Our Lady of the Islands (28 page)
Read Our Lady of the Islands Online
Authors: Shannon Page,Jay Lake
“Oh yes, my dear. We have a great deal to discuss. But, let’s go sit by the windows.” She glanced again into the closet with a shudder. “I much prefer the view there.”
Her feet sinking nearly to the ankles in the plush hall carpeting, Arian reached up to tap upon the healer’s door. She could only hope that Sian was equipped to execute her part of their necessarily vague plans, and be convincing about it. “My lady? I have brought Lord Alkattha, as you requested.”
“Thank you, Freda,” Sian answered from inside. “Please bring him in.”
With a glance back at the Census Taker, and the absurd monkey on his shoulder, Arian pushed the door open and stood aside to let him pass.
“You wished to see me?” Escotte said as Arian followed him inside.
“Yes, dear cousin. Thank you very much for coming.” Sian sat before the windows looking as calm as a mid-summer tide pool now.
“Of course, my dear. I have few greater concerns at present than ensuring your comfort here. Is there some further problem to address?” He looked pointedly back at Freda.
“Oh, no. Quite the opposite. Freda is just wonderful, and I am … Well, I have been thinking, actually. Quite a lot. I wish to apologize for having been such an ungrateful guest. I think I had begun to confuse the strain of all this turmoil in my life for some vague discontent with your extraordinary hospitality. I feel terrible about that. Now that it’s so clear.”
“Oh, cousin.” He gave her an indulgent smile. “You need hardly have concerned yourself. I understand completely.” He glanced back at Freda briefly, then gave a little shrug and turned to face Sian again. “I understood all that last night, in fact. As soon as my own little fit of pique had passed. I really must apologize as well, for having answered you so sharply. We are both under quite a bit more strain than usual these days. Please, don’t give it any further thought.”
“Thank you,” Sian said, slumping visibly in relief. Arian relaxed some too. The woman clearly had some acting ability. They might pull this off. “But … there is one other little thing?”
Escotte raised an eyebrow, and waited.
“You asked, last night, if there was anything more I might desire … I hope I am not wrong to presume that this was intended as an invitation to ask you if —”
“Yes, yes, of course,” he said preemptively. “Have you thought of something?”
“Well … I have.” She smiled shyly at him, like a little girl before an indulgent uncle. “I have also come to realize that what I miss most these days is really my work. The fabrics and the dyes. The patterns and designs; these have been my life, cousin. And suddenly, they’re gone. It feels as if … my very hands are withering for lack of use.”
Oh, very good
, thought Arian.
What a fine embellishment.
Her optimism rose further.
“Cleone has done a marvelous job of finding diversions to keep me occupied, of course, but what I’d really like to do, dear cousin — what would truly make me happy — is to create some dresses.”
“Dresses?” Escotte glanced toward Sian’s hidden closet, his brows rising another notch.
“Oh, you have been so much more than generous to provide me such a wealth of lovely things,” Sian rushed to assure him, “but it’s not more clothes I’m wanting, really. It is the creative task of making them. The fabric in my hands again, envisioning design and cut, working out the best approaches to construction. These dresses are all lovely, but they aren’t
mine
. Someone else has done the best part. I am left no greater role to play than letting someone put them on me. Do you see? To design a dress or two myself, to see those designs realized … Oh, dear Escotte. Such a task would bring me back to life here. I am sure of it. Might I have a seamstress to come work with me, right here in my room? Freda says she knows a very good one. Here on Cutter’s.”
Escotte turned to Arian, who looked down modestly. “My guards procure my maids, and now my maids procure my seamstresses?” Happily, he seemed more amused than irritated. The monkey scrambled up to the top of his head and peered about the room. “Perhaps I should just go join Víolethe up on the continent and let the staff run my affairs without me.”
“She is an extraordinarily fine seamstress, my lord,” said Arian, eyes still cast down respectfully, “and quite inexpensive.”
“Humph,” he grunted. “Money is not an issue where my dear cousin is concerned.” He turned back to Sian, considering her thoughtfully.
“I have worn all these by now,” Sian said, looking bashfully toward the hidden closet door. “Will a man of your refined tastes not grow tired of seeing me in the same things every night? Would you not be curious to see what sort of things I would create?”
