by Sarah Ash
Girim nel Ghislain had been given apartments in the Winter Palace at the request of His August Highness the Prince Ilsevir.
As Acir made his way to the Grand Maistre’s headquarters, the panelled walls painted in grey and creamy white, the delicate plasterwork adorning the ceiling and cornices with gilded bows and knots of flowers, all presented a significant contrast with the austerity of the Commanderie headquarters where he had first taken his vows.
‘Your orders, Captain.’ A secretary handed a sealed paper to Acir.
‘I thought I was to see the Grand Maistre in person.’
The secretary regarded him coldly over his spectacles.
‘I have no record of an appointment. The Grand Maistre is dining with the Prince tonight.’
Acir broke the seal and scanned the page.
‘Why is this assigning me to the Sanctuary?’ he said, shaking his head in confusion. ‘I understood I was to return to Sulien –’
‘Those are your orders.’ The secretary turned back to his work.
Orial hummed to herself as she combed her hair. She kept snatching little critical glances at herself in the mirror. First she pulled her hair back with a ribbon. Then she let it fall loose about her shoulders. Still unsatisfied, she took the two side locks and looped and pinned them… Which was the most becoming? Perhaps, after years at court, he preferred the natural, less artifical style. Perhaps –
What am I doing! She threw down her brush in dismay. Preening like a silly schoolgirl!
‘Say aloud three times, “The arrangement between us is strictly professional”,’ she ordered her reflection.
One moment, life was so enchanting she wanted to laugh aloud; the next, she was seized with a sense of its poignancy that brought her close to tears. And he had made her see this way, he had opened her eyes…
Amaru Khassian.
She could not even whisper his name without feeling a shiver of illicit delight.
This obsession was ridiculous. What would he, a man ten years older than she, ever find to intrigue him in a Sulien schoolgirl? She was wasting time on Amaru Khassian that she should have spent on her own compositions. His music dominated her waking life. His presence dominated her waking dreams: wounded, brooding, enigmatic.
Cramoisy was preparing to go shopping as Orial arrived at Mistress Permay’s house.
‘I was just saying to Amaru that I have not seen our dour-faced Captain for several days,’ the Diva announced. ‘Have you seen him, Orial?’
Orial shook her head. ‘Not since he came upon us rehearsing in the Undercity.’
‘Do you know what I think, Amar?’
‘No… but I know you’re going to tell me.’
‘I believe he has given up. He’s gone back to Allegonde. At last we are to be left in peace.’
‘Left in peace?’ Khassian gave a wry laugh. ‘He’s just biding his time. Waiting for the right moment to make his next move.’
The silence of the salon was broken only by the soft scritch-scratch of Orial’s pen. Khassian stood at the window, his back to her, silently dictating.
Across the sublimely agonised line of Elesstar’s aria, another tune suddenly intruded, a cracked tune, a lewd tune that broke her concentration.
Orial looked up.
‘Is there someone in the street?’
‘I can’t see anyone,’ Khassian said, scanning the Crescent below.
‘I – I thought I – There! Can’t you hear it now?’ Orial, frowning, put one hand to her head as if she could erase the intrusive tune with her fingers.
‘No. But it doesn’t matter.’ He came to her side and looked at what she had written. ‘Maybe you should take a rest. We’re making good progress. Soon we will have completed Elesstar’s mad scene. Then comes the final transfiguration and apotheosis.’
He might not be able to touch her with his ruined hands but it seemed that his voice caressed her.
“This is good. Very good.’ He leant over her, closer still. The warmth was tangible now, the warmth of his breath on the back of her neck. ‘You have understood my intentions… perfectly…’
‘I have?’ she whispered, turning her face to his.
‘I’m back!’ Cramoisy threw open the doors. Khassian drew away from Orial; she, blushing, began to assemble her pencils, pens and rulers.
Cramoisy deposited a number of little packages on the couch, talking loudly all the while, as if he had noticed nothing.
