He was diverted; he frowned. “Blasphemous?”
“Isn’t it what the avia dared to do?”
His eyes narrowed, and I moistened my lips. “Sir, they desired to fly like the gods.”
“You have the audacity to accuse these Ministers of blaspheming because they wear their ceremonial masks?”
“No, indeed not, Sir. But if I danced with such company myself I’d blaspheme, for the Ministration is the mouthpiece of the gods on Earth and the Lord Protector the Eagle’s own anointed. Who am I to dance among them?”
Silas still frowned. The musicians struck up a different air; the new dance began. “Are you saying that I too blaspheme if I take part in the dance, since I’m not a Minister myself?”
I thought quickly. “How could I say such a thing, Sir, when you look after all our souls in this household? I’m sure the Almighty favors you for doing His work. It’s right that you should take part, whereas I …” I spread my hands modestly, eyes cast down, “I’m only a maid from the village, Sir, and you’ve said yourself that my soul’s in danger.”
He scrutinized me, but I didn’t look up. “I’m glad you’re so concerned for your salvation, Agnes,” he said levelly at last. “I respect your feelings.”
“Thank you, Sir,” I murmured.
He gave me a curt bow. “I’ll see you at dinner, then.” The faintest scent of flower water was left behind him.
Dog turned to me. “What did you say to make him go?” she breathed.
“He didn’t realize I mocked him.”
“How did you dare? You spoke of the avia to him, those terrible creatures.”
“We shouldn’t be afraid of them, Dog. The Almighty created their form too.”
“As a punishment for their sins!” said Dog.
I thought of what the fool had said. “Not a punishment but a blessing,” I whispered to myself. But I still couldn’t fathom it.
I was alone now by the pillar. Dog had disappeared to her duties. Silas was sitting on the dais with the Master; I could see him bending close, solicitously, as they talked. And all the while the dancers wove their stately lines together, the rich darkness of their silks and satins catching the candlelight, the monstrous bird heads bobbing and turning.
And trapped among them somewhere, a slight, silver girl.
Why has the Almighty never punished the Ministration for daring to mimic the gods? I thought. Surely the sin of the avia was no worse?
The dancers were bowing to each other, carefully, so their heads shouldn’t fall off. I felt hysterical laughter well up inside me.
But the dancing was over. Now the banquet would begin.
XXII
The Truth Is Out
First, the Ministers had to repair to their chambers to remove their masks and replace their wigs. The entry into the Great Hall that followed was almost as elaborate as the Calvacade.
I was disconcerted to find myself placed at the top table, a seat away from Leah, with a portly, elderly gentleman between us, and on my left a severe-looking stick of middle years. Lord Grouted was seated on Leah’s right, the Master on the Lord Protector’s other side. Before me on the table I had a glittering forest of knives and forks to find my way through, and glasses of every shape.
As I sat down, I saw to my dismay that the fool, Gobchick, had been recaptured. A footman was dragging him along on his chain, and as he scurried past me, bent to his knees, he made mournful little cheeping noises.
At first I tried to listen to Leah’s conversation with Lord Grouted, but could hear little; my stout neighbor made so much noise chewing his food. Once or twice he spluttered out a question, which I answered, but he must have decided that as a mere companion I’d have no interesting conversation, for after that he spoke with the lady opposite and ignored me.
As for the stick on my left, he sucked in his sagging cheeks and pecked at his food so cautiously he must have been expecting to find maggots in it. Certainly he had no attention for the insignificant chit next to him.
It was a painful, fraught meal, and the magnificent food, which Gossop and the kitchen servants had so labored over, stuck in my throat as much as my neighbors’ treatment of me. Gobchick fared even worse; he was forced to kneel behind the Lord Protector’s chair like a dog. As I looked, he sat up and begged, and was thrown a piece of bread.
