Closer to the Heart (6 page)

But this morning the King was not taking his usual working breakfast with her, he was taking a working breakfast with her father.
She
had taken the chance to stockpile something suitable for breakfast yesterday afternoon—pocket pies made a lovely breakfast—so she didn't even have to go over to the Collegium to eat. She could just drowse until a guilty conscience or Rolan woke her up.

Her thoughts drifted, as they were inclined to do when she was trying to get back to sleep.
I wonder what sort of thing I could ask this odd genius Mags discovered to make for me.
Perhaps a necklace that could be turned into restraints? And perhaps some clever tools to take the place of corset stays? Certainly a pair of stilettos in place of the front busks. Amily didn't
need
to wear a corset, but she found that it helped with back fatigue when she had to stand for long periods of time. Substituting something useful in place of the stays seemed like a good idea.
I'll bet Mags will have useful things secreted in seams and hidden pockets all over himself before long.

Bear had warned her that after so many years of being a cripple, it was going to take a body a long time to adjust to the other extreme, and he was right. Yesterday had been one of those days; formal and informal Court and she'd been standing behind the throne for all of it.

On the other hand, yesterday the King had finally gotten around to formally requesting that Lady Dia “help” with the wedding . . . and Lady Dia had basically said, in lovely, courtly phrases, that anyone that got between her and the wedding planning was going to find him- or herself cut off at the knees. Having Lady Dia doing the planning meant that Violetta was going to find herself doing a
lot
of work, and the sort of thing she seemed to be very good at. If the wedding came off well, Violetta's reputation as a clever planner of festivities might even eclipse her reputation as the featherbrained wench whose romantic foolishness had nearly got two entire noble Houses murdered.
And hopefully she won't make any further mistakes; even trivial ones are always going to eclipse your successes,
she reflected ruefully.
Though . . . in the end, what could have been a complete disaster turned into the end of a bloody feud. I cannot say that I will miss Lord Kaltar, and I suspect neither does his Lady. Anyone that bloodthirsty was probably terrifying to be around. There's probably a good reason why he and Lady Kaltar only ever had a single child.

Well, between standing all day, and Mags' brilliant idea to just
run off and get married
 . . . well, maybe another reason why she was aching all over was that she was finally relaxing muscles she hadn't even known were tense.

Today there were no Council meetings, and no Court sessions, which meant that Amily was basically free. And she knew exactly what she was going to do.

This would be a good day to do a little snooping in the households of some of the Council members by way of the working cats and pets they had in their homes. A good many
of them had one or more of Lady Dia's little spaniels; they all had cats kept specifically for mousing. No well-regulated household could do without at least one cat in the kitchen, pantry and cellars, and at least one to patrol the upstairs. Most had more. And thanks to Amily's peculiar Gift, every single one of those animals could serve as eyes and ears for her.

So today would be a day when she could laze by the fire and see what she could learn.

Sometimes it bothered her, all this spying on people she should have been able to trust. But that was the thing, really, she
should
have been able to trust them, but they were still people, and people got their judgment swayed by personal considerations or ambitions, or things she couldn't even predict.
And if Father had this as a resource, he'd have used it without a second thought.

The apple had not fallen far from the tree after all. She might be King's Own, but like her father, she was also the King's Spy.
I wish I had a troupe of spies of my own, the way that Father and Mags do,
she thought, turning over and punching the pillow again.
Someone who could make
sure
I had little dogs I could listen through in every household where I might need one. Someone who was trusted, but invisible. Someone who. . . .

And that was when she had what
possibly
was a brilliant idea all her very own. So brilliant, that she sat straight up in bed, all thoughts of sleep vanishing.

There was one thing that Amily had been able to do very, very, well, back in the days when she could not move about without help. She could
observe.
And one of the things she had observed, forgotten until now, was the plight of young, highborn women with a title and no money.

