No…no, it wasn’t a draft. Now it wasn’t a shivery feeling, it was a feeling of warmth. She found herself smiling at him. He smiled back. Behind his spectacles, his eyes twinkled.
“I think you’re giving me more credit than I deserve,” she said awkwardly.
“And I think you’re giving yourself too little.” He winked at her. “But let’s not argue. Let’s see what the Godmother has to say.”
16
THE GREEN FACE HAD NO INFORMATION FOR THEM, but as Sebastian had suggested, he was one of the sources for the Godmother’s information. He promised that he himself would contact them when he had gathered as much as he could in the next day or two. Eric did not appear at supper, which did not surprise Sebastian.
“He’ll have stayed in the city. He generally does when he has a reason to go there,” Sebastian explained. “He gets money from our Factor in the city, and uses the Ducal town house — don’t get excited about that, I’ll bet it’s much smaller than your father’s house. I only keep on a Housekeeper there, but he won’t care; he eats at the taverns, anyway, and he visits the — ” Sebastian stopped, flushing a bright crimson. “There are women,” he said, after a long pause. “He might be gone a couple of days, maybe longer. It’s been a while since he went to the city. He’s been working really hard since my little…escape. He could stay a week and I think he deserves it, if he needs it.”
“Ah,” she replied, without comment. “Well, would you like to listen to some music tonight? I’m going to — I asked Sapphire to tell the others.”
“Really? Yes, I would!” He brightened considerably. “Very much so! I haven’t — well, I haven’t had any music that wasn’t my own bad singing in years.”
“Have you taken any thought to what I suggested about going back to Court at least in the middle of the month?” she asked, pointedly.
“I’d rather wait and see what the King and the Godmother say,” he demurred, looking uneasily down into his soup.
“Now, is that because you don’t want to go, or — ”
He interrupted her. “I want to go. I miss people. I miss music and libraries and talking and dancing. I even miss the ridiculous maneuvering at Court — since I was never a part of it, it was all pretty funny to watch. But…at the same time, it terrifies me. Everyone knows, or will know, that I’m a wizard now. I’m afraid people will be as afraid of a wizard as they would be of the beast.”
She pursed her lips. “Well…what did they think of you before?”
He shrugged. “Not much. I suppose I was sort of an amusing non-entity. Nobody bothered to trouble me because I wasn’t important enough to be a threat. I suppose at some point a desperate mother — or someone like your stepmother, anxious for any sort of title for her girl — would have started throwing a daughter at me, but it hadn’t happened yet. People liked me well enough. I know how to tell an amusing story, and even better, I know when a story isn’t amusing and I don’t tell it. I dance passably. I hunt well, and ride well. I don’t get into quarrels or, God forbid, duels. I play cards, but not for high stakes, and I’m not very lucky or very unlucky. I do — or did — have good discussions with the few folks who have scholarly inclinations, and some of the older people at Court. I’m a good listener.” He spread his hands wide. “There you have me. Such as I am. Quite forgettable.”
“Eat your soup and stop feeling sorry for yourself,” she said, a little sharply, because it did look as if he was about to mope. “You might not have made any fast friends, but it doesn’t sound as if you were trying. And unless someone at Court is responsible for your current condition, you didn’t make any enemies, either.”
He gave her one of his odd, sideways looks. “You really are a most unnatural female.” Strangely, that didn’t sound as if he meant it as an insult, or even a criticism. “I like that.”
“I’m glad someone does, since that is Genevieve’s chief complaint about me,” she replied. “Look, I just don’t see any point in obfuscation when there’s no need for it, and there isn’t, here. You are afraid that people will be afraid of your wizardly power, but that doesn’t necessarily have to happen. Now, weren’t you just telling me that people found you amusing?”
“More or less,” he admitted.
“Then keep being amusing, but add a few tricks,” she told him. “You know, silly little things. Nothing enormous. And when people ask you, just say modestly, ‘Oh, I can do a few things for parties.’ Not every wizard can call down lightning, after all! And yes, I know you can — ” she said, stopping him before he could interject that, “ — but they don’t have to know!”
He blinked at her. She had come to the conclusion that he blinked while he was thinking hard, not because she had baffled him or said something that made no sense. “I was an amusing fellow to have about because I had no real power and was not a threat. I will still be an amusing fellow to have about, perhaps even more amusing with a few petty tricks in my pocket, because they will think that I still have no power.” He smiled a little. “That all I am, you might say, is anecdotes and fireworks.”
“Can you do fireworks?” she asked, curiously.
He looked offended. “Of course I can. Every wizard can. The kind with charcoal and saltpeter, and the kind with Illusions. It’s rather expected of us. The Tradition demands it.”
She had to laugh at that. “So are you going to be the bumbling wizard?”
