The Fecund's Melancholy Daughter (8 page)

Almost ready at that point to throw off the cover and call for a bath, the chatelaine looked into the large mirror—which took up most of the west wall, and in which she discerned the row of her beloved beasts, stirring in their gilded cages—and, for the first time, saw the door to one cage hanging open.

That was the moment her day, her world, her life changed.

Agitation was clear in the faces of those remaining creatures, at least those with eyes. Fearful expressions, not understanding what had happened, brimming with hurt and betrayal of what they had seen in the night. The cries had been much more than hunger: they were of
betrayal
.

Why had she not looked earlier?

Heart pounding, the chatelaine stood for a moment, dizzy, naked except for the band of flea fur around her upper arm. She held onto the bed for support. Tiny stars spun about her head and drifted, falling, across her vision.

Her cherub was gone.

She glanced about the bedchambers, a slight twist of anticipation on her face, as if maybe an obscure joke had been told, one she didn’t quite get. Or maybe she was hopeful that the precious creature might be watching her, perched on a curtain rod, or on a statue, but she saw nothing of the sort and her wispy smile faded as quickly as it had come, replaced by apprehension that was like a rag pushed into her throat.

The cherub had never before been out of its cage.

Oiled parchment over the windows remained intact and the door had been closed when she awoke. Had one of her guests taken the poor thing during the night? Had a guest done unspeakable acts with her beloved pet after she’d passed out? She recalled, before the evening had really fallen apart, an image of herself and a man called Zoran, from the kitchen (bearded, skinny), standing in the alcove, drinks in hand, laughing while she introduced, one by one, her menagerie.

Had she taken other guests over there later?

The chatelaine stumbled over to the alcove. The beasts, looking away from the mirror to see her physically enter, let loose with shrieks and twitters and grunts, feathers flying or fur airborne. Only one or two remained inert; they had no choice, created immobile, twitching with pent emotions. She had caused this hurt, had torn apart their safe and pampered world by acts of irresponsibility.

How
could
she have just lain there?

The lock to the cage was scratched. Part had been bent. Picked, no doubt. Really, though, the quality of the lock was embarrassing, little more than an ornament.

Biting a knuckle, she stifled a wail.

Her poor cherub. Her poor, poor cherub.

She was a fool and an idiot and a terrible mother for getting herself into the state she’d been in, for letting strangers into her room every night, for drinking until oblivion put her to bed. The pets were right: she had done this with her own hands.

Two things became certain to the chatelaine as she stood there, breath coming in ragged gasps: first, of course, for the sake of Nowy Solum, she had to replace the cherub as soon as possible. Second was that she must tell the chamberlain of her mistake. Erricus and his palatinate officers already called her all sorts of a fool. She knew of their profound disapproval, for just about every aspect of her lifestyle.

They were right, it seemed.

She took another deep breath and began to pace.

As a young and anxious girl, the chatelaine had been handed control of Jesthe. Now, after years of decline, she had finally proved herself unworthy. There need not be a lecture from the chamberlain about priorities and her lack of security, and respect for the palatinate; she was all too aware that they had warned her of this very thing, as far back as the day she had first banished them from her wings of the palace. Erricus would imply, as he had back then, that she actually harboured a wish for someone to come into her bedchambers and cut her throat while she slept. She was lucky this time, he would say. This was a warning, a wake-up call.

The chatelaine did blubber a bit then, because she hated platitudes, especially when they were called for.

She offered hysterical apologies to her remaining pets.

Painful to admit that the chamberlain had been right all along. She sniffled.

Where was her little baby?

She made a fist.

During today’s conference, she would tell Erricus that the palatinate could return to all halls and chambers of the palace. She would admit defeat, and be humbled before his smugness.

Would this make her father happy? She was sure that the castellan worried about her, without protection down here, but in his current state of mind it was hard to be certain of anything.

She ground her fist against her palm.

Searching the floor for clues of any sort, she saw the signs of struggle and distress, but nothing unusual. Could she recall
nothing
? What was the matter with her?