‘The perfumier’s only had the citrus pomade, the astringent, so I bought a bottle of the bay lotion though it is somewhat inferior to the Bel’Esstar kind. I thought you must have finished for this afternoon. It is nearly time to meet Azare.’
‘I’ll get my cloak,’ Orial said, eyes lowered so as not to meet Cramoisy’s gaze.
‘Let me help you, child.’ He followed her out into the hall and, lifting down Orial’s cloak, placed it around her shoulders. As he did so, the castrato whispered, ‘Listen to me, Orial. Don’t be taken in by Khassian’s charm. He loves only himself. He cares only for his own music.’
Orial started and took a step away from the Diva.
‘Why are you saying this to me? Do you think I plan to take him away from you?’
‘From me?‘ Cramoisy placed one lace-gloved hand on his heart and began to laugh. ‘Oh, my dear, he’s never truly been mine.’
‘But I thought –’ Orial stopped, confused. She was floundering, out of her depth.
‘That I was his lover? That’s a little charade we’ve kept up for years. Well, there was a time…’ The mischievous glitter in Cramoisy’s eyes faded. ‘But we were not suited to each other, not in that way…’
‘I never meant to pry –’
‘Composers are curious creatures. Self-absorbed. Selfish. Single-minded. The music always comes first.’
The Commissaire of the Sulien Constabulary heard a gentle tap at his door. He glanced at the pile of warrants awaiting his signature. Paperwork, always more paperwork. He took up his pen.
‘I’m busy.’
The door opened.
‘I said, I’m busy.’ He set down his pen, ready to blast the intruder with a volley of words.
‘Not too busy to see me, I trust, Commissaire?’
He looked up and saw a young woman, ravishingly attired in jonquil colours: white, lemon-yellow, saffron-gold.
‘Madame, I –’ He rose clumsily to his feet. ‘Never too busy to see a lady as – as –’ Beautiful? Desirable? Words deserted him. ‘As yourself.’
‘I am here on a confidential matter.’
‘How can I assist you, madame? Stolen valuables, maybe? Some undesirable characters haunt Sulien in the season. But let me assure you, you can place complete confidence in me and my men –’
‘Are you aware, Commissaire, that there are Allegondan revolutionaries here in Sulien?’
He had been expecting the usual tale of a stolen necklace, a pilfered jewel box – not revolutionaries.
She laid one hand on her creamy breast and closed her eyes, obviously greatly distressed. ‘I… I fear for my life.’
She seemed about to faint. Alarmed, he went to her side and, one arm around her slender shoulders, helped her into a chair.
‘I’m… so sorry,’ she said in a whisper.
‘Let me get you some water?’
‘No… no…’ She weakly raised one delicate hand in negation. ‘I’ll be all right in a moment.’
‘My dear madame, tell me your story.’
‘My late husband… the Conte… died loyal to the Prince. I came to Sulien to… get over his death. But they followed me here. Now I fear I have become a target in his place.’ She raised her eyes to him, brimming with unshed tears. ‘They are desperate men, Commissaire. And I am so afraid.’
Desperate men. She had come to consult him in a professional capacity. He went back to his chair, placing the desk between them.
‘You have papers, madame, to prove your identity? I am obliged to ask, you understand.’
‘But of course.’ She handed him a folded document.
He opened it.
An Allegondan passport, stamped by the Sulien office, a visa for a stay of six months from Fevriar to Iul in Tourmalise. It gave her name as Fiammis, Contesse of Tal’Mont and Reial, her age as twenty-seven, hair – fair, eyes – blue, height – eight and a half spans. Other distinguishing feature – a small rose-mole on the right upper lip. The description in no way did justice to her beauty, or to her desperate vulnerability. But she was a noblewoman – and as a good citizen of the republic, he felt uncomfortable dealing with the privileged scion of an antiquated system Tourmalise had long ago rejected.
‘This seems to be in order,’ he said gruffly, handing her back the passport. ‘But as to your concerns… I am powerless to act.’
‘Even though they are dangerous revolutionaries?’
