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Authors: Caroline Stevermer

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BOOK: A College of Magics
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Faris nodded.
It was difficult to be certain, for with her back to the fire Jane's expression was hidden in shadow, but she seemed to be waiting expectantly. After a long pause, she added, “I won't tell a soul, you know.”
Faris said, “What
are
you talking about?” but before she finished speaking, she felt her too ready blush rise up to betray her. Even by firelight, her discomfiture was plain.
Jane shook her fist at Faris. “You wretch, you knew what I meant all along and you wanted to torture me until I said it aloud. And don't dare ask
Say what aloud?
or I shall
smite
you.”
“Very well. But don't try to persuade me that the Dean would ever ask me to explain my—my menial paramour.”
“She wouldn't have to ask. She could tell just by looking at you. I can't.”
Faris rose and began to pace. “How could you, when I have no idea myself?” She shook her head. “If you'd asked me this morning, I wouldn't have known what you were talking about. But when he brought me my gloves this afternoon, I finally realized. Oh, God, I'm so thick. And Brinker is quite right. He is my servant. He's married. Why am I even thinking about this?”
Jane sat at the writing desk and watched Faris pace restlessly before the fire. “Stop that. I don't need an answer after all. Your behavior makes it all perfectly clear.” In a murmur, she added, “I wonder if that's how the Dean does it?”
“What am I going to do?” Before Jane could reply, Faris lifted her hands in despair and answered her own question. “What am I saying? I know perfectly well what I'm going to do. I'm going to pretend nothing's changed. I'm going to ignore it. Nothing's happened. I'm fine. Everything's fine.”
“Just what I was going to say.”
“What am I going to
do,
Jane?”
Jane shook her head. “Wait and see.”
 
The storm lasted all through the night and well into the next day. When the snow stopped, the wind went from cold to ridiculously cold and stayed there for two days. Once the weather eased, the countryside lay silent in white, colored
only with the blue shadows cast by wind-carved snow. For a day longer, the silence held. Then the wind came back, from the south this time, the snow slowly vanished into brown fields, and a richly dressed messenger arrived at the gates of Galazon Chase. The king of Aravill had sent the duchess of Galazon her diplomatic credentials, and a warmly phrased invitation to attend him in Aravis.
The Warden of the North
Aravis
F
aris hated everything about the next five days. She had to pack, which was tedious, and then watch Jane pack, which was worse. She was leaving Galazon, but not Brinker. She was going to Aravis, where Hilarion had sent her, to attempt something she had no idea how to do.
To reach Aravis, they had to travel by carriage to Wex, then down the Lida by river steamer to Shene, and finally, by carriage again to Aravis. The meals were poor. The beds, when they managed to find a wayside inn that met Brinker's high standards, were damp. Neither the meals nor the beds mattered much to Faris, but both did to Agnes.
As they left the high meadows and deep forests of Galazon behind, the horizon dropped and the sky seemed to open and broaden. By Wex, the land was quite flat. Faris felt a sense of foreboding that increased as the journey went on, a mood she could not reason herself out of. Leaving Galazon was bad enough, but leaving it for the monotonous flats of the Lida river valley, was somehow worse.
The signs of snow vanished as they moved south. The bare trees regained only a little of their golden foliage, but the grass was still green. Faris was troubled by the feeling that they were running most unnaturally backward in time.
She had managed, with difficulty, to put her anxiety about Tyrian away where it could trouble neither of them. Tyrian, she told herself, had promised to go with her to Aravis so that she could mend the rift. To concern herself with anything beyond that was folly. There was no assurance there would
be
anything beyond that.
Tyrian's duties en route meant she seldom saw him for more than a moment. Faris could not help but feel relieved. She had utter faith in Tyrian's sense of decorum, but she feared for her own and dreaded that Agnes—or worse, Brinker—might surprise her in some fit of bashfulness.
Brinker and Agnes were traveling together in the lead carriage. The baby and her attendants were in the second. Jane and Faris were in the third, while the rest of the entourage, including servants and baggage, with Reed and Tyrian watchful over all, brought up the rear.
Preparations for the journey had kept Faris extremely busy. Despite her best intentions, she had not yet had time to finish Jane's neatly docketed report. She packed it with her personal effects but did not take time to look at it until the journey was nearly over. Even then, it was in self defense.
Jane had pored over her Baedeker ceaselessly since entering the carriage for the final stage of the journey. The steamer voyage down the river had reduced Jane to silent misery. Despite the smooth passage they had enjoyed, unusually calm for the season, Jane suffered the violent reaction to travel over water to which most witches of Greenlaw were prone. Since their debarkation at Shene, however, Jane's spirits had recovered completely.