Escotte humphed at her again, but with a crooked smile this time. “I would certainly not have said this to you under any other circumstances, dear, but there have been occasions when seeing you across the table wearing Víolethe’s old dresses did remind me of my wife in … somewhat unsettling ways.” His expression grew more wry. “I had actually already considered having some new things made for you.”
“Then you will let me have this seamstress?” Sian asked with an excited smile. “Could we start today, dear cousin?” She put a hand across her mouth as if to take the question back. “Is that asking too much?”
“This would make you happy here?” he asked.
“Oh, you cannot imagine how happy,” she all but gushed.
Arian had trouble keeping a straight face. Who’d have guessed the woman was this good? Then again, she
was
a self-made success at business, from what Hivat had been able to tell them about her. She’d have to know a fair amount about maneuvering others to have accomplished that.
“Your happiness means everything to me, dear cousin. Of course, you cannot let her know who you are. For your continued safety.” Escotte turned to Arian. “You are able to give me an address for this seamstress, I presume?”
“Oh, I could have her back here in a trice, my lord. Her house is hardly blocks away.”
He shook his head. “I would not want my cousin deprived of company for even that long, I’m afraid.”
Damn!
she thought, struggling to let nothing reach her face.
There goes the entire plan.
“I’ll have Sergeant Ennias get her,” Escotte said. “He seems to be my new procurer of such persons these days. Can you tell him where to find her?”
Aplologies to all the gods I’ve just been damning.
“Of course, sir. Shall I await him here?”
“I’m here already.” Escotte shrugged. “I might as well just take the address to him.”
“My stationery kit is over there,” Sian told her with an uncertain look, pointing to a miniature cabinet of drawers beside the bed.
Arian went to find it, mentally reviewing her knowledge of the immediate neighborhood. Escotte was surely well aware of everything around the Census Hall, and if the address she gave him made no sense, he’d know it. Were he not a man who’d had no female family members in his house for quite a while — except Sian, of course — Arian would have worried that Escotte would find it strange he hadn’t heard of such a fine seamstress so nearby. Or might even have one on staff. Fortunately, though most of Cutter’s was a virtual blank to Arian, the neighborhood around the Census Hall was somewhat more familiar, as she’d had occasion to come here a few times. As she found the right drawer at last, and pulled out Sian’s supply of writing instruments and paper, she searched her memory for any street name in a residential quarter near enough, then bent to write one that she hoped would pass.
She straightened, and brought the note to Escotte. “It’s just a house, my lord. Assidua has no storefront — and needs none, if you take my meaning.”
“I shall pass that fact along to Sergeant Ennias,” he said. “It’s good that she is accustomed to discretion.” He turned back to Sian. “Have we anything more to discuss, my dear?”
She shook her head, beaming delight at him. “Thank you so very, very much, Escotte. You can have no idea how much this kindness means to me.”
He smiled back at her. “Have I not just explained to you, yet again, how much your happiness matters to me?” He turned and started toward the door. “I look forward to being ravished by these stunning new creations of yours over many dinners in the coming week.” He wiggled his fat fingers at her. “Ta!”
Arian closed the door behind him, then turned to grin at Sian. “Oh, well done, my dear! Well done! You’d be a natural at any continental court I know of. I believe this will work beautifully.”
“But what address did you give him?”
“Oh, I just made up a number on a residential street nearby. It won’t matter to the sergeant. He knows this plan as well as I do, and will understand what must be done. Relax now. You did your part just wonderfully. We’ve nothing left to do but wait until he brings Maronne.”
“You really think we look enough alike to make this work?” Sian asked, all the confidence she had just been wearing laid aside as quickly as she had seemed to take it up.
“She is not that far from your build and coloring. And the silks and veil she’s wearing cover her hair and much of her face. She’ll be buried behind piles of fabric and supplies as well, of course. No one’s likely to have much idea what she looks like, or what you look like either, as we leave.”
“But what if someone comes —”
“Into your room? In the middle of the night? Does that happen often here?”
Sian shook her head. “Never that I know of, though I’d have been sleeping, so how would I know if I am checked on?”
“There is a guard at your door all night. Is that correct?”
Sian nodded.