He blinked some more. “No…I’d rather not. The absentminded one would suit me better. The one that forgets he has a frog in his pocket.”
“Perhaps not a frog,” she suggested. “Not the best guest at a party.”
“Singing bird, then.” He pondered that. “I had better make friends with some birds.”
“Cake crumbs,” she told him, out of a wealth of experience of being bored at outdoor galas and feeding a myriad of hungry songbirds with an endless stream of crumbled cakes.
“I’ll take that under advisement.” He finished his soup and looked at the next course curiously. “What in heaven’s name is that? It looks like one of those meat pies you get at taverns, only…elongated.”
“An experiment. We seem to have a superfluity of rabbits, so the cook suggested this might be nice.” The cook had suggested this variation on a beef dish, as something suitable for just two or three people; she trusted his — her — its judgment. Quite simply, it was mushroom-and-shallot paste spread over pastry, the whole then rolled around some boned pieces of rabbit.
“Forgive me if I’m a little worried about a dish that a creature who doesn’t eat has produced as an experiment.” Sebastian poked at it with his fork, dubiously, then cut off an end and tried it. His expression went from dubious to delighted. “It’s good!” he exclaimed.
She grinned, but said nothing.
It was dark by the time they were done, and one of the servants carried a candle ahead of them to light their way — which was just one of those things that reminded her that she wasn’t in an ordinary household anymore. She was usually in her own rooms by dark, and had gotten used to seeing — or not seeing — Sapphire puttering invisibly about. Seeing a floating candlestick…
“Now, how can I possibly invite people here when they’re going to see something like that?” he exclaimed, gesturing at the candle.
Well, well! Now he’s actually thinking about it!
“By making it into something people will want to see,” she pointed out. “Look, who were the folk you invited here in the first place?”
“Erm…mostly a few folk who came for the hunting,” he said. “I mean, the forest has been practically unhunted for years now. I probably have more game out here than any other noble within an easy ride of the city.”
“And I assume most of those few people are unlikely to be put off by invisible servants and floating candles?” she hazarded.
He thought about that as they passed through empty rooms and murder-corridors. “Probably not,” he said, finally. “They weren’t unnerved by the Manor itself,
after all.”
“So, while they’re here, tell them you only have a few of these servants. Have everyone but a handful take off their armbands. And then act as if everything is perfectly normal.” She made a face that he couldn’t see in the dark, remembering what Eric had said about being ignored as if he wasn’t there. “I very much suspect that they’ll be pleased rather than otherwise. Oh, it will be unnerving at first, so perhaps what you should do is have a very few people here at first, young ones that will enjoy the novelty, or be impressed by the magic. I suspect once they get over floating objects, the situation will suit them down to the ground.”
“Huh. You could be right…”
“Then, once word gets around that you have this wizardly Manor with invisible servants, people will want to see it for the thrill. You’ll have more people angling for invitations than you know what to do with.” They arrived at the music room…and she turned to face him. “And before you ask me what to do then, it’s very simple. You tell people that you can only conjure up so many servants for a few days out of the month, and you’re very sorry, but until you’ve rested and gotten your power back, it probably wouldn’t be good to visit unless they are prepared to tend themselves and cook their own meals.”
“Oho.” He had to chuckle at that — but then he spotted the congregation of instruments at the other end of the music room, right by the fireplace. Unlike the times when the musicians played for dancing, they all had wooden stands with candles affixed to them in front of their chairs, and sheets of music paper on the stands.
Since she wasn’t encumbered by skirts, she was pleased to see that some of the straw mattresses from target practice had been arranged into a very comfortable-looking lounging-thing on the floor near the fire, and covered with a beautiful velvet coverlet. She happily curled up on it, and after a moment of hesitation, Sebastian followed suit, sitting down with a stiffly decorous distance between them. He seemed acutely aware of her legs, pointedly not looking at them. Fortunately for his composure, he had plenty to look at with the five instrumentalists right in front of them.
When she and Sebastian were settled, and the only sound was the crackling of the fire rather than the muffled rustling of the straw, they began.
Sebastian’s features relaxed, and his mouth began to curve into a smile. His head nodded slightly in time to the music, and it was obvious that he was not just pleased, but quite impressed.
Seeing that he was happy, she relaxed, and gave herself over to the music, as well. The time they’d had to practice together was obvious to her; she could tell they were much better, and played more as a unit, than they had when she had first started listening to them.
Sebastian closed his eyes and settled back after the third piece, no longer trying to maintain that stiff distance between them. She wasn’t the sort who closed her eyes to listen to music, but she did make herself marginally more comfortable and let her mind drift, not thinking of anything in particular. She didn’t recognize any of the pieces — they weren’t dance numbers, and it was clear to her, at least, that they were meant to be listened to, as opposed to danced to. Most of them were far too slow to dance to, anyway, and contained tempo changes and pauses that a dancer would find very annoying.
