The stitcher and the mut.., p.13
The Stitcher and the Mute, page 13
‘“Mistress Col’bolo. Mistress Adeline.” The Wayward whip greeted us from a distance, just a voice in the dark. I jumped at the sound, as did my mother.
‘As we approached, the candle peeled back the darkness and, I initially thought, the Wayward’s clothes. He stood there naked as the day he started his story, though considerably bigger, and casually leaning on an enormous bow. I had never seen one as large as that, and haven’t since. I worry even as I tell this story that I may cause the Rogue no little envy in this regard; what man isn’t struck by the greener emotion when seeing another is blessed with a greater weapon?
‘“Yes, well, I… Well,” my mother said, struggling. “Here we are then. I hope in the years to come you’ll look back on this night fondly. And not a word to your father.” With that she turned and left me there, taking her candle with her.
‘Difficult as it may be for a member of the Audience, try to imagine what that moment was like for an eighteen year old woman who knew men only as father, staff, servant, or huntsman. There I was, in just my nightshift, plunged into darkness mere feet away from a well-armed stranger from another realm. Delivered to this man by my own mother, no less.
‘And then he said, “Remove your shift.”
‘“Pardon me?”
‘“Or I will.”
‘With no small tremble in my hands I pulled the nightshift over my head and dropped it to the floor. My eyes were beginning to adjust to the dark of the cellar, aided a little by an open trapdoor beyond the Wayward.
‘He held the bow out for me to take. It was surprisingly light. He knelt and retrieved a quiver that was also for me. From the darkness he conjured another bow and quiver for himself.
‘“You like to hunt,” he said.
‘“Yes, but—”
‘“Then keep up, and keep silent.” He moved off towards the trapdoor, through which large inanimate objects entered Col Wedge House. This night a very large, very animate object exited up a ladder, and I did my best to follow without staring. Having never seen a fully naked man before, my best proved a poor effort. How pale his buttocks were! How dark what lay between.
‘I did not imagine a man to be so hairy.
‘He led me from the house but not towards the stables. That we weren’t attired for riding was obvious enough, and I didn’t think even the Wayward rode naked; the horses may have been so lacking on the Steppes, but surely not the riders. Instead, I wondered why we hunted without hounds. When I asked the Wayward he grunted and said so softly that I almost didn’t hear him, “Too loud.”
‘We looped below the house, crossing one of the long formal vistas. I hunched low, as if that might help escape notice as the only moving thing in such a wide open space. The Wayward strode ahead as if nothing were amiss. Perhaps he spent most nights wandering the grounds without a scrap of clothing? Perhaps many men did? I had never thought to look for them.
‘I was relieved when we finally made the cover of the forest. Col Wedge had large, well-stocked woodlands on the estate. Deer, foxes, game birds: all were available without leaving the grounds. And yet there was something in the Wayward’s manner, in the way he moved, that made me think we were going farther afield. He was quiet, silent almost, but not… ready. Not alert to what might be waiting amongst the trees.
‘My attention was largely on where I trod next, unused to so much as traversing my room barefoot let alone a forest. It was uncomfortable and cold and I had never been more awake in all my eighteen years.
‘We walked and walked and I did not know how long had passed. I entertained the idea I was being taken to some Wayward camp. In those dark hours I entertained a great many other ideas that involved more handsome Wayward men with long hair and unreadable eyes.
‘Those unfulfilled stories were dispelled by a flash of colour in the gloom. The Wayward hadn’t noticed, being a good few yards ahead of me. I slowed, then stopped, and waited. Another flash, closer, an unmistakable russet with splashes of white. I crept forward with more care than I’d ever shown when hunting a fox before.
‘I found them lying between the roots of a huge tree. They were panting, their tongues slips of bright pink. I eased my bow up, from my hiding place beside a tree, but as I did so they came alive. At first I thought they were fleeing – a familiar sight to me. Instead, they frolicked amongst the roots, nipping each other and yelping.
‘I’m not soft hearted, if that is what you’re wondering. My arrow was ready and I just needed a clear shot.
‘But the Wayward stopped me.
‘I hadn’t heard him. I hadn’t smelled him either. He lowered my bow with a gentle hand. Without a word we watched until the foxes grew bored of each other and parted ways.
‘“This is not a night for foxes,” he said eventually. “As a girl you hunted foxes.”
‘Perhaps it was the strangeness of that night’s events, or I was wool-headed from a rudely interrupted sleep, but it took me longer than it should to ask my Wayward guide the obvious.
‘“Why are we naked?”
‘“Your clothes stink,” he whispered.
‘“I beg your pardon?”
‘He shushed me harshly. “Soaps. Perfumes. Powders. You are bad enough, clothes are worse. Stags catch your stink.”
‘I sniffed. “And sweat?”
‘“Better,” he said. “Belongs more in the forest. When the time comes, take your time. Only one arrow. Any more questions?”
‘I had many, but they seemed small and petty under his gaze and under the canopy. I shook my head, indicating I was finished with any unnecessary chatter. We started off again, and I worked hard to imitate my guide. Not just his crouching, his nocked arrow, and his way of searching the surroundings, but the manner in which he used his muscles. How he took each step. When he tensed, or didn’t. His body was slick with sweat, and it was difficult to tell what marks were dirt and what was hair. But the body beneath was as clear as horseflesh; nothing could hide the power held there.
