Akermen met them at the manor. Barbara had hesitated over opening it up for the few weeks she would be staying, and with such small company. But there were certain standards to maintain, hospitality to offer. Not a lavish show—that would give the wrong message in these times—but a solid generosity. And she wanted to test Akermen’s abilities and judgment.
The man had taken her at her word that only a few principal rooms need be prepared and a minimum of temporary staff. He looked harder now, more worn. Less the promising new man freshly returned from the university. He’d spent his years in Rotenek studying the usual program: history and rhetoric and law, with a smattering of radical ideas for leavening. It occurred to Barbara they might have spent time in the same lecture halls. He was of an age for it. She must see that those ambitions weren’t squandered.
Clerks learned in law were easy to find. More valuable was a man like Akermen who had grown up hearing the talk of farmers and discussions of how to bring land to its best use. One who wasn’t too proud or too disdainful of those roots to return and take up the challenge of such practical problems. He wouldn’t be content here for all his life, but for now their goals might serve each other.
Akermen met them wearing a town-made suit of sober cloth, agreed to share a glass of wine at the welcome, but declined the invitation to dine, excusing himself on the grounds that she would be tired from the journey. He exchanged glances with Maistir Tuting—looking for all the world like two strange dogs taking each other’s measure—and promised to return in the morning with all his accounts and surveys drawn up.
The paper accounts and surveys were only the first look at the status of the estate. The ritual of riding the markein once around served a more practical purpose here than it did at Saveze. Rituals had their own worth and power, but here the first purpose would be viewing the state of the land and meeting with her tenants on their own ground.
Tuting stayed behind, being of no use on a horse. Akermen hadn’t the seat of a gentleman, but he’d grown up riding across these fields.
Barbara suggested that Tavit, too, might take a holiday. “Brandel can attend me for the circuit,” she offered. Brandel should learn the habits and customs of holding property. It was never too soon to make his face familiar, should matters alter. One never knew.
But Tavit asked stiffly, “Mesnera, do you forbid me from accompanying you?”
“Not at all,” Barbara exclaimed in surprise. “I only thought…There’s little enough to defend me from out here.”
“Forgive me, Mesnera,” Tavit said, the tension in his voice easing slightly. “But this is still uncertain ground for you.” He threw a glance over where Akermen waited out of hearing. “I would ask that you allow me my own judgment in how you should be attended.”
Lately Tavit had become…no, not prickly. Nor was stubborn the precise word. But insistent. Yes, perhaps insistent was the right term. What would she have done with their positions reversed? But back in the days when she had been an armin, her status had been peculiar. Irregular, if you will. Her duty had been measured in wild swings between rigid protocol and silent obedience. And then there had been the time of freedom as a new baroness, looking to her own safety and honor and trusting only her own judgment. And Marken’s, of course. That went without saying. Marken had a lifetime’s experience and judgment to draw on.
But Tavit was right. He was doing nothing more than what an armin was bound to do. She nodded. “As you think best.”
But, oh, how it grated to have her own judgment called into question.
Summer found the Turinz lands better than she’d feared but worse than she’d hoped. She was no farmer, but there was a life, a vibrancy to the patchwork of green and gold fields, a firm solidity to the vineyards climbing the sides of the steeper hills, a sweet promise in the ranks of apple trees that edged every lane.
She ventured the opinion, “The harvest should be enough to see everyone through, if luck holds.”
Akermen’s glance was unreadable. “Must we trust to luck, Mesnera? I thought we might have higher assistance than that.”
Did he mean it for a joke? “God willing, if it needs to be said!” she answered. “But a personal miracle is beyond me.”
“You are a friend of the Royal Thaumaturgist…”
“And she is trying her best for all Alpennia. We aren’t the only ones in need.” How to explain that Margerit’s efforts were made on a longer scale, at a higher level? But perhaps… “There is a parish guild, is there not? What mysteries do they have for the crops? Perhaps they might be examined and made stronger.”
