The Mystic Marriage (35 page)

It embarrassed her, Margerit knew, but she bore with it all in good humor. The staff of the manor itself were more businesslike. For several days they had already been dealing with arriving wagons full of boxes and trunks. Margerit spent several hours hunting down her books and taking inventory to make certain all had arrived safely. She wondered again whether she should have brought Tanfrit’s Gaudericus. She’d barely had time to glance at it yet, but she hadn’t wanted to risk it in travel. The unpacking took hours, for she was shy about interrupting the servants to help her. She still felt like a stranger among these people. Only a handful of the staff from Rotenek had come with them. Saveze was very much Barbara’s domain, not hers. Everyone was unfailingly polite and respectful, but they treated her as a guest, not part of the family.

When the last of the books had been found and directed to the library, Margerit requested a bath and settled in for the luxury of doing as little as possible for the first few days. Barbara’s plans were less restful. At dawn the next morning, Margerit rolled over to find her up and dressed in riding clothes.

“Hush, go back to sleep,” she said. “I’m just going out with Cheruk to begin riding the
markein
.”

It was one of those rituals of the nobility that Margerit had been oblivious to before their first summer here together. Not quite a mystery, but more than a mere survey of the lands. They wouldn’t trace the true boundaries, of course, up along the stony mountaintops. But there was a path that stood in for those bounds and the riding of it in easy stages was not to be put off. “Do you think anything’s changed since last year?” she asked sleepily.

“I certainly hope so! Estefen had this place for scarce two years and I’m still repairing the damage. LeFevre gives me all the numbers and figures, but that’s not the same as seeing it for myself.”

Margerit allowed herself several days of indolence with nothing more strenuous than reading through the sheaf of papers that Iuli had pressed on her at the end of their final visit, but then it was time for her own summer ritual. Over morning tea she asked Akezze, “Are you recovered enough for a short drive? I’m going up to the convent today and I thought to introduce you.”

Akezze agreed somewhat reluctantly, but when she was handed up into the little one-horse gig, she commented, “This shouldn’t be so bad. It’s only the closeness of the traveling coach that does me in. I didn’t know that you drove.”

“Not in Rotenek,” Margerit answered as she twitched the reins to give the horse leave to start. “I wouldn’t dare try to manage a team in the city. But I had to learn the first summer I was here. Marken doesn’t drive,” she said with a nod to where he perched precariously behind them. “Barbara says it isn’t done to go about the countryside with a coachman and footmen and all. So if I had to learn, I preferred this to riding. I never have been entirely comfortable on a horse’s back.”

They left Marken with the gig at the livery stable at the foot of the hill and climbed up the path to Saint Orisul’s. He took his responsibilities in a more relaxed fashion here in Saveze. Country rules were different, it seemed. The portress at the gate didn’t need to ask their purpose but escorted them directly to Mother Teres’s office.

“You’ve come early,” the abbess greeted her.

“Yes, we left at floodtide this year since I won’t be attending the summer term at the university. I brought you a gift,” she said, holding out the sealed paper.

Mother Teres took it without examining it. It wasn’t the donation itself, of course, only a letter confirming it. But Margerit insisted on delivering it personally. “I’ve brought you another gift as well, if you like,” she continued, turning to Akezze. “This is Maisetra Mainus. She’s come to tutor me this summer but she fears I won’t give her enough work to earn her pay. So I thought, that is…I know most of the students go home for the summer, but perhaps she could offer some classes?”

“We don’t generally allow outsiders to teach the secular students,” Mother Teres interrupted. “But perhaps she will have something to offer our own teachers. What subjects do you know?”

Akezze nodded in greeting and rattled off a host of topics.

Mother Teres looked thoughtful. “Yes, perhaps. I’ll speak to the others and see what might be useful. And you, my dear,” she said to Margerit. “Will you be lending us your services as well? I still recall how helpful you were with the pilgrims’ mysteries that winter you were here.”

Margerit wondered how best to answer. “I made that offer to Sister Marzina last summer but it seems she had no need of me.”

