Blanche smiled knowingly, even as Lanval said, “Show my lady her dressing chamber, Blanche.”
As Blanche clapped her hands together in pleasure, Lanval added, “My lady, now that you are in good hands, I return to my other duties. Even so, should you have need of aught . . .” He bowed low, and then turned and stepped to the door.
As he exited, Camille called after, “Merci, Lanval.”
“My lady,” said Blanche, a gleam of pleasure in her eye, “if you will but follow me.”
Blanche led her mistress through a small doorway off the bedchamber and into a dim room, where the handmaid tugged on a pull cord, drawing the shade from the skylight above. And Camille drew in a great breath of incredulity, for revealed was a room perhaps even larger than the bedchamber itself; and it was filled with splendid clothes: gowns, dresses, skirts, blouses, chemises, shifts, jackets, lingerie, shoes, boots, gloves, cloaks, hats, ribbons, jewelry cases, and more. Camille gaped at the trove in disbelief, her astonishment reflected in the gilt-framed, full-length mirror affixed to the far wall therein.
“Oh, Blanche, these are marvelous, yet I wonder if they will fit.”
Blanche laughed. “My lady, they were fashioned for you alone.”
“But how? I mean, it’s not as if someone came in the night and took my measure.”
“Do not be too certain of that, my lady,” said Blanche, grinning, pulling at the cord to close the skylight blind above and protect the clothes against sun damage. “And now let us to the tub with you.”
That eve, served by Blanche, Camille, while abed, ate a delicious meal of biscuits and butter and jellies and tea and cream over berries, for the handmaid insisted that she needed rest after such a long journey. And so, bathed and scented, Camille sat propped against many pillows in her great, soft bed, the first ever she had not had to share with a sister or two. And in the middle of that vast expanse, with a bed tray across her lap, her meal half-eaten, Camille fell quite asleep, for it seemed, after all, Blanche was right.
The very next day, Blanche escorted Camille about the great manor, showing her all within, all that is but one floor of one wing—“ ’Tis the quarters of the prince himself, when he’s about, that is, and none but Lanval is permitted therein.—Oh, once a fortnight, maids are allowed, but only under Lanval’s eye.” Camille frowned, for she did not think those chambers would be forbidden to her, for, after all, even though she had yet to meet Alain, she was his betrothed, hence surely she would not be barred; yet she did not gainsay her handmaid.
All through the rest of the mansion they went, with its sitting rooms and guest rooms and ballrooms and rooms of other sorts, some small, some large, some vast. In one of the smaller chambers sat an elegant harp, with violins in cases nearby. Lyres and lutes and tambourines and small drums lay in the chamber as well. In the next room sat a harpsichord, and though neither Camille nor Blanche could play, they sat on the bench and struck the keys and laughed at the plucked dissonance they made. Even so, Camille looked longingly at the music sheet on the board above the keys, and she wondered at the symbols thereon and yearned to be able to read the arcane notations and play. Elsewhere, in several ballrooms, other harpsichords sat, some on stages, others directly on the ballroom floors, others still on balconies above.
Guest rooms abounded, and they sampled a number, and each one they entered was furnished in elegant taste. And with but few exceptions, nearly all the chambers had fireplaces—“Seldom used,” said Blanche, “given the warmth of summer.”
“Yet the rooms are not overwarm in the summer sun,” replied Camille, frowning. “And even though my chambers have no outside windows, still I believe I felt a drift of air therein.”
“Oh, my lady, that’s one of the wonders of Summerwood Manor,” replied Blanche. “I am told by Renaud the smith that on the many roofs, great scoops with fins that catch the wind and turn their mouths into the blow, direct the air down through channels in the walls to the rooms within, and the air does flow onward and out other hidden channels beyond. Only on the hottest or stillest of summer days might it become uncomfortable, but then we all sleep outside.” Blanche pointed up at a wide lattice in one wall, and then down near the floor on the opposite wall to another. “Have you not seen the grillwork in your chambers, my lady?”
“I thought it was just decorative,” replied Camille.