‘They may have been revolutionaries in Allegonde but here in Tourmalise they are merely visitors. We are a citizens’ republic, madame.’ He would not call her Contesse.
The brimming eyes implored him. ‘So I am defenceless.’
‘I can only arrest these individuals if you have proof. Or if a formal complaint has been made against them by a citizen of Sulien.’
‘They could attack me here and you would not lift a finger to protect me?’
‘Sulien is a spa, madame. Many foreign visitors pass through our city. The role of the Sulien Constabulary is to keep the peace. So far there has been no untoward occurrence.’ He rose, hoping she would take his cue. Her presence was disturbing him. ‘Let me assure you, madame, that you are in no danger. Write down the address of your lodgings… and I will request the constable who patrols that quarter to be especially vigilant.’
CHAPTER 15
Khassian watched the morning mists slowly drift from the roofs of Sulien to reveal a glorious day.
Yet the windows in the first-floor apartment in Mistress Permay’s house were shut to seal out the noise of the street, the clatter of barouche wheels on the Crescent cobbles, the rowdy whistling of the coachmen.
Orial sat at the escritoire, her pale face rapt, utterly absorbed in the task of transcription. Occasionally one hand would move upwards to tuck back a straying lock of hair. Yet all the while not one word was spoken, not one sound disturbed the stillness of the salon.
Khassian moved across to look over her shoulder.
‘What is this?’
This was not his opera. He did not recognise what she had been notating at all. It was utterly unfamiliar.
She shook her golden head.
He looked up from the score and met her eyes, dazzling in their iridescent glitter.
‘I – don’t understand.’
Her vagueness irritated him. He had been struggling to articulate the moment of Elesstar’s death – and she was not paying attention.
‘What in the name of hell is this?’
It was as if some other music had intruded upon her consciousness and she, unaware, had continued to notate it, nurturing the parasite within his own work.
‘I don’t know.’ She stared at the five bars, frowning. ‘I thought it was you.’
‘This is nothing like my style!’ He was angry now, insulted that she could have confused this aberration with his own distinctive musical voice.
‘I wrote down what I heard.’ She stood her ground. Bravely, for he could see the tears in her eyes.
‘Strike it out. We’ll have to start again.’
She nodded dumbly and lifted her pen to score through the alien fragment. Then he saw her – almost as if guided by a will other than her own – take the page and surreptitiously slip it beneath the others.
*
The River Avenne flowed serenely through the Parade Gardens. The mellow light of late-afternoon gilded the west-facing terraces on the surrounding hills but the riverwater was dark with secrets, untouched by the sun.
Orial stood at the railings, staring down into the water.
What am I doing here?
She could not remember walking this way, could not even remember leaving the Crescent house.
Notes formed themselves into a melody, a repetitive, insistent, obsessive melody. It flowed through her consciousness like a current of dark water. Where had she heard it before? The Parade band? She glanced over her shoulder to where the musicians were packing away their instruments beneath the striped awning.
She softly sang a few notes aloud.
No. It was not one of the simple country jigs or gavottes favoured by the band; its intervals were too wayward, its mode too melancholy. Neither was it a part of Khassian’s opera; it bore none of the characteristics of his style. Whenever she closed her eyes, waters lapped into her mind, cloud-dark waters, stirring with a breath of current…
The melody and the waters seemed inextricably linked, one with the other.
She wandered on alongside the Avenne, holding the iron rail, the feel of the cold metal against her finger-tips centring her, keeping the weaving spell of the melody at bay.
She lifted her hands from the railing and closed her eyes, waiting.
The music flooded back into her brain, a rushing current, eddying, swirling into a vortex. A whirlpool.
Orial gasped. The notes spun faster, faster, dragging her towards the black chasm at the centre of the spinning vortex. Whirled giddily around, she felt her knees buckling, she was falling, falling –
She opened her eyes. She was leaning out over the railing, dangerously far over the placid riverwaters below.
‘What is happening to me?’ she whispered.
