by Barbara Howe
For a few moments, the spectators seemed spellbound, too confused or scared to react. Only the king seemed oblivious to the black horror surrounding him. “Guards,” he yelled, “evict this impudent hussy. Who does she think she is, slandering one of her betters?”
From the corner of my eye, I saw Earl Eddensford rise, Claire beside him with her hand on his arm. How the magic worked I do not know, perhaps her touch freed him, because he said, in a ringing voice, “Let her be. She speaks the truth. Edmund was—” A wire whipped around the earl’s neck and tightened. He stopped with a strangled gasp and fell, his hands clawing at his throat.
Men yelled, women screamed. Witches and mundanes, noble and commoner alike bolted for the doors or cowered in their seats as the roiling tangle searched for other threats.
A stiletto of a voice—Sorceress Lorraine’s—soared over the commotion. “Mundanes, conspirators, freeze!”
Only the members of the counter-conspiracy, gathering closer to concentrate our power, were still free to move. Men, women, and children stopped dead in their tracks. The prince, diving from the dais towards his cousin, the earl, was caught in mid-leap. Claire, an angel come to rescue a poor sinner from the jaws of hell, stooped over her husband, golden hair haloing her face against the vile blackness.
A wire whipped around her throat, and tightened.
I yelled at René, Help them.
He ran, slashing a burning path to the earl’s side with a fiery wand. Sunbeam saw Claire, and bounded after René, leaving Maggie exposed.
Cords lashed at her. She shrieked and dove for the floor. Tom vaulted the chairs and fell on her, knocking her flat and taking the brunt of a dozen scourging strands on his own back. He screamed. Other witches and wizards scrambled to fill in the gaps and tighten the edge of our circle.
Come on, Beorn, undo the spell.
The engine of lies, aware now of the gravest threat, abandoned the pamphleteers. The room darkened as gears turned, pulling in power, building an impenetrable mesh around its core. A bubble of fire formed around us where black strands met copper. If René and Sunbeam hadn’t created a similar bubble, God help them. I couldn’t.
Beorn, help. Now would be good.
Sven and I sent blast after blast of flame, hot enough to melt glass, shooting into the conspiracy’s dense core, but it barely made a dent. I would use all the power I had, and it would not be enough. Even my rising anger, a battering ram of fury against the two warlocks on the dais refusing to help, wasn’t enough.
The black mass pressed down on us, crushing our bubble. We squeezed together, a dozen witches and wizards crowding round me with their hands on my arms and shoulders. A thrashing cord broke through our defences, slashing a wizard across the face.
The copper strands of the counter-conspiracy wavered, and other whipping cords broke through. Witches and wizards around me flailed, screamed, clawed at my arms and skirts.
And then I discovered aid coming from an unexpected direction. Lorraine was freezing cables, sucking the power out of them. All around her, they fell to the ground and shattered. If there were just two of her…
The tightness in my chest disappeared. At long last, I understood what she had done. I threw back my head and laughed. Power, more than enough, surrounded me, and the gift of cold water made it mine for the taking,
I yanked my arms free and stretched them out to the thrashing tangle. With one hand I drew in power from the attacking cables, with the other threw it back out as flame. For ten long breaths, light and darkness seemed evenly matched, and then, at a pace befitting a king’s funeral cortege, the diabolical engine began to destroy itself.
My arms shook from the strain before the jet of fire sizzling through the murk punched a path all the way to the dais. Jean’s beacon flooded back in a glorious golden blaze, burning the hole wider and wider. In seconds, he pushed his way into the circle. Our burning bubble expanded, and encompassed more of the room. Terrified men and women stood frozen in place, forced to see and hear a battle they did not understand. Beorn, still ensnared, watched. René whooped and pumped a fist when our bubble swallowed his and Sunbeam’s smaller one.
The bubble reached Beorn, lighting him up like a bonfire. He jumped off the dais with a roar and reached for me over Hazel’s head. “What took you so long?” he said, grinning.
