The Mystic Marriage (14 page)

There was one person she knew in Rotenek who would both know the book’s value and have the resources to guard it well. One person who she could trust to be honest enough to return it on demand. If the book were safe, she could sleep again.

Chapter Ten

Margerit

During the night, the light drizzling rain had turned to snow. Not the crisp, pretty snow of Chalanz that Margerit remembered from her childhood, but a moist slush that collected on street corners and settled in heavy clumps in the branches of the trees around the Plaiz. The short carriage ride to the cathedral for Mass became a morass of crowding vehicles and swearing coachmen. Even those whose dignity permitted them to walk to services on a Sunday morning had chosen to ride, and the drivers jockeyed for the closest spot to the steps to save fine shoes from the muck. Barbara had urged an early start, her old instincts anticipating the crush of the crowd, but even as small a household as theirs couldn’t be hurried so easily, and they arrived in the worst of the confusion.

So it wasn’t until Marken shifted—in that way an armin had that both warned of and warned off trouble—that Margerit noticed the woman working crosswise through the crowd on the porch, coming toward them. Her movements were vaguely familiar despite a worn cloak wrapped tightly around her, hiding her face in shadow. When she came close enough for Marken to step deliberately into her path, the familiarity resolved itself.

“Antuniet?” Margerit exclaimed, pausing in the flow of worshippers. At her back, she felt Barbara turn sharply, while Aunt Bertrut and Uncle Charul moved on toward the doors, unheedingly.

Antuniet tried unsuccessfully to step around Marken, looking daggers at him when he laid a hand lightly on her shoulder in warning, but she knew better than to persist. Margerit stepped forward, on the verge of calling him off, but Antuniet glanced around wildly, then drew a package from under her cloak, thrusting it into Marken’s waiting hands. Margerit knew Antuniet’s words were meant for her ears as she said urgently, “Keep it safe! Whatever you do, keep it safe!”

And then she was gone, back into the crowd. How long had she been waiting there for them? Margerit wondered. And what was she afraid of? She held out her hand to Marken for the package and saw him exchange a quick look over her shoulder with Barbara.

“Later,” Barbara said in her ear. “Let’s get inside first.”

Whatever fear was haunting Antuniet seemed to have infected the others, and Margerit let herself be carried along into the nave to find their places before repeating the request.

It was a battered leather satchel of the sort used to carry valuable books for travel. And by the weight and shape of the burden within, that seemed to be the contents of this one. She undid the straps enough to peek. It had an old, thick binding, corded across the back and worn rough at the corners. She started to pull it out then some instinct stopped her, as if she felt eyes upon her, watching. No, not here. Recalling the look in Antuniet’s eyes, she handed the satchel back to Marken. “You heard her, keep it safe. And out of sight,” she added as an afterthought. Time enough later for questions. He shrugged an arm out of the sleeve of his greatcoat to slip the strap over his shoulder and tucked the bag away in its folds behind his back.

The weather was not the only sign of the turn of the seasons. Next Sunday would begin the Advent services, a reminder that winter was truly come. Margerit looked over to the seats reserved for Princess Annek and others of the royal family. Back in Prince Aukust’s day they’d rarely been occupied, at least by the time she’d come to the city. He’d been too frail and Elisebet had preferred the private palace chapel. But Annek was there to be seen most Sundays and at all the special services. It was, perhaps, a calculated choice, but the others in the royal household followed her lead and the palace was always well represented these days. Advent would bring another such change, for Annek had announced that the Royal Guild’s Christmas mysteries would be public for the first time in anyone’s memories, leading up to the New Year’s court and all its pomp.

Margerit cared little for the court itself. Barbara had taken her during the two years past, and the intricate web of intrigue and power-balancing that played out on its stage had only confused her. Barbara drank it in like mother’s milk, watching the slightest changes in greetings and courtesies, hearing what was said in corridors, teasing every scrap of meaning out of the princess’s actions and the court’s responses. Barbara was the one who had found deeper meaning in the change to the Advent mysteries. Margerit only knew that it was a new chance to study the compositions of Tinzek without need for special pleading.