‘I may have been remiss in my storytelling so far, and forgotten to express just how much I was enjoying myself. My audience must forgive me on this account. I am only a Perlish noblewoman after all. I have focused on the unusual circumstances and neglected my excitement.
‘I was alive with it. The hunt, not necessarily as I knew it, but the hunt nonetheless. The crackle of anticipation was building within me, as lightning builds in a cloud. I would be tested. My strength against the life of another. And whatever the outcome, a tale for the Rogue, who revels in our defeats as well as our victories.
‘And so there I was, my bones bouncing under my skin when the Wayward brought us to a stop. I did not know why. I could not see what he had spotted. But he was as rigid as a scent hound the moment before they bolt.
‘We were at the top of a gentle slope that ran towards a trickle of a stream. I heard the water as much as I saw it; the forest was dense, old, and wary here. Centuries may have passed since the last human trod on that ground. The deer tracks, however, were clear even to my ignorant eye. With the tip of his bow he indicated down, beyond the stream, to a tangle of bushes. I stared with such an intensity, I believed myself capable of willing a deer into existence. But I saw nothing.
‘My guide indicated I should draw my bow.
‘I opened my mouth to complain and only just caught myself before I ruined everything. Instead, I did as he bid.
‘I sighted along the arrow, the huge bow now bearing all my earlier excitement and tension. I breathed slow and soft and waited, though my arms could only take so much.
‘Sweat slid down my temple, circled my eyes, and dropped from my nose. My gaze blurred at the edges. I was cold and hot at the same time, but on different parts of me. I breathed but it felt like smoke and fire. I was so far from home.
‘Then the top of a bush moved.
‘Amongst the thicket and bramble the shape of a stag came into being, like a constellation found for the first time.
‘I loosed my arrow straight to his heart.
‘He was majestic. He was wasted.
‘I felt like apologising for that, but he would not have listened. I found him at his lowest.
‘I didn’t think to ask at the time, but I have wondered many times since: what was he doing so far south?
‘And the way he looked at me made me remember I was young and knew little of the world. Parts of him were loose where they had once been tight. Scars dotted his neck and legs like lines on a map. Born and raised on the Steppes, he bore all the marks of a hard life. He was from the far north, and I don’t mean the outer-most reaches of Perlanse.’
*
Adeline cupped her hands and drank from the Rogue’s fountain; reward for the story offered. She stood and stretched. Back from her own story, she enjoyed the sounds and smells of the stables.
‘I don’t have so much hair on me,’ the stable boy said from the other side of the fountain.
Adeline laughed. ‘I should suppose not.’
‘But I know what lies between everyone’s legs.’
She went to where the boy was sitting, where he’d sat for her story with his pitch fork forgotten by his feet. She lifted his chin. His face was not unattractive, and might improve with age. ‘If that hair starts appearing, come to the main house and show me.’
Despite his gawping, she took a slow circle of the stables, admiring the stock of field hunters. The W’oventrouts at least knew their horseflesh, or knew others who did. There were few Gaters, which suited her; now she was here, she’d lead every hunt from the very front. Or she’d wander the forests with just her bow. The seasons were warmer this far south.
*
Father was waiting for her at the entrance to the stables. It is hard to imagine, I know, that he was once shy and bashful and would fit into one of your shirts, Phineas. But there he stood, hands clasped behind his back and unable to meet the eye of his bride-to-be.
‘I hope you found our accommodations to your liking,’ he said to his boots.
‘Very fine. You know your horses,’ Adeline said.
Father wrestled with the idea of lying to her. The thought of rising in her esteem was an alluring one. But he had ever been a pragmatic man, and saw the trap of that lie stretching out into his future. ‘Not I,’ he said. ‘My father.’
She shrugged. Her indifference was like a dagger to him. He desperately wanted to impress her. She fell in beside him with an ease he envied. They walked down the wide path towards the house.
‘I chose the ornamentation,’ he said. ‘The stone work and such.’
‘The Rogue’s statue?’
Bertram stood a little straighter. ‘The sculptor tried to get away with a simpler design. But I insisted. On the bow, and such. Your father said you hunted in every manner imaginable.’
‘And why Rustan stone?’
‘That is a long story,’ he said.
‘Perfect. I find gardens so very dull without a good story.’ She sat on a bench overlooking the lower gardens of Truss House.
Father had evidently avoided the trap of one fabrication, only to stumble into the jaws of another. It was the pattern of their relationship from the beginning; even when telling the truth he would be wrong-footed into something far from it. He blinked at the space on the bench beside her. He very much wanted to run in the opposite direction, but instead sat and stared at the sun arcing its way across the western sky. His audience was waiting.
‘It is no great family secret that my father married a Rustan woman,’ Bertram said. ‘It was, however, quite the story at the time.’
