Love-in-a-Mist Read online

  “Oh, this is Jemis, all right,” Mr. Dart said, grinning at me. “No one else could have quite that matter-of-fact air about referencing the sweet-shop seller in Ragnor Bella.”

  The maid came back with my plate of toast, presented Marcan with another bobbing curtsy, and set down the toast on the counter so she could serve him with coffee. He greeted her politely and said that ‘his friend here’ would like the Linder sauces for breakfast.

  “Very good, sorr,” she said, then blushed and curtsied again. “Your highness, sorry, sorr.”’

  He waved her off. “No matter that, Clara. Tell Master Swentin that I won’t be hunting this morning. I must see to my guests.”

  “I do thank you for your hospitality,” I said on this reminder.

  “It’s not as if you gave me any choice,” he grumbled. “Falling out of nowhere into my bedroom, dying, coming back to life … I’ve spent the night praying, I’ll have you know.”

  I thought of all those white prayer-birds. “I do know. Thank you.”

  He shifted uneasily. “Yes. Well. I’ll be speaking to the Archbishop of this. What is your direction?”

  “We’re on our way home to South Fiellan,” Mr. Dart said. “Is the pass over to the Coombe still open, do you know? Are we far from it?”

  “It’s about fifteen miles north from here,” Marcan replied, thus proving Clara to be quite correct. “There’s been snow on the heights but the passes should still be open, if you hasten. Swentin said there’s bad weather coming down. You might want to go all the way north and cross over the Crook.”

  Mr. Dart glanced at me. I shrugged, as aware as he that it was all too likely that the Indrillines would have sent out their forces to intercept us. We would be coming from an entirely unexpected direction, and might indeed manage to pass behind them if we were lucky, but that was not a sort of luck I had ever had much truckle with. Games of chance, yes. Chances with life, no.

  “We’ll discuss it with the others,” Mr. Dart said, and obviously changed the subject. “What sort of hunting do you have here? Bear? Boar? Stags?”

  Marcan leaned forward enthusiastically. “All of that and more. Mountain sheep, too, and chamois. There are even a few cougars in the upper ranges. Do you hunt?”

  “Fish, rather. We have salmon and trout—”

  “Salmon come so far up the Rag? We don’t have them this side of the mountains, alas—”

  And they were off.

  I smirked at Mr. Dart over my now refilled cup of coffee, thinking of all his invitations to go poaching, which was a sport everyone in our barony partook in at some point or another. Well, everyone but the actual owners of the river-rights, which consisted of the baron, Mr. Dart’s brother the Squire of Dartington, and my uncle. Everyone else nominally rented certain rights but actually poached from the good pools on the baron’s private stretch.

  This relentlessly ordinary conversation was interrupted by the arrival of, first, Violet, followed closely by Hal, and thirdly by Jullanar Maebh. The former two came in, greeted Mr. Dart and Marcan with grave (so to speak) courtesy, and smiled uncertainly at me. Neither appeared to have slept well either.

  I was about to ask Violet after her brother, whom I had not yet properly met, when Jullanar Maebh, who had moved to curtsy to Marcan, caught sight of me and emitted a short piercing scream. Quite as if she’d seen a ghost.

  I startled, half standing to return the salutations, and stared at her. She lifted her hand to her mouth, eyes wide and fearful. “Dear Lady. Can—dear goddess—I don’t—I can’t—”

  “Good morning,” I tried.

  Mr. Dart buffeted me in the arm. “It’s all right, cousin. He’s alive.”

  “He isn’t,” she insisted. “I laid out his body. I’ve laid out bodies before. He was dead.”

  “It was a miracle,” I offered.

  “Sit down and be quiet, Mr. Greenwing,” Mr. Dart ordered sharply, eyes flashing a colour I could not quite name. The air shivered around him, but I wasn’t sure if anyone noticed besides Hal, who raised his eyebrow briefly, and perhaps Violet, who frowned.

  Mr. Dart walked around the table and took his cousin’s—really his niece’s—arm to lead her gently but firmly from the room, talking intently in an undertone the while.

