The Mystic Marriage (36 page)

One morning Barbara interrupted her in the midst of her reading, saying, “I thought we might drive up to Atefels today. Can you spare the time? I was sent the oddest message about a stranger roaming the hills and from the description I think it might be someone you know.”

“Who?” Margerit asked curiously.

But there was a twinkle in Barbara’s eye that said she meant to keep the surprise.

Atefels was the smallest of the five named villages in the lands of Saveze. It lay eastward along the road leading to the pass. There the valley widened enough for fields and gardens below the rocky hills that rose up behind them. The village thought of itself as the first line of defense against foreign invaders, though in truth the last foreign army it had seen was the French heading east after passing through all of Alpennia. But the residents took their duty seriously to cast a sharp eye on travelers coming down from the mountains, even as they lined their pockets with offers of food and clean beds to the weary.

They made quite a cavalcade pulling up to the inn with the light gig and Tavit for an outrider and Marken following behind. Margerit found herself smiling to watch both armins ever so diplomatically declining to leave their charge in another’s hands at the faintest whiff of risk. The innkeeper came out to greet them, unsurprised at the invasion.

“Welcome! Welcome, Mesnera! Come, sit! Will you have beer or wine?”

Margerit tamped back her curiosity. There’d be no skipping the formalities of hospitality to his baroness. So it was only after food and drink had been served and all the concerns of the village had been asked after that Barbara inquired, “So what are these stories that have been drifting down the valley? Who can tell me about them?”

“Ah, for that you’ve come to the right place,” the innkeeper said. “It was my own message that brought you. Some foreign woman wandering in the hills. Could barely understand one word in five but she seems to think she’s a friend of yours, Mesnera. When she asked where she was and we told her that she’d stumbled into the Barony of Saveze, she claimed that she’d met you in Rotenek.”

Margerit hid a smile behind her hand, now certain of who they were dealing with.

He continued, “In the morning she goes wandering up into the hills and comes back with a basket of rocks. Then she paints them. That is, she doesn’t paint on the rocks but she paints pictures of the rocks, if you see what I mean. They all get tipped out back of my garden after that. If today goes as usual, she should be back soon.”

They settled in to wait, enjoying a bottle of wine in the sunshine of the courtyard and watching the occasional traveling coach pass along the road. After an hour, a pair of dark specks making their way down the slope opposite resolved into a sturdy middle-aged woman in a dark walking dress followed by an older man hunched under the weight of a sack.

“Frances Collfield!” Margerit cried when she came close enough to hail. “I knew it must be you!”

The botanist stopped and blinked in surprise. “Whatever are you doing here?”

“That’s what I should be asking you,” Margerit countered. “I thought you’d gone back to England last fall after your lecture.”

“Oh, I did, I did,” Miss Collfield said, pulling her wits about her. “But now you see it’s summer and I’m back collecting again. There’s no time to lose, you know. I have to complete my survey of the
Lecanorae
this summer if I’m going to finish my manuscript in time. My brother’s started collecting subscriptions for the publication, so I can’t dillydally.”

“But why didn’t you tell us you were coming?” Barbara asked. “I could have made arrangements for you.”

“Well, I never quite meant to come
here
exactly. I started out in Geneva at the beginning of the summer and simply followed my nose and this is where it brought me. I confess I’m not exactly sure where I am. The innkeeper kept mentioning your name, but I didn’t realize…So this is your land? What a charming place.”

Margerit had to laugh. “But now you’re here.”

In the days that followed, Miss Collfield declined an invitation to enjoy more than the occasional dinner as she worked her way down the valley, but those evenings brought a liveliness to the quiet of summer.
It’s like those long sessions in the library at Tiporsel
, Margerit thought.
Back when that was the only place Barbara and I could meet as equals.
And now, one by one, more quick minds were being added to that charmed circle. The season in Rotenek was so bounded about by rules and rituals. There had to be some way to re-create this experience in large.

