The Last Wizard

by Jane M. R.

  I feel his gaze linger on me even as my mother and I bow our heads. “We are honored to have been invited.”

  After my father exchanges a quick word with him himself, we head inside.

  We enter the foyer spiraling upward by aid of a staircase and a high ceiling that reaches to all three levels. It reminds me of a castle and a whole bunch of other sins I’m is not supposed to dream about. Bustles and frock coats are scattered across the glossy blue marble floor which could have been its own sky by how it reflects each spear of candle flame like smalls suns reaching a depth into the floor.

  For a man who has capitalized the lumber business, he lives in a house made of stone.

  Flowers explode from the railing on the stairs and hang in rows along the balcony. Presents are already piled on the foot of the stairs and my mother’s small box joins them.

  Barber of Seville is echoing throughout the vastness of the house from the ballroom beyond. Coming to the threshold of the ballroom, my father passes his calling card over to the butler standing by who announces in a well-articulated tone, “Mr. and Mrs. Frondarens.”

  The only one wearing white in the room, the debutante stands out like a cameo in a jewelry box, her gauzy dress of lace challenging an ocean’s foam. She looks remarkably like her handsome brother. Her hair, the same blond as Jaicom’s, curls over her right shoulder to slip down the low bodice. She is standing beside her mother who greets us as we approach. Shaking my father’s hand first, she turns to her daughter and says, “Mr. Frondaren, my daughter Varrica.”

  My father shakes her hand. “Your many bouquets are beautiful,” he says with a warm smile. He steps aside for my mother and myself to offer some glib compliment before moving on as a, “Lord Falcons” was announced at the door.

  I quickly lose my parents – maybe on purpose – in the hot scatter of bodies. I do my best to avoid the young men who don’t hide eyes spying out the girls traveling in packs down the hallways, foyer, and ballroom.

  Just as I’m debating whether to snoop around the house for the rumored vault or verify if Aklen has a silver toilet seat, I spot Jaicom standing in a corner of the foyer with a blond haired girl who is about a head shorter than him. She actually reminds me of… Crisy.

  I watch a moment longer. Jaicom steps to the side. It is Crisy. I watch with mute detachment as he brushes a finger across her cheek. She turns her head and buries her face in her hands. Jaicom’s body stiffens. He reaches out to her but she is quick to disappear from my view, and likely his too.

  My heart goes out to him.

  I actually feel weird, watching some melodrama happen in front of me that I am somehow part of because, though Jaicom calls on me, I just witnessed for myself I am not the girl he wants.

  And everything Crisy said about me being lucky now makes sense.

  I’m so bloody confused.

  “Brinella!”

  I jump at my mother’s snap. She latches onto my arm. “Brinella, they have humbugs!”

  “Oh… great. I’ll have to try some.” And my mother is gone again. Depending on what size clutch my mother brought, I don’t expect the Whaerins to have any confectionary left by the time we leave.

  I look back to the foyer but Jaicom is gone. I bury myself deeper into the ballroom.

  I’m not sure how my father did it, but he hauls over a young man – assuming the young man followed willingly – over to me and introduces him as the son of Lord Falcon. My life flashes before my eyes and I’m somehow dancing with the Lord’s son. He says he’s from London and makes a very flattering comment about the quality of silver my father pulls out of the mine, and the whole while all I can think is, status, status, status which oddly goes along with the tune of the song.

  I courtesy at the end and promptly find a new corner to hide in.

  Jaicom finds me first.

  “Miss Frondaren,” he says with a slight bow, “I am pleased you could make it tonight.”

  I stagger for something to say that won’t betray what I witnessed in the foyer. “I am pleased to be here.” Say something else. My eyes shoot to the ceiling. “Your house is so big.”

  “Like a castle,” he says, looking up at the ceiling with me. “Just missing the moat. Would you like something to eat?”

  I don’t, but I agree and we walk to the table laden with confectionary. Some I recognize as having come from London. Aklen must have brought them back when he took Varrica to meet the queen for her official debutante. That was in the newspaper, too.

  I eye the platters but can’t relocate my appetite cowering behind my plan to sneak about the house until I find the vault. The silver toilet seat will have to wait.

  I select three tarts and a small glass of pink hued wine and follow Jaicom to a seat along the wall. I rest my back against the wall and set about to watching couples dance leisurely to the slow cry of violins.

  Varrica’s white dress stands out in the center, dancing with a boy about three years older with a military cut hair style.

  The song ends.

  “Would you like to dance?” Jaicom asks in a tone I decide is obligatory.

  No, I want to say. Stop pretending to like me and dance with Crisy.

  I put my wine glass on the table next to a complicated arraignment of flowers and candles and accept his lead onto the floor. We get in position and begin the dance, though it is another moment before either of us say anything.

  “I’m sorry about your cousin,” he says.

  A little belated, since Jaicom has seen me since the end of my mourning period and now. But then I was dragging him up the side of the mountain during our last encounter.

  “Your sympathies are appreciated.” I pause as an idea comes. “It’s really odd and unfortunate that a heart attack ended his young life.” Because if the Thorn is found in his father’s vault, Jaicom will be suspect in Durain’s murder.