  I sat down obediently, then smiled apologetically at Violet, who was still just taking her seat. “Mr. Dart is coming to be more decisive of late, or so I’ve discovered. It must be our Morrowlea influence; Stoneybridge appears to have been much more reserved.”

  Marcan said, “You’re actually Jemis Greenwi—Wait. Do you mean your Mr. Dart went to Stoneybridge?”

  Chapter Two

  I have to admit that never in my life before had anyone been more startled by Mr. Dart’s name than my own. I was still greatly under the influence of spiritual peace: I found it gratifying.

  “Yes. He read History at Stoneybridge.”

  Marcan gave every evidence of awe. “He wrote the most amazing paper on the campaigns under the Emperor Eritanyr—oh! I had no idea he was just our age. My tutor said he’d been offered a fellowship at Tara. She desperately wanted him for our faculty, but didn’t expect he’d pass up a full fellowship there. Who would!”

  “Mm,” I replied, thinking of Mr. Dart’s mixed behaviour at Tara, but Marcan wasn’t attending.

  “I was sure he was already on his second degree at Stoneybridge. Lady, I must have read half of his term papers! I can’t believe it. There was a truly incredible account of the Orkaty campaign in last spring’s Journal of Astandalan History. So much has been written on it, of course, what with the extraordinary courage and fortitude shown by Major Jack Greenwing under the command of General Halioren, but Mr. Dart’s paper—”

  He shook his head in wonder. “And then that essay on the Gainsgooding Campaign, which he did in conjunction with some colleague studying Classical Shaian poetry supplying the translations.”

  He frowned suddenly at me. I assumed this was in some reflection on the fact that said Major Jack Greenwing was my father, but no. “You spent half of second year on those poems, in correspondence with your friend at Stoneybridge.”

  I hadn’t realized Mr. Dart had actually put our results in for publication. Mind, he might well have told me at some point when I was deep under the influence of the wireweed and consequently unheeding of outside concerns. “Yes? That was this Mr. Dart.”

  “Those are good translations,” he said grudgingly. “Mind you, pretty well all the historians think you went rather too far into the abstruse with your decipherments of their so-called esoteric meanings.”

  I had forgotten how bull-dogged Marcan could be about the facts, and only the facts, Jemis. It always amazed me how devout he was at the same time. I suppose if you accepted the tenets of faith as axioms, then a strict adherence to dogma made sense.

  Still, I was mightily pleased that I now actually had proof of my process. “We just escaped Orio Prison by exactly the same method of analysis, though the subject was Ariadne nev Lingarel’s On Being Incarcerated in Orio Prison, not one of the Gainsgooding poems. Albeit I think she might have been one of the undiscovered conspirators—”

  “Dear Lady, not that bloody poem again. Hal, how can you stand this? You heard even more about that poem than the rest of us.”

  Hal sipped from his coffee with ducal equanimity. “I have to admit that Jemis did manage to provide us a means of escaping the reputedly inescapable prison with only the poem and his studies of the architect’s works in the Archives.”

  “Well, there you have it,” Marcan said triumphantly.

  I stole my cup back from Mr. Dart’s place and rallied arguments, unreal as they seemed at the moment, and wholly unnecessary in the event, as the door opened on the maid, bringing a tray of dishes to set on the table.

  She set a platter of sausages in front of me, along with a fresh plate of toast. “Here you go, sorr, Linder sauces. M’lady, what would you like? There’s toast, and kippers, and sauces, and porridge.” br />
  “Porridge, thank you,” Violet replied demurely. “I must thank you, Marcan, for your hospitality. I’m afraid I didn’t greet you properly last night.”

  Marcan nodded, a little stiffly. He’d been there, of course, for the disastrous end of our Morrowlea education, when he and Hal had stood by me—and Violet by Lark. “Is your brother feeling better this morning?” he asked carefully. “I hope the physician was able to be of assistance, though we’re limited in our resources here.”

  She glanced at me and Hal. “The physician suggested his ailments would be best served by taking him to the Halls of Healing, on Nên Corovel. I would like that very much.” Her voice faltered. I tried to remember what I’d learned about her brother, and by extension herself, back in the prison. It was not that I didn’t recall it, precisely, but that everything from before my death felt … remote.

