“It is a thing to read about city life in books, but it is quite impressive to… Hey!” A hand grabbed his sleeve. Selen dragged him backwards. Only strangers walked behind them. Louis and Folc had not followed.
“Where are they?” Selen asked.
Lissandro stretched on the tip of his feet and spotted the white cloak of Folc hurrying towards a shop. “Over there.” Lissandro retraced his steps, treading on a few feet, and reached the shop under the insults of the molested passersby.
The heavy scents in the room went straight to his head. Lissandro knew he had entered the shop of a perfumer. Yet, the objects displayed varied from carved boxes to handkerchiefs. The merchant was occupied with two ladies, presenting them glimmering mousseline stoles. Louis stood near the counter, mesmerized by a pair of cobalt gloves embroidered with silver thread. As his friend reached for the precious handicraft, the merchant, who probably had eyes behind his back, scolded him.
“Don’t touch that!”
Louis retreated his hand.
“How dare you talk…” Folc exclaimed, turning towards the perfumer, but Louis stopped the boy with a hand on his shoulder.
“How I dare? In my own shop?” the perfumer replied to Folc with anger. “Young rascal. You will leave this place.” The man strode towards Folc, hand up, with the determination to give him a good beating.
Louis interposed and was pushed back against the counter. His hood slipped backwards. At the sight of the glittering circlet, everyone in the shop fell silent. The perfumer went down on his knees.
“Please, Your Majesty, have mercy.”
Louis sighed. “I only wanted to see your shop.”
So much for discretion, Lissandro thought while Selen pushed the curious out of the entrance. Folc unfolded his cloak, revealing his armour and insignia.
“It is an honour for me to welcome Your Majesty into my house. Let me show you around,” the perfumer said with a hundred bows.
Lissandro followed them into the workshop. Six people worked in the room. They all rose, startled.
“Please, carry on what you are doing,” Louis said.
The workers sat down, insecure. Two worked on a press and one collected the golden liquid in a bucket to pour it into vats. Near a table covered with alembics and retorts, a young man read out and corrected what sounded like formulae. Lissandro walked around, admiring the colorful liquids and the different flasks labelled with names such as apricot, iris, jonquil, musk, and amber. The heady fragrances in the room gave him a headache. He moved towards Louis and the merchant, who stood by two women embroidering tissues.
“And here is where the perfumed textiles receive their final touch,” the perfumer explained with pride.
“Where do you get all the ingredients for the scents?” Louis asked.
“A bit from everywhere, Your Majesty. Mostly from the Crysas Peninsula. The amber comes from the Windy Isles.”
“How hard does the guild weight on your shop? Do you have to follow oppressive, strict rules?”
The man looked at Louis with surprise. “It is an honour to be a member of the guild, Your Majesty. There are rules, but my trade is free from competition. My work is praised through the city and, as you can see, I have four apprentices. Without the guild, we would never have survived the war.”
“What do you wish from the new government?” Louis asked.
The man seemed puzzled by the question. “I hope the peace will last, Your Majesty.”
“Yes, everyone wants that, but more exactly. What do you expect from your king?”
The man turned pale and gaped. “I…”
No one here will dare to answer such questions, Lissandro thought, which actually was quite funny considering that in his world, people would beg, petition, and scream at the politicians to listen to them. When they for once had a genuinely honest leader who cared about their opinions, their minds were as dull and insipid as blancmange.
“Speak freely,” Louis insisted. “I command you.” His friend was losing patience.
“A…a good king,” the man stuttered. The perfumer looked at Louis and must have seen that the answer wasn’t satisfying as he added, “not too many taxes.”
Considering what the man had said about his ingredients, Lissandro thought that his faint complaint was aimed at the taxes on foreign trade. Yet, Lissandro would not point it out to Louis.
Louis nodded. “And you?” He turned to the apprentice with the book. “What do you wish of the government?”
The boy was livid and cast an appealing look at his Master. The man nodded. “Peace,” the boy whispered.