“Indeed?” Mother Teres said. “I see.” She turned to her assistant who sat patiently by the door. “If you would, ask Marzina to come speak with me.”

Margerit wished she’d found a way to pass over the matter. In the months that she and Barbara had found sanctuary here, she had worked side by side with the nun in charge of helping those who came to the convent in search of help with a miracle. But a careless word—a glance that carried too much meaning—had betrayed their secret to Marzina and she had turned cold and disapproving.
I hadn’t yet learned to be circumspect that spring,
Margerit remembered with regret. She doubted that Mother Teres was that much more accepting, but she had the welfare of the convent’s coffers to consider. There was no point in offending their two closest patronesses.

Sister Marzina appeared and asked, “You wished to speak with me?” without a glance at the guests.

The abbess rose from behind her desk. “As you can see, Maisetra Sovitre has returned to Saveze for the summer. I’ve let her know that we would be honored if the Royal Thaumaturgist could find time to assist us while she’s here. I’m sure you have only to send a message to the manor if the occasion should arise.”

“As you wish,” the nun said stiffly and bowed again. She left, still without greeting Margerit.

As they made their way down the path from the convent, Akezze asked curiously, “So is it only outside Rotenek that people dare to disapprove of you?”

“I’m certain that there’s disapproval enough in Rotenek.” She turned it to a joke. “After all, if it weren’t for me there would be an eligible baroness on the marriage market.” She added, “And if it weren’t for Barbara, there would be an heiress as well.”

“But how many people know that? I didn’t.”

Margerit had the grace to feel abashed. “I never meant it to be a secret from you, but how does one begin that conversation? Sister Marzina knows because I was indiscreet once, and she’s convinced it makes an abomination of my gifts.”

“And yet that doesn’t seem to bother you.”

Margerit turned more sober. “It bothers me, but what’s to do? I wouldn’t choose a different life. But it’s true—my Uncle Fulpi finds me something of a disgrace to the family name and that’s why my cousins aren’t allowed to visit me, not even at my house in Chalanz.”

“And yet disgrace can be overlooked for a price,” Akezze said dryly.

“Does it bother you?” Margerit ventured, wondering if she’d get a truthful answer. Akezze couldn’t afford to have scruples about an employer’s morals.

But they had come to the livery stable and there was no chance for Akezze to give an answer to that.

The visit to Saint Orisul’s had broken the sense of holiday and on returning to the manor, Akezze asked, “Shall we begin your studies? There’s no point in waiting. The summer won’t last forever and we have a great deal to get through.”

“Where did you want to start?” Margerit asked. “You know I’m not very strong on the modern philosophers, but I’ve been told that Wolff and Mazzies would be useful for my work.”

“We begin at the beginning,” Akezze intoned. “Your knowledge is all bits and pieces. I can’t build without a sound foundation.”

“What? All the way back to Aristotle, then?” Margerit asked, half-joking, but not dismayed when Akezze nodded.

Those first few weeks flew by quickly, if tediously. There was some frustration at going through the baby steps again, but she was on sure ground. The classics had always been her favorites. The blithe confidence of the ancient authors that all the world could be distilled down into simple truths was restful if inadequate. When they moved on to the medieval commentaries, her flaws began to show. The tangled arguments of the Sophists had always seemed a pointless distraction. And as a guest at the university lectures she’d never had a chance to take part in the disputations that might pry sense from them.

“It’s not just an academic game,” insisted Akezze. “You’d be surprised how many mysteries rest on faulty propositions and mistaken definitions. It can be more important to know how to spot a flawed argument than to construct a sound one.”

And that was what made Akezze’s lectures more than dry exercises. They pulled out Bartolomeus’s
Lives and Mysteries of the Saints
and worked their way through the logical structure of some of the older ceremonies. When, after covering Descartes, they paused in the course of philosophers to take in the grammarians, even more began to fall into place.