Akezze’s schedule had added two days a week when she went up to Saint Orisul’s to teach. And though Margerit would have driven her up in the gig or offered to have someone take her, Akezze preferred to walk, saying that there was no point in spending the summer in the country and then wasting the opportunity to savor it. But one day, more than a month after their arrival, she returned with a formally worded request from Sister Marzina that Maisetra Sovitre might lend her assistance with one of the pilgrim’s mysteries if it were convenient. And so, at the next trip back to Saint Orisul’s, they again left the carriage at the foot of the hill and Margerit climbed up alongside Akezze and presented herself at Sister Marzina’s office.

Marzina laid out the purpose of the ceremony in a few brief sentences.
So we aren’t to discuss why I wasn’t sent for before,
Margerit thought, looking over the rough outline of the proposed text. “The child they hope will be granted a miracle—how old is he?”

“Not quite seven, I think,” came the answer. “It’s been two years since the fever that took his hearing. They thought he might recover and then they tried what could be found closer to home. Likely it took most of the last year to save the expenses of the journey, so we’ll do our best for him in the name of Saint Orisul and Our Lady.”

The outline—for it could hardly be called an
expositulum
yet—followed the usual pattern: praise and invocation of the chosen saints, a formal statement of the petition and the desired cure, then a blank where the petition became more specific with praise and thanks to close. “You haven’t decided on the elaborations yet?”

Sister Marzina gestured to where a girl in a student’s uniform stood quietly waiting. “I was hoping to use Maisetra Perneld’s gifts there in some way. Valeir, make your curtsey to Princess Annek’s thaumaturgist.”

The girl stepped forward and bobbed a greeting. One of the secular students, by her dress, and old enough that she must be in her last year at school. Margerit had thought at first that she might be a novice in training to assist Marzina. “And what are your talents, Valeir?” she asked.

“I…” The girl glanced at Marzina. “I hear things. They say I hear angel voices.”

“Voices?” She’d never heard of an
auditor
whose perceptions came that specifically.

“It’s just an old country expression,” Marzina said sourly. “She means the usual humming and ringing, from what she’s described. But I thought that since our miracle involves sound, it could be useful to monitor the
sonitus
effects as well as your visions.”

“Yes,” Margerit agreed, returning to the outline and taking up a pen, with a brief glance for permission.

Whatever lay between her and Marzina, they’d fallen back into their old working partnership easily. “The miracle I asked when Iohennis Lutoz was struck dumb would be a useful starting point,” Margerit suggested. “I didn’t have time to plan that one, but here is the structure of the part that was answered.” She sketched out a few notes. “We can celebrate the basic ceremony and add changes based on what the
fluctus
tells us.”
Akezze would scold me. But it’s easier to work by feel than to plan it entirely from the beginning.
“Valeir, your task will be to stand in for the deaf boy. The more clearly you hear the
fluctus
, the more effective the mystery is likely to be.”

Working through the preparations took several days—several mornings, rather, for Margerit still kept afternoons for her own studies. The girl Valeir stood awkwardly by at first while they rehearsed and tuned the ceremony, answering only when questioned on what she heard. But when she gave up on words and hummed a sweet but tuneless phrase, Margerit exclaimed, “That’s perfect! Sing what you’re hearing while we work. Then I can match it more easily to my visions.” The key, Margerit thought, was first to open the boy’s ears to the divine music and then to allow it to flow through him, clearing away whatever blockage the fever had left.

When all was prepared and they gathered in the chapel for the celebration, only minor details strayed from the path they had mapped. The boy was restless—fidgeting and hiding in his mother’s skirts—until Sister Marzina thought to add more movements to accompany the words he couldn’t hear. And then it was necessary for Valeir to sing with the
fluctus
again to guide the progress of the petition and response.

But at last a look of wonder grew in the boy’s face and he stilled, looking around first at the space over the altar where Margerit could see the wisps of color coalescing at the
concrescatio
, and then staring at Valeir as if she were indeed one of the angels in the stained glass windows, and at last at his mother as she cried his name over and over. The miracle was granted.