“But there must be more to it,” Louis insisted to the boy. “Don’t you feel oppressed by the laws? Don’t you wish for a house, an education?”
“But…but, Your Majesty, I have already an education,” the boy whispered.
Louis opened his mouth to speak, but Lissandro stopped him. “Your Majesty,” he said. Louis looked at him. Lissandro could not voice the words, but Louis understood and turned towards the merchant again.
“We thank you for your time. It was interesting,” Louis said.
Lissandro did not know if the merchant felt the yoke of the government’s oppression on his neck, but if there was a face symbolizing relief, it was the one he had right now.
“It was all my pleasure, Your Majesty,” the merchant said with a bow. He moved towards a small trunk and came back. “Please, let me offer you these gloves. They are of better quality than the ones on the counter. They are one of our masterpieces.” The gloves in the man’s hands were superb. They were made of the finest leather and embroidered with gold thread. Lissandro gave a slight smile. They were purple. “They are perfumed with orchid.”
“Thank you,” Louis said as he took the gift. “Is there a way for us to go out unnoticed?”
“Of course. Follow me.”
The merchant led them to the rear of the shop to a back door. As they stepped outside, they put their hoods on again. The door closed behind them.
“Should we try a tavern?” Lissandro proposed.
“I think I need a drink,” Selen said. Lissandro could not agree more. “And something to eat.”
“Don’t talk about food,” Lissandro said. “The smell in there was unbearable.” Yet, miraculously, neither he nor the two pallid men inside had retched.
“I know a place,” Folc said. He took the lead, and they moved up the street. “Oh, and if you think it smelled bad in there, never enter a butchery or a tannery.”
The tavern was a house built of stone with a wooden balcony on the first floor. Flowerpots decorated the windowsills. Light shone through the small windows with green stained glass. A painted wooden sign representing a dancing toad hung over the threshold. The group stopped in front of the dark red door.
“Whatever happens in there, we keep our hoods on. As long as no one pulls out a knife, I can endure a bit of pushing and scolding,” Louis said to Folc. The boy scowled but nodded.
They opened the door and entered. As Lissandro had expected, the place was crowded, hot, and the smell of the stew barely won over the smell from sweaty customers. While Folc ordered drinks and food from the innkeeper, they sat down at a table near a window. To be wrapped in their cloaks and hoods in the middle of summer made them look ridiculous. However, Lissandro knew that in such crowded places, you could kill your neighbor on the bench, and no one would raise an eyebrow if the man’s head fell in his soup. Lissandro and his friends could well wear cloaks and gloves without raising a single suspicion. At least, Lissandro did not need to push his hood to the rim of his eyes, unlike his companions. On the other side of the table, Selen’s face was barely visible. Louis had offered him the gloves, and Selen was busy trying them on. Lissandro smelled a faint scent of orchid every time his friend moved his hands.
“You look more relaxed than I thought, Selen,” Lissandro said.
“Oh, yes,” Selen said, startled out of his thoughts. “It helps that I am not alone, and
though the smell is horrendous, the customers seem calm.”
“I am positively surprised that it’s not crawling with harlots. Nice choice, Folc,” Louis added.
“I don’t know what you all are used to, but this is one of the most popular taverns of the city, and it barely smells,” Folc said with surprise.
A plump, smiling woman came with their order and placed the foaming mugs at the end of the table. Selen passed the beer around. Lissandro grabbed his mug and raised it up.
“I propose a toast to our noble king. May we smell the perfume of our fellow countrymen once in a while to remember our modest origins,” Lissandro said. “To the king.”
“To the king,” Selen and Folc repeated, raising their mugs.
In front of him, Louis’s fingers drummed on the side of his mug. “Do you know the tale of the lion and the gnat, Lilo?”
“Am I that irritating?” Lissandro asked, half offended, half amused. “I have always thought that your compatriots had a cutting sense of humor.”