She had always been able to see the wrongness of a mystery in the movements and appearance of the
fluctus
. And working backward from that she had developed an instinct for finding the flaws in the language and structure that generated it. But Akezze showed her how to predict weak points in the mysteries from the
expositulum
alone. For devotional mysteries it might not matter. Their essence was between the heart of the worshipper and the ears of God and the saints. No one was going to quibble that Aquinas had erred in composing the text of his
gloriosa
when it had stood unchanged for six hundred years. But in functional mysteries precision and meaning mattered greatly, whether they were the minor everyday ones, like a prayer to soothe the fever of a sick child, or civic rituals like the
tutelas
. And for the great mysteries like those she worked on for Annek, there the structure and language must be built as strongly as a bridge or tower, with no ill-fitting stones or crumbling mortar.

The summer days filled quickly. With Akezze’s guidance she spent more time over her books than if she’d stayed in Rotenek for the summer term. Barbara finished the survey of her lands and projects and now there was time to drive out, whether for purpose or pleasure. And the reading was augmented one afternoon when Barbara placed a beautiful inlaid box in her lap, saying, “I’ve finished them. I…I’m not sure what to think anymore. Read them.”

She left and Margerit opened the casket to riffle through the collection of paper it contained: the baron’s letters. She hung poised for long moments between curiosity and doubt, then took them up as water to a thirsty soul.

It was easy to see how Barbara had become lost in those missives for days at a time. Margerit set herself a rule to read them only in the morning hours when Barbara was out riding and before her lessons. The story unfolded like a romantic novel: that first formal invitation, hints of secret meetings and growing passion, brief notes slipped hand to hand during the closely scrutinized chaos of the season. There must have been an accomplice. A maid? Perhaps her own mother? No, Margerit recalled, her mother would have been back in Chalanz by then. Then came the crushing disappointment when the season came to a close and he was free to offer.

I spoke with your father last night at the club. It seems his ambitions climb higher than the chance to address his grandsons as “Mesner” and I am to be dismissed as a penniless fortune-hunter. I cannot find it in myself to fault his caution. This year I have set in train several ventures by which I hope to remedy that judgment. They will take some time to show promise. Will you stand faithful to me and have patience?

And she had, for quite some time. There was a series of brief encouraging notes, chronicling the rise of Marziel’s fortunes, his hopes, a reassurance that rumors of his return to religious studies were false, a note of triumph that the uncertainty in France that frightened others was an opportunity for those who were bold enough to seize it. Then a more worried tone: a whisper that Maistir Anzeld had spoken with this suitor or that, and one name appearing too often.

I saw you at the Saluns’ ball but you never found the chance to slip away. Would there be such hazard in dancing with me in everyone’s sight? I know you are as skilled as any woman at dissembling, for I watched you with Arpik and no one could have guessed from the brightness of your eyes that you didn’t mean to encourage him.

And then later:
I must see you. Today, tomorrow. I must hear from your own lips that you have refused Arpik’s offer. All of society is abuzz with rumor.
And in the next brief scrawl:
What have they threatened that you could not refuse? You held true for so long. If there is no other way, my carriage stands waiting. We could go to Genoa; my business flourishes there. Can you find some way to escape from your father’s house when all are abed? I dare not try to meet you by day for you are always in an armin’s shadow.

Whatever plans he had urged had come to naught. The next sheet was not a letter but a black-edged card. The salutation no longer addressed Maisetra Anzeld. The date was more than a year later and leapt from the page. Seventeen hundred and ninety-two. The battle of Tarnzais, when the flower of Alpennia was lost against the armies of France.
On Sunday, the 14th of October will be held a memorial mass for the soul of Mihail Lumbeirt.
Written on the back in stiffly formal words:
Count and Countess Turinz are invited to join us for a reception at Tiporsel House after the services.
And it was signed
Marziel Lumbeirt, Baron Saveze.

Had he sent it in friendship or bitterness? Had she received it with regret? She couldn’t have known that fate would have rewarded faithfulness so completely. What had driven her to accept the marriage? The baron had alluded to threats, but had she needed any greater threat than the passing years? She would have spent four years out in society by the time she capitulated. And had she attended the funeral and once more faced the man who had loved her so fiercely? Did she know already what a disaster her marriage would be?