The black tangle disappeared in a dazzling burst, leaving the room clear. I followed the circle of fire with my mind’s eye as it expanded further and further outward, sweeping all of Frankland and burning away the last remnants of the conspiracy.
Beorn let go, and we were back in the royal palace, facing a ballroom full of frightened and bewildered people. That was all I saw before I pitched forward into my husband’s arms.
I regained consciousness in our bedroom, to hear Jean barking orders at our flustered staff.
“You wonderful, wonderful witch,” he said, punctuating each word with a brisk but fervent kiss. “Eat. Sleep. Rest here until you have recovered.” Another solid kiss, and he disappeared into the fireplace.
I ate. I slept. I woke, still confused over Jean and Beorn’s reluctance to help, but warmed by Jean’s praise. The anger that had been my constant companion for weeks melted away. I had been a fool to let fear and jealousy cloud my reason; he did still love me. Hadn’t he called me wonderful? Late in the afternoon, when neither Jean nor René had returned, and no word had come from Paris, I scraped together the last of my reserves, and called up images in the fire of the day’s events.
The ballroom would have been a maelstrom of screaming people if the spectators had not still been frozen in place. The few moving were the counter-conspirators, and Mother Celeste, scrambling down from the dais to lay healing hands first on Earl Eddensford and Claire, half-strangled, and then Tom with his flayed back, and other unfortunates gashed by whipping wires.
While she worked her healing magic, Beorn provided an account of what had just happened. It was the most polished speech I ever heard him give. As if he’d spent hours practicing.
Only then did Lorraine lift her spell. The din the shuffling audience made died quickly as they strained to hear the shouting king. Whether he was too dim or too self-absorbed wasn’t obvious, but he had failed to grasp Beorn’s explanations. He was still raging at Maggie Archer, claiming she had defamed Lord Edmund, and demanding a trial.
I leaned forward, not wanting to miss Lorraine’s sarcastic response.
“Certainly, Your Majesty,” she said. “Here and now. This afternoon.”
I almost fell into the fire. Maggie Archer on trial? Never once had I considered that possibility. Facing the Water Office was far worse than facing a magical conspiracy. Until this morning, the conspiracy had not tried to kill anyone.
Why were the hairs on the back of my neck standing on end? Maggie was in no danger. The Water Office didn’t freeze slanderers. And it wasn’t slander to tell the truth. With the conspiracy destroyed, the truth could be told at the trial. Maggie had nothing to worry about.
Then Lorraine’s words from weeks ago came back to me. “I would bring a test case to the nobles in August, to shock them…” Ice water flowed through my veins. We had handed her a test case, made to order, for her to demonstrate just how broken the Water Office was.
Maggie in the Balance
Thank God I missed the legal manoeuvrings. Sitting before the fire in my bedroom, I flew through that tedium. Only a few things caught my attention: Tom and Matt facing down the king’s men-at-arms over custody of the distraught girl. The crown prince, to his father’s fury, regarding René with something close to hero worship. Lorraine boxing the king into a corner when he demanded the noblewomen leave the ballroom—if the allegations were falsehoods, nothing could offend their delicate sensibilities, could it?
A water wizard delivered a large silver balance to one side of the dais. Jean and Lorraine huddled with the king
’s advisors, while the royal family and nobles left for their midday meal. Despite the August heat, most commoners stayed, packed into the upper tiers, unwilling to give up their vantage spots for the coming show. Our pamphlets appeared, passed from hand to hand, amidst a rising tide of angry muttering. More spectators packed in the already crowded balconies until I feared they would collapse under their weight. Outside, commoners converged on the palace from all directions, blocking traffic in the streets, and climbing trees and fence posts to see. Far too late the guards attempted to close the gates, but the crowds wouldn’t let them.
The nobles trickled back in. Tom and Matt escorted Maggie onto the dais, and saved her from falling when confronted with the silver scales. The royal family returned, and the trial began.
Over the past few weeks, I had grown accustomed to thinking of the head of the Water Guild as Sorceress Lorraine, a woman with heart under a cool demeanour. But the woman presiding over the trial was without doubt the Frost Maiden, with an alabaster complexion and a voice as sharp as the north wind.