  The Halls of Healing on Nên Corovel were the premier school of medicine on Alinor. I wasn’t sure if they were simply located near, or actually were a part of, the Lady of Alinor’s court there. The Isle had been noted for healing waters for many, many centuries.

  Long before the coming of the Empire there had been stories about sacred wells and magic flowers and unicorns and all sorts of similar wonders. The Summer Country, it was named in many stories. The Rainbow-Girt Isle in others. Once, it was said, it had floated around the world on the back of a whale.

  My father had been healed there, after being rescued in the summer from the pirate ship on which he had been enslaved.

  I let the conversation flow around me as I attended to the ‘sauces’, which were quite delicious, flavoured with a herb I didn’t recognize. In a quiet moment I leaned over to Hal, who sat next to me, and asked him if he knew what it was. It was something like thyme, but a little saltier and with a hint of parsley or something like it.

  “Summer savoury, I believe,” he said after taking a bite. “These are good.”

  He had gone for the kippers, which looked delicious. They always tempted me, when I saw them, but I always regretted them afterwards.

  “I like the gravy, too,” I said, wishing I dared use the bread to sop it up.

  “That would be most appreciated, Marcan, thank you,” Violet said gratefully. Hal and I both turned enquiringly to her.

  “Marcan’s offered us the use of his carriage,” she explained. “We should be able to take a ship safely from one of the free ports along the Arcadian coast. Ru’s too unwell to ride, I fear.”

  Ah yes, her brother’s name was Ruaridh … and he was the son and heir of the Lady of Alinor.

  The knowledge slid into place easily, then sat there awkwardly.

  Violet, whom I had thought an Indrilline spy, was instead a spy for the Lady of Alinor on the Indrillines. And the Lady had been keeping herself remote and reluctant to act against the growing might of the Indrillines not only because of her attention being focused on their rival criminal gang, the Knockermen, who had pirate fleets in the Northern Sea, but also because her heir Ruaridh had been held hostage in the prison of Orio City for the past six years.

  Mr. Dart and Hal would have a far better sense than I what might change in the world as a result of this rescue. I have to admit that I was more interested by the realization that this meant that Violet was actually someone I could appropriately court. I would have done so regardless, but I couldn’t pretend it wouldn’t make it easier all round.

  The daughter of the Lady of Alinor was more than a tad high for me, in fact—except that I was the Viscount St-Noire, according to Hal second-most-eligible bachelor of Northwest Oriole after himself, and surely that had to be good for something.

  Hal elbowed me. “Jemis, stop smiling like that.”

  I blinked at him. “How was I smiling?”

  He hesitated, which I took to mean that I was showing too much emotion too nakedly. From his relieved expression when I straightened my expression, it was too close a reminder of last night’s miracle. I wanted to sing out to the heavens that I had seen the heavens, and how goodly they were indeed; but that was not how well-educated young gentlemen of our day behaved.

  “You’ll have to leave soon, then, if you want to catch a ship before the season’s over,” Marcan said. He looked over at Hal and me. “What are your plans? Not to say that you may not stay here a while, if you’d like,” he added, less enthusiastically.

  I repressed an amused snort. Hal simply nodded and replied at face value. “Thank you, but I do need to return to Fillering Pool as quickly as possible. There have been some strange developments this past week, and I must confer with my advisors.” He gave an oblique smile at Violet. “I shall have to make some adjustments to the list of invitations for our Winterturn Ball, at the very least. You’re coming, I hope, Marcan?”

  “My father won’t give me permission to take orders before I come of age,” Marcan said glumly, which was evidently the agreement Hal expected, for he simply clouted him on the shoulder.

  “Our hunting’s not so fine as your mountains, but we do have some excellent deer.”

  Marcan nodded more happily. “Well, that’s all right then! So you’re headed north, over the Crook?”

  “And my party to the pass to the Coombe,” I put in, “if we can make it before the snow closes it in.”

  “You’ll want to get mules at Finoury’s Inn, in that case. Let me think.”

