The Privilege of the Sword (12 page)

“Don’t be patronizing, Robert. Dull is not what your sister needs. And most particularly, not dull and poor with romantic connections.” Robert raised his eyebrows. His mother nodded. “Gregory Talbert. Yes. The most unmarriageable young noble in the city.”

“
And
Tremontaine’s oldest nephew. Who’s to say there’s not a duchy in his future?”

“Tremontaine, for one. There’s a feud between the families. The duke has the privilege of naming his heir, and I doubt it will be any of his sister’s children.”

“What about the daughter, that girl he had brought here?”

His mother pressed her lips together. “You don’t see her at any of the parties for the young ladies, do you?” She did not mention, even to Robert, that she had already intercepted one letter from the Lady Katherine to Artemisia, frantic and flowery and badly spelt, hinting at dire fates and desperate measures. She profoundly hoped that there would be no others. “Whatever the duke means to do with her, it can’t be anything decent.”

“The brother seems a solid enough fellow…. Don’t worry, Mama, when I see him I’ll try to warn him off.”

“Thank you, Robbie. I know I can trust both my children to do the right thing. Anything you can do to help your sister right now…you see, you cannot underestimate the importance of her always being in her best looks and spirits at this particular time.”

“Oh, she’s always a huge hit. I don’t see what the fuss is about.”

“Robbie.” His mother sighed. “Darling. May I speak to you as an adult?” He drew himself up. “All right. Listen. What happens to Artemisia this Season or the next will determine the course of her entire life from now on. She is on display, everything about her: her clothes, her hair, her teeth, her laugh, her voice…so that some gentleman can choose whether he wants to make her the mistress of his household and the mother of his heirs. Think of it as—oh, I don’t know, as a horse that has only one race to win. If she marries well, she will be comfortable and happy. If she makes a poor choice, or fails to attract a worthy man, the rest of her life will be a misery. I know you young people think that, ah, physical attraction is enough. But when you’re forty and the parent of a brood, if your spouse is poor or poor of judgment, believe me, there is no romance there.”

She leaned forward confidentially. “Now, you and I know what a tremendous success Artemisia is, once she gets out there. You know no one has anything but good to say about our darling—and you’d tell me if they did, wouldn’t you, Robbie, dear? But a woman alone, in her boudoir, well, she suffers certain anxieties. So you see, we all need to be very kind and helpful to her, right now. You understand that, darling, don’t you?”

“If it will help get her married and out of the house, I shall do everything in my power,” her brother said devoutly. And though his mother said he didn’t mean it, and that there was no friend like a sister to see you through life’s ups and down, he rather thought he did, and left, nearly colliding with the footman coming up the stairs with flowers for his sister.

Dorrie brought them in to her, hoping her mistress would be cheered by them. And indeed, Artemisia’s face brightened when she saw the fine bouquet of roses and freesias. If a Certain Person had sent them, it would make up for everything, and she might hope again. With trembling hands (and with her mother standing by), she unfurled the note from the center of the bouquet. She could imagine already the soft words from one whose eye had caught hers, whose hand had gently caressed hers, and whose heart, perhaps, might someday win her.

“Oh no!” she shrieked. The note was signed
Terence Monteith
.

She cast herself upon the bed, sobbing, “I
hate
Terence Monteith! I hate everyone! It’s all a disaster! Everybody hates me. Oh, leave me alone!”

In the end, they had to put her to bed with tea and a little brandy. Had Robert only been a little more patient, he might have had the carriage, after all.

Artemisia curled up with her favorite book, and cried, and wondered whether any man would ever love her enough to risk his soul’s honor for her sake, and why swordsmen were so
boring
these days.

chapter
IX

M
Y UNCLE’S SERVANT
M
ARCUS HAD BEEN RIGHT:
the gardens of Tremontaine House were beautiful, and beautifully tended, delightful and various. There were well-kempt paths and carefully clipped bushes punctuated by classical sculptures. Some of their stories I knew; other figures were quite obscure, but seemed to be involved in unlikely couplings. Perhaps they were a joke, or came from books only my brothers were allowed to read. There were also arcs and swirls of flowers and leafy plants of different heights and colors, set throughout with benches and bowers, though no one ever was sitting in them. And long grassy alleys ran down to the river. The more I practiced my sword, the more I felt like running down them, especially as the last of summer began to take on the bite of autumn.

In my boy’s clothes I could hurtle along the banks and slopes without pausing to think about my skirts. Stone walls were easy to get over. I never had to go around, and even falling down never meant a torn hem or ruffle. I did tear a sleeve once, but that was a piece of foolishness, stretching my arms out over my head and rolling all the way down the grass to the river landing. The duke’s barge floated there, wrapped in canvas. I wondered when I’d get to ride in it. I mended the sleeve myself as best I could, but it showed. When Betty took it away from me I thought she was angry and might tell the duke, but she only had it mended by a real tailor, good as new.

If my family had had the money for lessons, I might have learned to sketch and paint well enough to portray the gardens. If Artemisia had been a true friend to me, I might have invited her by now to do just that, for I was sure she had all the accomplishments. If ever I saw my uncle the Mad Duke again, perhaps I would ask him why I could not have a drawing master, in addition to Master Venturus? I could not spend every minute on swordplay. Why should he mind if I learned watercolors or something nice in my spare time?

