Tracing the Shadow (45 page)

“Henri’s probably not even noticed. When he’s working, he loses all concept of time,” Celestine said with an affectionate smile.

“Henri, why are you working in this poor light?” called Dame Elmire as they entered the darkened house. “Hasn’t Francinette been up to light the lamps? Francinette!” She disappeared down the back stair to the kitchen to look for the maid.

The house was silent. Celestine tiptoed to the music room door. Henri must be composing at his desk, and she had no wish to disturb him, she just wanted to sneak a little look…

CHAPTER 33

“Back to Enhirre?” Jagu sensed that Captain de Lanvaux was looking at him intently, but he could not meet his gaze. “Why this sudden desire to leave Francia, Guerrier?”

Jagu stared at the floor.

“Ah. So she turned you down?”

Jagu managed the slightest, curtest of nods. To have to admit aloud that he had been rejected would only increase his humiliation.

“I see.” There was no hint of censure in the captain’s voice. “But to go so far…is that really necessary? I’d hoped that you would continue to work for me, as part of the special division. You and Demoiselle de Joyeuse acquitted yourselves with distinction in Bel’Esstar. You make a good team. I’d hoped that I could pair you together again.”

“Well, that won’t happen now,” Jagu said brusquely, “as the demoiselle is getting married.”

“Married? What happy news. And who is the lucky man?”

“Maistre de Joyeuse.”

“Excellent!” Captain de Lanvaux was smiling broadly. “They seem made for each other. I can’t help feeling a little responsible for this, as I brought them together at Saint Azilia’s. I must pay them a visit to offer my congratulations.”

The captain, his mind obviously distracted by Commanderie matters, had still not guessed the reason for Jagu’s black mood. This conversation was only rubbing salt in Jagu’s wounds. “May I be excused, sir?”

Captain de Lanvaux rose and walked round his desk to place a hand on Jagu’s shoulder. Jagu looked away. “Please reconsider your decision. Your quick thinking in the basilica saved the princess’s life. Not many have your experience when it comes to detecting the Forbidden Arts. Oh, and by the way, I’m recommending you for promotion.”

Jagu’s head lifted. “Promotion?”

“No one deserves it more than you.”

Rieuk lay on the narrow bed. The faint light of the waning moon shone through the cobwebbed window of his rented garret room. He was conserving his strength for the time when he must make his move. Beside him on the windowsill stood the soul-glass, faintly luminous in the darkness with the essence of Henri de Joyeuse’s immortal soul.

“Henri?” Celestine tapped on the music room door. When there was no answer, she opened it and peered into the room. “Won’t you join us for dinner, Henri? You must eat.”

He was sitting with his back to her, leaning over the open score on his desk, pen in hand.

“Later,” he said distantly.

She ventured a little farther into the room, longing to fling her arms around his neck and kiss the top of his head. Yet he seemed so deep in thought that she did not dare disturb him.

“Shall I bring you some food on a tray?”

“Thank you.”

She retreated to the kitchen, where Dame Elmire greeted her with a knowing look. “What did I tell you? He’s always like this when he’s composing, especially in the early stages of a new work. You’ve seen it before yourself! It’s best to let him alone until he’s ready to mix with us ordinary mortals again.”

Celestine let out a little sigh. She had been longing to discuss wedding plans. But if Henri was in the throes of composition, she was loathe to disturb him.

Rieuk watched Celestine through his Emissary’s eyes as she withdrew on tiptoe. There was still too much activity in the house to risk making his move, yet he could hear from the clatter of plates below that the servant was clearing away the remains of supper.

When she returns with the supper tray…

“I’m off to bed now,” called out the aunt. “Good night.”

“Good night,” he heard Celestine reply.

“And Francinette, make sure you’ve safely extinguished all the lamps. We don’t want to be burned alive in our beds.”

“Yes, madame,” came the surly response from the kitchen.

“I’ve brought you some soup and bread.” Celestine placed the tray on the music room table. “It’s pea and ham, your favorite. Don’t let it go cold.”

“Thank you.” Again that abstracted voice greeted her; Henri was leaning over the score, his head propped on one hand, his hair escaping its black ribbon, half-obscuring his face.

“Your aunt wished you good night.” She came closer. “The dressmaker took my measurements for the wedding gown today.” She just couldn’t resist telling him her news. “But I’m not allowed to say anymore; it’s bad luck.”

“Celestine. You’re an orphan; you never knew your parents. Is that right?”

Why was he asking her this question tonight? He had never seemed bothered before.

“I don’t remember them very well,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “I was only five when they died.” She longed to tell him all about herself, to share the secrets of her past with one who loved and understood her. But what if he looked at her with horror?

Yet even now he was looking at her oddly. “So you knew their names?” Was he testing her? Or worse still, had the jealous Aurélie been spreading malicious rumors?

“Is it important, Henri?”

“I thought there might be relations of yours that you would want to invite to our wedding. An uncle…or an aunt, perhaps?” His eyes had lost their usual brilliance and were dull and glazed.

“No one,” she said firmly.

“Forgive me. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“Of course. I forgive you.” She went to him and, standing on tiptoe, kissed him full on the lips. “Good night.”

Rieuk had been wondering where the book might be hidden when Celestine suddenly flung her arms about him and kissed him passionately.

