Silver and lead, p.39
Silver and Lead, page 39
Goldengreen had always been a beautiful knowe, and in the absence of Evening’s cold insistence on absolute perfection, it was beginning to blossom into what it had always held the potential to be. The air was lighter, the skylights high above us open to allow the creamy golden moonlight to shine through, the stone walls softened with tapestries and hanging coats of arms, many of which were unfamiliar to me. Quentin had no proper coat of his own, not under his current circumstances, and so the space next to Dean’s own arms was occupied by the arms of Shadowed Hills, modified by the addition of a sprig of heather crossed with a stylized oar down at the bottom. Somehow I wouldn’t be surprised if that little symbol was a part of Quentin’s actual arms when the time came for them to be revealed.
Young love has its attractions. It burns hot and fast and intense, without perspective, without comparison. The early days of my love for Amandine were glorious, bright, dazzling things, where a smile was my salvation and the touch of a hand was all but overwhelming. But those days passed. For their sake, I hoped the boys had something between them beyond that fire. Fire isn’t sustainable forever.
With Patrick and Dianda, I was experiencing the kind of love my parents used to wish for me, a mature, considerate love that warmed but didn’t burn, progressed but didn’t hurry. We were immortal. We had all the time in the world.
I walked along the hall, listening to the bogeys scurrying in the rafters above, and stopped when I reached the open doorway to the kitchen, looking inside. Marcia was there as promised, moving between a pot of something on the stove and a wooden island where she was slicing some sort of roast in quick, easy strokes. She wasn’t alone: two other members of the staff were there with her, a dainty Hob scrubbing out one of the ovens, and a sturdier-looking Silene sorting through a pantry that was apparently used entirely for the storage of root vegetables.
All three of them looked around as I entered the room. Marcia pursed her lips.
“Ah, the infamous Baron Torquill. Are you here today as the father of my liege, or because you’ve decided to enchant us again?”
The Hob made a frightened squeaking sound and lurched to his feet, abandoning his efforts at cleaning the oven as he scurried behind Marcia. It was almost comic: neither of them was particularly tall, but the Hob was much broader-bodied than Marcia, making him look like a human child trying to hide behind a telephone pole.
“I come in peace,” I said, raising my hands to her, palms out, to show that they were empty. “As you say, I am the stepfather of your liege, and this is one of the easiest passages between your realm and the one I inhabit. I mean no harm now, as I meant no harm then—my actions were not my own.”
The Hob glanced around Marcia, looking conflicted, while the Silene turned to face me, tail swishing wildly.
“When the Lady of the Flowers made us think as we were people we’re not, I did some things I’m not full proud of,” she said. “Bad decisions that looked like good ones because they were being made through me by someone else. From what I hear, same thing was done to you the day you come and made us all be trees and flowers and things.”
“Yes,” I said, with some relief. “I don’t want to name the woman who enthralled me, for fear that she might hear us, but yes. I had no desire to do those things. I regretted them as soon as I was returned to myself again.”
Marcia frowned, looking unsure. “Why are you here?”
“I came to land to attend Queen Windermere’s Court. I came to Goldengreen to begin my journey home to Saltmist. I came to the kitchen because it’s a long swim home, and I would rather not undertake it on an empty stomach.” I gave her a beseeching look. “Your Count informed me that a hungry man might be able to find a meal here.”
For the first time, a flicker of amusement worked its way through her expression. “Well, far be it from me to make a liar of my liege, or throw his hospitality into question. We haven’t got anything fancy right now—just bread and cheese, if you’d want a sandwich, or a beef stew I’ve been working on for the kitchen staff.”
“I will gladly eat whatever my lady wants to set before me, and consider myself privileged by the flavor,” I said, and moved toward the kitchen table. Many nobles won’t allow their household staff to dine with them, considering it “improper,” and so almost all kitchens are fitted with a sturdy table intended for eating rather than food preparation. I settled myself, folding my hands at the table’s edge, and leaned back to wait.