Certainly I was not failing in my lessons. Venturus watched carefully as I strove against my straw doll, Fifi. He gave me pointers, and I began to realize that despite the bluster, his advice was always solid. I couldn’t help giving Fifi a personality and clever countermoves to go with it—one day, when Venturus was being unpleasant about a failed move of mine, I said, “But what else am I to do when Fif—when my opponent comes at me with a high disarm?”

“Here.” The swordmaster took a weapon from the rack. “I show.” He came at me with a high disarm, which I failed to disengage and pass under until he showed me how. And, so simply, that was how we started sparring together.

I came to know the bright blade, first as something like a dance-partner as we rehearsed our patterned strokes and counters, parries and ripostes, and then as an unexpected visitor, to be anticipated in a half-breath, and turned as brusquely away.

The hardest part was looking in my teacher’s eyes as I fought, but this he said I must do, although it felt horribly bold and immodest.

“No watch sword,” he rasped, “watch man. Man is mind of sword.”

As often as we sparred, my teacher grumbled that I was a waste of his time. “I fall asleep practicing you, duke-boy. Other students of Venturus learn on each other. You all alone with straw man and me, too much alone. Lucky have great teacher, very lucky he be practicing you. Why you crazy father make you live alone?”

“He’s not my father,” I said automatically for what was surely the hundredth time. “I’m not a boy.”

“Venturus not fight with no girls.” He raised his sword high, and pointed it downwards to signal a pause in the bout, so he could attack me with his temper. “You got no respect for teacher, you! Other students beg Venturus for lessons. You
argue
him. Ha!”

In the end, always we went back to practice, all morning now. I liked the feel of my teacher giving way on the floor before me, even if it was only an exercise. But I thought I deserved a chance at watercolors, too.

T
HE DUKE’S LOVER SAID,
“I
WISH YOU WOULD MAKE UP
your mind.”

He shivered as the duke ran a cold finger down his back. “My mind is quite made up. The problem is, you don’t like the way it’s gone.”

“I want to stay here in Riverside.”

“And so do I. But not tonight. My poet must have dignity. He’ll have more standing on the Hill.”

“The whole city knows what you are. Which house you do it in hardly makes a difference.”

The duke said, “You don’t like my ideas, you don’t like my choices…the truth is, you don’t like me very much, Alcuin, do you?”

“Of course I do, I love you.”

“It’s all right. I don’t like you much, either.”

“Why do you keep me, then?”

“Who said anything about keeping you?”

Alcuin bent his beautiful head over the duke’s manicured hand, sweeping it with his lips. “Please…” And Tremontaine did not push him away.

When the duke slept, though, Alcuin dressed, and scribbled a little note and propped it on the duke’s dressing table, and ordered up a carriage to take him to the Hill. In the duke’s bedroom, the curtains were always drawn; his lover was almost surprised to find that outside it was daylight.

They knew him at Tremontaine House, and he still wore their master’s ring. They let him in, and nobody followed him through the corridors to the duke’s apartments. There he looked for papers, any papers that might serve his needs and embarrass his lover, but he could not find what he wanted there, any more than he had in Riverside. He proceeded to the library and opened the likeliest books, but all that they contained were words. He had expected the room to be empty, and started violently when he heard the crackle of paper.

It was only a boy, pretty and well dressed, with astonishingly long hair—a student, then—sitting in the window seat with a book. As he prided himself on his ability to deal with any situation, Alcuin bowed to him. It was not, after all, as though he had been doing anything but looking at books. That was what one did in a library. He’d just have to wait for privacy for the desk to divulge its contents.

The boy got up hurriedly, shoving the book under a cushion. “Oh!” he said. “Is my uncle back?”

Alcuin stared. “And who is your uncle?”

“The duke, I mean,” the boy stammered. “You’re—you’re Alcuin, aren’t you?”

The man smiled, not unflattered to be known. “You’ve come early for the party, child.” He moved in a little closer. Yes, you could see the family resemblance if you looked hard, though it was mostly in the tone of the skin, the setting of the eyes.

“Were you looking for something in here? Perhaps I could help you.” This boy’s lineaments were soft and round where the duke’s were sharp-cut. In fact—

“No!” Alcuin snapped. “You keep out of my affairs.” He should have recognized her sooner. Those silly clothes confused him.

The duke’s niece boldly faced him, looking at him with a direct gaze he found disconcerting.

“There is no call to be so angry,” she said. “When will my uncle be back?”

“I—” But he could not say he did not know. “Soon. In time for his party. Will you be performing the comic theatricals?”

He had the satisfaction of seeing her blush. But she stood her ground, and so the library was closed to him for now.

He returned to the duke’s own chambers upstairs, which he found now occupied by their master in a snarling foul humor, attended by his boy, Marcus.

He was preparing to leave them when the duke said, “Stay out of the way tonight, Alcuin.”

“Why? Are you afraid I’ll draw attention from your precious poet?”

“I’m afraid you’ll bore them to death. Nobody wants to hear your opinion on meter and verse. It is all too painfully obvious that you start thinking of these things only after other people have begun to talk about them.”

“You’re screwing your poet, too, aren’t you?”

“If I am, you’ll still have nothing interesting to say.”