Faris, on the other hand, was struggling to conceal her gloom, which deepened with every mile that brought her closer to Aravis. Though the flatness of the landscape was gone, replaced by stony ridges, the sense of exposure remained. In an effort to discourage Jane, she brought forth her report and tried to pretend she could concentrate on it while the carriage swayed along. “Where did you say this report of yours came from?”
“I didn't say.” Jane turned a page.
“Aravis, the capital of Aravill, and one of the most romantically beautiful cities in Europe, is finely situated on a series of ridges, separated by ravines, south of Shene Inlet, of which charming views are obtained from the higher parts of town.”
“Riveting,
The principal political parties of Aravill are Royalist, Conservative Royalist, Monarchist, and Liberal Radical. The king's ministers are chosen by a coalition of the first two parties. The latter two parties have formed an uneasy coalition to represent the opposition.”
Faris held a page of the report up to the carriage window and squinted at it. “British watermark. Yet you came by it in Paris. Odd.”
“You're supposed to read it, not appraise it.”
“Very well.
The Monarchist party, in particular, bears a misleading label, since part of their platform repudiates the house of Paganell and denies its right to rule. By far the newest of the parties, it has been active only in the past four years. The extremist element of the Monarchists hold that reform, by any means necessary, is vital. These extremists, who revel in elaborate passwords and countersigns, may provide a disruptive element in the future. The
party
anthem,
Tom o'Bedlam's Song,
has been outlawed by royal fiat.”
“How interesting. Allow me to inform you that
the population, excluding Shene, is (1908) 350,500. Aravis is the seat of the administrative and judicial authorities of Aravill, and is renowned for its excellent university and schools.”
“Bilge.
Members of the Monarchist party are predominantly young and uneducated. The party leader, Istvan Graelent, is a recent graduate of the University of Aravis. Reliable sources inform us that the popular songs concerned with the modern exploits of Tom o'Bedlam, obviously inspired by the party anthem, refer to this individual. Rumors associating Monarchist party fortunes with Austrian financial interests cannot be confirmed, but neither can they be discounted.”
Faris stopped reading aloud, but turned the page, absorbed.
Relentlessly, Jane continued.
“Excursions in the neighborhood of Aravis are extremely beautiful and historically interesting. The royal chateau at Sevenfold is one of the greatest attractions.”
“Oh, Jane, put it away.”
“Perhaps no fairer or more harmonious combination of art and nature is to be found among the cities of the world, and even the buildings of little or no beauty in themselves generally blend happily with the surrounding scenery. The stranger is advised to begin his acquaintance with the ‘Modern Athens' by obtaining a general view of it from the castle or from Artegal Hill.”
“Look, I'm putting the report away. I won't read any more if you don't.”
Jane was resolute.
“Near the center of the city and between the main street and the castle, there are some pretty grounds called Montleret Gardens. At the heart of the grounds lies Montleret Water, a small but picturesque natural lake which is enhanced by fountains, the water supplied by the elaborate cisterns, a triumph of engineering, which have been carved into the living stone beneath the castle rock. To the north of Montleret Gardens
—Did you say something?” Jane looked up. “Is anything the matter? You look dreadful. Are you going to be ill?”
Faris put her head in her hands. Her governess had taught her history and geography in which Galazon and Aravill were inextricably mixed. Yet now she realized just how little she knew of Aravis. The dry facts conspired to fog her mind. Even the crowded, noisy, smelly quay side they had left behind them at Shene became ephemeral as soon as Jane read the name aloud. She groaned softly. “What am I doing? I don't know anything about protocol. I don't know anything about cisterns. I don't know anything about the Monarchists or the Conservative Royalists.”
Jane studied Faris for an instant, then clapped shut her red Baedeker and rummaged in the depths of her valise. She produced a flat silver flask, pulled the stopper, and handed it to Faris. “Drink this.”
Faris eyed the little flask mistrustfully. “Brandy won't solve everything.”
“It's cognac and it will solve what's wrong with you. You've got stage fright, that's what. Let me just remind you that you don't have to know anything about protocol. That's what I'm for. Nor cisterns, that's what the Baedeker's
for. And as for the Monarchists—” Jane snapped her fingers. “They can look out for themselves.”
Faris took a cautious sip. Jane held out her hand. “That's enough. Save a little for first-night jitters.”
Faris returned the flask. “Thank you. I think I'll be fine now, if I don't hear any more about the charming views.”
