by Melanie Rawn
Anticipating Cade’s move into his own digs, Mieka had designed, and his wife and her mother had made, a counterpane. Well, designed probably wasn’t the right word; he’d told them his idea, and they’d executed it. The quilted coverlet was thickly embroidered with a pattern of white goose-feather quills on a dark blue background. The border featured little bottles of ink in every color imaginable, with comical splotches here and there to show it had been spilled. And at the writing end of one feather was a tiny silver teardrop charm to symbolize the magic Cayden created with his words. How anyone, even accomplished needlewomen like his wife and her mother, could take silks and threads and craft something so wonderful was beyond his understanding. But probably people said the same thing about what his father did when making a lute, or what Mieka himself did with the magic Cade gave him in the withies.
The carriage had pulled round in front of the house, and everyone but Cade had climbed into it. Mieka’s mother, with the three-year-olds Jorie and Tavier drowsing in her arms, one on each hip, was supervising the loading of a hamper, but doing it quietly. Mistress Mirdley had helped with the cooking, and in all fairness should take some of it home with her. Besides, more food remained than even the tribe of Windthistles could eat, and it was only sensible to make sure none of it went to waste. Mieka knew that these considerations were neither here nor there nor anywhere else to Lady Jaspiela’s way of thinking. She would take offense at any implication that other people’s leftovers were needed to feed her household. So Mieka had had a brief word with his mother earlier, and she had nodded understanding.
“A proud woman, she is,” Mishia Windthistle had sighed. “One could wish she’d unbend enough to say how proud she is of Cayden… oh, she is, and no mistaking it,” she’d added when Mieka stared at her. “How could any mother not be priding herself on a son like that?”
There were mothers, and then there were mothers, as Mieka knew very well. But he didn’t belabor the point. Now, as Jeska and Rafe hugged their tregetour farewell for the night, and Lady Jaspiela raised her noble voice impatiently, Mieka sighed a sigh of his own. One day the woman might admit she was proud of her elder son. He didn’t plan to sit up nights waiting for it.
“Quill!” He saw his friend turn towards him, and heaved the package. Cade barely caught it. “For if you get cold,” Mieka told him.
Rafe pretended amazement. “There’s a girl tied up in there?”
Crisiant gave her husband a thoughtful glance. “Cade has always liked them pocket-sized, hasn’t he?”
Cade made a face at her and undid the ribbon. The counterpane unwrapped itself. Mieka doubled over laughing as Cade struggled to keep it off the ground. Jeska cowered back in mock horror, yelling, “It’s alive!”
“A sword!” Rafe called out. “A knife! A toasting fork! Anything to stab it before it eats my tregetour!”
“Don’t be so bleedin’ silly!” Mieka chided. “Not enough meat on him to tempt a starving cat.”
Cade eventually wrestled most of the slippery silk into his arms. He wore a look of comical helplessness—quite deliberate, Mieka knew. Quite the entertainer himself at times, was Cayden Silversun.
Mieka clucked his tongue against his teeth as he tucked up a few loose folds. “Clumperton. It’s a miracle, it is, that you can put one foot in front of the other and not fall over. Go on, get in and spread that over your mother and brother before they freeze. Happy Namingday, Quill!”
The gray eyes glinted merrily at him. “And to think I’ve a whole year and more to think up something for your twenty-first!”
“I tremble in terror, O Great Tregetour,” Mieka assured him.
“You’d damned well better!”
A few minutes later the counterpane had been duly deployed to keep the carriage’s occupants warm. Kearney was full of praise for its beauty and the skill of its makers. Lady Jaspiela unbent enough to finger the design of feathers and nod approval. Derien was already asleep on Mistress Mirdley’s lap. Mieka waved them onto the road, then returned to the courtyard.
It was a rather abrupt end to the party. Yazz had doused the bonfire. Robel was stacking chairs, and Mieka spent a minute or two admiring the swish and rustle of her skirts and the luscious figure beneath them. Jezael was consolidating the remains of three barrels of ale into one, and Mieka offered to help by draining one of them down his own throat. His elder brother snorted.