“See mine as thin as a spider web.”
“You see! Cutting,” Lissandro chuckled. “I like you too.” He smiled. Louis smiled back.
“I hope you are hungry,” Folc placed the cooking pot in the center of the table. He tossed Lissandro a trencher and served a full ladle of steaming stew on it.
Lissandro saw cauliflowers, leeks, and parsnips but not the tasty meat bits he had looked forward to. “Vegetables only?” Lissandro exclaimed. “Did you order nuncheons?”
“There should be some morsels of eel somewhere. I thought they would like it,” Folc said, pointing at Selen and Louis. “I’m sorry I didn’t take your diet into consideration.”
“Commoners are too poor to afford meat, but maybe for the sake of your delicate stomach, I should promote the concept of a restaurant?” Louis said. Though half his face was in shadows, Lissandro could see the smirk in his eyes.
“Don’t be so mean. Maybe the stew is worth the sweating,” Lissandro replied sardonically and attacked his stew with his spoon. “Yet, it’s a brilliant idea. You could as well promote the concept of fast food.”
“What is fast food?” Louis asked.
“It’s the future of restaurants. If I describe it in a few words, minced meat, a sauce, and a few vegetables between two slices of bread, the whole served with fries, or should I say for you, pommes Pont-Neuf.”
“Really? Do they still eat that shit in your time? Besides, I don’t see how street food could replace restaurants. You can’t prepare a pot-au-feu on the street.”
“To favour boiled meat over a hamburger and its delicious fries, Louis, you have no sense of taste. This could explain why you still eat that cow puke.” Lissandro’s spoon squelched the tepid, grey mixture. Maybe that was how everything tasted once the salt, the pepper, and the grease were removed. Maybe the first fries had been roughly cut potatoes soaked in fish oil. The poor ate shit. It was a permanent trait throughout history. “Folc, you owe me a meal,” Lissandro said, shaking his spoon in the boy’s direction. “So, Your Majesty, were you satisfied with your meeting with the commoners?”
“I thought they would be more prompt to complain about their standard of living,” Louis answered. “The people are happy with their masters’ fortune and moan with glory under the yoke of their cruel ambition,” he sighed. “But I won’t give up. I know it will take time.”
“Yeah, happiness is a new idea in Trevalden. While you force the concept of democracy down their throats, you should know that the second time this concept spread throughout the world, it did not turn out as well as in the society of the primitive sitting next to you. Democracy is a sweet word used as a smoke screen by the oligarchy. Elections are a fool’s game, and everyone blame his neighbor for ruining his little, boring paradise. The only thing worse than blatant tyranny is the illusion of freedom.”
“We are in a completely different context,” Louis said.
“Men are men. They want to eat, sleep, make love, and see their children grow.”
“Your vision of mankind is depressing,” Louis sighed. “But you are American, you can’t understand—”
“That moral duty and knowledge is, in every country, the surest basis of public happiness?”
“Well, yes!” Louis exclaimed, his hands open. “Did you just quote La Boetie?”
“George Washington. Your country does not have the monopoly on human rights.” Lissandro winked.
“Lissandro, does my country still exist in your time?” Louis asked.
“Oh yes, but you don’t want to know what it looks like. You may recognize a bit of the countryside, but it would break your heart if I described the cities. The men who killed you have ruled the world for two hundred years now. The damage is…consequent,” Lissandro saw Louis turn gloomy. “My country does not look better, if you want to know, though it has never been brilliant like yours. I hope you will succeed this time. Don’t let these bastards win.”
“Unfortunately, one must wait for a disaster big enough for the general opinion to feel the need of salutary measures. The good will always come from a disaster. Started too early, these sanitary measures only seem weird or inappropriate,” Louis said. “The good is what we must pursue, whatever the price.”
Lissandro thought that Louis’s words sometimes were so incisive and steadfast that they could be put in a neat, square box. Too bad that the world was round.