It seemed special pleading would not have been needed in any event. In the confused lull after services ended came an informal summons to Annek’s presence in the name of that very topic.

“You were planning to attend?” she asked, evidently in no doubt of the answer.

Margerit nodded with a small curtsey.

“Then I was hoping you might take some notes. I have no plans to change the ceremony itself, of course, but I’d like to have a better understanding of the purpose and effects. I’d like to do that for most of the Guild’s work eventually—saving only those of the Great Mysteries for which we have no present need. And I’d like to know if having spectators affects the work. Secrecy and privacy have their place, but…”

Margerit knew the rest of it from frequent repetition. The people should see how they were governed and what their rulers did for them. Secrecy bred irrelevance. The old guard was scandalized by Annek’s approach, but it was a new age. “I’ll need a copy of the text,” Margerit began.

“Yes, yes, of course,” Annek replied, already turned to the next petitioner. “Come to the palace tomorrow. My secretary will have a copy you can borrow.”

On their return to Tiporsel House, it was like those early days in Rotenek when nothing had seemed more important than slipping away to the library to study a newly acquired book, with Barbara leaning close at her elbow. How slow she’d been to realize that Barbara leaning close had been as important as the books! There was no need for coy, accidental touches now.

Barbara stood over her as she slipped Antuniet’s puzzle out onto the round table in the center of the room and pulled a chair close to study it.

The pages were covered with what seemed like gibberish, though the diagrams and symbols made the contents clear. “Alchemy. Well, that’s no surprise,” Margerit said, feeling something akin to disappointment. “I heard that was what she’s been working on. For all the fuss I expected something more dangerous.”

“Dangerous enough to have frightened her,” Barbara countered. “And you have no idea what the book really holds.” She traced a finger along the first few lines of text. “A simple substitution in the vowels, I think. See here?
De gemis itaque ac lapidibus.
That’s clear enough even without knowing the symbols. But it would take some time to work through and I suspect there are other codes. You don’t know, and ignorance is dangerous. Don’t forget what happened the last time a Chazillen left papers in your hands. That time they were meant to brand you a traitor. You’d do better to hand the book off at once.”

“To whom?”

Barbara shrugged. “Someone better equipped to weather those dangers. Who’s to say what’s hidden in here? Take it to the palace. If you give it to Annek at once, no one can accuse you later of conspiring in whatever comes of this.”

“But she gave it to me. Keep it safe, she said. I’ll tell Her Grace about it, but there must be some reason Antuniet entrusted it to me.”

Margerit heard victory in Barbara’s sigh. There was one more warning. “Don’t assume that reason is to anyone’s benefit but Antuniet’s.” But she sat down and pulled the book over to examine it more closely.

After two hours of study, Margerit was only a little more enlightened than she had been by those first few pages. The book was wide-ranging and detailed, with formulas and diagrams at every step—more the working notebooks of a practitioner than a text meant for the instruction of students. If Antuniet had been keeping ribbons in the sections of particular interest to her work, those markers had been carefully removed. She closed the covers at last and looked questioningly at Barbara. “Safe?”

Barbara gestured around them. “What could be a safer place to hide a book than in among the rest?”

It hardly seemed to answer Antuniet’s sense of concern, but without knowing what specifics she had feared, there was no telling how to counter them. Safe from thieves? From damage? From some more invisible hazard? She looked up at the shelves for an open space. Not among works of similar topic. In the end she slipped it in between two volumes of a commentary on the
Statuta Antiqua
whose bindings were similar in age and color. Nothing would draw the eye. “I wish I knew—” Margerit began.

“I intend to find out,” Barbara countered. “I should have been keeping a closer eye on her since the day I knew she’d returned.”

“Barbara, do you really think this is some revenge aimed at me? It doesn’t smell like a trap. And why be so obvious?”

“At you? No. But that business with the Guild wasn’t aimed at you either. Not really. It was aimed at your fortune. And at Efriturik and his brother. That didn’t mean you were in any less danger. The Chazillens have always acted for their own interests first. They don’t much care who falls under the carriage wheels. That’s what worries me.”