“Help me with these or I’ll drown you in one of them—the way Mum should’ve done to you at birth.”
“That I was born at all is your fault, yours and Jed’s,” he retorted, and helped Jez heft a barrel. “You turned out so revoltingly adorable that she wanted more. How was poor Mum to know she’d get me and Jinsie instead?”
“It’s a wonderment to me that Cilka and Petrinka and then Tavier and Jorie came along, then. And I’ve no idea in the world why your little Jindra is such a darling, with you for a sire. Are you planning on more? Or are you scared you might get something like you next time?”
The barrel safely drained, Mieka pushed it into his brother’s massive chest. It made no impression, other than to make him grunt. Jez let it fall, then reached over and snagged Mieka by his collar, lifting him effortlessly a few inches off the ground.
“Now, what was that you were trying to say, little brother? Something along the lines of ‘I’m sorry, Jez’ and ‘You’re always right, Jez’?”
He barely had time to kick and flail a bit, as had been usual with this game since they were children, when Jez abruptly released him. He landed on his bum on the cobblestones, and glared up—way up—at his brother. “Is this any way to treat a famous Master Glisker who’s celebrated and praised the length and width of Albeyn?”
But Jezael wasn’t looking at him. He was smiling in the direction of the house as he murmured, “I’ll finish you off later, Your Lordship.” Then, more loudly: “Time to put your husband to bed, I think—he’s falling-down drunk!”
“I only fell down because you dropped me!” He scrambled to his feet and brushed himself off, then seized his wife around the waist and kissed her. She resisted, so he kissed her harder. When she yielded, he relented, and hugged her. “You should’ve come with me to see the Silversuns off.”
“I couldn’t. Oh, Mieka, I just couldn’t, not after what was said.” He racked his memory for some unseemliness, but she spared him the trouble by rushing on. “It’s just not done, to invite someone to a celebration so far from the city and then—and then someone implying we’ve not enough beds for them—”
“Oh, that.” He shook his head. “Don’t anguish yourself about it, girl.”
“But I so much wanted Lady Jaspiela to like us—”
“Lady Jaspiela likes us fine. Would she have come today if she didn’t?”
“But, Mieka—”
“Enough.” He knew where this conversation was headed. She wanted Lady Jaspiela to like them enough to invite them to Redpebble Square, preferably when there were other highborns about. As if there were any fun to be had in a swarm of nobles—except to scandalize them. Still, because he knew it was important to her, he added, “While we’re at Trials, why don’t you visit at Wistly for a few days? You could go see Blye and Jed, and just happen to drop in on Lady Jaspiela, and—”
“Without an invitation? It’s not done, Mieka, it just is not done!”
Annoyed, he shrugged and let her go. “Just as you fancy. Let’s get some mulled ale going in the drawing room, shall we? The night’s gone chill.”
3
Gallantrybanks was a long drive from Hilldrop. A very long drive. The trip wouldn’t have been half so tedious if Derien had been awake. Circumspect and manners-minding as the brothers usually were around their mother, still there would have been interesting conversation. As it was, the boy slept in Mistress Mirdley’s lap, only his tousled dark hair visible amid the billowing counterpane. It fell therefore to Cade to make polite social mouthings from time to time.
Kearney Fairwalk was no help. When
it came to His Lordship, Lady Jaspiela swung between two extremes: respect for his ancient name and title, and total incomprehension of why he had chosen to amuse his noble self by managing a theater group. Depending on which attitude she exhibited at any given time, Kearney either obliged her with Court gossip or shut up completely. Tonight was one of the silent times. He had, after all, just delivered the wagon in which her elder son would be traipsing across Albeyn making an exhibition of himself. After apologizing for any discomfort she might experience on the drive back to Gallantrybanks, he subsided into the carriage’s farthest corner and to all appearances went to sleep.
So, after a few miles, it was up to Cade to start a conversation. He expressed his appreciation that his mother had taken the trouble to come all this way for his Namingday party. She answered that it had indeed been tiring. A few minutes later he remarked on how nice Mieka’s neighbors seemed to be. She replied that she hadn’t spoken to any of them. Another mile or two went by before he mentioned that Mieka’s little daughter was a very pretty child.