When they were back in Marzina’s office, making the final notes and comments on the
expositulum
, Margerit asked Valeir, “Will you be studying with Sister Marzina all summer?” Her mind darted ahead to the possibilities for training a true
auditor
.

“Only for another two weeks,” Valeir said. “I should have gone home already but Mama’s been busy with my sister’s confinement and didn’t want me underfoot. I start my dancing season in the fall and there’s so much to do.”

“Then perhaps after you return to Rotenek we could speak about further studies,” Margerit suggested. “It isn’t as easy to find the teaching you’ll need at the university as it would be here, but I can advise you.”

She looked doubtful. “I don’t think Papa…”

“Perneld, that was your family name, yes? I think I’ve met your mother a time or two. I could speak to her.”

But Marzina interrupted, “Valeir, return to the students’ hall. Your work is done here.” When the girl had left, she turned to Margerit angrily. “Is this how it starts? Is this the path to corruption?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Margerit replied stiffly, though in truth she suspected she did.

“First you encourage her to disregard her parents’ wishes. Then you tempt her with worldly power from a talent that should belong to God, as your own should belong to God. And when she falls from grace—as she will—then you will be waiting, won’t you?”

She made it sound so…so hateful. And she meant to. But was Marzina so wrong?
Yes, I want Valeir to defy her parents’ expectations and seize the chance to use her talent for some greater purpose. And yes, if I must stand ready to catch her if she falls, I will.
But it was the other matter that she couldn’t let pass. The ugly shadow that lay between them.

“Marzina, do you remember what you said that day we first met? You told me that when my mother came looking for a miracle to be granted a living child, you created the mystery using Mesnera Arpik’s pregnancy as part of the structure. You said you knew that Barbara and I would share a destiny. How can you be so sure this wasn’t the destiny we were meant for?”

For a moment Marzina hesitated, as if remembering that long-ago day, but then her face hardened again. “The Holy Virgin would not have granted your mother her miracle only to let sin and filth into the world.”

Margerit’s mouth trembled. But she had stood alone in Saint Mauriz’s cathedral working a mystery out of thin air when her life depended on it. And she had dared to lecture Archbishop Fereir on his own ceremonies. She could defend herself to one mean-spirited nun. “No, the Holy Virgin would not have granted a miracle to bring sin into the world. And yet She answered my mother’s plea. And in bringing me into the world, She brought me to Barbara. And there I have found the closest thing I have known to divine love. Perhaps you should think on that.”

There was no purpose to staying after that. Marzina might send for her again if there were a puzzle in need of assistance, but she knew they would never return to anything resembling friendship.

* * *

On an afternoon when the summer storms were sweeping down the valley and all sensible people stayed indoors, Margerit came out of her studies to find Barbara dressed in riding clothes and with a brief apology on her lips. “I know we’d meant to go over the accounts to make sure they’re ready for LeFevre’s review, but I’m called away.” She laughed lightly, but it sounded forced. “Another mysterious stranger passing through, sending me secret messages by name.”

Margerit could hear the tension underneath. “Who is it now?” There was no glint of humor in Barbara’s eye this time and she pleaded, “No secrets.”

Barbara frowned and bit her lip. “There was no name on the note, but…” She took a folded paper from inside her waistcoat and handed it over.

Margerit skimmed through the opening lines. “Barbara, how are you meant to read this? ‘To a true friend of the Atilliets’ or ‘to a friend of the true Atilliets’?”

“I don’t think that was mere clumsiness. The writer chose that ambiguity carefully. Read the rest.”

There was little enough to puzzle out: a meeting place, a suggestion of matters of importance to Alpennia, a caution for secrecy, and no signature but the letter K. That alone narrowed down the possibilities greatly: not an Alpennian name nor yet French or Italian. “Kreiser?” she asked.

Barbara hesitated, then nodded. “That would be my guess, but why to me? And what does he intend?”

Margerit suppressed her first impulse to beg her to stay home. “You’ll only know if you meet with him. Be careful.”

“You needn’t tell me that. Don’t wait dinner for me, I may be late.”