Each course ended with a toast proposed by one of the guests. Glasses were raised to “the long session,” “short council,” “the messengers” — all mysteries to me — and sometimes to the names of individuals. As the glasses clinked, I looked around at the faces masked by white makeup, the wine-stained mouths, the glittering eyes.
These weren’t good people, I could feel it. After a few toasts I only pretended to drink the wine. It made me feel queasy.
“Quaint,” said the bony woman in puffed black satin opposite the portly gentleman, and she gestured at the silver bowls of flowers. “Quaint, yet pretty. But wildflowers don’t last, do they?” She put a lace handkerchief to her nostrils and sniffed delicately.
We were waiting for the footmen to bring in the roasted oxen from the stable yard. I could hear Lord Grouted and the Master talking in low voices beneath the babble. Leah was as silent as I was; I knew she was listening too.
“This is a good turnout, Gilbert. I’m pleasantly surprised. I’d thought things might be a struggle for you, up here in the Eastern Edge — shortages and so on.”
The Master smiled. “We don’t think of ourselves as quite the back of beyond, you know — the front of the back, perhaps.”
“Aye, but the villagers? Do they produce for you? Where do you get the stuff?” Grouted waved his thick fingers at the spread before him.
“We’ve had a good harvest. We produce most of our food here on the estate, thanks to Silas’s management. I don’t like to demand much from the villagers. They have themselves to feed.”
“You always were soft, Gilbert.”
“Perhaps.”
“Hah! You’d live on your dreams if you could.” Lord Grouted prised a knot of gristle from between his teeth, looked at it critically, then dropped it onto his plate. “The project you were working on when we last met, that contraption, you’re finished with all that, ain’t you?”
“Oh, I look at it from time to time, Porter,” said the Master lightly
“I don’t like to hear that. We allowed you to keep your books. That was a big concession.”
“And I’m more than grateful for it.”
“But that contraption of yours could be conceived of as a greater blasphemy than the words your books contain.”
“Hardly, I think.” The Master’s tone was weary. He wasn’t looking well tonight, nor eating. His high color was drained, and he rubbed his arm as if it pained him.
“It’s what I think that matters. Others too. Why, damn it, you’ve as good as made a pair of wings!”
“I hide it well enough. Only my most trusted servants have seen it.”
“Do more than that, Gilbert. Get rid of the thing. Take this as advice from a friend. I’m thinking of your own good and the future of your estate, man.” He leaned closer. “Do I speak plainly?”
“Thank you, My Lord,” said the Master. “I’ll bear your advice in mind.”
When at last the steamed sponges, the jewel-colored jellies and milk blancmanges, the meringues piled with cream, the bursting summer puddings, the honey ices and fruit sorbets, and the foamy syllabubs had been consumed, it was time for the final toast.
A wheat-colored wine was poured into tiny glasses, delicate squares of sweetmeats passed around. The thin woman in black satin stood up and raised her glass. “To Lord Grouted.”
Everyone in the hall rose to his feet.
Each guest had to cross hands and glasses, and drink from the glass put into his right hand by the neighbor on his left. I had no idea what to do, and had to be shown by Leah. After a great muddle on my part, the fat gentleman accepted my glass with some disdain.
When the toast was over, everyone sat down. By now, the guests’ makeup had melted into greasy channels with the heat of wine and candlelight, and their wigs were uncurling. As the grotesque faces turned to the Master for the banquet speech, I felt a sudden chill.
He wasn’t among friends.
“Help me stand,” he said to Jukes behind him, and he placed his hands on the arms of the wheelchair and tried to heave himself up.
“Sir!” began Leah in alarm, leaping to her feet so quickly her chair fell over. A murmur swelled among the guests.
Like a shadow, Silas came swiftly from his place. “Let me, Sir,” he said smoothly, and took the Master’s weight on his left side. Together he and Jukes managed to support the Master, who shook with strain as if he had the ague.
Leah’s eyes filled with tears. “There’s no need for this, Sir.”
“I must,” he growled, through clenched teeth.
