by Sharon Shinn
“Do you need me?” I called to my grandmother as I stepped through the door. “If not, I’ll unpack.”
“I’m fine,” she replied. “Get settled.”
So I dragged the final few bundles to my room, looking around me as I moved through the cottage. As always upon my return, it seemed smaller than I remembered, its compact stone walls grayer and more dense. I noticed details as if for the first time—the way bundles of herbs hung, hundreds in a row, from the parallel beams of the ceiling; the varieties of plants clustered at all four windows of the parlor, all in bloom, all heavy with their own medicinal secrets. My eyes went to the comfortable but worn furniture, a helter-skelter arrangement of stools and sofas and rocking chairs and armoires—and bookshelves lining every wall, spilling over with books, books piled up before them, books open on every surface in the room. I had thought for years that every single one was a spellbook, filled with herb lore and potions, but once I was old enough to read, I found that many of them were novels and romances. My grandmother was not what you would call sentimental, but she loved a good story.
My own chamber was much neater than the central room, and it looked as though my grandmother had not even stepped inside it the whole three months that I was gone. It was filled with sturdy furniture and bright colors: a narrow bed covered with a scarlet comforter, a rocking chair, an overstuffed armchair, a cedar chest, a mirror, a handwoven rug of many colors, and a bookshelf of my own. Like my grandmother, I enjoyed a good story; unlike her, I was often too lazy to read.
I opened the closet and began organizing clothes into piles—dirty, dirty, very dirty, clean enough to hang up and wear again. I could see it would take me three days to get my wardrobe back in order, but I had enough clean clothes to last those three days, so I abandoned the task. I wandered back to the kitchen to assist my grandmother.
“So what are you making?” I asked. I snagged an apple from an open basket and perched on a stool close to the stove.
“Experimental. It’s supposed to guard against warts. Angus wants it for his son, who spends all day in the marsh gathering thatching reeds. I read the recipe in an old book, but I’ve never heard of anyone using it successfully. But I added a few ingredients of my own.”
“I brought you a present from the apothecary at Castle Auburn,” I said, suddenly remembering.
“Oh, you did? What might that be?”
“Sarafis,” I said. “She said it’s very rare.”
My grandmother actually looked up from her stirring when I pronounced the word. “Sarafis,” she repeated. “I haven’t had any of that for years. Twenty years, maybe.”
“So it’s good?”
“Wonderful. Heals without headaches, as my aunt used to say. Nothing like it. That was generous of her.”
“Well, I gave her some halen root.”
She nodded. “A good trade.”
“And I brought you something else,” I said. “I wonder if you’ve heard of it, because I never did.”
“What’s that?”
“Dayig seeds.”
This time she was not awestruck enough to lift her gaze from the book before her. She gave a small snort. “Don’t know what I’d use them for. Poison the rats, maybe, though they haven’t been bad this year.”
“So they are poison?” I asked, because I had never been sure. “Will they kill a man?”
“They will—if he eats a hundred of them every day for a month,” she said. “Trace poison. The seeds can make you sick, but you’d have to be pretty stupid to die from them.”
“Huh,” I said, and didn’t explain why I was asking. “The fruit’s good, though.”
She nodded absently. “That it is. Where did you come across it?”
“Out with Jaxon. Hunting.”
She snorted again, more loudly. “Just the sort of man who’d go picking questionable fruit from the trees and feeding it to his friends.”
I held my peace. Nothing would improve her opinion of Jaxon or any member of his family. We sat in silence for a while, if you discounted the munching sounds I made as I consumed the apple, and then suddenly she gave a small exclamation of annoyance.
“I forgot the elderberry! But it still has to settle twenty minutes or so—perhaps it’s not too late—”
I hopped up from my seat. I knew right where it was. “I’ll get it.”
“Oh, good. Two bottles. And hurry. Thank goodness you’re back.”
And that’s how I knew she was pleased to see me return.