  Jaicom, however, only nods and looks away.

  First, I need to verify if they even have a vault.

  “I hear your family has a massive vault.”

  He appears to contemplate this. “Is this town so small that my family’s vault is the pinnacle of conversation?”

  I smile sheepishly. “It’s just that… no one else has a vault.” I hope. “And so for your family to have one is interesting, I guess. So, ya. Your family’s vault would be the pinnacle of conversation.”

  “Hmmmm.” Jaicom twirls me on cue to the song.

  “Is it really as big as everyone says it is?”

  “How big do they say it is?”

  “Like…” I look around. “Like as big as this room.”

  He laughs. “Well, I guess I should show you so the town can stop speculating and the topic of our vault can be put to rest.”

  I want to cheer my success. Instead, we finish the dance to a rapture of cheering and he leads me away. We come into the foyer where I spy the corner him and Crisy had occupied earlier. It feels like they are both still standing in it.

  Down a hallway, he opens a door to reveal descending steps. We go through and he closes the door behind me.

  The only light we have is what escapes through the bottom of the door, but Jaicom walks down the stairwell without hesitation. I pick up my dress with one hand and follow him.

  The wooden steps rumble as we walk. Jaicom stops at the bottom. There is a scratching sound and light blossoms from a match he puts inside the oil lamp. He closes the glass door and looks at me expectantly. His handsome eyes glow in the light before he turns into the room.

  The lantern glows upon a massive black steal door pressed against the stone foundation of the house. Jaicom stops in front of the vault door and I think for a moment he is going to unlock it and take me inside.

  “The myth has been debunked!” he declares. He turns his head down to me. He’s a little taller than I am. “Not as large as everyone thought, huh?”

  Still big though. According to the size of the door, the inside has to be about as big as my bedroom. And I hope
beyond it is the Thorn.

  “Would you like to see inside?”

  I almost fall off my high heels with the shock of his offer. I try not to sound too eager. “Oh, well, I suppose. It’s really not a big deal. I was just curious.” Don’t listen to anything I’m saying. Open the bloody the door!

  He hands the oil lamp to me. “Would you hold that?”

  I take it, surprised when he pulls a key out of his pocket and fits it into the lock. Maybe his father has kept Jaicom in the habit of carrying the key around with him. So far this is easier than I thought it would be.

  He pushes down on the handle and pulls the door open. “Leave the lantern on the floor.

  I do, stepping passed it to follow him inside.

  So it isn’t as big as my room. Definitely big enough for three tables with bags of different sizes and colors positioned in an orderly manner. They are also on the floor which leaves a small footpath between them all. Essentially, I’m staring at the Whaerin fortune and I half suspect they’ve robbed the royal treasury.

  I can’t fathom why Jaicom is showing this to me. I’m sure there is an obvious, good reason that I can’t see right now, but I can’t think about it. Because I’m staring at the third Thorn resting on the table in the back.

  I tear my gaze off it so Jaicom won’t notice me staring. I try to say something witty. “It appears your family is poor.” And fail.

  “Destitute, rather.” He indicates we should vacate the vault.

  I step out and he shuts the door, pocketing the key. He picks up the lantern, preparing to lead me upstairs.

  But I don’t move. Now that my thoughts about the Thorn have been sated, that sense that something is off with everything comes creeping back to me; the edgy bond between father and son which is only too obvious whenever Aklen sees Jaicom with me, Jaicom’s random decision to court me, his courting me despite there are better suited girls for his status that didn’t run around untied as long as I did, and all of that through his failure to show that he actually likes me.

  I open my mouth to say it all, to say how I saw him with Crisy in the foyer and demand to know why he is courting me instead, but my father’s hand of advice wraps around my throat and I choke.

  “And that is why I don’t want you to ever question Jaicom why he is courting you. I was worried for a while that no man would want to court you. No man has courted you.”

  No other man has courted me. Because I went untied a year and a half longer than I should have. I make threats to join the gypsies but I don’t want to do that. And though I would much rather support myself as a single woman than be owned in marriage by a man, the fact of that is I can’t function in society that way. I would end up being a gypsy where I would have to steal my food to eat. I’d never be a mother. I’d shame my father – and that matters to me, and I would never again live in a house or own books and…

  For the first time in sixteen years, I dread being alone the rest of my life. The evidence is sliding heat under my dress and I’m glad for the dim so Jaicom can’t see my face flush.

  If Jaicom doesn’t marry me, who will?

  No one. Because no one else has courted me so far, and I’m running out of time before I’ll be considered a spinster.

  I follow his lead up the stairs.

  OOO

  The rest of the evening is a blur. I dance with many more young men – all of them from out of town who have no idea how long I went untied. But I save my last dance for Jaicom. I sneak him a kiss on the cheek when he walks me out to the coach.

  I climb into the coach and it rolls away. He’s still standing there watching me as we vanish from his sight.

  I need to make sure he knows I’m devoted to him so marriage to him will be less of a question for both of us. Mostly, however, I need to show him I am innocent and incapable of doing something illegal.

  So I won’t be accused when his vault is robbed.