The murmuring died. The guests looked at one another meaningfully, a feral gleam in their eyes, and waited for the kill.
With a visible effort, the Master collected himself and began to speak. He began by thanking the guests for coming so far and for their presents to his ward. “We’re both deeply honored that so many of you have managed to attend tonight, not least, of course, the Lord Protector himself.”
Lord Grouted bowed from the waist, and his lizard eyes flicked around.
“It’s good to see so many of my old colleagues again after my years of absence from the sessions,” said the Master.
The lady opposite waved the white hand that held her liqueur glass, and bracelets clacked down her scrawny arm like manacles. “So good to see you, dear Gilbert.” Her red mouth smiled at him treacherously.
The Master spoke fluently and from time to time made a little jest for his audience. Behind the Lord Protector, Gob-chick cackled and clapped his hands together. In the whole gathering, I think he was the only one whose laughter was genuine.
For a moment the Master drooped between the two men who supported him. But then he lifted his head, spoke louder. “As you all will realize, this is a great occasion for me, as well as for Leah. My ward has reached her sixteenth birthday. She has come of age. The state considers her a child no longer, but an adult, owed the respect and with the responsibilities that being an adult brings.
“For Leah, the respect given her will go hand in hand with how she carries out her responsibilities, as one day she will inherit Murkmere.”
People knew about the old feud. All eyes turned expectantly to Lord Grouted, waiting for his reaction. He was tapping his fingers on the table; his nails were trimmed square, like spades. Leah knelt by the Master’s chair, a flush tingeing her pale cheeks.
“A long time ago the Lord Protector and I quarreled over this.” The Master nodded at his guests. “I make no secret of it. Lord Grouted thought that unknown blood would defile the Ministration. We quarreled violently, and I am sorry for it and have borne my own self-inflicted punishment for many years. But now I’ve an announcement to make that will set things right. The time is ripe for the truth, since now Leah is sixteen she is the legal age to inherit Murkmere on my death, which may be any time.”
Several guests shook their heads and protested at that. The Master smiled. “One must be realistic.”
Lord Grouted examined his nails. “What is this truth you speak of, Gilbert?”
The Master lifted his head. He looked triumphant. He stared straight at Porter Grouted as if challenging him. “The truth is this, and now you’ll need be concerned no longer. For Leah is indeed one of us. She has the blood of the Ministration in her veins. She is my daughter.”
There was utter silence in the hall, a dangerous silence. Leah lifted her hand, touched her neck. Silas stood still as death, his knuckles white where he gripped the Master.
“Soon after my wife’s death I knew the baby had survived,” said the Master. “But I told no one.”
Lord Grouted bore himself up from his chair, thrusting his bald head toward the Master. “Why in the name of the Eagle didn’t you? It would have saved endless trouble. We need never have had our dispute for a start, man.”
The Master didn’t flinch. “I had my reasons. The Eastern Edge isn’t like your softer south, where the occasional uprising can be quelled without difficulty. We’ve wildmen here, bandits and vagabonds, and you know that rebels cluster in the remoter villages and that their numbers are growing. They would seek any chance to harm us. I didn’t want to lose my daughter to kidnappers, or worse.”
“So now we’re to welcome your daughter as one of us, no foundling at all but the true offspring of a Minister?”
“Yes, indeed.”
“And we can take your word for it?”
For a moment the Master looked dumbfounded. “It’s the truth, I swear it.” He began to breathe heavily and I saw his hands ball into fists. “If you doubt me, I have the midwife’s signed certificate of birth.”
But Porter Grouted laughed. “A joke, old man, that’s all. I’ll not risk confronting you again.” He turned to the guests with a great show of good humour. “We’ll drink a toast to it. Tonight’s a double celebration, ain’t it now?” He raised his glass and held it in the air so that the liqueur shone like liquid gold in the candlelight. “To Leah, on her sixteenth birthday! A true daughter of Murkmere Hall!”
