Ozark Trilogy 2: The Grand Jubilee (8 page)

“Law,” she whispered, more to herself than to him, “I wonder what will happen now?”

He swore, and stood up to stand with his back to her, staring out of her window, holding back one curtain with his hand.

In honest bewilderment she asked him, “Why are you angry?”

“I’m not angry,” he said, but he didn’t turn around, and she knew that now
he
lied.

“Lewis Motley Wommack,” she said, “go eat with the children. They’ll be serving them now.”

He left her without another word, and she sat there rocking until the last light was gone from her room and she rocked in full darkness. She wasn’t sorry for what she had done; nothing that pleasant could be a thing to regret. And her fear of him was gone for good and all. But the consequences of what she had done, now there was something to ponder on. For one thing, she was vulnerable to a number of unpleasant things that her virginity had protected her from until now. The Magicians of Rank would not need to be half so constrained in their constant wearing away at her, now that she lacked her maidenhead, and the first to take a look at her tomorrow would know that. As would the Grannys, one and all. But the Prophecy had been most specific: whatever it was that she would loose upon this world, she and Jewel of Wommack’s brother, the harm would not come from knowledge shared by their bodies. That was laid out unmistakably.

She knew his body well now, and intended to know it a great deal better; and with his skill he no doubt knew everything there was to know about hers. But if it was not that, not that knowledge that held the danger, what
was
it then? They had not talked as much as you did over the ordinary cup of coffee.

“Botheration,” said Responsible, and decided she didn’t want any supper.

She would take off her sheets, for they reeked of salt, and sleep that night on her counterpane. Let Granny Leeward lie on the other side of the wall and wonder why the daughter of this Castle had not appeared for supper; the daughter of this Castle would be sound asleep and not caring.

Tomorrow would be burden enough, when she had to face them all and see in their eyes-even Leeward’s-that they knew of the change in her. Tomorrow there’d be no eternal agenda of ceremonies and prayers to hold back the plans of the delegations set to bring down the Confederation, the fools! Tomorrow she would sit in the balcony and watch, alert for the slightest move, the least word, the beginning of crisis, the turn that would mean it was time to call on the loyal delegations and find a way to put the necessary words in their mouths.

Tonight, she would sleep.

Responsible was sitting over the last cup of the pot of tea the servingmaid had brought her when the knack came at her door. She set the cup down, made sure her nightgown was decently arranged, and called, “Who’s there?”

“Granny Leeward here, Responsible of Brightwater. Granny Leeward of Castle Traveller. May I come in?”

“You sound nothing
what
soever like a Granny,” said Responsible deliberately. “I do believe you’re a fraud and a sham, whoever you may be.”

There was a silence, time enough for her to have another sip of her tea. It was her favorite cup, emerald-green china with a rim of silver, and sturdy enough to drink from half awake without worrying that she’d crush it, the last unbroken one of a set used for company meals when she was still in Granny School. She despised the cups her mother and grandmother chose to start their days with, delicate white porcelain with the Brightwater Crest on the side, big enough to hold maybe three good swallows, and so frail they felt like eggshells in your hand. She could face those later in the day if need be, but not before breakfast, and at no time did she admire them.

“Responsible of Brightwater, you bar your door to me, you’ll rue it! A fine day it’ll be when a wench of fourteen keeps me standing in a hall saying howdydo to the bare boards, and I’ll thank you to keep that in mind, missy!”

“Ah,” said Responsible, “now I hear you use formspeech, I recognize you for a Granny after all! Please to come in, Granny Leeward.”

The old woman was dressed and ready for the day, all in her customary black, and her pale-blue eyes so cold in her bony face that they put Responsible in mind of two small dead fishes, side by side.

“Have a rocker,” she told her, “and make yourself comfortable. Have you had your tea this morning or shall I send for you some?”