She had not been to very many concerts in the homes of the extremely wealthy — Genevieve was bored out of her mind by such things — and unfortunately, most of those had been marred by people incessantly gossiping and drowning out the softer passages. She would very much have liked to be able to sit up near the front with the folk who were actually there to listen to the music, but she had been stuck with Genevieve and the twins, and they were inevitably seated in the back of the room, with others like themselves, who only saw the concert as another excuse to continue whatever conversation they’d been having the last time they saw each other. This…was lovely.
Oh, there were moments even she recognized as fumbling and missed notes, even though she didn’t know the music — there always were when the Spirit Elementals played. But those were few and far between, and she was listening alongside someone whose pleasure in the melodies was so acute he practically radiated it.
Sebastian hasn’t had many moments of pleasure since the curse came on him…
She didn’t know how she knew that — except, of course, that she knew him. She could guess what his anguish had been the first time he’d awakened in the imprisoning cell and been told what had happened to him. She could imagine the number of times he really had contemplated throwing himself out of a window, and the restraint it had taken not to. She had a very good idea of the terribly lonely nights he had spent, certain that no cure for his condition would ever be found.
How terrible had it been, to see his father’s liegemen and their allies desert him even before he changed, as Eric acted as his Guardian? And how betrayed had he felt when the very servants slipped away afterward? He must have wondered what it was he had done to make them all despise him so much that they wouldn’t remain even to take advantage of him.
“My father loved this piece,” he said, very quietly, so as not to disrupt the music. She turned from watching the harp strings vibrating to look at him. He smiled wryly. “I know, from what you’ve heard about him, you probably wouldn’t think of him as a music lover, but he was. It was one of the rare things we shared. He went to many concerts when we were in the city, though that was rarely — he hated Court. He had musicians come out here, and had several of the servants who expressed an interest trained to play, as well. It was a welcome duty for them, since it meant lighter duties elsewhere. He had very old-fashioned tastes, and this was one of his favorite pieces. I — I honestly never thought I’d hear it again.”
Greatly moved by this, she impulsively put her hand atop his, shivering a little at her own daring, and at the odd thrill the touch of his hand gave her. He went very still for just a moment, and she wondered if she had transgressed —
But then he turned his hand upward, and clasped hers.
Nothing more than that, but she thought nothing had ever felt so right, so comfortable and comforting, as his hand holding hers. He closed his eyes again, and she went back to watching the musical instruments seem to play themselves, but something had changed between them. There was a bond — perhaps it had been there for some time, but now they had acknowledged it.
She frowned a little, then, and attuned her mind to search for the pressure of The Tradition. Because if that was what was responsible —
Well, there was pressure, all right, but it was not trying to shove her at Sebastian. It definitely stirred and took interest when she thought — tentatively — about how handsome Eric was when he smiled. But when she thought tenderly about Sebastian’s funny little habit of pushing his glasses up on his nose and tilting his head to the side when she puzzled him, it withdrew, as if offended.
Ha. Thus reassured, she went back to enjoying the music and the warmth of Sebastian’s hand clasping hers.
Finally, there came a pause, which made him open his eyes again, and then the harp tentatively played a few notes of what she recognized as a familiar old lullaby.
Sebastian laughed. “All right, my friends, let this be your last piece.” He let go of her hand, and clasped both of his on his knee. “It’s become a custom among musicians playing a concert that when they are tired and want to stop, they play a lullaby as a gentle hint. Of course, not every host is willing to take that hint, and rather too often he ignores the first lullaby, and the second, and only yields at the third. I, however, am not that mean-spirited.”
She smiled and nodded, and the rest of the players took up the melody that the harp had begun, playing it three times, slower each time, until the last tender notes fell softly into the air and ended in stillness.
And so, after a long moment, the instruments rose into the air and were carried out, leaving the two of them alone.
Sebastian rose to his feet, and held out his hand to help her up. “That was the best gift that anyone h
as given me in a very, very long time. And the crowning gift of a day full of them,” he said, still holding her hand, and looking down into her eyes. “I really do not have the words to thank you. You’ve done all these wonderful things for me, and all I have done for you was to lacerate your foot.”
The last surprised a laugh out of her. He grinned back. But he still didn’t let go of her hand.
“It wasn’t the laceration I minded so much,” she said lightly. “It was the thought of Genevieve in charge of the household. But strangely enough, that seems to be working itself out.”
“Perhaps because, without the stepdaughter there, The Tradition is allowing her to be herself, and not what it wants her to be,” he replied, startling her with the same insight that she had had. “I wonder what would happen if the stepdaughter never went back — or at least, not as the rival in the household.”
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