  CHAPTER NINE

  BRINELLA

  Laying in bed, I dare to open Durain’s book again. I stare too long at the orange flying dog thing the handwritten description on the left of the page has named:

  FÆWRAITH

  I draw my fingers over the Old English letters. They are hard to read. I flip the book back to the first page.

  Zadicayn,

  I hopeth thou hast a birth year happiness like upon a sunrise.

  ~Elshina

  “What are you,” I whisper to the book. “Durain,” I say instead because he’s more likely to hear, “What is this? Why do you have it? Where did you get it?”

  The darkness does not reply.

  OOO

  My mother doesn’t question why I want to wear her gaudy silver necklace my father made for her. She likely thinks I’m trying to be more feminine. I wish I could tell her it’s to bait a thief, so she can talk me out of it and give me a better idea on how to break into a vault.

  It’s only the second day at violin class but I’m the only one who hasn’t shown any improvement. It doesn’t help that maybe I am just not trying because I just don’t care, my motivation impacted by the flying hooved creature I saw in real life who’s only picture is in a book also listing dragons, gryphons, and pegasi.

  All mythical.

  That in turn is impacted by Jaicom courting me when I witnessed for myself he has affection toward Crisy and I’m stressed because I’m trying to finish what Durain started which includes breaking into a vault, and the only way I know how to do that is bait a thief and by now my violin is screeching so loudly the teacher calls for the class to stop.

  “Miss Frondaren.” I stop playing and look up. “You seem distracted.”

  I wish I was only distracted. “Sorry,” I say, tempted to use my cousin’s death as an excuse but it’s been long enough since his funeral that no one would believe me. Instead, I buckle down and indicate I am ready to play for real.

  The presence of my father waiting for me after class does not ease the frustration coiled in my stomach like the hair on my head Varseena had curled today. I need to tell someone. Ask someone to help me. I’m filled with all these questions and worries and it is chewing me up inside.

  But I can’t say anything. Because someone killed Durian to keep this secret quiet.

  “Was class that bad?” my father jokes, reaching across the space separating our horses and nudges my shoulder.

  “Horrible,” I say. “I think I should drop out. It’s damaging my health.”

  My father laughs like I just made a joke.

  A gypsy wearing a skirt patched together with random squares of dirty colors crosses the street in front of us, pulling a hand cart. The left wheel wobbles dangerously and falls flat, dumping the contents of the cart over the cobblestone. The gypsy woman presses a hand to her mouth and begins to sob.

  “Oh dear,” my father says. He swings his leg over the saddle and goes to her side. Watching him, I see where I get my humbleness from; one of the three key owners to the silver mine will still reach a hand to help those beneath him.

  “Miss Frondaren!”

  I look to my right. Jesaro is leaning against the red brick wall of the printing house, his monkey fumbling with something shiny in his hands.

  “Hello!” I call enthusiastically. He’s standing a little ways off so I have to raise my voice to reach him. “You aren’t playing today?”

  He scratches his monkey’s head. “Tommy wants to give you something. He really likes you.”

  I gush a little, something inside me chastising that I should not lean too heavily on the opinions of a monkey. I look over at my father who has removed his coat and is helping the gypsy woman figure out how to reattach the wheel to her cart.

  I dismount. Maybe this time I’ll get to hold the monkey.

  I approach the gypsy man. The monkey perched on his shoulder rewards me with a toothy grin on a head turned sideways and lifts his tiny top hat to me. What a gentleman!

  I near Jesaro and he shifts his body so his right shoulder is leaned
against the building. I position to face him, my back to my father.

  “Tommy,” I comment, reaching for the monkey who has what looks like an earring in his tiny paws.

  The monkey leaps off Jesaro’s shoulder and lands on mine, startling me which Jesaro must have translated into disgust because he starts spattering, “Tommy! She’s a lady.”

  “It’s alright,” I say, letting the monkey press the earring to my ear. I smile at Jesaro. “Does it match my dress?”

  Jesaro’s eyes shift about for a brief moment before settling their gaze on the sky.

  Darkness covers my eyes with a hard press against my face. I inhale sharply and gag on a sweet sickness burning the back of my throat. I thrash my shoulders and it’s not until hands grab at me that I begin to panic, trying to scream through the sweet cloth jammed in my teeth but the sound is muted at best. My equilibrium begins to swim.

  I’m being dragged backward. The man has such a grip on me with one arm around my waist and the other pressing a rag into my face that no amount of fighting is yielding my release. I try to hold my breath against the cloth drugging me to unconsciousness but it is impossible. Fear is making my heart race too hard. My brain is rolling around in my skull and my thoughts no longer connect because a sweet ocean is busting them to pieces.

  I can’t hold my breath anymore. I inhale sharply.

  And black out.

  CHAPTER TEN

  BRINELLA

  A drummer in my brain wakes me. I open my eyes with a hiss as light through the canvas tent stabs into my eyes. I only don’t throw up because I can’t lean over far enough not to splatter myself.

  My sluggish thoughts aren’t helping me piece together what happened. Slowly, I am aware of a pain lancing through both shoulders from my numb hands tied behind my back, my back resting against a wooden pole.