“Then unless they fear you’ll climb out these windows and shimmy down the trellis all the way into the garden far below, I cannot see why they should feel any need to check on you in here before your maid comes in the morning. I will certainly find
you
sleeping peacefully when I arrive. And as the
seamstress
is returning so early with the first of your new dresses, we’ll have you back up here and dressed in ample time to ravish Escotte over breakfast.”
“You keep making it all sound so easy,” Sian sighed.
“Cleone will be recovered from her fever by tomorrow evening. I’ll be gone by the next day, and Escotte will have no idea anything at all has ever happened. Except that you will look a great deal better over meals, and my son will have suddenly recovered despite the Census Taker’s best-laid plans — all praise to the Mishrah-Khote, of course. The hardest part of this was getting Escotte to agree to let Maronne come see you up here in the first place. Now that’s done, thank the elusive gods of Alizar.”
Sian still didn’t look entirely convinced. “And your maids will not mind giving me so many of their dresses?”
“In exchange for new ones?” Arian laughed. “Oh my dear, they’ll be blessing you before the mirror for months to come. I’ll make sure of that. They’ll have more than earned it by the time all this is over.”
Sian fidgeted as the minutes ticked by. Half an hour became an hour, and still no one arrived. She and the Factora-Consort had fallen rather quickly into thoughtful silence after their initial burst of self-congratulations. For all her reassurances, Arian seemed no more inclined to chatter now than Sian felt.
“Do I hear something?” Sian asked, glancing from the windows toward the vague suggestion of a footfall from beyond her door.
Arian rose immediately and rushed to check. She cracked the door and stuck her head out, then pulled back into the room and closed the door again. “No one there. Perhaps it took Escotte some time to find the sergeant, or he was distracted by some other matter, and forgot about us. Would you like me to go inquire with someone?”
Sian shook her head, fearful of trying Escotte’s patience any further than she must surely have already done. Or of raising his suspicions. “What will you do to Escotte, when all of this is over?” she asked, wondering how much more the world might change before she was returned to it.
“Assuming we are able to determine who else is involved this conspiracy, and defuse it before it can succeed,” the Factora-Consort said, “a lot of heads will doubtless roll. For your cousin, I assume it will mean exile at the very least. For others, likely even graver consequences. The least powerful conspirators will doubtless suffer most. That is usually the way of things. You and Sergeant Ennias, however, will likely find your fortunes vastly enhanced.”
Would Arouf want her back then? Sian wondered. Once she was an
asset
again … Would she want him to?
This time the sound of footfalls was unmistakable.
“Thank the gods,” said Arian, rising to head for the door again.
She pulled it open to reveal someone bent back under such a load of bolts and skeins and bags of ribbon that it was difficult at first to be sure it was even a woman, much less guess at her appearance. The poor creature came wobbling in beneath her load, followed by Sergeant Ennias carrying a trunk upon his back half as big as Sian herself. With a groan, the woman dumped her tower of fabrics on Sian’s bed, while the sergeant squatted almost gracefully to let his burden slide gently between his hands onto the floor at the bed’s foot.
“I am glad they sent a man to fetch me,” said the woman. “We’d just have had to ask for one if you had come as planned, my —”
“Shhhh!” The Factora-Consort rushed to close the door.
“Thank you,
Freda
,” said the sergeant, giving Maronne a gentle nudge.
“This may not be quite so easy as I thought,” Maronne said, twisting to stretch out her back. “Old habits die hard, dear Freda.”
“You are here now,” said the Factora-Consort. “That is what matters. Most of these things can remain where they are tonight, until the dressmaker returns in the morning for Sian’s final fitting.” She looked at Ennias. “Was there some trouble? You were longer than expected.”
“If you wished us back here sooner,
Freda
, you should have given him an address that wasn’t two miles away. We had to hang around the wagon long enough so that Lord Alkattha would believe I’d gone that far, found this woman, helped her gather all these things, and gotten them back here. Had I come dashing back much sooner, he’d have thrown us all in prison at the door, I’m pretty sure.”
“I’m sorry,” Arian said. “I had not thought the street was that far off. It’s been quite a while since I was here, and I had very little time to invent an address for him.”
“As you said, we’re here now,” Ennias replied. “Unless there’s anything else I ought to know, I’ll leave you ladies to your work. Guards don’t usually hang about to gab with guests.” He started for the door.