*
Despite the splendour of Truss House, my parent’s marriage was not one of silver or gold, but of tin. I cannot speak for the Col’bolos, but most of the eastern families have some degree of stake in the eastern tin mines. You could not say either? No, I imagine your father preferred not to burden you with such crudities as business. Perhaps I will ask him of it after dinner. Regardless, not so long ago the W’oventrouts and other families faced a significant downturn in their tin mining concerns. For my family in particular this meant a problem further along the supply chain. You see, we did not just own stakes in mines but also much of the surrounding industry – smelters, craftsmen, traders, and such. Sadly, most people do not appreciate the complex web that is industry, especially here in Perlanse. The noble families consider it a subject beneath them, for the commoners it is too challenging to conceive, and for others—
What is that? Boring? Yes, I suppose you have the right of it. For most people, regardless of station, it is simply too boring. So I will return to that eternally fascinating subject: marriage.
Before she was my mother, Watcher Darmst was the youngest daughter of the Great Watcher of the Rusting Mountains. More exciting? I thought so. As did many of the eastern families at the time. The marriage was arranged by my grandfather, who spent much of his final years in the Rusting Mountains and the southern parts of the Lowlands in pursuit of tin. My father never left Truss House. The bride and groom had never met. Until she arrived here with nothing more than a hardy leather sack slung over one shoulder.
Watcher Darmst had not walked the entire length of the Union, though few would have doubted her capable of doing just that. She had, with her father’s blessing, taken a somewhat circuitous route north on a Casker barge she boarded at Bordair. What occurred on that barge, and the day’s layover in Fenest, is a story for another time. But Darmst parted ways with the barge due south of Truss House. Typical Rustan logic; she did not consider what lay between the house and the River Stave. Were there roads? How safe was the countryside? How would a lone Rustan woman be treated so far from home?
You may know little of the Rustan people – few this far north do. But they are a very direct realm. Not just in their conversation or their opinions, but in their thinking. Darmst truly believed she should be able to travel the straight line from the banks of the Stave to Truss House because in the Rusting Mountains she would have been able to do just that. The concept of a bend in the road simply does not occur to a Rustan. What is the need of a corner when one can simply go higher?
But I see I have lost my audience.
All that is to say, Watcher Darmst arrived at Truss House with even less pageantry than yourself. No coach, no gig, no family, not even attendants, only one leather sack and the heavy Rustan clothes she wore. She had been expected for weeks. My father was beside himself with worry. She did not understand why.
On that very first day, my father was summoned from his room to find his bride standing in the entrance hall. She was… striking. He stood on the terrace, unbeknownst to her, and tried to order his thoughts. She was attractive, he felt that much, but not in a way he understood immediately. She was far from a typical Perlish beauty. She had a strong jawline, a serious set to her face, and her skin was darkened by what he assumed were days in the southern sun. Her hair was tied back into a single, thick braid.
He had expected all manner of metal parts sprouting from her. He’d feared his wife would embrace him with metal arms, that when they kissed he would taste iron, that when she spoke he would hear the grinding of gears. As with most fears it was intertwined with excitement; he found himself disappointed when he saw little metal on his wife-to-be. From where he stood she looked different, out of place, but not terrifyingly so. He found his courage and descended the sweeping staircase.
‘Samuel W’oventrout,’ she said, before he had a chance to properly introduce himself. ‘I know you from the portrait your father carried. You are to be my husband.’ She spoke as if she was talking of the weather or the weeding of a garden.
‘Yes,’ Samuel said.
She offered her hand, which in his confusion he shook rather than kissed. She appeared satisfied.
‘Welcome,’ he said. ‘Welcome to Truss House.’
‘It is a big house.’ Her tone suggested this was not necessarily a good thing.
‘Would you like to see it?’
‘I can see it.’
‘I meant the rest of the house,’ Samuel said.
She turned a full circle, her gaze lifting to the marbled terrace, until she came to look at him again. ‘You polish your stone,’ she said.
‘Someone does, I suppose.’
‘Someone.’
‘The staff, perhaps?’ He felt his cheeks warming, though he wasn’t entirely sure why.
‘The staff.’
‘You must be tired, from your journey,’ he said, trying to regain some kind of control of the situation. ‘Would you care to accompany me to your chamber?’
She stared at him.
‘I mean, that is to say, I did not mean—’ He took a breath. ‘I’ll have someone show you to your rooms.’
‘I would like you to show me.’
‘Of course. Why not. I know where they are, after all,’ he said, laughing at his own jest until he realised she wasn’t. ‘May I take your bag?’
‘No,’ she said.
‘I meant, not to take, but— never mind. This way.’ Samuel was glad to be walking ahead of his bride, his burning cheeks hidden at least. He felt he had not comported himself well in their first meeting. She must think him a buffoon, he thought, stumbling over his words and making unsophisticated attempts at humour. A tale to share with the Drunkard and the Amateur. He could picture them laughing as they listened, as the Devotee just shook her head. Such musings made him hurry down the carpeted halls, past his own rooms, beyond the main terrace and along to the east wing. She kept pace easily. When he opened the door to the next corridor, he advised her to take care with the step down as it surprised many guests.
‘Whose house are we in now?’ she said.
‘Whose? Mine, still. I mean Truss House. This is still Truss House.’
