The elixir of inheritanc.., p.21
The Elixir of Inheritance, page 21
“Well,” he muttered. “At least we have permission.”
“We’re well within the law now,” Ibram said, with a glance in Dolman’s direction. He tugged on his gambeson. The heat from the fire was doing its work to dry him off, but the smell of the funerary unguent was working itself into the fabric. He grimaced.
Ahksell opened his mouth as if he were going to debate the point, but he too remembered Mistress Dolman by the fire, and subsided. He came to stand at the foot of the corpse, and opened his carry-all. He withdrew the Hessele’s Cage and held it in both hands. He wasn’t comfortable, but being at a complete ease with a possibly murdered corpse seemed impossible. Ahksell narrowed his eyes in thought as he observed the length and breadth of Master Savoldyn. Ibram obligingly raised up the yellow blanket so that Ahksell could examine the body beneath.
“Are these the clothes he was wearing?” he asked.
Ibram shook his head. “He had on a velvet tunic and hose, I think. I would expect this silken traveler’s attire is for the funeral.”
“Of course it is,” Mistress Dolman muttered, almost unwillingly.
Ahksell raised his eyebrows; Ibram shook his head. Master Savoldyn did look like a fancy merchant—which was what he had been, of course—but he’d been dressed as if he were going out on one of his own caravans. If that caravan had taken place in an evening courtyard’s theater. His clothes were silk and fine cotton, and a large enameled fibula brooch had been pinned over his heart to hold closed the thick cloak upon which he lay. Jewels glittered on his fingers and in his hands was a small pouch. Ibram would bet that it contained wood-biscuits and a bit of dried meat for the journey.
“Put that over there,” Ahksell said, pointing nearer the fire. “I need room to maneuver.”
Ibram did as instructed; he folded the blanket in thirds and lay the bundle on a side table he noticed hidden in a corner of the building. Mistress Dolman continued to stir her cauldron. She seemed quite at home, and so Ibram left her to her business.
Ahksell unwrapped the red and yellow yarn which held the Hessele’s Cage closed, and then opened the thin metal frames which made up the structure. For such a small bundle, it was a dramatically long and wide thing, a framework of the finest metal threads connected by tiny hinges. Ibram thought even his own father, master craftsman that he was, might have struggled to accomplish so delicate a task as making it.
“Hold one end for me,” Ahksell said. “I need to rewind the strings around it. Really, Attendant Dakreia is very hard on her tools.”
Ibram licked his lips. “Are you certain? It seems to be glittering a bit.”
Ahksell shrugged. “It can’t hurt you,” he said. “It’s just happy to be waking up.”
That didn’t make Ibram feel any better, but he held up his hands anyway. “I just don’t wish to be shocked again, that’s all.”
Ahksell winced. “Yes, well, don’t worry about that,” he said.
“You say that now, but if I develop a tic or some such from your continual jolting, then I demand you take responsibility for my care.”
“I’ve got the tricky part,” Ahksell assured him. “Just go back to his head, maybe a little further.”
Ibram grasped the furthest metal threads which Ahksell held out to him, and then walked backwards the length of the table. Ahksell quickly drew up both ends of the yarn dangling to the floor, the red and the yellow strings. He raised them up by their copper capped ends, took a deep breath, and then removed his hands. The yarn dangled in the air, and Ahksell extended both of his first fingers.
He began to move them over and under in the air, left and then right, and right and then left, as if he were listening to music only he could hear. A feeling like chafing rose up Ibram’s spine, as though a prickling cone was being curled against his skin. It was like watching Lady Azadiya doing her meditations, rolling and unrolling her hair into braids, up and over her combs and hair sticks. Only in this case, Ahksell had his eyes open and carefully watching; he almost seemed to be holding his breath as the yarn wound itself precisely through the metal wires until the copper ends dangled an inch from Ibram’s hands.
Ahksell coughed and took a deep breath. “That should do it,” he said. “I’m getting better at that.”
“Any time to practice is a good time, I suppose.”