Lady Jaspiela shrugged, a rustling of silk in the darkness of the carriage. “They had best hope that she grows up prettily enough to compensate for her circumstances. One can scarcely expect a worthwhile marriage for the daughter of a theater player and a seamstress.”
“Windthistle is one of the oldest Elfen names there is.”
“A meaningless consideration, after this descent into the working classes.”
Though he couldn’t see her face, he knew precisely which of her many condescending expressions she would be wearing. “I’m a theater player,” he said. Then, most unwisely: “I’m working class.”
“No, you are not. There is a difference, Cayden, between how a gentleman amuses himself in his youth and what a person must do to keep a roof over his head.”
A slight, involuntary movement of Kearney’s shoulders told Cade that he was faking sleep. The grunt and sigh that followed signaled that he intended to go on faking; no gentleman would make such boorish noises while conscious, and therefore His Lordship must be asleep. Cade rather admired the shrewdness of the deception, and for the rest of the drive kept his mouth shut.
At some point along the rest of the silent way home he realized that his mother had given him the first hint of what was to come. And it came only minutes after leaving the elegant confines of Lord Fairwalk’s carriage for the vestibule of Number Eight, Redpebble Square. Lady Jaspiela told Mistress Mirdley to take Derien up to bed, then turned to Cade.
“A few moments of your time, please, Cayden.”
He knew what she wanted to talk about. Money. More to the point, his money, the inheritance from his father’s father, who’d been a Master Fettler back in the day. She was about to tell Cayden that because he was now financially independent, he need not continue in the theater. She would mention the advantages of his acquaintance with Princess Miriuzca, Prince Ashgar’s bride. She would remind him of his father’s position at Court and of her own noble antecedents, and end with the observation that whereas he’d enjoyed a certain amount of success, it was time he settled to a profession worthier of his ancestors than that of Master Tregetour.
He was right about the money, but wrong about everything else.
She led him into the drawing room. One of the footmen had made up a nice little fire against the spring evening’s chill, and left a long-necked bottle of Colvado brandy and a pair of snifters on a side table. This told him she had been planning this discussion and had left orders for her comfort. Cade poured liquor into each glass, presented her with one, and waited while she seated herself with an instinctively well-designed arrangement of skirts. Some portion of his mind made note of the precision of the drapery for use onstage; the little details of a performance always meant so much.
“It’s late, so I will be brief,” she said. “At this point in your life, your father and I had expected that you would be decently established in a profession, perhaps even advantageously married to a young woman of rank and distinction. We—”
“I hadn’t expected to still be living at home, either.”
“You will have the courtesy to let me finish, Cayden. We had thought that by this time we would be turning our entire efforts to Derien, to his education and future prospects. As it happens, he has developed a curiosity about foreign lands—very much due to your travels last year, and I am grateful to you for sparking this interest. The favor shown you by the Princess is another thing I had not expected, but is also gratifying. And you have made other contacts among the nobility which I know you do not care to use, but which will be essential to your brother. With the proper training and connections, Derien may well become a Royal envoy. But such things come expensive.” She sipped at her brandy and set the glass aside. “He will be nine years old this summer. By this autumn I hope to see him enrolled in the King’s College rather than the littleschool he now attends. There, he will receive the best education, and make the friends necessary for his advancement.” She paused again. “We must wait, of course, for the particular style of his magic to appear. But in anticipation of that day, your father and I wish to see him placed as favorably as possible.”
He drank brandy and waited for her to go on.
“Your father’s father was under the impression, as was I, that you would be my only offspring. Cadriel Silversun died years before Derien was born. Thus no provision was made for another son or daughter. The whole of his legacy, while not vast by certain standards, is now yours.” She looked him directly in the eyes. Hers were dark and determined, and he saw that there were a few tiny dry lines at their corners. “I am certain you understand what I am asking of you now.”