* * *
THE NEXT DAY I was less certain. I emerged from my room later than usual to the sound of light, feminine conversation. When I made it to the kitchen, still rubbing my eyes, I found my grandmother talking to a fair-haired girl about my age. She looked vaguely familiar, so I assumed she was from one of the village families, and she looked fairly intent, so I figured she had come for advice or healing.
Imagine my surprise when my sleepy brain took in the gist of my grandmother’s words, which were nothing less than a lesson in potion-making, which I had learned last spring.
“Now, if it’s a cough only, you add a few leaves of sifronel, but if it’s a cough and a fever, omit the sifronel. Substitute with butter hazel or lemon aliote.”
“Good morning,” I said stupidly to the two of them.
My grandmother barely glanced my way, but the blond girl gave me a shy smile. “You must be Corie,” she said. “I’m Milette.”
“Hello,” I said, then waited for an explanation that did not come. My grandmother glanced over again.
“Hurry up,” she said with her usual impatience. “The day’s half over and you haven’t even dressed. Time for lessons.”
Unsure of how to reply to that, I nodded and went to clean up. Twenty minutes later I was back in the kitchen, helping myself to toast and fruit. Milette was now learning the proper way to grind the sifronel, which pestle to use and how fine to make the powder. She watched my grandmother closely, absorbed but not nervous; she must have come here often, because it takes a while to become at ease around my grandmother.
“Well, I’m ready,” I said loudly, setting aside my plate. “What do we learn next?”
Milette and I took our lessons together for the rest of the day. When she finally left, my grandmother accompanied her out the door, calling to me to feed the hens and rabbits. The coop and pens were some distance from the house, past the extensive garden filled with mysterious flowers and even more mysterious herbs. I took my time about feeding the animals, dribbling corn, grain, and lettuce into their cages and watching them gobble up their meals. Then I freshened their water, petted my favorites, and walked slowly back to the cottage.
Grandmother was setting a stew over the fire, and the smells of dill and onion were comforting and strong. I sat on my customary stool and watched her for some time without speaking.
She was the one who finally offered an explanation for which I was too stubborn to ask. “Rosa’s girl. You know, the candlemaker. Fifth child and no more hands needed in that house. Rosa asked if I’d take her on as an apprentice.”
“And you have,” I said in a neutral tone.
Grandmother shrugged. “We’ll see. So far she learns pretty quickly, but I haven’t given her any hard lessons. But I like her. She’s a good girl, not too talky, not too stupid.”
“But I thought I was your apprentice,” I said.
Again that dismissive snort. “You’re my apprentice when you’re here, which is only three quarters of the year. And will you be here when you turn twenty or twenty-one? I don’t think so. I’m the only wise woman for thirty miles. I need to train someone I can trust to be here when I’m gone.”
“I’ll be here!” I protested, a little heat streaking through my voice. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
She cast me one quick, derisive look. “No one who’s been offered a castle will choose a cottage,” she said.
“But I haven’t been offered a castle!”
She twisted one hand in
an indeterminate gesture that meant Not yet, maybe. “I know what your uncle Jaxon is grooming you for, and it’s not life dispensing herbs to childless village women,” she said. “You have the right to make your own choice, of course, but it’s not hard to see what your future holds. When you live among grand people, your ambitions change. Nothing strange about that.”
How many people had made much this same prediction for me during the past summer? Yet this time it filled me with an unreasoning panic. “I don’t want grand houses! I don’t want to marry some nobleman that Jaxon and Greta pick out for me! I want to live with you and become wise woman to the village and never marry—or, perhaps, marry for love, some country boy with no manners but a good heart—”
She laughed at that. “And there aren’t as many of those around as you would like to think, either,” she said. “I’d be happy if that was the life you picked, but I’m not depending on it. So I invited Milette in, and she’ll stay. You’ll both just have to get used to it.”
“But, Grandmother—” I said.