Maybe a person other than a lover had come into Jesthe during the night, from the slums outside? Might even a servant, one of her own women, have done this? Almost anyone could enter the bedchambers on nights like the previous one. The palace was riddled, like old cheese.

Were there people in Nowy Solum who wished her ill-will? This concept was always a bit hard for her to get her head around. Why would people want to hurt her? The biggest crime she’d ever committed was sloth, or disregard. She was not malicious, nor had she ever harboured any ill-will of her own to force upon the citizenry.

She wiped her nose on her sleeve. “They should receive steel,” she told her pets, who raised a small furor at the sound of her voice. “Or burn in eternal fire!”

The chatelaine could trust none of her staff. Not one of them. They were all backstabbers, harpies vying for attentions and favours and—

The kholic.

This time, thoughts of the girl stopped the chatelaine in her tracks. Even her pets fell suddenly silent. The first kholic ever to be in these parts of Jesthe and the chatelaine didn’t even know where she was or where she had been. Could the kholic have taken the cherub?

Surely the girl was as innocent as her pets?

But what did the chatelaine really know about kholics? They were taken away from their mothers at birth, raised in the ostracon. Everyone knew that much. They had black fluids in their hearts and could get no pleasure, save from cleaning up the refuse of hemos—

If Erricus and his officers were allowed up here again, on this level of the palace, what would become of the melancholic girl? They would encounter each other at some point. What then?

If the kholic was still around.

The chatelaine dressed quickly in a long chemise and threw open the doors to her room, standing at the threshold to the Great Hall. Crooked Greta, the candlemender, was, by a misfortune of timing, passing by at that precise moment.

“Fetch the new girl,” demanded the chatelaine.

Greta frowned, twisting her entire upper body to make eye contact. “What?”

The chatelaine did not yet even know the kholic’s name. But today she would. She promised herself. Today. Today was a new day, a new start. “Fetch me the kholic.”

Scowling, mumbling, Greta shuffled away.

Recalling then, as she waited for the girl to arrive, the pretty, tattooed face, and the fabulous body hinted at under the shift that the kholic now wore, the chatelaine had to admit that there were elements of spite in the attraction and lust she felt, a distant but gnawing jealously of the kholic’s youth and beauty. She tried to tell herself this was a foolish thought: she was the chatelaine of Nowy Solum, after all, and the girl was just a kholic from the streets outside, but the chatelaine knew all too well on this morning of truths that her own youth had dwindled, her vitality faded. Exposed here, in her new skin, she also understood that beauty and youth were the reasons she had solicited the girl in the first place. Beauty, youth, and novelty.

“You are a fool,” the chatelaine said to herself under her breath, almost smiling. No, she did not suspect the kholic of misdeed: she
needed
the girl, more than anything, to be with her now, to make her pain go away.

A second later, miraculously, the chatelaine found herself staring down at the kholic’s face, a face even more beautiful than she recalled; the girl had appeared in the broad doorway to her chamber like a seraph.

Without hesitating, the chatelaine reached out and touched the kholic’s hair, which was brown and matted and greasy. The girl’s blue eyes did not quite meet the chatelaine’s own, but were nonetheless a startling colour against the black tattoo. The chatelaine wanted to embrace and be embraced in return. She cleared her throat. “Thank you for coming.” The girl was
truly
disarming up close. The chatelaine’s heart raced. “I would like you to call me, er, Terra Bella. That’s the name that the castellan—my father—gave me when I was born. Though no one is really allowed to call me that. I want to tell you, I’ve been robbed, and I need you to do me a favour.”

Those averted eyes, set off so gorgeously by the tattoo, did not appear to react in the least.

“Last night,” continued the chatelaine, quietly, reluctant to invite the girl in, for she did not trust herself at this point and felt, somehow, that if she did let the girl come in, the servant might get put in as much jeopardy as the pets (which were making a ruckus yet again): the chatelaine’s environment, and maybe even her own touch, were unsafe around any innocence. “A cherub, my beloved cherub, was taken from my chambers.”

“Winged baby?”

The kholic’s voice, too, was exquisite.