Blanche smiled, and on they went, visiting the servants’ chamber down below, butlers and maids jumping to their feet and bowing and curtseying. Camille merely nodded in acknowledgment, having been instructed by Blanche that such would be sufficient, and onward they went.
They visited the kitchens as well, and here Camille was given a sweet pastry to hold her until the noonday meal, even though she had eaten breakfast in her bed, served to her by Blanche.
Through a laundry room they passed, with its great tubs sitting on platforms, wood-fired heating chambers beneath, cold for the nonce, no laundresses in sight.
They came to a door which seemed about to burst with women’s laughter. Blanche grinned, saying, “Follow me,” and they entered into a sewing chamber filled with gaiety, a half dozen seamstresses laughing. Upon seeing Camille their voices stilled, though mirth yet dwelled in their eyes, and the women rose from chairs and curtseyed. Feeling as if she had interrupted a festive party, Camille did thank them all for fashioning so many lovely clothes for her to wear. And then she and Blanche withdrew.
Later on they entered a ladies’ sewing chamber, with its tambour frames and sewing baskets and daylight streaming in, a place where fine fabric with cross-stitch and embroidery patterns laid thereon would be captured in hoops, and needles and thread and floss and yarn would pop and hiss through taut cloth, while quiet converse murmured about. Camille could not but think that the cheer of the seamstress chamber would be a better place to sew.
In one room they found a nursery with rocker, crib, and toys—cloth poppets, rattles, teething rings, and the like. “In a place such as this your children will sleep,” said Blanche.
“My children?”
“Those visited upon you by Prince Alain,” replied Blanche.
“Oh,” said Camille, reddening, feeling quite naïve.
They stopped for the noontide meal, Blanche having deposited her mistress in an elegant dining room and then abandoning her. Camille sat alone at the foot of a great long table, feeling embarrassed at the number of servants waiting upon her—all those eyes looking without seeming to look, watching her every bite—the men ready to leap forward at her slightest need.
Somehow she managed to struggle through, and not a stray drop or crumb fell onto her lovely lavender dress. Thank Mithras for Mistress Agnès and the etiquette lessons she taught to me. “I may be nought but a gardener, young lady, yet manners I do well know, and we wouldn’t want you to embarrass Fra Galanni by acting like a pig, now would we? Here, then, I’ll teach you about knives and forks and other such, including finger bowls, though ’tis unlikely you’ll ever see any, much less use one.”
Camille dipped her fingers in the finger bowl and dried them, and, as if by some mystical means, Blanche reappeared, and they took up once again the tour of the manor.
In a grand chamber was a great library, one that made the small library in Camille’s suite look to be no more than a shelf or two by comparison. Books abounded, along with scrolls and pamphlets and journals and other printings and writings. Camille studied the spines of several books, finding poetry, legends, fables, histories, and much more ere Blanche dragged her away, saying, “My lady, there will be time in years to come to learn all, and I would have you see a great deal of this manse.” And so onward they went.
A game room they visited: in the center of the room sat a small table with facing chairs and holding an elegant échecs set of carven jade—pale yellow for one player, translucent green for the other—the pieces arrayed on an onyx-and-marble board. Tears welled in Camille’s eyes as she remembered the wooden set her père had carved, the set she and
Giles had used.
“Do you play?” asked Camille, taking up a spearman.
“Oh, no, I think not, my lady, at least I do not remember ever having done so.” Her voice trembled as if in some distress.
Camille frowned. How could one not know whether they had ever played échecs? But she merely said, “Someday I will teach you, then.”
There were other échecs tables scattered about, though the sets were not quite as elegant.
In one corner sat a large, round table with several chairs about, and thereon were a scatter of small, flat, very stiff paper rectangles. Camille took up several and studied the various depictions of vices, virtues, and elemental forces, and nobility and peasantry thereon. “What are these, Blanche?” asked Camille.
With her fingers interlocked and clasped tightly, Blanche said, “I only know they are used in a game called taroc, my lady, though some say there are arcane uses for such as well.”