The kiss, so intimate, so invasive, shocked all other thoughts from his mind. He was inhabiting the Maistre’s body more easily now, moving with greater fluency. But seeing, feeling,
tasting
through another’s senses was deeply unsettling. Distracting, too; the feelings that had flooded through him awakened memories of a time when he had loved and been loved in return. For that brief moment, he knew what it was to adore Celestine with every fiber of his being. The image lingered on and it took a supreme effort of will to wrench his thoughts back to his mission. Even then, the soft radiance of her blue eyes still haunted him.

As he suspected, she had not told a soul her true name. But why was she working for the Commanderie, the very organization that had destroyed her father?

He had noted a trunk in the corner on which she had placed a jug of pale late roses, a gift, perhaps, from her fiancé? But he could not detect the slightest trace of an aethyrial presence. Azilis must have concealed herself from Ormas’s keen senses.

He stood on the landing, uncertain where to go. He had no idea which room was the Maistre’s bedchamber. It would not do to walk in by accident on the old lady as she was preparing for bed. He could only retreat to the music room and pretend to work late into the night.

He already felt drained by the tremendous effort he had expended. Returning to his own body, he checked the soul-glass. Was it his imagination or had the starry glimmer of the composer’s trapped soul begun to fade? He felt the first stirrings of panic. He had lost Paol de Lannion this way; he must not make the same mistake again.

A drop of Maunoir blood, that was all he needed to undo the binding spell. But it must be taken by stealth.

There had been roses in a jug on the trunk and they were drooping, starting to shed their petals. And roses had sharp thorns…

“I thought you were made of stronger stuff.” Kilian stood over Jagu as he packed his kit. “I never took you for the kind of man to run away.”

“I just asked to be posted overseas again.” Jagu did not even look up, suspecting that Kilian was trying to provoke him. “I’m not running away.”

Kilian hunkered down beside him. “So she turned you down? The captain’s made you an offer you’d be a fool to reject. And yet here you are, playing the rejected lover.”

Jagu said nothing.

“Haven’t you heard? Grand Maistre Donatien has resigned. He’s retired to the Monastery of Saint Bernez. Very suddenly. Very unexpectedly.”

Jagu raised his head. He had been so wrapped up in his own misery that he had been oblivious to other events going on around him. “Resigned? Is he ill?”

“There’s all kinds of rumors flying around.” Kilian leaned closer to Jagu and added in an undertone, “Some are even saying he’s betrayed the Commanderie.”

“Maistre Donatien?” Jagu gazed at Kilian and saw that, for once, his friend was in earnest.

“A canker eating away at the heart of our brotherhood. It could easily destabilize the Commanderie.”

“You don’t think that what happened to the regiment in Ondhessar—”

“All I’m saying is: Be careful. We’re entering uncharted waters. The captain will need our support.”

“Fresh roses, Henri?” Celestine took the little bouquet of blush-cream blooms from him and sniffed them, inhaling a faint memory of summer from their petals. He must have noticed that the others had died. “Autumn roses have such a delicate scent. Thank you.” She stood on tiptoe to kiss him. “I’ll put them in water straightaway.”

The stems were studded with vicious thorns and, in spite of handling them carefully, she still managed to prick her thumb as she placed them in a vase. “Ow!” She sucked the tiny puncture.

“You should let the blood flow to flush out any dirt that might infect the cut.” He held out his handkerchief.

“It’s only a little thorn prick.” But she was touched that he should worry about her, and taking the fine white linen, she pressed it to her injured thumb. “See? The bleeding’s stopped already.”

The glimmer in the soul-glass flickered, like a candleflame wavering in the breeze. Aethyric crystal had remarkable properties, but it could not sustain a mortal soul for too long once that soul was separated from its body, as Rieuk already knew to his cost.

“Henri, we’re going out to the drapers’ to choose trimmings and lace,” announced Dame Elmire. “Look at you; you’re a disgrace. You’ve been wearing the same clothes since the day before yesterday and you haven’t even bothered to shave.”

“I’m sorry, Aunt.”
At last the house would be empty and he could complete his mission.

He waited until he heard the front door close, then made his way upstairs and into Celestine’s chamber, lurching in his haste and almost losing control of the Maistre’s body. He knelt and took the jug of roses off the wooden trunk. Undoing the catch was frustratingly difficult with the Maistre’s long, slender fingers but at last he managed it and flung open the lid.

“
There
you are,” he breathed. Celestine, trusting soul that she was, had merely wrapped her father’s grimoire in an old petticoat. He had no doubt that his long search was over, for as his fingers closed around the book’s leather binding and he lifted it from its hiding place, he felt the telltale tingle of aethyrial energy in his fingertips.

But the image on the front of the book confused him: the title proclaimed in gold letters that it was a
Lives of the Holy Saints.
The cover showed a pious young woman with hands tight-clasped in prayer, and a modest, downcast gaze. Was he mistaken? Yet even as he puzzled over it, the woman in the picture slowly raised her head and fixed him with large, soulful eyes.

“You. It
is
you. Why have you been evading me for so long?” He gazed back at her in wonder. “Don’t you remember me? I set you free.”

“
But you were too weak to bind me.
” Each word resounded in his mind like a clear crystal bell.

“I’m much stronger now. And I know your true name.”

“
I am already bound to Celestine. Bound by blood.
”

Rieuk had never once imagined that the spirit would defy him. “I’m going to break that bond. I’m going to take you back to Ondhessar.”

A shudder went through the spirit’s translucent form. “
And what if I don’t want to return?
”

“But the Rift is closing. And as it closes, our mage powers are growing weaker.” She seemed not to be listening. Panicking, he tried a more personal appeal. “We’re your children, aren’t we? We need you, Azilis. We need you to keep the Rift between the worlds open.”