Silas bent to take the Master’s glass from the table with his free hand, and offered it to him. I stood up; everyone but Leah stood, waiting for the Master to take it from Silas and drink, but instead he turned to Leah kneeling beside his chair and looked into her upturned face.
“Leah?” he said softly. “Leah, my love, my dearest daughter? I believe you’ve known all along, haven’t you?”
Leah said nothing. Her face had lost the flush of wine and was moon-pale.
There was a silence of several heartbeats’ length. The Master’s face took on a terrible hurt.
Then Leah rose and ran from the hall, from the guests standing open-mouthed, from the flickering candles and the shining glasses, from her father. Gobchick began to moan softly, but no one paid him any attention.
The tapestries flapped over the door, and Leah was gone.
XXIII
The Master’s Message
The Master fell back into his chair. There was an agitated commotion of people around him, commiserating, comforting.
No one saw me leave but Silas. As I left my place, his black eyes met mine, defeated. He knew what I was doing, but he was trapped. At such a time it would look bad if a steward didn’t stay with his Master.
I ran from the room, between the tapestries and through the door, and at the end of the passage I saw the shine of Leah’s dress. She was leaning against the wall, her eyes huge and fixed.
I marched straight up and shook her. Her head flipped round; her eyes focused on me. “Leah,” I said. “Leah, why did you leave?”
She shook her head; she looked desperately unhappy. I couldn’t understand it. Where was the joy I’d expected?
“What is it?” I whispered. “You can tell me.”
She was so deep in misery she was unaware of my question. I put my arms around her, but still she said nothing. Her shoulder blades were sharp beneath her dress. She was like a bird in my arms, a beautiful bird.
Then Jukes came around the corner on his way to the hall, carrying a silver bowl of dark green nero leaves.
Leah heard his footsteps and looked up. She pushed my arms away. “I must prepare myself for the dancing,” was all she said. “I’ll summon Doggett to the parlor. Go back to the Hall, Aggie.”
She’d rejected me. I stood uncertainly in the passage as she slipped away, and tears pricked behind my eyes.
Then the gangling figure of Jukes came back through the door from the hall. I half-turned away from him as if I were going elsewhere, but he hurried up to me, his long face gloomier than ever. “Miss Agnes, I’m glad you’re still here. The Master’s asking for you.”
“Me?”
“You and no one else, he says.”
Bemused and apprehensive, I followed Jukes back to the Great Hall. The crowd around the Master drew back a little as I approached. The concerned, hypocritical voices fell silent.
Lord Grouted was standing back, watching. I didn’t look at him. It was the Master I cared about, slumped over an arm of the wheelchair, his cheeks patchworked with red and white, his breath coming in gasps. Silas was patting his back as if he’d choked, but I knew it wasn’t choking that had made him like this.
I laid my hand on the Master’s. “Sir?”
“Aggie? Take me away from all this.”
I stared straight at Silas and put my hands on the bar handle of the chair. Silas fell back. He said nothing; no one said anything as I wheeled the Master away.
Jukes held open the door for us and followed with a candle. I was grateful, though it wasn’t needed. The sconces were bright in the passage, all the way to the Master’s room. I would have run with the chair if I’d had the strength, so anxious was I to get the Master to his medicine, but it was heavy. I was out of breath by the time we arrived and Jukes had opened the door.
“I can manage now, thank you, Jukes,” I said, and he bowed gravely and left as the nurse came out of the anteroom.
The Master’s room was growing dim, lit only by firelight and the fading daylight. The curtains weren’t yet drawn; the nurse hadn’t been expecting the Master back so soon.
“He’s been taken sick,” I said urgently. “What can you do?”
I was glad she didn’t fuss but examined his face and went swiftly to her row of bottles. She selected one, poured out a glass of a dark liquid, and handed it to me. “Too much excitement has thickened his blood. This should thin it.”
I sniffed the physic doubtfully: it smelt of rotting tree bark, of ancient forests. But when I held it to the Master’s lips, he drained the glass, meek as a child.
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