A cheerful whistling cut across the insistent river-music, a drinking catch, robust and simple. The drinking catch argued with the river-music in Orial’s mind. She tried to concentrate on the catch, on its bright major intervals, thirds, clean, clear fifths, sixths…
‘Are you all right, demselle?’ The park-keeper was coming along the path towards her; the last sunlight burnished the brass buttons on his uniform.
‘A – little – dizzy –’ Orial whispered. Keep whistling. Please keep whistling.
‘You could have fallen in the river!’ He caught hold of her, prising her fingers from the railings.
Normally she would have shrunk from such intimate contact with a stranger. But now she sank thankfully against his broad shoulder, utterly spent. He smelt strongly of pipe tobacco, his breath warm, tainted with the stale smoke. A real smell. A comforting smell.
‘Shall I call you a barouche, demselle? Have you far to go?’
‘Dr Magelonne’s Sanatorium,’ she said faintly.
‘Let’s sit you on this bench to recover.’
Shadows were lengthening, birds were fluttering in the ornamental cherry branches overhead, settling to roost. Underfoot the dewy grass was white with cherry and crab apple blossom. She stared at the fallen blossom. Spring was passing. It would soon be the Day of the Dead.
‘Dr Magelonne?’
Jerame looked up from his notes.
A woman stood on the threshold.
He got up, frowning slightly. It was not yet time for his first patient of the morning.
‘You have me at a disadvantage.’
‘Fiammis, Contesse of Tal’mont.’ She held out one gloved hand. ‘I have no appointment.’ It was a statement, not an apology. A trace of a foreign accent subtly coloured her speech.
‘How can I help you?’
She sat opposite him, placing the frilled parasol she was carrying across her lap.
‘We will not be disturbed?’
Mesmerised, he shook his head.
‘You have a daughter, Dr Magelonne?’
‘Orial.’ Jerame felt a slight unease; he had been expecting the Contesse to make discreet enquiries about the treatments he had to offer. Wealthy women frequently came to the Sanatorium hoping for a cure for infertility or the removal of some unsightly skin blemish. Over the centuries, the Sulien waters had gained a miraculous reputation.
‘I don�
�t like to interfere in your personal affairs, Doctor, but are you aware that she has been regularly visiting Amaru Khassian?’
‘Amaru Khassian?’ At first he was too astonished by the information to wonder why she had taken it upon herself to impart it to him.
‘I see that you were unaware of this.’
Orial had deliberately disobeyed him! She must have been taking music lessons with the composer – and in doing so, had unknowingly exposed herself to the very danger from which he had sought to shield her. Dear Goddess, what damage might she have unwittingly inflicted upon herself?
He made an effort to collect his thoughts.
‘Why have you come here to tell me this?’
‘Because I believe Khassian is plotting some kind of insurrection, using Sulien as his base. He is a wanted man, Doctor Magelonne.’
Magelonne blinked, pushing his spectacles higher up the bridge of his nose as if to see the Contesse more clearly. This elegant stranger could have no idea of the reason for his distress; who – save Tartarus and Jolaine – knew of the dangers of the Accidie?
‘Now, wait. How can I be sure you are telling me the truth, Contesse? What precisely have you to gain from telling me? For all you know, my sympathies might already lie with Khassian’s cause. What’s to stop me going to warn him?’
‘Your daughter’s wellbeing.’
He gazed at her in disbelief. She was still smiling; a self-composed, calm smile that belied the threat in her words.
‘You’re threatening my daughter?’
‘I am merely informing you of the facts, Doctor.’ She stood up, shaking out the frills of her parasol. ‘Act upon them as you see fit.’
He sat down at his desk again, dumbfounded. His neat writing in the open ledger no longer made any sense as he stared at it, through it.
Orial – visiting Amaru Khassian? Was Khassian the secret suitor who had brought such a becoming flush to her cheeks, who had caused her to lie and dissemble?
No. He slammed the ledger shut. It must be a mistake. She was helping Jolaine Tradescar – she had told him so.
He grabbed his hat and cane and made for the door; outside he almost bumped into Sister Crespine who, starched and immaculate as ever, was bustling down the corridor.