The Book of Forbidden Wisdom (7 page)

Then Trey came over to Silky and me, and despite my thoughts and fears—­against all the rules I'd been taught, against the decorum, the rituals, the modesty that had been instilled in me—­I put an arm around Trey and drew him into our embrace.

T
rey let go first, and we stood apart, awkward, embarrassed. Then Trey turned away.

Eyeing him, Silky leaned up and whispered in my ear. “Are you going to marry him
now
?”

“Like a brother, Silky,” I murmured. “He's like a brother to me.”

She seemed to consider that.

“Are you
sure
?” she asked.

While Trey adjusted Bran's saddle, I walked over to the dead man, knelt down and started going through his pockets.

I looked up for a moment and saw both Silky and Trey staring at me.

“Angel,” said Silky. “You shouldn't
touch
him. You'll be unclean until sunset, and even then, we don't know if we'll find enough water for full immersion.”

She was right.

I didn't stop.

“We let the landless prepare bodies for burial,” I said finally, doing my best not to feel the flesh beneath the clothes. “And they sometimes aren't purified for days.”

“But they have no caste,” Silky said.

“We have enough water for me to wash my hands,” I said. “That's the best I can do.”

Silky looked doubtful.

“She's doing it for us,” said Trey softly to Silky.

The dead man was clearly landless and of low caste—­perhaps a vagrant. His clothes were dirty and torn. In his food wallet he carried only a small heel of bread, but in his breeches pocket, I found a sheet of cheap paper, dirty from handling. In large, easy-­to-­read letters was spelled out
REWARD.
Below was written
LADY ANGEL MONTROSE.
And below that (if any vagrant could read so far):
HARLOT.

I doubted the dead man could spell it all out, but he must have known someone was wanted. Perhaps someone else read the words to him. Because he had known my name.

And he had called me a harlot. I would have expected a cruder term; someone educated had spoken to him. Trey seemed to read my mind.

“Kalo and Leth are moving quickly,” said Trey. “They must have started distributing these before dawn. There's no shortage of landless who would want a land reward—­plus Leth's gold.”

There was no sign of the horse that had been echoing us, and so we hurried, assuming it belonged to one of the men, and knowing that when it got back to its stall, someone might sound the alarm. Before leaving, we cleaned the site and buried my attacker in a shallow grave.

“It's too bad he didn't have money,” said Trey. “I brought what I had, but we'll need more eventually.”

“I have some,” I said.

“We're landowners,” said Silky. “We don't
need
money.”

“All that was yesterday,” I said, and I wondered how long it would be before she understood that the Lady Silky of the House of Montrose was gone forever.

I
saw
The Book
again. My mother looked into my eyes, put her hand over her heart, bowed her head and was gone. I had been given permission.

I
was careful what I said next.

“If we were to return to Arcadia with
The Book of Forbidden Wisdom
,” I said, “they'd take us back.”

“Yes,” said Trey. “
The Book
would open all doors. So what?”

“So north to Shibbeth.”

Trey stopped Bran, and I stopped too.

“Your mother told you something before she died,” said Trey.

I had kept the secret a long time. It was hard to speak, even to Trey.

“Yes,” I said.

“You've been lying since you were a child.”

“Yes.”

“You could have told me,” said Trey.

“You could have told
me,
” said Silky.

“No—­I couldn't have. It wasn't my secret to tell.”

“So you've known where it is the whole time?” Trey asked.

“No. And I still don't know, exactly.”

“What does that mean?” he said.

“It means Mother will guide the three of us. A stage at a time.”

“Mother's
dead,
” said Silky.

“It doesn't matter,” I said.

“All right,” said Trey after a long moment. “One thing at a time. I can do that.”

“Well
I
can't,” said Silky.

“You'll have to, Lady Silky,” said Trey. “We're going to have to trust Angel.” He turned to me. “I suppose this means the Spiral City is real?”

“It's real.”

I couldn't read his expression precisely, but I knew there was no land greed in his face, no desire to wield
The
Book.
He was no Kalo. No Leth. But I had always known that. He just wanted me safe—­and Silky too, of course. That made me ride a bit lighter in my saddle.

We continued. After a while, Trey looked thoughtful. “I doubt Leth will follow us all the way into Shibbeth. He has no land papers.”

“Yes,” I said. “But he's very annoyed.”

“I don't understand,” said Silky. “
He
might be logical enough to stop—­given he has no papers—­but
we're
going to ride right in. With no papers at all.”

“You're right,” I said. “We are.”

W
e set up camp at dusk, and we all felt awkward about it. There was no purple perfumed Women's Tent. No feather camp divans, soft as beds. No tent for a chaperone to stay between the Women's Tent and the place where the men slept. There were, in fact, no tents at all. I felt we were totally unprepared for a night spent together, much less a night spent together in the wild. Trey had brought bedding and a rain sheet, but the ground was hard, and even in late summer the deep night air carried a bite.