The three kitchen staff in evidence resumed their tasks, some with more enthusiasm than others. The Silene seemed to take pleasure in hefting heavier and heavier burdens, making sure I saw how much physically stronger she was than me, while the Hob was slower to creep back to his oven and kneel to collect his cleaning tools. As for Marcia, she crossed to one of the stoves, removing the lid from a large pot, and filled a bowl with two ladles of thick brown stew, which she carried over to my table.
“Stew,” she said. When I looked avidly at the bowl and didn’t recoil from its lumpy, mixed-together contents, she smiled. “I’ll get you some bread.”
“I appreciate your efforts on my behalf,” I said, and smiled as she waved my words away as unimportant. The rituals of dealing with kitchen staff have remained fairly consistent for centuries—be polite, don’t touch things without invitation, and appreciate their stew, and you’ll be on solid footing.
The stew was beef, as promised, with chunks of carrot, potato, turnip, and beet bobbing in the thick gravy. There were onions as well, and a mixture of herbs that was at once familiar and surprising to my tongue. I didn’t have to feign pleasure as I began to eat, and my mouth was full when Marcia returned with a small loaf of crusty bread and a pot of butter, both of which she set beside my bowl.
“What’s the matter, Baron? Do they not feed you in the Undersea?” she asked, almost laughing.
“They do, but rarely beef,” I replied, after a hasty swallow. “The chefs in Saltmist are both excellent and understandably focused on seafood. Any taste of the land is a pleasant treat to receive. There are nights when I think I would contemplate crime for the sake of a chicken and mushroom pie.”
I smiled to show that I was kidding. When one is considered a criminal, jokes about crime must be made with the utmost delicacy if they’re to be made at all. There was a time when I would have joked about self-harm instead, but the efforts of my therapist and my spouses have convinced me that it’s better not to behave as if my life were a coin I might choose to spend at any moment.
Marcia did laugh then. “I’ll get you a piece of cheese,” she said, as if she were conferring some impossibly large favor, and wandered deeper into her kitchen, leaving me to eat my fill.
It was strange to be sitting comfortably in the kitchen of a land-based knowe. It would have been strange anywhere, but here, where my lady had so recently kept her courts, it was almost an impossibility. I ate my stew and thought of other kitchens, all the way back to the ones I’d known in childhood, when my brother had been always at my side and our futures had still seemed impossibly distant.
Sylvester had already been fond of racing at things headlong, unable to conceive that he might be putting himself in danger, and had taken to picking up all manner of sticks and such to use as swords until the day when our father allowed him a weapon of his own. I had been quieter almost from the beginning, fond of reading, of gardening, of understanding the way things could be put together. The first time I remembered one of our mothers saying that Sylvester would break things and I would fix them, I had been scarcely five years old, and had taken those words as my personal creed, throwing myself against them until the thing that broke had been my sense of self-worth. Sylvester had armored himself and ridden off to do battle, leaving me behind, and I’d been grateful for his abandonment, because if I wasn’t meant to be protecting my brother, I might be able to devote some effort to protecting myself.
Raising children was so fraught. There were so many ways to do them harm without even realizing the risk was there. I remembered the raising of two daughters, but had only truly been involved in raising one—and that child, not half so much as I should have. In the real world, Amy had shut me out of August’s childhood as much as she could, reducing me almost to an affectionate uncle who would sneak her cake and encourage her to grub about in gardens, nothing meaningful. Nothing present.
But August had still chosen me in the divorce, because my absence had been less destructive than Amy’s presence. That terrified me.
There was a scrape across from me as Marcia pulled out the other chair and settled, setting the plate with my cheese in front of me and a bowl of peapods in her lap. She set a second bowl in front of her, looking me directly in the eye, as if she were waiting for me to object to her presence. When I didn’t, she began briskly shelling peas into the second bowl, still watching me.