Keep it safe.
The words haunted Margerit’s dreams that night. The Antuniet she remembered from their time as students together had never been that haunted, that desperate. What had she seen in the years since she’d left Rotenek that had stripped away the old confidence and—yes—arrogance? Margerit checked that the book was still in place the next morning before setting out to the palace.
Keep it safe.
It still whispered at the back of her mind when she took the borrowed
expositulum
for the Advent mysteries to the Poor-Scholars Hall at the edge of the university district and asked who might be available to do a bit of copying.

“It’s a bit of a rush, I’m afraid,” she told the older woman who had met her in the visitors’ parlor. Margerit had never seen more of the building than that room. Whatever their lives had been before being taken into the Hall, the young women there were watched over as strictly as any well-born debutante or convent-bound novice until the day they left to take up the careers that the scant edges of a university education might fit them for. All too often, Margerit knew, their futures held nothing higher than keeping accounts in a shop or tutoring the daughters of ambitious
burfroi
families. It seemed a paltry thing to bring her copy-work to them, but Margerit had fallen into the habit of coming here by preference.

“I’ll fetch Mefro Mainus,” the woman replied. “She’ll know who might be available.”

“Akezze? Is she still here?” Margerit was surprised. She hadn’t seen Akezze Mainus since the breaking up of the ill-fated Guild of Saint Atelpirt. She must have found some position outside the city. The woman shrugged and left the parlor. She was only a portress and chaperone. It wasn’t her business to know the whys, only the wheres and with whoms.

Akezze’s eyes lit up when she entered the parlor. She had clearly come direct from her work, for a smudge of ink stood out against the pallor of her cheek where she must have tucked a stray coppery curl back under her muslin cap. “Maisetra Sovitre! I hoped I might see you again! How may I serve you?”

Her greeting was a reminder that the illusion of equal fellowship had dissolved with the Guild. Margerit kept the other woman’s Christian name off her tongue and gave her the dignity of formal address and a scholar’s rank. “Maisetra Mainus, I have a bit of copying to be done. I’m afraid I’m in a bit of a hurry and some discretion is called for. Ceremonies of the Royal Guild. I know there’s a scriptorium here at the Hall but I can’t really let the papers out of my hands. The work would have to be done at my house. Do you have anyone who could be spared?”

“
I
can be spared,” she answered crisply. “Is it bound or loose? Would it help to have several hands? There are two or three girls who might have time at the moment. You’d have to pay extra to have one of the matrons come with them. I’m afraid I’m not respectable enough to serve the purpose.”

Margerit smiled in amusement at that. Akezze was one of the most proper people she knew, but the matrons also had widowhood as a shield for their reputations. “Are you still studying?” she asked. “I’d thought—”

A troubled look crossed Akezze’s face. “No, I’m only passing through between positions. There was space to lend me a bed for a few months and I’ve been overseeing the scribbling to pay for my keep.” Her brisk tone didn’t invite further questions.

Margerit nodded, returning to business. “Whoever you can spare, then. Starting this afternoon, if possible, when lectures are over. I need to return the
expositula
to the palace by Saturday. And—” A sudden thought came to her. “—I have another job in mind after that. Similarly discreet and requiring some very careful work.”

Akezze echoed her nod, then said more warmly, “It’s good to see you again. I heard about your appointment and…the other matter. The baroness.”

And which part of
that
did she mean? But there was no hint of anything but friendly interest, and surely the simple matter of Barbara’s inheritance was all she intended. Margerit answered vaguely, “Who guessed how the world would turn?”

“And are
you
still studying?”

Margerit grinned. “Always and ever. As much as they’ll let me.” Neither of them had ever been matriculated students, of course. Whether Poor-Scholar or well-off dabbler, female students were allowed to attend lectures from the gallery as long as sufficient fees were paid. But even apart from no hope for a degree, there were limits. Margerit allowed some of her frustration to show. “How did you ever get so far with Kant? I remember you outpaced even Choriaz in working proofs but I’ve met walls at every turn. I can’t trust to luck that one of the men will ask the same questions I’m puzzling over, and you know how Grossler is. Even a royal command couldn’t get him to bend on the subject of tutoring women. Not that I’d ask Her Grace to interfere, of course,” she added hastily.