Ahksell rolled his eyes. “Just put the cage over the body, please.”
Ibram did so with his corner of the Hessele’s Cage, laying it over Savoldyn’s head, and then stepping back from the table. Ahksell, after a moment, did the same by the corpse’s feet. He stepped back and wiped his hands on his gambeson. The cage sparkled a little, a small flickering brightness at the hinges.
“It’s old,” Ahksell said. “I’m sorry about the bleed through.”
“Can it tell us what we need to know?” Ibram asked.
“Of course,” he said, “it isn’t broken.”
Ibram shrugged. “Well then, let’s examine Master Savoldyn’s fibers.”
“That’s not—never mind,” Ahksell said, and then took out his introrse pendant.
He slipped the end loop over his middle finger on his right hand and let the braided copper wires drop down. Ahksell closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. He held out the pendant so that the trimstone arrowhead dangled at the top hinge of the Hessele’s Cage, and then covered his right hand with his left. Ibram leaned against the back wall, and crossed his arms. Mistress Dolman had left off her stirring, and now watched, unabashed.
“An alchemist’s work is quite a sight to behold, don’t you think, Mistress?” he asked quietly.
She nodded without looking at him. “But the plane of reality is as nothing to the direction of the Navigator,” she told him, in a creaking voice.
“Just so, just so,” Ibram said. “Still, whatever gets you there, don’t you agree?”
She sniffed audibly, and deigned to give him a stern look from the corner of her eye. Ibram grinned. He was only a harmless young man, after all.
“Did the meddlers send you?” she asked.
Ibram chuckled, but softly. Ahksell was following the path of the lights glimmering along the yarn twisted among the wires; he was at Savoldyn’s knees now. His face was serene, but intent, and Ibram had no wish to break his concentration.
“No meddlers up the living mountain,” he said, and craned his neck towards her direction. “Only helpful folk.”
Mistress Dolman sniffed. “They focus too much on where they are, and not enough on where they are going.”
“Such are the demands of reality,” Ibram said. “Its perfection requires focus.”
He watched her observing Ahksell at his trade; not many folk had the chance to see real technical alchemy. On player’s stages at some of the evening courtyards they often played the ancient romances, where alchemists held very high offices and struck terror into the hearts of evil Isconians before dying in the arms of their beloved, but the alchemy was mostly sketched in. Honestly, it was often just folk waving their hands in the air and muttering about ‘feeling the earth move,’ as fake as magic. Still, it seemed to have distracted her from her past irritation at Ibram’s sheer existence. He sensed a strategic opportunity on the horizon.
“I feel I should apologize, Mistress,” he said. “My actions in your house were not me at my best.”
“It is not my house,” she said, a tad automatically. She seemed then to realize what he had said, and deigned to glance up at him from her seat on the hearth. “But you were quite rude.”
“Then I apologize,” Ibram said, with a short bow. “I allowed my concerns to overtake my common sense.”
She nodded. They both spent a few moments watching Ahksell frowning at the lights on the Hessele’s Cage. Ibram tilted his head. She seemed content to sit there until they left her alone with the body. Did familiarity breed such loyalty? If Ama or Father died, he couldn’t imagine their own housekeeper, Kholdo, keeping such a vigil; it was generally a family duty. He paused. Well, he might bake rose cake for the altars.
“How long have you been in the Savoldyns’ household? Only it’s not often that I see a worthy such as yourself attending at a death. I thought this was the journey undertaken alone.”
His nights eating dinner beneath the droning of a lecture hadn’t left him completely underprepared, after all. The Navigator was very impressed by teamwork, but even more delighted with independence. In Vissilia, stubbornness was a celestial trait. The Savoldyns’ falling out would have been socially upsetting, but religiously permissible.
Her mouth pursed in thought. “I have been their servant since Mistress Ignalle’s own mother still lived,” she said, after a pause. “I came with her into her new household when she married Master Savoldyn. Her father was a welcome visitor to the Ark.”
“And Mistress Ignalle?”