Mostly, they were hangers-on in the entourages of wealthier relatives—hoping for a crumb of a dower in some cases, in others hoping to prove they had some form of talent so they
could get the Crown to sponsor them to the Collegia. Often they served as unpaid governesses or companions. She had heard whispered stories of exceptionally pretty ones who had blatantly become kept mistresses—or had even become the star attractions of a brothel.

But mostly, they languished in the households of those who were wealthier than they were, grateful for a bed and regular meals, trained in all the skills a highborn girl was supposed to have, but not in anything that made her fit to
work.

Amily had seen over a dozen girls like that, either exploited or ignored by their well-off relations, and that had been before she was actually looking for them. How many more were out there? For the most part, so far as the
truly
wealthy and highborn were concerned, they were so invisible they might not even exist. The sort of highborn that frequented the Court left such girls to their seneschals to deal with.

Now, what if Amily was to actively start recruiting some of them? Some would probably object, but there should be some who would be willing to help.

:If you are waiting for me to voice an objection, you will be waiting until your hair turns gray,:
Rolan observed.
:We should give them incentives in the form of . . . hmm. Perhaps the incentives should vary.:

The urge to drowse forgotten, Amily squirmed out of bed and grabbed a fresh uniform.

After fortifying herself with breakfast, she called on Dia. Unlike most of her peers, Dia was an early riser, and invited her old friend to have a tour of the kennels and inspect the new litters of puppies. There were two litters of the tiny muff-dogs, sweet-tempered spaniels that Dia had bred to keep bored ladies company. The puppies were adorable, and so small two of them would fit in Amily's hand. But muff-dogs were not all Dia bred; she supplied the Guard with hounds they could train to search for hidden enemies or search for people who were
lost, she bred enormous, patient dogs that were first-class nursemaids for adventuresome littles, courageous rat-terriers who never hesitated in taking on the vermin even cats feared to attack, and she bred enormous mastiffs as protection dogs. Amily always enjoyed taking the tours of Dia's kennels, and secretly got a lot of amusement at seeing the elegant Lady Dia with her lush, brown hair tied in a knot on the top of her head, bits straggling out, in an old moleskin tunic, trews, and tarred boots, getting down on the floor and being covered in giant herds of dog.

When they were done, both of them were ready for a second breakfast—and in Lady Dia's case, a good wash and a change of clothing.

“Now, what is it that you need to talk about that you'd endure getting dragged through my kennels in order to get to talk to me?” Dia asked, as she settled herself on a comfortable seat, her sensuous body wrapped in a gorgeous robe. Her handmaid put her hair in order while she hungrily devoured miniature egg pies. Dia's handmaid was exactly the sort of young woman Amily wanted to recruit for her informants—not Miana herself, because if Dia became untrustworthy, the next thing that would occur would be for the sun to rise in the west—but the sort of beautifully bred and absolutely impoverished highborn girl that had
no
prospects in front of her without someone like Lady Dia. Miana, aside from knowing the ins and outs of everything needed to keep Dia looking stunning, knew every detail of the voluminous genealogies of the highborn families of Valdemar. Dia called that, “deep knowledge of the studbook.” And Miana was as plain as plain could be. With her mousy brown hair, flat, uninteresting face, and equally flat figure, the only way many women would take her as a handmaiden was as someone to feel superior to.

Which was ridiculous, because Miana had a mind as sharp as any scholar's. There were so many things she helped Dia
with that were
not
involved in making Dia look gorgeous that it sometimes made Amily's head spin.

“Actually, this is a perfect time to talk to you, because Miana is here,” Amily replied, helping herself to some as well. She explained her idea as both Dia and her handmaid listened intently. When she was done, Miana was the first to speak up.