On other tables sat games of dames, twelve red and twelve black pieces on alternating squares of the damiers, the boards like those of the ones for échecs, though the playing pieces were round disks all.
Camille looked up from the games and found hanging above a broad fireplace the portrait of a slender young man dressed all in blue and standing on a grassy hill, the wind blowing his cloak about and ruffling his dark hair. He was quite handsome, with a long, straight nose and regular features; across his body he held a walking stick in his two hands, almost as one would hold a quarterstaff low. He seemed to be looking out of the portrait and straight across the room. Camille turned, and on the opposite wall above a white marble table was a second portrait, this one of a striking woman in green, standing on another windy hilltop, her black hair loose and blowing, her cloak and gown billowing in the wind; she was dressed as if for riding horse-back, a crop in her hand. She faced the image opposite. It was as if they stood on adjacent hills in the same gusty blow, looking at one another across a vale between.
“Who are they?” asked Camille.
“Prince Alain’s sire and dam,” replied Blanche, her face quite pale. “They say this is how they met—him out for a walk, she out for a ride.”
“Does Alain look like his père . . . or mère?”
“Oh, my lady, please don’t ask. I am pledged not to say aught of the prince. It is his wish, for he would tell you himself.”
Camille took a deep breath, and then asked, “Where are they now, père and mère, that is?”
“No one knows, my lady. They vanished sometime back, and all the hunters and trackers in Faery couldn’t seem to find them. ’Tis a sad thing for his brother and sisters and himself, their parents gone missing.”
“Prince Borel, and Ladies Celeste and Liaze?”
Blanche nodded, and in a pleading voice said, “Oh, let us go from this room, for tragedy is like to overwhelm me.” And so they went onward.
Through hallways they trod, and here and there in the walls were panels, and when asked, Blanche opened one and pulled on a rope in the space behind, pulleys squeaking somewhere above; a wooden box, open on the front, came into view. “It is used to convey food or other goods from one floor to another,” said Blanche, smiling. “It is called a sourd-muet serveur.”
“Oh, but how clever,” said Camille. “It must save many a footstep bearing loads up and down stairs.”
“Indeed, my lady,” replied Blanche, closing the panel and then moving on.
They came to a chamber with a hardwood floor; at the far end there was nought but a great oaken desk and chair facing toward the door, with other chairs ranged about the walls. Blanche had no knowledge as to the use of this room, though Camille deemed it was for conducting the landowner’s business; meetings with smallholders, mayhap.
Still in another room sat a huge table of many shallow drawers running from board to floor, and therein lay maps and charts of lands both within Faery and without, some sections marked with warnings of dire creatures therein, other whole sections completely blank.
And thus did go the day, Blanche leading Camille thither and yon as they explored the whole of the house, all, that is, but for one floor of one wing, there where the prince did dwell. Camille was quite astonished at the size of it all, as well as o’erwhelmed by its opulence.
That evening, again she dined alone at the foot of a very long mahogany table, servants hovering in the candlelight and watching her every move like owls ready to pounce on a vole, even though they stood quite motionless with their backs to the wall and their eyes seeming elsewhere . . . more or less.
The next day Blanche took her out on a tour of the grounds, and they followed along white-stone pathways wending among the many gardens, with their chrysanthemums and roses and violets and tulips and entire spectrums of flowers that Camille could not name, their blossoms all nodding in a gentle summer breeze. They strolled past ornamental grasses alongside ponds of still water with flowering lily pads afloat. In some, golden-scaled fish swam lazily; in others, the fish seemed bedecked in many-colored calico. Streams burbled across the estate, lucid in their clearness, singing their songs as they tumbled over rocks. One stream was quite broad and fairly deep, and here did Camille see the black swans aswimming. She and Blanche passed by deliberate arrangements of large and small boulders sitting here and there, with vines growing between and spiralling up and ’round the rocks. And now and again to Camille’s wonder, they came across stone sculptings and metal castings and various other imaginative placements: small figures of toads and frogs sat on the banks of ponds; stone mice and voles peeked out from ’neath the bases of boulders; here and there were scattered burbling fountains and slow-flowing basins in which birds bathed and mayhap other diminutive beings as well; small footbridges crossed over rills, stanchions for lanterns along the rail, and in places only large, flat stones spanned the running streams.