Jane stoppered the flask and put it away. “Too late. Here comes one now.” She nodded toward the window.
Faris turned to look. Their route had taken them south from Shene into gray hills, rocky and dry, then eastward along the brow of a ridge. Now from the right side of the carriage they could see the hills drop away into a vale of scattered houses, and far beyond rise again in a ridge as jagged and stark as a dragon's spine.
The line of the ridge rose and fell and rose again, as if mocking the rise and fall of a dragon's haunch and back and shoulder, a silhouette familiar to Faris from her first school books. At this distance, she could not make out the summit of the last rise. Plumes of cloud or smoke concealed it. But from those same books, she knew that the distant ridge, scaled with roof tops and scored with streets, was Aravis. The dragon's head was crowned with the castle that gave the city its older name, Aravis Palatine.
Jane and Faris watched in silence until the route turned south again and the carriage windows showed them only trees and houses and featureless garden walls. “Perfectly charming. If only it were a clearer day, we might have been able to make out the castle itself from here.” Jane started to reach for her Baedeker but Faris's glance of mute entreaty
stilled her hand. “I expect we'll see the castle soon enough.”
“At close quarters.” Faris shut her eyes. She badly wanted a cup of coffee.
The road took them down into the valley, across a bridge, and into an area closely built with houses, where it turned into a street. Gradually the houses came closer and closer together until they bumped into each other and ran in even rows, squashed shoulder to shoulder facing the street.
Faris regarded the cramped symmetry with dislike. As their route began to rise again, the street passed through a city gate and then climbed to the foot of the ridge. Here the streets were narrow and crooked. In places buildings had grown together overhead, leaving only a tunnel to let foot traffic continue.
Some of the sweating brick passages were hardly more than a flight of steps connecting two streets. Some were large enough to warrant a street sign set into the wall near the entrance. Faris savored the names: White Horse Close, Anchor Close, Hunter's Tryst.
The main street (Castle Street, the signs said) rose and fell as it followed the dragon's spine through the city. At the dragon's shoulder, broad Castle Street widened still more. It became the Esplanade and swept up the dragon's neck to the castle gates.
Faris and her party did not go so far. At a spot between the dragon's shoulder blades, their carriages drew up before the imposing facade of the Hotel Metropol.
Jane lowered her veil and gathered up her bag. Faris sat motionless, eyes shut again. “More cognac?”
“Coffee,” said Faris plaintively.
“Soon, I promise. You'll have to come inside, though.”
Faris sighed and opened her eyes. “You English. You're so strict.”
The door of the carriage opened and Reed joined them. “Slight delay.” At their inquiring looks, he explained. “Change of plans. The hotelier must reorganize the available suites to accommodate Lord and Lady Brinker, too. They'll be in your suite, Faris. Be patient. They're doing their best to make room for you somewhere.”
Jane looked surprised. “Why can't they stay at the castle as they planned?”
“The official reason is that Lord Brinker has decided he cannot allow his niece to stay alone in a hotel, even a first-class hotel. He must stay and add to her consequence. The embassy is Galazon territory, even if it's only a hotel suite. He's here to help make it more so.”
“And the real reason?” Faris asked.
Reed smirked. “In fact, I can give you a fairly authentic answer, since I caught a snatch of the argument. It has come to Lady Brinker that she does not wish her infant daughter to stay in the castle. She will have it brought there, when the time is right, for her father to look at. But she won't stay there herself and she won't let the child stay there under any circumstances.”
“Why not?” Faris asked.
“I gather it's bad for children. I didn't catch enough of the quarrel to follow the reasoning. Something to do with her baby sister.”
Jane looked concerned. “Menary's not here, is she?”
“God, no. At least, I don't think so. I'll ask, if you like.”
Faris raised her eyebrows. “Ask whom?”
“Oh, I'll just ask around.” Reed opened the carriage door and prepared to descend. “It's the only way to find out anything, you know. Even Tyrian stoops to it occasionally.”
 
T
he suite assigned to Faris was enormous. The task of rendering it secure kept Tyrian and Reed fully occupied. Despite Agnes's arrival taking precedence, Jane humbled the hotel staff in short order. Luggage began to arrive.
Without quite realizing how it happened, Faris found herself with nothing to do but sit in a comfortable chair near a window. For a while she simply stared blankly out at the bustle of traffic on the Esplanade. Then it began to rain steadily, sleet-edged rain that would certainly have fallen as snow in Galazon.
BOOK: A College of Magics
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