Trey built a fire. Before I foraged through the bags on the packhorse for something to eat, I stood in front of the flames and stretched my whole body, glad to be out of the saddle.

Then I saw Trey watching me. He turned away before I could speak.

Later, as Silky stoked the fire, he took me aside.

“I'll just speak frankly,” he said. “I'll be sleeping outside the perimeter of the camp. Your modesty is safe.” He thought for a moment. “So is Silky's,” he added.

“I know,” I said. “Like a brother. Remember?”

“All right, Angel,” he said. “But no need to do all that stretching around me, all right? I'm not
actually
your brother.”

And with that, he went to set up his sleeping area.

Silky and I put our blankets by the fire, but then she looked at me, hesitant.

“Remember the perfumed traveling tents?” Silky asked wistfully as we set out our bedding by the fire.

“I do,” I said. “They were always too hot. And they made one smell of cheap incense.” I was making the best of it. I missed those perfumed traveling tents terribly.

“
Expensive
incense,” said Silky.

“All right,” I said. “Now get ready for bed.”

“I can't undress,” she said.

“Trey's not going to look,” I said. “Anyway, he saw you in your nightgown last night.”

“That was
different,
” said Silky. “It was a rescue. I didn't even
notice
—­“

“Notice what?”

She leaned toward me conspiratorially. “He's turned into a
man
.”

I tried to ignore her comment. Then I glanced at the perimeter where Trey was standing and looking into the darkness.

“I hope he won't be cold,” I said.

“He's awfully far from the fire.”

On a normal journey that required an overnight stop, we would have been able to pretend that Trey was sleeping somewhere else entirely, nowhere as indelicate as within thirty yards. But we didn't have the tents. Or the chaperones. Or the servants. Or the messengers to go between. All those ceremonies and chaperones hadn't given us much practice at being around men. We just didn't know how to do it—­we barely knew how to converse outside of the regulation conversations. They might as well have bound our feet, as I heard they used to do in Shibbeth.

“Let me do your hair,” I said to Silky. It was a ritual that soothed us both, and she eagerly sat with her back to me. She had put her hair up after the attack, and when I undid the pins, it cascaded down her back. I brushed it out as carefully as I could and then helped her with her nightgown. She got into her bedding quiet as a pet lamb.

“Thank you, Angel,” she said.

“Go to sleep.” I was soon in my bed, and the warmth of the fire made me sleepy.

“Angel?”

“Hmmm?”

“I was thinking,” said Silky. “Wouldn't it be
safer
if Trey were closer to us? If we're going to break rules, that is.”

“Maybe,” I said.

“Will you ask him?”

“We'd be breaking rules that are quite serious, Silky.”

“I'm sure he won't try to come too close.”

I hesitated, because how close was too close? Still, I was sure my morals weren't eroding—­much less the careful walls around my heart. And who would know?

I climbed out of bed and put my cloak over my nightclothes. I made ready to approach Trey.

He had been arranging his bedding as I approached, and he looked at me, surprised.

“Is everything all right?” he asked quickly.

“Yes,” I said. “Silky thinks you should sleep closer to the fire.”

“That's—­that's kind.”

“It was Silky's idea. She says you're harmless.”

It would be hard to describe the expression on his face.

“I'll appreciate the warmth. But Angel?”

“Yes?”

“Just to be clear. I'm not sure I like being called harmless.”

“But you are,” I said. “You would never hurt me or Silky.”

Trey, like the freeman who saw me behind the island, said nothing, but bowed his head and put his hand over his heart. I walked back to the fire.

The breeze was brisk, and as I made my way back to Silky, I felt cold. Visiting Trey at night, undressed, with only a coat as cover, had suddenly felt like visiting the rim of the moon.

F
inally Trey, now closer to the fire, slept. Silky slept too. The fire burned low. A few late-­summer Light Creatures blinked in the air; a night bird began her song. Soon the moon set, and I realized I had never seen so many stars. They were like jewels against the soft darkness.

I nudged Silky awake to share the night.

But I let Trey sleep.

Perhaps I was a little bit afraid of him—­because of marriage, because of all it entailed.

Because I knew, of course, that if we ever made our way back, I was going to have to marry Trey. No matter what happened—­or rather,
didn't
happen—­between us, Trey and I were now bound forever. I was tainted by my failed marriage to Leth, and now I was stained by my closeness to Trey. I would have to marry, and I would have to marry him. Or be an outcast.

That's where all the convoluted, twisted paths led. Out of some labyrinths, there was no safe passage.