She pointed to the pantry behind me. “I need salt. And see if you can find any dried marjoram. This smells too bland for me.”
And that was the last discussion we had on the topic. For the rest of the fall, and the entire winter, Milette was at the house as soon as I woke, and there till lessons ended at dusk. Sometimes she stayed the night, sleeping silently on the worn red couch in the parlor, never stirring, never crying out. Once I got up in the middle of the night, thirsty and looking for water, and I stood over her a long time, watching her untroubled sleep. She was everything I had always thought I was—a cheerful, intelligent, hardworking girl who knew her place in the world and had a certain ambition for her life—and she inhabited a role everyone seemed determined to push me out of. I could not hate her but I was able to resist liking her, and she was wary of me as well. Thus an unspoken but fierce competition existed between us, and we each engaged to learn every new lesson before the other. It made us better students, which pleased my grandmother no end, but it did not make life any less complicated.
When summer came around the following year and I prepared to return to Castle Auburn, I realized that I would lose ground to Milette every day of the next three months. And the thought was bitter, though it did not prevent me from making my annual sojourn. When I returned to my grandmother’s that fall, I studied extra hard to make up missed time and I eventually caught up with my rival.
But the next summer I fell even further behind, and even further the following year. I was a good witch, but Milette was better, and that did not make it any easier to leave for Castle Auburn that summer.
PART TWO
Disillusionments
6
The summer I was seventeen, everything went wrong. Elisandra was not at the castle during the first week of my visit. Her mother had carried her off to Tregonia to visit insipid Lady Megan and her vacuous family. I didn’t learn this news until I arrived, late and exhausted, to find only the servants awaiting Jaxon and me in the great hallway. I, of course, rushed immediately up to Greta’s suite to discover all those rooms empty and no fire in my own bedroom. The footman who had carried my luggage up two stairwells and down two long hallways hustled off to find a chambermaid who could build a fire and bring me fresh water.
Jaxon had carried one of my bags himself and glanced around my cold room while we waited.
“Not very welcoming,” he observed. “I thought I told Greta when I’d arrive, but maybe she mislaid the note.”
“But I wrote Elisandra. I know she wouldn’t have forgotten,” I said, sniffling a little, though I was trying not to cry. “That horrible woman has taken her away on purpose.”
Jaxon shrugged. “Maybe. Who knows. I’ll talk to her when I get back.”
“When you get back!”
“I’m off for Faelyn Market in the morning.”
“But Uncle Jaxon! I’ve scarcely seen you! When will you be back?”
He hugged me somewhat absentmindedly. “A month, maybe. I’ve got a hunting trip planned as well.”
I pulled away and stared at him openmouthed. It was typical of him to be gone from the castle during much of my sojourn, but usually he stayed long enough to see me settled in. “Uncle Jaxon—” I said again.
“I know,” he said sympathetically. “Not the best plans all in all. I’ll make it up to you later on.”
When he left, I cried myself to sleep, even though by now I was much too old for such foolishness. All I could think was how much better off I would be, still in the village contesting with Milette for my grandmother’s affections. If no one wanted me here, why had I made such an effort to arrive?
But things were a little better in the morning. The first thing I saw when I opened my eyes was Cressida’s slim shape, moving silently between my luggage and my closet, putting away my clothes.
I sat up in bed, calling out her name. She came over to sit beside me. “Good morning, Corie,” she said in that sweet, soft voice that lapped over me like warm summer rain. “Look at you! You’ve gotten all grown-up over the winter.”
I laughed and straightened where I sat, the better to show off my newly developed bustline. “And I’ve grown another inch taller, but I hope it’s the very last time,” I said. “I’m getting too tall.”
“No such thing as too tall,” she said. She had automatically reached for a brush and now she began uncoiling the tangles of my hair. “It’s good for a woman to be able to look into a man’s eyes. Then she’s not afraid to tell him what she thinks.”