“Talking about concepts that could improve the life of the people,” Louis said while carving his trencher with his spoon, “I would like to install running water, but I don’t have the slightest idea of how it works.”
Lissandro chuckled. “Don’t look at me like that. It is a complex system which requires years of study in engineering and—”
“Not at all,” Selen interrupted him. “I know how it works. We had running water in the palace. Would you like a primitive to explain to you what a siphon is?”
“And electricity? Do you know how to turn on a light bulb? No. That’s what I thought, only good at making pottery,” Lissandro replied with a sneer and a wink. Selen did not answer. His face had turned pale. “Selen?” Lissandro called. Selen put a hand on his mouth. His body jerked, and he rushed outside.
Lissandro followed his friend and was the first one out of the tavern. Selen stood in the alley on the side of the building. He still leaned against the wall. Vomit lay splattered between his spread legs. Lissandro’s attention was caught by a bright light coming from Selen’s hand. His friend hastily put his gloves on.
“Selen, your hand?”
“You have seen nothing,” Selen hissed. Behind him, Lissandro heard the footsteps of Louis and Folc. “Nothing,” Selen repeated near his face.
Lissandro turned around, aghast, and watched Selen join their friends.
“Selen, are you all right?” Louis asked, worried, a hand on Selen’s arm.
“Yes. It must have been the food or the heat. Let’s go home.”
CHAPTER 65
Selen went up the staircase leading to the library. His long robes brushed the steps behind him. He opened the door. The heavy cinnamon smell of old paper engulfed him. Bookshelves were cluttered with codices, dusty books, and loose documents. Volumes stood open on carved wooden lecterns. Considering the dust, it had been a long time since someone had taken care of the place. The shutters were half closed to protect the documents from the light. Selen progressed between the shelves, careful not to stumble on a pile of books.
Lissandro sat on a corner of a table covered with manuscripts and unrolled papers. His eyebrows were frowned and so were his lips. The quill in his hand flitted on the paper with small scratches.
“I should have visited this room before I took the responsibility of this charge,” Lissandro grumbled.
Selen considered that drawing up an inventory of the documents in this room would take months if not years, and there were two more floors above them. “I came to give you back your book,” he said, laying down a book titled Ant
hology, Minstrels’ Songs, and Popular Dances on the table.
“I guess you are ready for tonight,” Lissandro grinned. “Not too deceived?”
Selen squirmed. “It’s not exactly the kind of dances I was prepared for. It’s a lot more…sober.”
“You can still perform a Dionysian dance. Yet, I’m not sure it is a demonstration the court is ready to see.” Lissandro raised his head and gazed at him with his large, blue eyes. “Unlike me. Can you such dances?” he asked with a high, inappropriate interest.
“It is a way to celebrate the gods. Those dances are only performed during festivals and events. And not alone,” Selen answered, “but we certainly use our body a lot more than the people in this book do.”
“I should probably read it as well before tonight. I used to dance when I was young, but with the decades, the art lost its prestige. I have not practiced for a long time and I have forgotten the steps.”
“Do you want to rehearse with me?” Selen thought he had learned most of the steps, but he was still unsure if he could reproduce them with someone. He would not mind a try before stepping on the floor.
“You should know that, as those dances are performed between two people, they require coordination, and often, complicity.” Lissandro rose and stepped towards him. “You will need to touch your partner, hold his hand, his waist, to step into his private space, and anticipate his moves. Dance is a game of seduction, of sensuality—” Lissandro stopped a few inches from him “—of lust.” His friend kept his gaze down. Selen felt as if Lissandro was almost on him. He smelled his perfume, felt his warmth. It made him feel uneasy. “This is why I won’t dance with you,” Lissandro breathed before stepping back. “The good thing is that we will only dance with women, thus leaving us the leisure to concentrate on our steps,” Lissandro said. “Still, it can be pleasant. You will see.” He smiled.
Rising from Dust (Light from Aphelion Book 1) Page 44