she sat with Joanna amidst what must surely be a full cartload of hothouse flowers, whether destined for marriage-offerings or simply to decorate the house for the occasion, it was difficult to guess—with an expression of affectionate impatience.

  “I had forgot, after all these years,” she said, “how difficult it is to gain your attention when you have something on your mind.”

  Joanna produced a most uncharacteristic giggle; Gray frowned at her, but to no effect.

  “I did have your things here,” Jenny continued, greatly increasing his bewilderment. “I wished to show them to you myself. But as there was not room enough for everything, once the flowers arrived, I have asked Treveur to put them in your bedroom—”

  “My things? What things?”

  “Graham Valerius Marshall, you did not think I should permit you to be married in those appalling clothes?” his sister demanded.

  He glanced down at the outgrown trousers, the threadbare waistcoat, the coat that—despite the best efforts of Mrs. Wallis and several Kergabet servants—still bore traces of its misadventures at Merlin.

  “I . . . I had not thought at all,” he admitted.

  “Well, go and look.” Jenny shook her head in good-natured despair. “My lord will send his man up later to do something about your hair.”

  In his bedroom he found neatly laid out a suit of clothes, recognisably much finer than any he had ever owned—and as to size (of which he was a rather better judge) more accurately cut than he would have thought possible. Not for the first time he wondered, with a groan, how he should ever succeed in repaying his brother-in-law for the tremendous outlay of coin which he must be making; to repay his even greater outlay of effort and goodwill was, of course, quite impossible.

  * * *

  Sophie woke to a hesitant knocking at her bedroom door and rose from her bed, against whose coverlet she had collapsed, exhausted from experimenting with warding-spells, some unknown while before, to open it. She had expected Jenny or Joanna—perhaps Mrs. Wallis, or Jenny’s maid—come to harry her into new clothes or carry out their threats to dress her hair “just like the Queen’s.” Instead the knocker was Gray, wearing the diffident expression that she so seldom saw of late, from which she deduced that his errand concerned matters of the heart, rather than of the intellect.

  “Sophie,” he began, “might I—have you a moment to—”

  “Come in,” she said, rubbing one eye, and, when he hesitated, “Gray, we shall be married in a few hours’ time; surely there can be no impropriety . . . but do not close the door, if you had rather not.”

  Rather to her surprise, he ducked under the lintel and pulled the door to.

  “I have . . . I should have liked to give you a proper betrothal-gift,” he said, stepping close to her and taking her hand. At his touch she smiled, warmed to her toes. “This . . . it is not exactly mine to give—I have had to ask my brother-in-law to find it for me, and to pay for it—but the thought, at least—”

  “There is no need to give me anything,” Sophie told him, indulging herself by stretching up to tuck a stray lock of hair behind his ear. “You ought to know that, if anyone does.”

  Gray returned the smile; he put up a hand as though to touch her cheek but halted it in midgesture. “Still,” he said, “one ought to do things properly, and, besides . . .” He let go her hand and reached into a coat-pocket, from which he extracted some small, glinting thing. Then reaching again for her hand, he turned it palm up, and gently folded her fingers round the object.

  Opening her hand, Sophie looked down at a slender gold ring.

  “Oh,” she said softly, rendered quite as inarticulate as Gray had ever been. She turned th
e ring around in her fingers, admiring the delicately chased laurel-leaves that decorated its outer surface, and marvelled that he should have contrived to choose for her so exactly what she might have chosen for herself. Then, looking up at him, hoping that he would read in her face what she could not quite manage to say, she slipped it onto her finger—against the vein which, so said healers’ lore, leads most directly to the heart.

  About to attempt some expression of thanks, she was forestalled by another, more importunate knock at the door. This time it was Jenny indeed, with Joanna and a brace of maids.

  “Baths,” the mistress of the house announced succinctly, and, pointing an imperious finger at her brother, “Upstairs with you.”

  Though the traditional festive visit to the public baths was out of the question, the Roman-plumbed facilities chez Kergabet were quite luxurious enough for Sophie’s taste. On this occasion a fire crackled merrily on the marble hearth of the second-floor bathroom, and the large bath was already filled with steaming water.

  Properly steamed and scrubbed, Sophie drank Mrs. Wallis’s vile-tasting tincture of wild carrot seeds and was ceremoniously attired in her makeshift wedding-clothes. Jenny performed the motherly office of tying the broad sash in an elaborate knot, and her maid, Henriette, took firm charge of Sophie’s hair.

  By the time she was summoned to appear downstairs, Sophie felt she would go quite mad from the suspense.

  * * *

  The drawing-room was lit by half a dozen candelabra and filled with the scents of flowers blooming out of season—roses and lilies, hyacinth and eglantine. The priest had set up his altar, lit his incense, pronounced his opening invocation; he summoned the bride, and Jenny led Sophie forward. Sophie answered his questions in a sort of haze, declaring (not altogether truthfully) that she was indeed Sophia Lavinia Callender, of an age to marry and contracted to no other man, and had come here of her own will to be married to Gray; her family’s consent was sought, and Mrs. Wallis gave it. She heard Gray called likewise, and likewise declare himself, and Sieur Germain give consent on behalf of his family. Bride and bridegroom bowed to the altar. The priest—who looked rather cross, for no reason that Sophie could discern—led them in making their offerings to those deities concerned with marriage.