Everywhere they went, gardeners and groundskeepers and other such bowed or tipped their hats to the Lady Camille. As she had been instructed by Blanche, Camille responded with a nod, though she also added a smile.
They passed by a long queue of empty stables to come to a smithy, where a fairly young and portly man with grey eyes peering out through a hanging-down shock of dark hair stepped forth and bowed low. “This is Renaud, my lady,” said Blanche, “blacksmith and farrier.”
“Smith I may be, Blanche, or at least I think so, for in these last several years, I have learned much about the blending and heating and hammering and shaping and molding and quenching of metals, bronze and brass in particular.”
“Bronze and brass and not iron?” said Camille.
“Oh, no, my lady, not iron,” answered Renaud. “There are those in Faery who cannot abide iron, and so we keep it out.”
“No iron whatsoever? Not even for nails or horseshoes?”
“Wooden pegs make splendid nails . . . likewise brass. Brass for shoeing horses, too—shoes and nails alike—not that I am much of a farrier these days, for there are no horses at all in the stables.”
Camille laughed and said, “Horses or no, it matters not, for I know not how to ride.”
Renaud grinned and thrust out a hand of negation, saying, “Not true, my lady, for did I not see you riding to the great house yon on the back of the”—Renaud frowned—“on the back of the—”
“The Bear,” supplied Blanche.
“Yes, the Bear,” agreed Renaud, nodding at Blanche.
“Ah, but, Master Farrier,” said Camille, “I would think that quite different from riding a horse.”
Renaud smiled and said, “And so would I, my lady. And so would I. Still, I think you’ll not get a chance to learn, for, ever since the Bear came, the horses are all gone away.”
“Bear? My Bear? Why would that ever make a difference? He’s quite gentle, you know.”
“Aye. We know—you and I and Blanche and all folk here at Summerwood Manor—however, try telling that to a horse.” Renaud sighed. “We simply had to send them away.” He glanced over his shoulder to
the red coals in the forge. “But now if you will excuse me, I have fittings in the fire.”
Camille nodded, and Renaud rushed back into the smithy, leaving the ladies to go on.
At the noontide, in one of the many gazebos, servants provided Camille with a lunch of peeled cucumber slices served on a white, crusty bread. Too, there was golden honey and pale yellow butter, if my lady did so prefer; and all was enhanced by a sweet, tangy drink made of a yellow fruit from across the seas, or so did the handmaid believe. Camille did manage to have Blanche join her in this fine midday repast, though the black-haired girl barely ate a bite, belying her hale manner and her ample size.
After lunch, they came to the entrance of the tall hedge maze, and, in spite of Camille’s importuning, here did Blanche balk. “Oh, my lady, I dare not enter. ’Tis a puzzle I must not essay, else I would be lost forever.”
“Pish, tush,” responded Camille. “The maze is here for the fun of it. Besides, in Fra Galanni’s library I read about such labyrinths, and I’ve always wanted to experience one.” Laughing, she took Blanche’s hand and tugged, yet Blanche burst into tears and pulled loose and fled away.
Puzzled, Camille followed, coming upon Blanche sitting on the grass beside one of the many ponds.
Camille sat on the sward at her lady’s maid’s side. Calico-fish lazily gathered in the water nigh, as if waiting to be fed. “What is it, Blanche, that frightens you so?”
“I don’t know,” replied Blanche. “It’s just that I can never go in there.”
“Well, then, we shan’t,” said Camille.
Timidly, Blanche smiled at her mistress.
“Come,” said Camille, standing and holding out her hand, “there is much more to see.”
Blanche reached up and took the offered grip and stood and brushed herself off, brushing off Camille’s white dress as well.
Through shaded arbors they strolled, the summer air mild within. In one of the arbors they came across an elderly gardener upon his knees in a freshly tilled plot, where he carefully worked seeds into the dark soil.
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