It was a vain thought. Margerit wouldn’t have time for such a task this summer. Not with the school to be built. But the promise returned some of Akermen’s enthusiasm.
Her manager’s enthusiasms came between them again in the last days of her visit. They had been speaking of what measures might be decided on in the extended summer council sessions, when he unexpectedly said, “There are likely to be new elections for the common council next winter. Do you favor anyone in particular? It’s unlikely that Perkumen could be dislodged from his seat, but the other one is less fixed.”
“I have my opinions, like anyone else,” Barbara replied with amusement. “But as I have no vote in the matter, I don’t see that they’re of any importance.”
He looked nonplussed. “I had thought—” A glance at Brandel.
Good heavens, did he think she meant to set her cousin up in politics? Now that the thought occurred to her, it was a reasonable suspicion, if she had been inclined that way. No doubt other lords whose bloodlines crossed over into the burfroites might find it convenient to install a relative in the lower council.
“My preference,” she said evenly, “is for someone of experience and clear thinking, who will bend to neither fear nor favor. My preference,” she emphasized, “is for laws to be made from sound judgment rather than loyalty. And yes—” She waved her hand to stop any protest. “I know well how these things truly work. But I have no mind to meddle unless there’s need.”
Akermen looked disappointed before his face smoothed into blandness again. Clearly he had his own interest in the seat, but she was loathe to encourage him at this time. It would be impossible for her own estate manager to take up a place in council without giving the appearance that he would be her creature. And Turinz couldn’t be overseen by someone who spent months at a time in Rotenek for the sessions.
* * *
The journey to Saveze was longer than it would have been, except for her choice to avoid traveling across Mazuk’s lands. An excess of caution, perhaps, making the detour to Rapenfil more awkward. There Brandel left their party for a month’s visit with his family. But soon enough the white walls of the Orisules’ convent came into view on the mountainside, followed by the verdigrised roofs of the manor at Saveze.
Saveze, in truth, needed little of her oversight. Cheruk had its affairs well in hand. And without the distraction of other guests—and most especially of Margerit, so far away in Rotenek—the days dragged as she waited for word from her expected visitor.
Two summers past, Kreiser had sent a message to her secretly at Saveze, when he was persona non grata after the business with Antuniet. The wind had blown in several different directions since then and she had more of his measure. She still didn’t entirely trust him, but their every interaction carried the thrill of sparring, of matching wits with someone who enjoyed the game as much as she did.
This time, a letter awaited her when she arrived, the superscription indicating that he’d written it at Geneva. She knew he’d planned to hunt down more evidence of mystic disasters. The Swiss were close-mouthed and wary—not given to interest in thaumaturgy at the best of times. But when something beyond the vagaries of fortune struck, they suspected their neighbors and made free with accusations. In Lombardy and Piedmont they had strong opinions of whom to blame for the forces that locked the mountains in winter, though with no better evidence than anyone else had.
They, at least, had been trying to peck away at the southern edges of the disruption with rituals both great and small.
She knew Kreiser was mapping the ambit of the effects as best he could, with information gleaned in the spring through some sort of scrying, though he’d declined to elaborate. The letter held little more than a hint of his current travels lest it fall into another’s hands. He named the date when she might expect him. Two weeks after her own arrival.
When Kreiser did not appear as appointed, she gave it little weight. Travel in the mountains was chancy at best, even without the state of the passes. The innkeeper at Atefels had been instructed to expect him and returned her a sorrowful tale of how the trade in travelers was sadly diminished, even from the previous slow year. Those who came through told of harrowing treks between piled snowbanks higher than their horses and no passage for coaches at all.
Barbara began to fidget. Not from concern for the man himself, but from the unease that disrupted plans always stirred in her.