“Sergeant,” Sian said.
He turned to face her.
“Thank you. I’ve misjudged you. Clearly. Would you tell Captain Reikos, and my Pino, that … I am deeply sorry for what they suffer, and that they never leave my mind, or my heart?”
“I will, my lady. Just as soon as I can do so without risking notice. They are well, all things considered, and quite concerned for you too. I’m sorry I wasn’t free to tell you earlier.”
“You have nothing to apologize to me for, Sergeant,” Sian said. “My profound thanks go with you.”
He offered her a nod, and vanished through the door.
“Well, then,” Arian said with satisfaction. “Maronne, it’s my pleasure to present Domina Sian Kattë. Sian Kattë, my maid Maronne, hereafter to be addressed as ‘Assidua, the seamstress’ just as I must continue to be Freda.” She gazed pointedly at Maronne. “Are we all clear on that now?”
“Quite clear, dear Freda,” Maronne said, blushing. “It’s a pleasure doing business with you once again.”
“Good.” Arian spread her arms. “Let the fittings begin.”
“What kind of dress should we be making?” Sian asked.
“Does it matter?” the Factora-Consort asked. “The dresses are already made. And anyone who comes to check on us — in this household, at least — is going to be a man, who won’t have any notion what he’s looking at in here.” She went to Maronne’s pile of quite breathtaking silks and airy brocades, and began to toss them here and there around the room. “Let’s just make things look like we’re working hard, and pin some of these fabrics onto you, gracefully enough, of course, so that if anyone should knock we can stand you up and let them have a glimpse before we shoo them off again.”
While Arian went on draping gorgeous fabrics over furniture around the room, Maronne came to start pinning lengths of shimmering violet silk and mouthwatering gold brocade onto Sian.
“So what are we to do for all these hours until we leave tonight?” Sian asked.
“I brought cards,” Maronne said, smiling. “And chocolates, of course. No seamstress of any quality would come to a home as fine as this one without chocolates.”
“And wine, I hope,” Arian chimed in.
“To the home of Escotte Alkattha?” Maronne scoffed. “Surely we can send down for far better wines here than any I’d have brought. The Factorate’s neglected cellars have grown quite disappointing lately, have you not noticed, Freda?”
“I may have been distracted by some larger issues,” Arian said. “It’s just as well, though. Given the brilliant exchange Sian conducted with her cousin earlier, I suspect we’ll want to call the servants up from time to time so that they can report to him what tremendous girlish fun we’re having. Which reminds me, you should send me downstairs in an hour or two, my lady, to request that your meal be sent up here tonight, due to such extended fittings. If your cousin objects to being deprived of your company at dinner, we may have to stage another audience with him up here so you can wheedle his permission. It is crucial that the dressmaker not be asked to leave before the maid goes home as well. And they would never let Assidua just sit up here while you were in the dining room.”
“I trust you will remember, Freda, to convey the lady’s wishes that we be fed as well,” said Maronne.
“I am a maid, dear Assidua, not a moron,” the Factora-Consort said with a smile.
Listening to this banter, the
Factora-Consort
began to fade in Sian’s mind into … well, Arian des Chances. A woman made of flesh rather than of mere power and politics. Capable of friendship. And of feelings … Feelings as real and immediate as Sian’s.
Arian
. Sian had known what the Factora-Consort’s name was just as well as she knew cousin Viktor’s. But never until now had she connected it this way with the woman herself.
Arian
. It was a lovely name. Like music.
I’m so glad I did not call the guards on you, Arian
, she thought with a shudder.
As Maronne continued covering Sian in fabrics such as she would likely never see again — even in her line of work — Sian studied this woman’s appearance more closely too. Though clearly of an age with Arian, Maronne’s skin was far lovelier, if several shades lighter than Sian’s. Probably a benefit of having had to slather far less cosmetic paint across it than the Factora-Consort did each day, if her claims were not exaggerated. Maronne’s dark hair was long and delicately curled, though heavily streaked with gray, as Sian’s own hair had been just weeks ago. Maronne’s eyes were green, not fire-spattered black like Sian’s.
Noticing her scrutiny, Maronne looked up and smiled. “Of course, we will spend some time with the cosmetics case I’ve brought as well, Domina Kattë. Do not worry. By the time you are ready to leave me here, I will be a darker, younger-looking woman, while you, alas, will look a great deal more like me.”