Mistress Dolman snorted, and went back to stirring her cauldron. Ibram fought not to sneeze. He could see several open pots by her feet, clearly new ingredients to be added.
“Her husband is for the Advisor,” she said. “Mistress Ignalle comes but rarely these days.”
Ibram resettled himself against the wall, and raised his eyebrows. It wasn’t unheard-of. His own parents had had a doubled wedding, in the forge for Father and under the stars for Ama.
“But she did before?” he asked, watching as Ahksell moved up the body.
Was the Hessele’s Cage seeing something? Or did Ahksell read the little lights shining off the framework. Ibram didn’t see much difference in one light to the next, they weren’t even different colors. At least with the stickums and the automatons, you could get a show in as well as call a bit of luck to yourself. They desperately needed a bit of luck now. If Savoldyn really hadn’t been poisoned, Ibram would throw himself on Mentor Nieminen’s mercy and try to keep Ahksell out of it. If he couldn’t…well, he had better hope Ladyship’s recovery was swift and left her in a forgiving mood.
“Mistress Ignalle is a sharp one,” Mistress Dolman said with a tired chuckle. “She knows how the wind blows.”
“Is that why she showed up the morning I arrived for Lady Azadiya’s order?” Ibram asked. “Ladyship is a pretty important client.”
Mistress Dolman shrugged one shoulder. “That, I could not say,” she said. “She simply came to the door, just after breakfast, and asked to see her father.”
“And you admitted her?”
“Master Savoldyn never gave instructions to bar her from the manor,” she said. “I admitted her, and they spent the time much as you witnessed.”
Ibram nodded slowly. “Just in time to share a cup of shay and screaming.”
“The screaming happened,” Mistress Dolman said, as she stirred her pot. “But not the shay. When Master Savoldyn sent for his next drink, there was only one cup.”
Ibram tilted his head to the side. “Only one? A bit pointed, wouldn’t you say?”
“I’m sure Marit merely hadn’t realized two were required,” Mistress Dolman said. She shook her head suddenly, and huffed a laugh. “If she had, there would have been bread and butter as well. Our cook is proud of her skill, and Mistress Ignalle appreciates a good meal.”
“Oh?”
“Almost as much as getting her way—In that, she resembles her father. I remember, once, when her lady mother was still on the path, she ran away with a caravan sent to the Red Coast to take ship to Orlinda.”
Ibram smiled. “All that way?”
Mistress Dolman looked amused; her eyes turned inward. “She sent a note by runner, telling her parents they needed a full accounting of the cargo, and she had appointed herself deputy.”
Ibram shuffled his feet against the floor, and laughed quietly. “Your young mistress sounds like a handful,” he said.
“She always knew her own mind,” Mistress Dolman replied. “Even then.”
“Was she as good at the business as her father?” he asked.
“They worked well together,” Mistress Dolman said, “when her mother was alive to mediate. They got so that they could anticipate each other’s…”
She swallowed and shook her head. Ibram watched as Ahksell moved around Savoldyn’s head; he bent over, almost as if he were listening to something. Mistress Dolman leaned forward to fit another small log on the fire, and then resituated herself. Ibram rubbed his eyebrow with his thumb.
“I suppose you must have been around, when she ran away to be married,” he said.
She snorted. “Of course, I was,” she said. “Don’t you remember the ruckus? The shame of her rejection nearly killed him, then. I felt sorry for him.”
Ibram shook his head. “I’m afraid I was out and about when everything happened,” he said. “It’s the first I ever heard of it.”
“She cast off the expectations of her family, all the work she put into the business…” Mistress Dolman pressed her lips together. “I would not say his response was just, Master Ucalegon, but anyone could have told her the outcome of her rash decisions.”
“Too much alike, as you said,” Ibram said, and watched her carefully. Grief did many things to folk, made them talkative, made them quiet. Some got angry and then let it burn through them. Mistress Dolman seemed tired.
“Where is Mistress Savoldyn?” he asked.
“At home,” Mistress Dolman said. “The terms of the master’s will requires an inventory be taken of the household goods and stores.”