Then a messenger rode down from Atefels, followed in two days by Kreiser himself. He was traveling lightly, accompanied only by a man who combined the functions of aide-de-camp and valet. Though there was space in plenty at the manor Barbara directed him to the village inn. One of the irritations raised against her in the council of nobles was her seeming friendship with the Austrian. She preferred being able to deny that Kreiser had been a guest in her home.
A dinner invitation carried no such risk. The manor’s dining room with its long oak table was too large and echoing for use in the absence of a full set of summer guests, but it supplied space for the series of maps Kreiser unrolled from a long cylindrical case. Tavit satisfied his sense of duty by playing the butler, standing by to pour drinks and attend to any immediate needs. Barbara had no doubts of the discretion of the manor staff, but this service kept their discussions more private. Too, it avoided any awkward implication that she felt the need for protection in her own home.
Kreiser had never stated plainly just what level of mystical sensitivity he possessed. His interest in Antuniet’s alchemy that had first brought him to Rotenek gave few clues, for alchemy could be pursued without any special talents. But as Kreiser began listing some of his observations in the mountains, Barbara compared them to the ways that Margerit and Antuniet discussed their visions. She guessed he fell more toward the lower end of the middle. Far less sensitivity than Margerit possessed, but more than Antuniet, though he shared with her cousin an air of frustration every time the subject came up.
“I’ve succeeded, I believe, in mapping out the current spread of this zauberwerk, though the eastern parts I know only by rumor. The original scope is harder to estimate.” He traced his finger across the map. “We still believe it was intended to disrupt certain key travel routes. But the spread and the secondary effects confused the matter. I doubt the net was meant to be cast so wide.”
We, he said. Barbara took that for the Austrian government. Or perhaps only certain agencies within it. She saw her own investigations embedded in his analysis: the collected travelers’ reports on weather and road conditions up to Geneva, over to Turin. The earthquake, the crop failures, the outbreaks of fever, even the warehouse fires in Rotenek. Anything that one might have expected the saints’ protections to have eased. She reviewed the essentials. “Nothing at this end of the mountains in the early part of twenty-two. Certainly nothing affecting the weather, for floodtide came as expected that year. That only started a year past, but by then the mystery had taken firm hold. Snow blocking the passes well into the summer and no floodtide to speak of.”
Kreiser grimaced and continued. “If the authors had put a bit more effort into specifics it might have saved a great deal of harm. Your Rotein is only a small part of it. The Po would be affected worse if not for the difference in rain patterns. The southern Swiss cantons have lost half their summer pasture this year. And travel from Bohemia…well—”
He bit off what he might have said. Their newfound partnership still had limits when it touched on Austrian concerns. “If we can find a way to break the central zauberwerk, the roads should return to normal in a year or so, even with two years worth of snowpack tied up. But that’s just the lancing of the boil. The spell has spread and fragmented. Even if these other effects are tied to the original purpose, breaking that spell may not touch them.”
Barbara could still be startled by Kreiser’s use of the language of sorcery to describe the weather mystery. Margerit avoided those terms entirely, dividing the mystical world into religious ritual and the common charms of the untutored.
She turned her thoughts to the timing. “It was only this past autumn when Margerit commented on the fraying of the Great Mysteries at the eastern edges of Alpennia. She thought perhaps she hadn’t been looking closely enough—it was Maisetra Talarico who saw it first. But perhaps there hadn’t been anything to see.”
“Yes,” Kreiser said. “The beginnings were a year before. And farther east. I asked you once what you knew of events in Spain?”
Barbara felt a sudden sympathy for Brandel being quizzed on his studies. She had followed the ins and outs of Alpennian politics closely under the old baron. And when he had been Prince Aukust’s emissary to the discussions at Vienna she had attempted to follow their concerns at a distance. But Alpennia had little influence outside its borders and there had been much to distract her at home since then.
“The restoration of King Ferdinand in Spain,” she offered. “But Alb— people say that’s long past.” No need to name names. Kreiser might guess that she had Albori’s authorization, but it wasn’t part of the game to say so.