“Where’d you go, Baron?” she asked. “I know it can’t be the bread. I baked that myself this morning, and it’s excellent.”
“No false modesty?”
She shook her head, still shelling peas. “Never much saw the point,” she said. “It’s always been easier to own what I’ve done brilliantly than it is to pretend I can’t see good from bad and wait for someone else to tell me how skilled I am.”
“A healthy outlook,” I said. “I apologize. The stew is excellent, and eating it here reminded me of my childhood, which brought up some thoughts that might be better contemplated elsewhere.”
“Londinium, wasn’t it?” she asked.
I blinked at her. “Yes, but I thought I was well-shed of the accent. How did you…?”
“Well-shed isn’t the same as ‘free,’” she said. “There are traces, if you listen long enough. And no, I haven’t listened to you long enough, but you have a convenient brother who used to associate with my mistress, back when I still served Lily. I’ve heard him say all manner of things. Plus, well. I serve in a Daoine Sidhe’s Court. I can name the origins and bloodlines of every Daoine Sidhe in the Mists. It seemed safer to do my homework.”
“Fair enough,” I agreed. “I miss it sometimes. Not the city, so much, but the land. The country. The fae have lived in England as long as the humans have, and the land knows us. We followed their ships to the Americas, and this land has never been as familiar, or as welcoming.”
“Doesn’t have to be,” said Marcia.
“No, it doesn’t.”
“What thoughts came that put you a million miles away and leaving your stew to cool?” She snapped another peapod. “Maybe I can help.”
“I don’t—” I paused, then sighed and swirled my spoon in the stew. “Have you ever had children?”
Marcia went very still. “Yes,” she said finally. “But it was a long time ago, and I don’t particularly want to talk about it. Their father and I are not presently together.”
“I apologize, my lady, and didn’t mean to cross any boundaries; I ask only because I am pondering parenthood, and how difficult it is, and how great a thing to undertake.”
“Ah,” said Marcia, nodding. “You took your two daughters and married into a family with two sons. I guess that’s plenty of parenting for one man.”
“Yes, and during Titania’s enchantment, when I was given what I desired most in all the world, I was able to raise both my daughters in peace and comfort, with as few dangers as possible coming anywhere near to them.”
Marcia blinked. “When you were—pardon me, Baron, but that’s not how I’ve heard anyone else describe that liar’s reality. Most people were being punished in some way. What do you mean?”
“I mean that my ex-wife had volunteered me as a sacrifice to the planned Ride that would solidify that world in place of our own, and in order for me to qualify, I had to first be given seven years of paradise. I suppose that since there wasn’t time for a true seven years within the enchantment, they opted instead to give me a lifetime of pleasant memories shared with my family. It was a gift, and as long as I don’t allow myself to consider the strings attached to it, I’m able to appreciate the moments of sweetness it provided to me.”
Marcia blinked again, expression turning horrified. “I … no one told me that,” she squeaked.
“Put very little past the Lady of Flowers,” I said gently. “She has shown us her true colors, and I would rather they not be forgotten again. I can only hope the Lady of the Waters will be better, if she ever chooses to return to us.”
“She will be,” said Marcia, with a quiet, terrible conviction in her voice. “She has to be better than that, or why are we even trying?”
“Indeed,” I said. “And on that note, with a full stomach, I must praise your hospitality and be on my way.” I rose, picking up my empty bowl. “Where shall I put this?”
“Leave it, leave it,” said Marcia, still looking disturbed. “The Count has so little work for us to do, it’s shameful. Let me have the pleasure of doing one of the things I’m paid for.”
“Very well,” I said. “Am I forgiven for my actions while bespelled?”
“Right now, Baron Torquill, you’re forgiven for everything you’ve ever done.”
I smiled. “If only it were so. Good night, Lady Seneschal, and may you have open roads before you.”
“Kind tides to carry you home,” she replied, and watched as I walked away.