But I am not a younger woman
, Sian almost said, having briefly forgotten, even now, the effects this god’s gift had worked upon her thrice-healed body.
The time flew by. Twice they sent Freda down for wine, then laughed and japed as Sian posed for the servants who brought it up to them, to reassure Escotte that he need have no further worries about Sian’s discontent. Then they sat playing Five Birds, Picapenny, and Spar with Maronne’s cards until the time came to send Freda back down with Sian’s request that she and her attendants be allowed to eat dinner in her room that night.
A new, more careful simulation of real fitted drapery was pinned to Sian just beforehand, in shimmering silver and peacock blue silks even more breathtaking than the ones before, just in case Escotte himself should come to debate this latest request in person — which, as they had feared, he did.
Freda had been gone for hardly any time at all when the knock came. Sian and Maronne rushed into position, Sian’s arms held out, Maronne’s clenched teeth filled with pins as she adjusted pleats. “Come in!” Sian called out.
“You are decent then, cousin?” Escotte asked, already through the door, just steps ahead of Arian. “What marvelous colors, my dear!” He brushed past Maronne as if she weren’t there, to finger Sian’s nascent dress appreciatively. “What truly lovely fabric!” His surprise seemed quite genuine. “My congratulations! Your creations promise as much elegance as I had hoped.” He looked down at the seamstress finally, and said, “I am impressed with your selection, woman. Perhaps we should have a word downstairs before you go. Several of my sitting rooms are in need of drapes.” He gazed around at the textile treasure-trove thrown over half the furnishings. “These luscious fabrics fill me with ideas.”
“It would be my great honor, lord,” said Maronne, neither rising from her crouch at Sian’s hem, nor raising her green eyes to meet his gaze, which was quick thinking, Sian realized.
“Very good. Very good,” Escotte purred, smiling back up at Sian. “So what is this I hear about our dinner, cousin? I am to eat alone?”
“Oh, dear Escotte,” she said, bringing both hands to her mouth as if just realizing he might be disappointed. “I am so sorry. I did not mean to hurt your feelings; it is just that I am having
such
a wonderful time, and there is still so much more to do.” She let her eyes grow wide. “I know! Why don’t you bring your dinner up here too, and join the fun!” She spread her arms wider to gesture at the fabrics he had just been praising. “I am sure you would have wonderful ideas to contribute to some of my designs. We could make dresses together!”
He did not disappoint her. His expression grew just a little queasy, his smile a bit less certain. Even Gigi looked dubious, burying her face in his fleshy neck with a low whine. “I am honored and delighted by your invitation.” His joviality seemed hardly forced at all. “And were my attention not required by so many other tasks tonight, I would accept enthusiastically, of course. But alas, the burdens of my position often curtail my freedom. I have come to enjoy our evening conversations so, but, if you must go on without me here, I will simply look forward all the more to your company in one of these fabulous new dresses tomorrow evening. If that would be acceptable to you, my dear?”
It was getting almost too easy to pull his strings by now. “You are so kind, dear cousin. Thank you for understanding. I shall make it up to you, I promise. And, please, don’t put the kitchen to any more trouble than necessary. We require nothing fancy here. A plate of sandwiches or something will do very nicely.”
“I would not hear of such a thing,” he said with mock severity. “I’ll make sure personally that they send up something worthy of all this beauty.” He had the grace to gesture at all three women as he said this, not just at Sian.
As soon as he was gone again, Maronne started giggling. “Oh my,” she said. “You
are
a genius. I would never have thought to ask him to come join us.”
Blushing at such praise from this sophisticated woman, Sian turned to Arian, only to discover that she seemed far less amused.
“Unfortunately, we have a problem,” said Arian. “Now he wants to speak with the seamstress before she leaves.”
Maronne’s laughter fled instantly. “Oh. I did not think.” She looked up at her mistress, horrified. “I am so sorry.”
“What for? You did not offer. He asked, and Assidua could hardly have refused. But while merely escorting Sian from the house would not have been too hard, allowing her to sit and talk with Escotte about drapes for any length of time … I am not sure that can be managed.”
“Perhaps … if we stay here late enough,” Sian tried, “he will have gone to bed?”