I laughed again. “Not usually a problem I have, anyway.”
She smiled. “No . . . So what else happened while you were gone? What about that Milette girl? Is she still there?”
Just her voice, just her presence, just the comforting stroke of her hands through my hair made me happier than I had been since I left my grandmother’s cottage. I told her all about Milette, some of the potions I had learned, and the names of the village boys who had flirted with me during the autumn, winter, and spring.
“And here? How is everybody?” I demanded. “Elisandra?”
“Lovely as always. She was very unhappy that she would be gone when you arrived, but she should be here in a day or two. She has a new maid, the quietest little thing, but so devoted to her. It seems to have made her days easier.”
“And Kent? Marian? Angela? How are they?
“Kent looks more like his father every day—getting heavier in the bones, more like a man. Marian and Angela are silly as ever, but growing up just like you.”
“And Bryan?”
She was silent a moment, or so it seemed, then she laid the brush aside. “Bryan is as he always is, but more so,” was the unhelpful response. “Hard to believe he will be king next year. Time for you to take a bath. I’ll get a dress ready for you.”
Forty-five minutes later I was clean, hungry, and in the small breakfast room where food was laid out for those who did not eat in their rooms. I was late, so I expected it to be empty, but Kent and his father strode in shortly after I had started eating.
Lord Matthew did no more than nod at me before filling his plate at the sideboard, but Kent came over to give me a hug.
“Stand up,” he commanded, pulling me from my chair. “Look at you! Turn around. Amazing. You look more like your sister every year.”
No compliment could have pleased me more. I gave him a quick curtsey and inspected him in turn. His dark hair looked newly cut, for the planes of his face seemed sharper, more severe than I remembered, and his gray eyes more direct. While I had grown taller, he seemed to have grown broader, though he was still trim and lean. Cressida was right; the thin, serious youth had become a thoughtful, sober man. “You look older,” I said.
He smiled at that. “You had all winter to think about it, and you couldn’t come up with a nicer thing to say?”
“Older, wiser, more authoritative, and better looking,” I amended. “Do you like that better?”
The regent did glance over at that. “I’ll need you in a few minutes, Kent.”
Kent nodded. “I’ll be right there.”
Lord Matthew looked as if he might say something else, didn’t, and set down his plate. He had eaten everything he wanted in three brief minutes. Without another word, he left the room.
“Is something wrong?” I asked.
“Something’s always wrong, when you’re trying to run a kingdom,” Kent said lightly.
“Like what?”
He looked at me consideringly, as if he wasn’t sure I was truly interested. “Eight provinces ruled by strong-willed viceroys who have always respected my father. One year from the time a twenty-year-old hothead ascends to the throne. Some of the viceroys don’t want to be led by the new king, and they haven’t been too subtle about the ways they’ve said so. Which has not made Bryan any less volatile. My father is doing what he can to soothe the waters. It’s been an interesting year.”
Much as I had always mooned over Bryan, I could see Kent’s point: The handsome redheaded prince was much more likely to appeal to an impressionable young lady than a seasoned and wary landowner. “Which viceroys don’t like him?” I asked.
Kent smiled. “Most of them, but Dirkson of Tregonia has been the most vocal. One of the reasons your sister is there now, trying to win some support from the Tregonian court. I don’t think it will work, though. Dirkson has said flat out that he won’t swear alliance with Auburn unless a different man is on the throne—or a different woman.”
I was confused. “Different woman?”
“His daughter. Then he’d back Bryan. He’d have to.”
“But—wait. He wants Megan to marry Bryan? But—but Elisandra and Bryan have been betrothed for nineteen years.”
Kent nodded. “Ah, but he wouldn’t leave her completely out of the matrimonial arena,” he said, and his voice was very dry. “His son, Borgan, is a personable young man of about twenty-five who would very much like a close alliance with the house of Ouvrelet. And Halsing is close enough for him.”