“Surely that’s a job for the housekeeper,” Ibram said.
“Mistress Savoldyn feels more at ease with a task at hand,” she said, “Now that he’s not there, she has a greater degree of latitude.”
Ibram leaned forward; he felt the urge to grin, but refused to let it show. “Ah, one of those folk, was he?” he whispered, as if they were in confidence. “I had an uncle like that, you know. Had to be in control of every little aspect of our work, almost never let me get a word in edgewise.”
“I find it difficult to believe anyone could stopper your tongue, Master Ucalegon,” she said.
Ibram waved his right hand in the air. “Oh, we always find ways around a difficult man, don’t we?”
Mistress Dolman might have been tired enough of her responsibilities, but she wasn’t stupid. Her face returned to that pinched expression which Ibram was so familiar with. She took up the ladle in the cauldron and stirred its contents.
“Master Savoldyn was a man who demanded respect,” she said.
“A man can demand all he wants,” Ibram said with a shrug of his left shoulder. “I don’t know if it changes what he receives.”
Ladyship once told him, during that unfortunate incident with the portable forge and the linen chest, that everyone in the world had a story they wanted to tell someone about. Sometimes the story changed, and sometimes they never told more than part of it, but if a good agent tapped that rich vein, there was no telling what might spill out.
He glanced up at Ahksell, who was rounding the table again, this time following the red thread. Whisps of smoke rose up from beneath his hands, but Ahksell seemed sanguine about the matter and Ibram let it pass without question. Mistress Dolman made a noncommittal noise in the back of her throat. Ibram considered what he knew—which was little enough—and what had been bothering him, which was plenty. He considered the quality of Mistress Dolman’s yellow gown; it was old, but finely made.
“May I ask you something, Mistress Dolman?”
She leaned back quickly, as if surprised, and peered up into his face. “Like what?”
“I have no wish to embarrass you,” Ibram said, and she raised her eyebrows at him. He stood away from the wall and crouched before her, spreading his hands to show his palms. “Why do you have so few servants? A man who can import glass cloth to Lady Azadiya can run a full household.”
Mistress Dolman sighed and looked out over the body. Ahksell glanced up; he was winding his introrse pendant around his first two fingers, pointing the arrowhead at Savoldyn’s heart. Ibram shook his head quickly, and Ahksell returned to his work.
“When Mistress Ignalle—the young mistress Elene as she was—ran away from home to be married, it was her maid who helped her, and a groom who covered their escape,” Mistress Dolman said, while she laced her hands in her lap. “Master Savoldyn turned them out in a rage, and most of the household with them. It has just been myself, Hilo, and the kitchen staff ever since. Until his marriage, of course, when his wife brought her own maid.”
An entire household of servants released in such a manner as that. Ibram chewed the thought over in his mind. That was quite a number of resentful people to keep track of, whether they were upset at the impetuous young mistress or her father, or more likely, both. They would have knowledge of the house and grounds, as well.
Ahksell stepped away from the table with a sigh that swelled and deflated his entire chest. He looked down at his pendant, now pooled in the cup of his palm, and then shook his head. Ibram stood up while Ahksell put his tool away, and then began to gather the Hessele’s Cage together.
“Mistress Dolman,” Ahksell said with a frown at the body. “I feel I must ask you an impertinent question.”
“That seems to be the fashion with you boys,” Mistress Dolman said.
Ahksell cleared his throat, and ducked his head. “Well, yes, I suppose so.”
“I don’t know about that, to be sure,” Ibram said at the same time.
They both paused, and then Ibram waggled his fingers for Ahksell to continue. Ahksell bit his lip; his eyes narrowed in thought.
“Master Savoldyn was a drinking man,” he said, and continued at Mistress Dolman’s nod. “What did he drink the morning of his death?”
“No more than his usual,” Mistress Dolman said. She struggled to her feet, leaning one hand on the hearth to propel her upwards. “A glass of tolnic with his morning meal, and shay throughout the day.”
“Nothing else?” Ahksell said. “Something one of the other servants might have given him?”