“If Lady Dia hadn't asked me to be her companion, I'd have given something like that serious consideration, Herald,” she said soberly. “Especially if there was some sort of reward at the end of it.” Lady Dia reached up and patted her hand as the young woman continued. “Milady has assured me of a pension and a pretty little apartment of my own, but not every lady's handmaiden is so lucky.” She patted the last strand of Dia's hair into perfection, and handed Dia a mirror for her approval. “Given the consideration that a girl might uncover something to the undoing of the family she is in, Herald—”

“I think such an assurance goes without saying,” Amily replied, sensing Rolan's immediate assent. “Basically, what I wanted to know was, did you two think this was a good idea, and did you have any way of reaching out to such girls?”

Dia handed the mirror back to her handmaiden and the two exchanged a long glance. “I can reach some,” Dia said. “Probably the ones Miana can't.”

“And I can reach a great many,” Miana replied. “There is a sort of . . . unofficial network of us. We are always looking out for a good place for those who don't have one.” She handed Lady Dia a lambswool puff and a little pot of pink powder, and Dia lightly dusted her cheeks. “I suspect those of us who are in less than comfortable positions would be happy to join your ranks, on the assurance that they would be taken care of if the position became unendurable.” She took the lambswool and pot away, and handed Dia the exotic stuff from Kata'shin'a'in that Dia used to darken the eyelids over her melting brown eyes, turning them from lovely to seductive. “That's our worst
fear, you know, that we have no choice but to starve or continue to endure places where we are treated worse than servants, because we can't leave.”

Dia finished and handed the implements back to Miana, then spread her hands. “Well, there you have it. I think it is a good idea, and so does Miana. We can also ask these girls to insert one or more of my dogs into their households so you'll have a second set of eyes and ears there.”

“At the very least they can tell you where the cats are,” Miana pointed out. “But we are practically invisible, unless our Lady is like Lady Dia. People say horrid things right in front of us, and pay us no heed, as if we were furniture. Of course, that's if we're plain. . . .”

Amily seized that. “We wouldn't ever ask anyone to do anything she wasn't comfortable with. I would
never
ask someone to go into a man's bed just to get information.”

“But there are some that wouldn't object to doing just that,” Miana pointed out firmly. “For a pretty one, it's very hard to say
no
and be heeded. Almost impossible, in fact. So if being used is going to happen anyway, knowing you'll be protected and can get away afterward—”

“I would much rather get a girl out of such a position
before
anything happens,” Amily said firmly, then wavered, when both Dia and Miana looked at her steadily. “But . . .”

“Let's not create nightmares and work ourselves up over them yet,” Dia said firmly. “And let's not make decisions for girls we have not yet recruited.” She nodded and got up, so that Miana could help her into one of her gorgeous, and terribly complicated gowns. “And it is time for you to take this idea, first to your father, and then to the King. Come back to me when you have his approval, and we three will put our heads together.”

• • •

Mags had given a careful report about Tuck and Linden last night to both Nikolas and the Seneschal and his Herald. All three of them had agreed whole-heartedly with his plan, and the Seneschal had given him leave to draw whatever funds he needed out of the Treasury. So the morning was spent, first in going by Aunty Minda's and rounding up four of the bigger boys, then in buying things all over Haven, and having them taken to Tuck's shed. Discreetly. Quietly. Stealthily. It would not do to have the neighbors wonder why Tuck and Linden were suddenly so prosperous.

The only thing he couldn't have delivered was a full load of wood, but he reckoned Linden would find a way to explain that away.

At around lunchtime, he turned up himself, with a stout purse full of coppers and some silver. He hadn't had much chance to look over the immediate neighborhood of Tuck's shed yesterday, but today, when he did, he finally deduced
why
there was a shed in the yard of a larger building in the first place. The main building was a large structure now divided up into rooms people could rent. But it had been a brewery, and the stable had held the delivery-van horses.

He slipped past the larger building, through a wooden gate, and into what had been the stableyard, and now served mostly for littles to play in and women to hang laundry, although there was a sty for a single pig, a couple of henhouses and four pigeon-coops. It was the gate that made all that possible of course. It was probably locked at night, so no one would steal the livestock.