That made two of us suffering from overactive consciences, but her armour was better than mine.
I had already had my fill of Lord Edmund. I flicked through the presentation of the first rape, noting with relief it did not show the woman’s face, and nearly missed the interruption.
“Stop this! Now!”
The mirror clouded over, and I searched for the source of the vehement order. Queen Marguerite leaned forward on her throne, her face and body rigid, with her hands clamped over the squirming prince’s eyes. Her husband squinted at her as if she had turned into a scorpion.
“I will not watch any more of this filth,” the queen said. “I will not have my son subjected to it either.” She raked the line of dukes with her eyes. “I never imagined anyone from a noble family could engage in such heinous behaviour. It is obvious, Stephen, we have been lied to.”
King Stephen’s relief was palpable. “Yes, yes, my dear, that is so.” He turned and glared at the dukes. Several of them returned the glare, but didn’t refute the charge.
“I beg your pardon, Your Majesty,” Lorraine said, “but may I remind you several dozen men and women risked their lives today to destroy a conspiracy that, they claim, masked Lord Edmund’s true nature. It is inappropriate for children, but if we adults cannot view these events, how shall we know the truth?”
The king summoned a man-at-arms to escort the protesting prince from the ballroom. Then he turned to his wife. “My dear, you should leave, too. Your delicate constitution can’t take this.”
“Queen Marguerite’s constitution, Your Majesty,” Mother Celeste said, “is stronger than yours. She is healthier in both mind and body than some of the women Lord Edmund attacked. She is unlikely to suffer permanent damage watching what they had to live through.”
The queen patted her husband’s hand. “Sorceress Lorraine and Mother Celeste make good points. It’s sweet of you, dear, to try to spare me from this, but what kind of a queen would I be if I ran away from every hint of bad news? I believe I must stay, on behalf of Frankland’s women, no matter how dreadful it is. But if other women want to leave, please go ahead and do so.”
A flurry of conversation followed as many noblemen encouraged the women with them to withdraw. No one moved.
The queen said, “Must you show us everything? Couldn’t you skip over some of the, er…”
“Most disagreeable parts?” Lorraine said. “Yes, but I insist we witness enough to either confirm or deny Miss Archer’s charge.”
The small mirror in the queen’s hand wobbled. She gripped it with both hands, raised her chin, and straightened her spine. “Very well, go on.”
The images in the fire faded as I burned through the last dregs of my power. The trial hadn’t finished. I ran for the Fortress and charged up the stairs to the tunnel ending in the royal ballroom’s cavernous fireplace. I crept forward in the shadows under the balconies while the magic mirror over the thrones replayed the argument between the old earl and Lord Richard. This time it was as I had seen it, to the old earl’s detriment.
Maggie saw me, and glared. I looked away. Jean gave me the barest shake of his head. I shouldn’t have come? Too bad, I wasn’t going to miss this show.
The counter-conspirators were a sorry-looking lot of sluggards. Some valiant souls fought to stay awake; others, like René and Sunbeam, gave up all pretence and snored. Master Sven leaned forward, forehead resting on the seat back in front of him. He raised his head and nodded when I slid in beside him.
He whispered, “I promised Miss Archer the Fire Guild would pay the fine, but the rest…” He shrugged. “I’ll pay out of my own pocket if the Council doesn’t agree.”
“I’ll split it with you,” I said. “Seems like the least we can do. But what do you mean, the rest? All I remember from Baron D’Armond’s trial is a fine.”
“The Water Office has been increasing the penalties, remember? Sorceress Eleanor said the most recent suit ended with the girl having to pay a fine and go into service with the man who raped her.”
“Frostbite,” I squawked. A dozen nearby heads swivelled to throw shocked glances at me.
Sven glared. “Watch your language.”
“Why?” I hissed. “Because there are women present? That word can’t be as shocking as what you just said. What went wrong? The truth is out now. How can she be convicted of defamation?”