“I’ve been through with my tea this past hour,” said Granny Leeward, chill and snappish, “and waiting till I heard the sound of your cup on your saucer so I’d not wake you. You keep mighty highclass hours, to my way of thinking.”

“Proceedings don’t begin at Confederation Hall till nine,” said Responsible, “and it’s a while yet till it strikes seven. Ample time for what I have before me today.”

“You’ve mighty little before you, this day and some days to come.” The Granny sat down in a rocker, carefully settling her heavy skirts around her, and folded her hands in her lap. “That’s what I’ve come to tell you about-and mind, I’ll have no sass from you.”

Responsible had some more tea and waited the move, and after the silence had stretched a ways Granny Leeward continued. “You’ll recall, I expect, that I was present-and quite a number of the other members of our delegation with me-when you put on your disgraceful performance at Castle Traveller a while back.”

“I do recollect that, yes.”

And you do agree that it was-disgraceful.”

“I messed up your fan a tad,” said Responsible coldly, “but I did you no harm. And I believe Castle Traveller’s budget will run to a fan or two.”

“Sin,” said Granny Leeward, like a stone falling. “It was sin, what you did.”

“No,” said Responsible. “it was illegal. The two things are not the same.”

“Only a Magician of Rank has the authority to do what you did that day,” said the Granny, chopping off every word, “and
that’s
the illegal part. The sinful part is a woman even knowing what you obviously know, and having no more decency than to use that knowledge, and in full daylight before a dozen respectable people on top of
that.
And it was an ugly trick, missy, a purely ugly trick!”

“If there was sin-which I don’t admit to-it was in losing my temper and falling into the trap you and your kin set for me. I’d say that was more stupidity than wickedness.”

Granny Leeward gave her a narrow look, and as Responsible had expected, there came
 
a sudden look of understanding in her eyes. She’d be seeing that look a lot oftener than she cared to today.

“I see you’ve added a new wickedness to your inventory,” said the old woman, “You’re a
bold
hussy, I’ll grant you that.” Responsible sighed, and set her tray on the night table by her bed.

“Granny Leeward,” she said, “you’ve come to chastise me for my foolishness at Castle Traveller-call it sin if you please, I’ll not waste my breath arguing theology with you before breakfast. Well and good; I’m not proud of it. There you sat, leading me on and fanning yourself with that black fan; and all I had to do was heat up its handle a tad to advise you I intended to be treated with respect. There was no call for me to turn that fan into a handful of mushrooms-”

“Black and
rotting
mushrooms, wi
^t
h the smell of death on ‘em!” interrupted L eeward and Responsible, nodded.

“Quite right,” she said. “The black was appropriate, seeing as how
y
ou Travellers find it the only fit color for human use, but there was no call to make them rot in your hand. You caught me with a child’s trick, and I’m well and thoroughly ashamed that I took that bait. But it seems to me you made me pay for that already, Granny Leeward. How greedy for revenge
are
you?
”

The old woman snorted, and her face was stiff with contempt. “I wouldn’t want any misunderstanding between you and me,” she said, leaning back in the rocker and steepling her fingers. “Not any misunderstanding whatsoever. Might could be I should clarify this for you.”

“I’d be grateful,” said Responsible,

Granny Leeward counted the points off one at a time. “What you did to
me
,” she said, “practicing an illegal act of magic, and a foul one, on my person-that goes unpunished still. You lay for a day with deathdance fever, that the Magicians call Anderson’s Disease, as payment for carrying out your ugliness before the Family-that’s paid. Your offense to me still stands, and I’ll call that in when I choose; I don’t choose just yet, Responsible of Brightwater, not just yet. And that’s not why I’m here.”

“You’re not clarifying
much,
Granny Leeward, but your narrowness of spirit. Perhaps you could try a little harder?”

“There are six delegates from Castle Traveller as will sit in the Independence Room this day, and as saw what you did,” hissed Granny Leeward, “and they’re ready and willing to denounce you before the entire convention of delegates, the audience in the balcony, and those watching on their comsets. That make it clearer?”