He had the irrelevant thought that Derien was lucky to have been born a boy. What their mother would have done with a daughter didn’t bear contemplating. Married off as young as decently possible to some rich, well-connected lord—if she turned out “prettily enough.” If not… if he’d had a sister who looked like him…
“Cayden. I desire to know what you intend to do.”
She wanted something from him. Something only he could give her. She was actually asking him rather than demanding, ordering, insisting, informing him of a decision already made. This was unprecedented. He wished he weren’t so tired; he could have enjoyed it more. He finished off his brandy in one gulp—disgraceful, not to savor a fine liquor, but he wanted to get this over with.
“Share the money with Derien? Of course. On one condition.”
He watched triumph blaze in her eyes, and the quick flare of angry outrage that followed it. Interesting, to see her struggle between elation that he would do as she wanted, and fury that he dared demand anything in return.
“Once the paperwork is done and the money is officially mine, it goes into a fund with two names on it, and two names only: mine and Lord Fairwalk’s.”
The implication sent an ugly flush into her cheeks. Once more she fought rage, and the effort shook her voice. “That is unworthy of you.”
“But prudent. Be as insulted as you please, Mother. You’ve got what you wanted—for Derien, for his education and support.” He laid a light emphasis on the name. “And as for still living here, I’ll be gone at Trials soon, and then on the Ducal or Royal Circuit all summer and into the autumn, and then I’ll be gone for good.”
“You’ve found rooms?”
“Not yet.” And he would have to make drastic alterations in his searchings, now that he wouldn’t have his grandfather’s money to spend. Lord Oakapple’s purse would go only so far. Touchstone was still owed for the trip to the Continent last year, there being some contention regarding a shattered row of windows at the Princess’s father’s palace, but Kearney was working on that. In any event, the rooms he’d end up with would no doubt horrify her if she ever saw them, which he had every confidence she never would. “After I come back from the Circuit. Then you and Father can concentrate every effort on Dery.” He started for the door, then swung back round. “One other stipulat
ion. He never knows where the money came from. As far as he’s concerned, you’ve spent years scrimping for this. Agreed?”
Through rigid lips she said, “Agreed.”
With a nod, he left her and climbed the wrought-iron stairs up to the fifth floor. His bedchamber was despicably tidy. He had the urge to rip everything to shreds, smash the windows, splinter the furniture. Instead, he undressed, and before he crawled into bed gave himself a Namingday present: a night’s dreamless sleep with the application of a thornful of blockweed.
* * *
“Amazing, wasn’t it?” Blye remarked the next afternoon. She had returned that rainy morning to Gallantrybanks with her in-laws, though Jed had stayed behind in Hilldrop to supervise the final fittings on Mieka’s refurbished barn. “Lady Jaspiela Highcollar, mixing with the common folk at a country party!”
“Did she ‘mix’? I never saw her ‘mixing’—in fact, she told me flat out that she hadn’t even spoken to any of Mieka’s neighbors.”
Cade handed her another glass plate from the set she was preparing for display. Forbidden by Guild rules to make anything hollow, Blye satisfied the inspectors who came round by having all manner of acceptable things for sale in the shop. Plates and platters, candleflats and windowpanes, anything that would legally justify her prosperity. Her real money was in making withies for Touchstone and the Shadowshapers—but the glass twigs were hollow, and thus officially prohibited to her. So these she made in secret. Usually Rikka Ashbottle, Blye’s not-apprentice—because of course only a master crafter could have an apprentice—would be doing this polishing work, but Rikka was out running errands.
“I imagine Mieka’s neighbors were too overawed to talk to Her Ladyship, but she was there, wasn’t she?” Blye slanted him a smile, dark eyes gleaming beneath a fringe of white-blond hair. She held the plate over a little device made long ago by her father: a glass beaker with a cork to stopper the place where one poured in the water and a thin spout for steam to escape. She could just as easily have used a teakettle, but the beaker was prettier, all swirled about with orange and yellow. Cade had obliged her by calling up a bit of Wizardfire beneath the beaker where it rested atop a steel ring. The steam fogged the glass plate, which she handed to Cade for polishing. This worked on wineglasses, too, but of course she wasn’t allowed to make those. Not officially, anyway.