* * *
Back in the hall, feeling much better for having eaten, I proceeded to the winding stairway down to the receiving cove. It was a gloriously impossible space, a single set of stairs anchored to the sand at one end and to the free-hanging door on the other—the wall the door was actually set in not being visible once you were on the stairs. At the bottom, a wide expanse of sand extended to a small boardwalk before giving way to the sea, which lapped gently against the contained shore.
There were no riptides here, no storms. The water was always warmer than the Pacific ever deigned to be, because this was a slice of the Summerlands sea, provided for Dean’s sake, to make it easier for his family to visit.
I would never forget the first time I had seen this room, hauled along by October and her King of Cats as they presented me to the people who had arranged for my salvation, who had looked at a broken man and seen that there was still something there to save. Up until that moment, I had given up daring to hope that I might someday be free of the chains I had willingly wrapped around myself, of the terrible people who would only ever use me for terrible things.
I walked across the sand to the boardwalk, stepping onto it and looking out across the water. I had a home now, a true home, for the first time in centuries. I had a family that loved me, not only because they felt they could use me, but because they looked at me and knew that I would return their love enough to keep us all afloat.
I walked to the edge of the boardwalk, looking down. For some men, that would have been a pose of despair. For me, in this moment, it was a pose of greatest hope, and acceptance.
I deserved what was waiting for me in the water. I might not always believe that, but I accepted it now, and I was going to let myself have what I deserved.
Pulling a flask from inside my shirt, I popped the cork out with my thumb and swallowed its contents in a single fierce gulp. They were bubbling and faintly acidic, like drinking a shot of lemon juice mixed with absinthe. While I had been able to refine the water-breathing potion beyond what Dianda’s alchemists had achieved before I came along, I had yet to stabilize the flavor. Every batch was different, and none were what I would call truly pleasant. Still. Putting the flask back inside my shirt, I stood up a little straighter, waiting for the potion to take effect.
When my former mistress had ordered me to remove October from our world, she had done so in vague enough terms that she would have deniability if somehow I was caught, if somehow I was forced to give her up. And because of those vague terms, I had been able to twist what I knew full well was an assassination order into a transformation, changing the girl who was my child in the eyes of the law into a fish’s form and leaving her to the waters. When the change had taken hold, I’d watched her start to suffocate, no longer able to thrive in air. And I had laughed.
I could say that it had been part of a performance, that I’d been trying to keep Oleander’s suspicions at bay—she would respect cruelty where she would have crushed kindness—but I had still done it, and the last thing October had heard with her true ears for fourteen years had been the sound of the man who should have cherished and protected her laughing at her pain.
So I stayed where I was until my own breath began to catch in my throat, my lungs laboring against an atmosphere turned alien to them, and when I felt myself on the verge of suffocation I allowed myself to fall forward into the water, gracelessly returning to the sea.
My breathing resumed immediately, oxygen-starved body taking what it needed from the water without hesitation. I inhaled gratefully. The point hadn’t merely been self-denial, for all that I found peace in paying pebbles of penance into the sea; it was easier to fill my lungs with water when they already ached for air. Without that pause, I would wind up holding my breath anyway, unable to quite relax enough to inhale below the waves until it was almost too late.
The shell in my pocket glowed a bright and enthusiastic green, marking my place in the sea. I turned and began swimming toward the cove exit. Anceline was small, as Cetacea went, but she was still more than twelve feet long, the mermaid melding of Daoine Sidhe and killer whale. It would be easier for her to take me in open waters.
So I swam, only slightly hampered by my shoes and court clothes, head kept well below the water, until I passed below the cove wall and all the glory of the Summerlands sea unspooled around me. It was warmer than the mortal ocean, yes, but also brighter, filled with shafts of coruscating light that pierced deeper than the sun ever could, illuminating the scales of bright-bodied fish and the occasional passing turtle. We were close to the California shore, even here, but the waters around me were more like those of the mortal tropics, welcoming and calm.