“Oh, be quiet. I don’t know.” He put his head down in his hands and spoke to the floor. “When the commoners hear the penalties imposed they’ll go berserk.”
Thank God Lord Edmund was dead. The new earl was a decent man, but Maggie had already lost her brother, and now the rest of her life would be ruined. And it was my fault.
In the mirror above, a young fop I didn’t recognise said to Lord Edmund, “You’ve been fawning over Lady Susan lately. I didn’t think you liked her.”
“My brother thinks she’s his. I’ll give his nose a good, hard tweak if I steal her out from under it.”
“He doesn’t act like he’s in a hurry.”
“That’s why she’ll accept when I ask for her hand. She’s tired of waiting for him. Besides, she’s rich. I don’t have to like her.”
“I know, but still… She says every nasty thing that comes into her head. I can’t bear being in the same room with her. I can’t imagine wanting to take her to bed.”
Lord Edmund’s smile was more repulsive than a grimace. “I can. When she’s mine, I’ll pay her back triple for every vile thing she’s ever said to me. She’ll learn to keep a civil tongue in her head, and I will enjoy every minute of it.”
An outraged voice interrupted the scene. “That’s my daughter!”
Lorraine said, “What would you expect? That a man who rapes without remorse would treat his wife with respect? You are a fool, Your Grace.” She gestured, and the magic mirror became, once again, just a mirror. “We have now seen Lord Edmund’s true nature, or enough of it that matters. We arrive now at the crucial questions. Miss Archer has accused Lord Edmund of raping five women.”
She gestured at the silver balance. Doll-like figures, one resembling Maggie Archer, the other Lord Edmund, appeared, one on each weighing pan. “We do not simply have her word against his now-mute testimony. The evidence we have seen upholds her charge.” Another hand wave, and five faceless figures appeared on the pan with the figure of Maggie. “We charge thee, Water Office, according to Frankland’s laws and customs, to show those assembled here a just verdict. Is Lord Edmund guilty—”
“Stop,” the king roared. “Lord Edmund isn’t on trial.”
“Indeed, he is not. He has doubtless already been called to account at a higher court than this, and nothing we say or do here on earth can change that verdict. What do you fear, Your Majesty? Your advisors have already agreed he is beyond our reach.”
The
king chewed his lip without answering.
“Perhaps,” she said, “I may rephrase the question to be more to your liking. Did Lord Edmund’s actions justify Miss Archer’s charge of rape?”
“I still don’t—” the king said, but the balance arm was swinging, the pan with the women’s replicas dropping. The arm was vertical when it settled. A definitive yes. A gusty sigh, mingling relief, regret, and rage ran through the audience, and then was stilled. The answer surprised few other than Sven and me.
I glanced at Sven. He shook his head and raised his hands, palms up.
Lorraine waved again at the scales, and the arm swung back to horizontal. The faceless dolls disappeared, leaving Maggie and Edmund again in balance. “A second question,” she said. “Did Miss Archer have reason to believe Lord Edmund intended to rape her on his appearance at her home?”
The pan holding Maggie’s replica dipped.
“And finally, the question at the heart of the defamation charge. Despite the revolting scenes we have witnessed revealing Lord Edmund’s true nature, that truth has no bearing on the charge against Miss Archer.”
Sven jerked upright. “Frostbite.”
“The only question I am permitted to ask in determining Miss Archer’s fate is this, Did Miss Archer’s statement, and the resulting exposé, damage Lord Edmund’s reputation?”
The weighing pan holding the figure of Lord Edmund dipped. After one shocked intake of breath, the watching commoners turned in an instant into a howling mob, out for blood. Hatred and revulsion battered me like stones, though I was not their target.
Beorn’s bellow shook the walls and echoed from nearby buildings, overriding the howling. “Sit down and shut up. I’ll burn anyone with a weapon, be they scullery maids or dukes.”
The mob ignored him. Missiles flew from the balconies: shoes, ladies’ purses, anything at hand. The shielded noblemen yelled back, shaking fists at the commoners above them. Witches, wizards, and noblewomen ran for cover.