“Exactly. Yes. A winged baby. Can you hear my other darlings? They are in mourning. As am I. They are all I have, and I am all they have.” Now she could not stop herself from brushing a knuckle against the kholic’s blackened cheek, though she made a lame effort to fight the urge.

“Sorry to hear that.”

“I thought of you.” Her fingers went up to the matted hair again, twined. “You must forgive me for bringing you into my palace and then abandoning you. I had become, well, distracted. What’s your name?”

Octavia told her.

“You know, I feel I can trust you, Octavia.” The chatelaine smiled, but it was a pained smile. “Though you might find this impossible to believe, I think we have much in common. I feel it in my heart. We were meant to meet. Tell me, Octavia, have you ever heard of the fecund?”

“My Lady?”

“Of course you have. Even you.” This didn’t sound right at all. The chatelaine plowed on. “The fecund is my associate. My familiar. She belongs to Jesthe, rather. To whomever lives in this room. She was my father’s and now she is mine.”

“I’ve heard stories.”

“Well, the fecund is real, let me assure you. And you will meet her soon.”

The girl said nothing.

“She’s locked up, you see, in a cell, below the palace. She’s been there almost forever. I want you to visit the fecund, and I want you to give her a message. I am too ashamed to go myself. She already believes me unworthy. But she can be a powerful friend, you’ll see. She’ll meet with you, Octavia, and will listen to you. She’ll like you, I’m sure.”

Now the girl looked beyond the chatelaine, toward the rumpled bed, toward the harnesses and attachments abandoned on the crude side table, still smeared with fluids from the previous night. If Octavia was shocked by what she saw, she gave no indication. Her nostrils flared, sniffing.

“I don’t know what the fecund’ll make for me this time,” said the chatelaine, in an even quieter voice. “Probably not another cherub, not like that one. They’re all different, you know.” She put her hand on the girl’s taut shoulder. She could not stop touching her. “Listen, Octavia, I would invite you in but the place has not been cleaned, and my fire has almost died. I must see to that.”

“I understand.”

Was there a heat radiating from this girl? The chatelaine ran her fingers down the brown, toned arm. “Maybe you’ll come back later, after your task? Tell me how it went?”

“Sure.” There was still no expression on the tattooed face. “I’d like that.”

The chatelaine excused herself to fetch the small wooden box from her bedside table. When she returned, she displayed the contents to the girl. After a long moment, during which neither chatelaine nor kholic moved, she said, “You must choose one.”

“What are they?”

“These are my dreams.”

Hesitantly, the girl’s fingers rose.

“She feeds on dreams, you see.” The chatelaine whispered now. “I mean, she eats food, like me and you, but a dream gets her started. The fecund makes my pets, inside her, around these dreams, like pearls around a grain of sand. These are not from last night, naturally, but from several nights ago, from when I had an almost pleasant sleep. I was holding my baby in my arms while she rested against me. And when I awoke, I saw her on her perch, in her cage, looking peaceful and sweet. She sang me a little song that morning. She could talk, you know? The only one of my pets that could ever talk. Oh, Octavia, my heart has broken!”

Eyes downcast, looking at their feet. “What shall you have me do?”

“Do? Well, yes, of course. Please select one of these pieces of cotton and go down there right now. My chances are good, I think, to have a new baby similar, at least, to the gentle cherub. Will you go, Octavia? Will you do an old lady a favour?” She dabbed at her eyes with her fingers and felt moisture there.

The girl inspected the damp waddings and lifted one from the box.

“Be careful. Hold it in two fingers. Don’t get it all sweaty. With that in your hand, you’ll have no problem finding your way to the cell. I need not tell you directions. She’ll guide you, she’ll pull you there.”

As the kholic turned to leave, the chatelaine took her by the upper arm. “Your face is very pretty,” she said. “I have to tell you that.” She did not know how to continue. She knew absolutely nothing about this girl. She did not understand the kholic’s boundaries or sensitivities and felt that, already, she might have gone too far.

Were they all this damn stoic? There had been one or two in the past—strictly men, as far as she could recall—but subtleties of their demeanour were lost in the haze of spiritus and fervour of the moment—