 

B
reakfast was an awkward affair. I couldn't, of course, eat off any utensil Trey had put in his mouth, and we weren't supposed to share dishes, either, although since all we had was a spoon and a porridge pot, that delicate bit of behavior had to fall by the wayside. I could hardly fault Trey for not bringing enough spoons and forks.

“Needs be,” I said, serving myself with the spoon Trey had been using.

“But, Angel,” said Silky. “What about the protocols? It seems we're forgetting about
all
of them.”

I handed the spoon back to Trey. Before Silky spoke I had been wondering if, perhaps, I had natural immoral tendencies. Now I was simply annoyed.

“Do you really think,” I said, “that we're compromised by eating from the same spoon as Trey?”

“It's
unusual
.”

“Do I have a say?” asked Trey.

“All right,” I said.

“It's a pleasure to share with you.”

I gasped and then laughed. Silky just gasped.

“This is so strange,” she said. “And it's
so
wrong, in
so
many ways.”

“Come on, Silky,” I said, bolder now. “Needs be.”

“Even
married
­people don't share the same spoon,” she said.

I'd almost been a married person, and I had been told by my chaperone the night before the wedding that marriage, although no dishes were ever to be used in common, consisted of another kind of sharing. She hadn't been very specific, but some of the whispers among the girls over the years had been pretty raw. And everyone knew that after marriage, on the very first night, the rules that we had been raised on changed.

If the wedding to Leth had been completed, after the Arbitrator had sealed us in the Book of Marriage and the Book of Land, after the feast and the cake and the dancing, after all excuses to avoid it were over, would come the shaking of the sheets, the final ceremony. The chaperones would give me to the young maids, who would dress me in my nightclothes. Then, after rose petals and lavender sprigs had been sprinkled on the bed, they would all withdraw. There I would wait for Leth. He would get into bed with me. He would touch me. Presumably he would know more of the rules governing this than I did.

Sharing a spoon with Trey bore no comparison.

Leth would have touched me, and I would have diminished into the House of Nesson.

W
e finished breakfast hurriedly. By the time we were actually packed up and ready to ride, we had broken so many rules that I had stopped counting.

Silky, on the other hand, was keeping a running tally.

“That's
twenty-­four,
” she said as Trey gave me a leg up on Jasmine.

“Someone always helps us get on our horses, Silky,” I said.

“Not an eligible man from a Great House—­who, by the way, accidentally touched your leg, which is
twenty-­five
.”

“I'm flattered by how dangerous I seem to be,” said Trey. “Kalo has nothing on me.”

“I think you're enjoying this,” I said.

“
I
certainly am,” said Silky. “Now help me up, please, Trey. And that'll be
twenty-­six
.”

“Happy to oblige,” said Trey, who, instead of delicately holding his hands so Silky could step up onto Squab's back, picked Silky up and tossed her onto Squab as if she'd been a sack of feathers.

“
Hey
!”

“You're welcome, Lady Silky,” said Trey. He looked over at me with a smile. “I held back with you, Angel,” he said. “A few too many rules would have gone by the way. Given your advanced age.”

“I'm getting used to fewer rules,” I said.

“Angel,” said Trey. “You love rules. They keep you safe from life.”

I didn't say anything. I didn't understand what he meant.

We rode at a jog until the sun was beating down. There was no sign of pursuit, and as we rode, farms were becoming farther apart—­Leth and Kalo could hand out all the Reward sheets they wanted, but word would be unlikely to reach this far.

It couldn't be long to the Great North Way now. It seemed as if we were being channeled toward the north by chance and by circumstance. All the better.

Perhaps,
I thought,
we will find
The Book
quickly and go home in triumph
.

I was suddenly happy.

After all, I was with Silky and Trey, my two most favorite ­people in the world. I pulled some food from the saddlebag, and I started eating a dried biscuit, thereby breaking two more rules by Silky's count (don't eat with your fingers; only eat when seated at a table). We passed close by a small tree, and I broke off a twig and started tickling Jasmine's ears. Just because.

Jasmine was very tolerant.

My happiness made me warm.

I was away from the Great House of Montrose, where my father moped and dreamt up land-­merger marriages. Kalo was absent. And as for Leth's betrayal, well, it allowed me to see how lucky I had been that the wedding hadn't been completed.

Maybe everything would be all right.

T
hat's when I heard the Echo again. As if it had never been gone.

Clip.

Clop.

Clip.

Clop.

Trey didn't need to say anything. I could see by his face that he had heard it too.

Silky looked at both of us. She was upset.

It seemed our Echo had not been made by the men who had attacked us, and whoever it was had been out there while we, vulnerable, had slept.

But then the Echo was drowned out by something louder—­the sound of running, rushing water.

“The River Wys,” said Trey. “It flows near the Great North Way.”

“Maybe the Echo will lose our trail in the water,” said Silky. “The way we lost Kalo and Father at the river.”

“We're too visible,” I said. “It was night then.”