  We all continued with our meals as he pondered. Clara wandered in and refilled everyone’s coffee, stating in a desultory sort of way that our other guests were dining in their rooms. I hoped Jullanar Maebh recovered from her fright soon. I didn’t think I was at fault, precisely, but obviously it was my doing she was so overtaken.

  “I have it,” Marcan said after a moment. “Violet, you and your brother will take the carriage south—I’ll give you a letter of recommendation in case anyone stops to enquire why you have it. You may meet my father on the way, he’s coming up for a week’s hunting some time soon. I’m afraid I don’t have any riding horses to spare for the rest of you. I know Jemis doesn’t mind going longshank, and Hal, of course you walked with us from Morrowlea, but we shouldn’t subject Mr. Dart’s cousin to the exertion. If you will pardon the indignity, I will direct the carter to take you all in the heavy dray towards Finoury’s Inn, where Hal can collect the stagecoach or a hack, and Jemis’s party can hire mules to take them over the pass.”

  We all agreed to this reasonable suggestion, and shortly after broke up our grouping to tell the rest of our party the plan and collect our few belongings together. I had nothing at all, and after informing Mr. Dart that we would be leaving in an hour or so, I wandered along the upper hallway examining the carvings.

  I encountered Violet at the far end of the gallery. She had just come out of a door as I turned the corner, and startled badly.

  “Violet,” I said, sweeping her one of my foolish be-curlicued bows and giving her what I hoped was an engaging smile.

  “Jemis,” she replied severely, though there was a hint of a dimple at the corner of her mouth.

  I wasn’t sure what to say. I had given last night the messages I had been entrusted with, from various late relations, but once spoken the news had faded out of my mind; they were not my secrets to know, or to keep, only to pass on. Violet’s had been from a grandmother, I remembered vaguely, but nothing else.

  “It was a beautiful place, where you were?” Violet asked suddenly. “On the other side.”

  I leaned up against the gallery balustrade. The upper floor of the lodge was arranged in a square around a central two-storey space. It was all very solid and material. “It was,” I agreed. “There was a forest, and a stream, and flowers. The Mountains in the distance.”

  “And Ariadne nev Lingarel waiting for you.”

  I smiled at her, the delight thrilling through me again, the mystery and the grace of that encounter. “Yes. I don’t understand it, you know. I’ve never read much theology. I met her, and we talked, then she went on to the Mountains and I went
to a kind of glade where I saw my mother and stepfather and the others and talked with them.”

  She was silent for a few minutes, looking down. I waited patiently. Finally she said, “And was that Heaven, do you think?”

  “The Mountains are our true home,” I said with the certainty I had felt on seeing them. “The forest there … Ariadne called it the Wood of Spiritual Refreshment. She said it takes everyone different lengths of time to be ready to go on. I know I would have been there a while … She said she hadn’t been a good person, in this life, and it was only through her poetry that she learned her way to the Mountains. The Lady said that no one who desired the Mountains would be left behind.”

  Violet looked up at me, and I recalled the deep secret she had given as coin for her passage through the Labyrinth of Ihuranuë, that her brother’s long imprisonment and consequent broken health were the result of an ill-judged and ill-spirited prank of hers.

  I judged it best to change the subject.

  “I think you’d look very well in the dress Ariadne was wearing,” I blurted out without thinking further. “It was very simple—a columnar skirt, gathered under the bodice, with a sort of square neck—”

  She burst out laughing. “Are you truly giving me fashion advice from the afterlife? Oh, Jemis!”

  I blushed, but laughed along with her. “It was a lovely dress. I remember wishing it had been in fashion.”

  “I’ve seen pictures of that period. They can be most flattering garments.”

  “And not current style anywhere at the moment.”

  “A point to be considered, certainly,” she replied, eyes dancing.

  “Violet,” I said impulsively, “may I write to you?”

  Her face went still and sober immediately. “Jemis …”

  “Violet,” I said again, “you told me I shouldn’t trust you, that things were not as they seem. But now I know that you’re on the Lady’s side—”

  “It remains to be seen whether she will let me stay at her side.”

  We were speaking of two different Ladies, one the Lady of the Green and White, the goddess, the other the human great mage who was Lady of Alinor. I changed tack to that thought. “She’s your mother.”