“It had been suggested back at the Congress of Verona,” Kreiser continued, ignoring her stumble, “that a larger, more balanced force should intervene in Spain. Moving across the mountains here and then by ship. But…”
“But they couldn’t get through,” Barbara finished for him. “They would have been stopped before the pass. But wasn’t the mystery already in place by then?”
Kreiser waved aside the objection. “By the time anyone gets to talking, the moves and counter-moves have already been made. Someone wanted to prevent that army from traveling to Spain. And even leaving behind artillery,” he continued, “by the time they could march through under those conditions, the battle would have been decided. The debates were a meaningless show. The army never moved and France had a free hand in Spanish affairs.”
“So you think it’s France?”
Kreiser’s sidelong glance was both amused and suspicious. “Do you?” He leaned back in his chair and seemed to be enjoying himself greatly. “If it were only that simple! I suspect everyone. There were some who signed to the accords who were quite happy to have had the matter taken out of their hands. Within my own government there are forces who have moved in the past to preempt the ministers’ decisions. And there are companies of thaumaturgists on every side. Not all have the power to work something of this sort, but the ones who do are rarely those who boast that they could.”
For a brief moment, all masks seemed to drop away and Kreiser looked more tired than Barbara had ever seen before.
“There’s a good reason why my activities in Alpennia have not fallen under the most official channels,” he said. “And why my public mission has been cloaked in playing at marital intrigues.”
If it were a ploy for sympathy, it fell short. Kreiser’s “playing” had left bodies in its wake the year before, and it was only good fortune that none of them had been people she cared for. But she could believe it had been nothing more than misdirection, for it had come to nothing in the end.
Barbara was no longer certain how much of Kreiser’s tale was belated honesty and how much was still part of that game. If he could pretend to bluntness, so could she. “Why Alpennia? Why me? Why haven’t you brought this directly to Princess Anna’s ministers or to your own ambassador? Why quiz me like a catechism rather than stating what you need outright?”
Kre
iser exhaled, halfway between a sigh and a grunt. “Alpennia is at the heart of it, I’m certain. Not in the way my superiors think, but they wouldn’t take my word for that, and—” He leaned forward in a move that might still be playacting. “—I don’t trust them any more than I trust you or the Russians or the French, though perhaps more than I trust the English. I have been tasked with determining whether we’re dealing with external enemies or with hidden forces within the Empire itself. If this is the work of foreign thaumaturgists, I am to cripple them as best I can. And that is where I hope to have your support.” His gesture took in the entirety of Alpennia. “No one in Vienna has the power to work at this distance, and we don’t have anyone with the right talent in place in Paris. The Russians don’t do this type of work. The English won’t even admit to having thaumaturgists. The last thing I want is to get tangled up with the disaster that is Rome. You have the mystical traditions and people with the skills to help carry it off, as well as the will to do so. I can’t be seen to be working directly with your government, but no one will notice my dealings with you.”
Yes, Barbara thought. She had played at cat-and-mouse with him over most of his false distractions. No one would find anything suspicious in their continued entanglements.
“And if it turns out to be agents within Austria itself?” she asked.
Kreiser’s face settled into grimmer lines. “Then it’s possible I will be a dead man as soon as I make my report.”
* * *
A summer season in Saveze should have been a time of productive idleness. The days should have been spent riding up the steep valleys, renewing ties with her tenants, enjoying a sky unconstrained by the press of buildings. It was the first summer she had spent away from Margerit’s side for more than a few weeks at a time. The experience might have harked back to her girlhood—those years of preparation and practice, always waiting for the old baron’s appearance and the chance that he might drop a word of praise or a promise of adventure. That had been a different world. Back then her life had spun around her patron—her father—like the moon in orbit. Now she circled an equal body, like two dancers in the waltz. When every necessary task at Saveze was complete and she gave the word to ready the traveling coach, her nerves tingled like a girl in her dancing season looking ahead to a ball.
Mother of Souls: A novel of Alpennia Page 27