There was a bend in the road. We were in a forested area, and there was no way to see ahead to the Wys, even as I heard it bubble and sing.

Silky and Trey and I came around the curve at the same time, and the road simply ended. Water lapped at the horse's hooves. A long, dirty expanse of water spread before us, and in its center ran the wild river Wys.

The river had overflowed its banks; the Great North Way was nowhere to be seen.

“Is the Great North Way just
gone
?” asked Silky.

“It's there,” said Trey. “But we have to cross the flood and the river Wys in the center. That's going to be the tricky part.”

“Everything's the tricky part.” My buoyant mood quickly evaporated. All that water.

There were some things I could do quite well: I had a prodigious memory—­I mean really prodigious. If I read something once, I knew it. There were some things I could do fairly well: I was hard to beat at Nancalo. And there were some things I had never bothered to learn how to do at all.

Like swimming.

We were silent, contemplating the power of water. And then we could hear hoofbeats at our backs, above the sound of the wild rush of the river. Our Echo was no longer an echo, and the hoofbeats were coming closer.

“We hide in the trees, or we cross,” said Trey, but he was already half dismounted, ready to lead Bran into the swirling waters. Silky was urging Squab forward. Only I hesitated.

“Where will it end?” I asked. “If we manage to swim to the Great North Way, where will it end?”

Silky looked at me in surprise.

Trey set his lips and then spoke. “It's not going to end here,” he said firmly. “Not here.” He pulled Bran ahead until the water was up to the horse's knees. Trey remounted and turned and looked at me.

“All right,” I said.

“Angel can't
swim,
Trey,” said Silky.

“I know, Silky.” Then he spoke firmly to me. “Hang on to Jasmine's mane.”

“Not the saddle?” I was near panic.

“Saddles come off,” said Trey shortly. “Manes don't.”

The three of us moved into the water. The smooth brown pond was easy to traverse, but the current that ran through its center—­the old river Wys—­was another story. We waded until we were at the edge of the current.

I could no longer hear the hoofbeats of our Echo over the surge of the water, but when I took a quick look back, I saw a horse round the same sharp curve we had. The rider pulled up suddenly, probably, I thought, as surprised as we had been by the flood.

But there was no time to think about the sighting of our Echo. I had other problems.

“I'll be the shield,” said Trey. “Bran's the biggest.”

I didn't know what he meant until he and Bran staggered into the current and tried to brace against it.

“You'll be swept away,” I said, raising my voice in an attempt to be heard over the water.

“Hurry,” he said. Silky moved Squab forward. She was almost at Bran's flank, and Bran was standing solid as a rock; the water split around him into two streams.

For a moment I really thought it was going to work. The current of the Wys wasn't so very wide. I briefly looked at the Echo-­horse on the bank. The rider was beginning to move his horse into the flood.

Then Squab plunged forward. I let Silky go ahead, farther into Bran's shadow, where the force of the swirling waters was broken up.

After that, it was my turn.

Jasmine stepped into the river Wys, and almost immediately I felt her begin to lose her footing. That's when I saw something huge and knobby and black coming toward us from upstream. A moment later the shape took form.

It was an enormous tree trunk, and it was going to crush me.

There was no time to prepare myself for the impact, not that it would have made any difference.

The log reached me and knocked me off Jasmine. I saw Trey's appalled face.

After that, the water closed over my head.

When I came up, the tree limb was gone. I was holding nothing. I was nowhere near Jasmine or Squab or Bran or Silky or Trey. I flailed in the water knowing I would soon reach the end of my strength, of my luck. No more Lady Angel Montrose. No more Angel. Then I got water in my mouth and went down.

When I reached the surface this time, I was sputtering and swallowing water, and I could feel my legs fatally tangled in my wet clothing. If I went under now, there was no way I would be able to make it back to the surface.

I heard a great cry, and I realized that Trey was calling me, although I couldn't hear what he was saying over Silky's screams.

And I started to go down again.

I clawed at the water.

There was movement closer to shore. Time suddenly seemed to slow down, as if the river were going to take its time in finishing me off. As I struggled, the current swirled me so that I could see the bank. I saw the Echo-­horse, and I saw someone dive from the Echo-­horse into the Wys, which, I found myself thinking, was a stupid thing to do.

I tried to turn to get back toward Trey, and I saw he was trying to hold Silky, to keep her from the voracious current. To keep her from coming after me. To keep her from dying.

Thank you,
I thought.

I went under, and the water closed over my head.

I knew I didn't have the strength to struggle back to the surface.

Sometimes, one just knows when it's time to give up. I didn't want to leave Silky alone, and, somehow, I didn't like leaving Trey. But trying to breathe meant swallowing more and more water. I went ahead and closed my eyes.

And then, as far as I knew, I drowned.