“Mighty gallant, your men,” said Responsible. “It must make you proud.”

“A female such as you, missy, ought not to have the gall to ask for gallantry. Well on the way to being a witch, and clear the other side of being a fornicator, and you talk about gallantry? That’s for decent women, not for your kind.”

“You’re plain-spoken,” said Responsible. “‘That’s useful in a Granny.”

“Didn’t I say I’d take no sass from you? Your memory gone with your maidenhead?”

“A compliment is not sass,” said Responsible, with as much sass as she was able to muster. “I judge Grannys as I judge Mules, and you rank high. Now speak your piece.”

Those pale-blue eyes . . . she had not been surprised to see them like dead fish, but spitting blue fire was surprising. It would have been pleasant to think that the old woman might be tricked in return, brought to a sufficient pitch of fury to lead her into some indiscretion of her own, leaving the two of them in a more balanced position; but it wouldn’t happen. To begin with, they were alone, and if the Granny was being humiliated there was no one to see or know it but herself. And to go on with, Responsible was certain the woman knew nothing beyond Granny Magic, all of which was legal for her to use.

Granny Leeward leaned forward, stabbing the air with her pointing finger, and she laid it out for Responsible so there could be no confusion in any least particular.

“Either you stay clear away from Confederation Hall,” the Granny said, “where you cannot interfere in what’s none of your business and never has been, or my son will stand before the entire assembly this morning and denounce you-leaving out no details, keep that in mind’-and the rest of those as saw you will back him up. Now I reckon that is clear as springwater, but if it’s not I’ll be glad to embroider it for you same.”

Responsible sank back against her pillows and whistled long and low and silent. Now she’d heard it, it was obvious, but she hadn’t expected
it.
Which was an interesting measure of her strategic skills.

“Botheration,” she said aloud, and thought a word that she’d never heard spoken, though it was claimed to exist.

“Keep your botherations to yourself,” said the Granny, “and the Travellers won’t add to them. We’ve other doings to concern us, and telling that sorry tale about you would only use up another day on top of the one you wasted for us yesterday. But if you insist on coming into the Hall, spite of what I’ve said to you, we will waste that time, I promise you, and I’ll not scruple to stand in the balcony and add my voice to the testimonies.”

“I believe you have me,” said Responsible, taking another drink of tea. “All things considered.”

“That we do,” said Granny Leeward. “That we surely do, and if ever a female deserved it, you qualify.”

“Blackmail doesn’t burden your conscience, Granny?” Responsible asked.

Granny Leeward sat straight and pale. “We walk a narrow line at Castle Traveller,” she said. “We keep the old ways, and there’s none of the rest of you as does. We know, the Gates be praised, the difference between a sin and its name. That’s a difference not to be despised, nor yet forgotten.”

“Explain me that, Granny Leeward-and its application in this matter of you and me. I don’t see it.”

“I’ll explain you nothing! You need moral instruction, you’ve a Granny here, and a Reverend as well, though he’s a poor thing. This universe has one primary law--as ye sow, so shall ye reap and
we
abide by that. I come here as no instrument of blackmail, Responsible of Brightwater; I come as an instrument of justice!”

“I wonder,” mused Responsible, and the Granny drew herself up in the rocker, bridling all over with outrage. Responsible had heard about people bridling, and read the phrase, but this was the first time she’d ever seen it.

“On Old Earth,” she said casually, “there were those so convinced of their purity, so sure they were instruments of justice, that they put others to the rack and the fire out of concern for their immortal souls. Now I suggest to you that you might want to keep that in mind your
self,
Granny Leeward. There’s ugly, and then there’s ugly.”

Granny Leeward stood up like she’d sat on a straight pin, shaking all over with a rage she wouldn’t stoop to express, and Responsible made a mental note-this was one who did not handle well any criticism that struck at her morality. It might be useful to know that one day. And while she had it going, she drove it home.