The Stumpwork Robe (The Chronicles of Eirie 1) (18 page)

Chapter Twenty Six

Severine di Accia laid her head on her pillow in the inn further down
the mountain and stared up at the whitewashed ceiling. The drapes were drawn back and a fiercesome night sky - black, indigo and grey - swirled across the face of a moon almost as pallid as Severine’s cheeks. All her life she had craved to know of things Faeran. Wasn’t she after all a changeling? In her youth, she had listened and absorbed the tales she heard on the road. For one such as she, attractive, different from her parents certainly, charming when she wanted to be, it was easy to presume she had such links. In very rare, more realistic moments, if she wasn’t Faeran then it was possible to assume such likeness. And that is where the arrival of the Count di Accia had been fortuitous, taking her away from the death of her parents. The man had money. Money brought knowledge and knowledge, as Severine knew, was power.

It required no real effort on her part to seduce him. She had previously had one cheap if informative night with an oily Raji reeking of garlic. The experience was just that - an experience, but one which she tailored to her needs and which served to put the old Count right in her pocket. When she left in his cavalcade the next day, she experienced no guilt. Her emotions were a perfect vacuum, space enough to be filled with more important matters.

Count Di Accia chose to marry the ‘changeling’ on the way from Veniche to the Pymm Archipelago. Privately thrilled at having her on his arm, the fact she was alarmingly younger was nothing. The sylph-like beauty gave herself all the airs and graces of a noble Other and he felt it reflected well on him. He gave her gelt by the bag load and she brought clothes and jewellry and furnished their palazzo on the Venichese waterways in a manner befitting a man of his rank. What he couldn’t understand was why she spent money filling a library with weighty tomes on Other life. Why she learned to play harp and gittern. Why she employed a strange wisp of a man dressed in cobwebs of brown and grey to teach her obscure languages. And why she spent long days and nights, sequestered in the library studying.

She smiled to herself as she lay on the bed. She had learned much. It wasn’t hard to convince simple folk she might be Other in her skills. Not when she had such knowledge of occult law, such powerful comprehension at her fingertips. It was a quaint poem, one of four cantrips translated by her odd little henchman that she chanted in her moments alone. Her mantra, her prayer for the future, her insurance just in case. As she lay in bed staring up at the sky she whispered and the words sat in the air above her in ribbons of vapour as the evening air grew colder.

‘From caverns deep, abysses cold

There lies a ring, so very old.

Through its eye the bearer sees

souls of Others which are keys

Keys to locks within a door

from which the bearer can expect more.

More life eternal, evermore.

‘The souls must part befront, behind.

Till four of the same from two will wind

their power around, around and more.

More life, eternal evermore.’

It had taken her time to secure the ring. Her wispy man, an Other, found it for her after months of searching. The ultimate weapon - an artifact from the days of chaos when Other had fought Othe
r. This battered piece of jewelry made by the worst of the goblin wights had the power to kill the Faeran, sucking their souls into its sphere. And by some ancient glamour, anyone who possessed the ring and the souls could have the power of everlasting life.

Ironically, not long after the find Severine’s husband, frail and unprotected by rings and souls, cast his mortal coil. Of course, lesser people could assume she had helped him reach the other side. No one would ever know. What everyone did appreciate was that she was now one of the wealthiest women in Veniche, in Eirie perhaps, as even Heads of State recognised her fiduciary power and treated her with cautious respect.

She stretched in the bed, reaching for a looking glass. Adelina? By
Behir, the bitch was nothing compared to the face staring back from the mirror. That common Traveller, her childhood combatant, looked like a whore and behaved liked a harridan. A laugh escaped, soaring to the rafters of her chamber and hanging there to echo in the stillness of a winter’s night.
She turned her head this way and that in the mirror and in the soft
light of a lamp she was able to admire her complexion with its unblemished skin; the deep slate eyes so clear of guilt, smooth ebony hair falling down her back, not a wisp of grey. Despite the harsh words of that odious silk seller at the market, she knew her cool looks would last longer than the overblown face of her childhood acquaintance. But there was a rub to it all. Time waited for no man. And she knew that she would age, become heavy of body, wrinkled of visage and decrepit of mind if she was not truly immortal. Unless...

She was within days and minutes of holding her grail in her hands.
And the robe? It would serve to fulfill a two-fold duty. One being a way to emasculate Adelina. And the other? The perfect place to sew the souls.
She grinned.

She had one of course... one of the ‘keys’. In truth, its deep blackness
and its texture of freezing nothingness disturbed her. But never mind. It had been an easy capture that day by the lake. The silk seller, she of the sarcasm and wit had received such a surprise when Severine, coming upon in her in a solitary walk after the Fire Festival market, had acted instinctively. Whipping off the ring, holding it to her eye, she pulled the woman’s soul into her grasp, leaving her a frozen husk amongst the feathers and bird-dung of the shore. The woman hadn’t even time to cry out, only her eyes opened wide with horror as her soul tore free of its earthly anchor. Severine smirked. The speed and ease with which she had carried out the action without any forethought or rationalising thrilled her.

And now one more and then they would be parted ‘
befront, behind... till four of the same of two’
existed and she would force Adelina to sew them into the stumpwork of that robe and every single time she donned the garment more and more glamour would seep into her bones until she
was
immortal. She stared at the mirror, into her cold eyes with their absence of guilt. There was nothing, absolutely nothing, she wouldn’t do to secure this end.

***

I am sure you can see as you read, that what people are and how they act truly does affect their fate, does it not? Although Jasper would disagree. He would say one’s fate is cast from the outset.

Remember too, my friend, back in the early days of this history I talked about kindred spirits? Ah! Kindred spirits are the glue that keep Travellers together. But Travellers are also able to feel the reverse, someone who is meant never to be kindred of any sort. The day I met Severine as a young child, the hair stood up on the back of my neck. I knew even then we would be destined to be at best, competitors.

At worst, sworn enemies.

Ah well... shall we continue?

C
hapter Twenty Seven

‘You still don’t wish to contact your family,
muirnin
? Even now? With the prospect of your marriage and journeying to another life entirely?’ Adelina shook her head as she asked, unhappy with the ease with which Ana had cast her family aside. Whilst she waited for Ana’s answer, she had tried three times to thread a needle and three times her hand shook just as the thread nipped the eye. She had no doubt the tension was fired by anger at Liam’s arrogant confrontation with her. And she knew she had been stymied by the marriage proposal. If she spoke to Kholi he would never believe her, his experience of Liam so contrary to her own. And Ana? Like any young woman in the throes of love, lust and marriage, she doubted the girl would listen. She put the needle and thread aside and picked up a length of fine wire as Ana answered.

‘No. Liam is all I need.’

Adelina studied her and couldn’t help noticing her assurance.
It’s as if by joining with Liam she has reinforced herself, re-invented herself
. She glanced down to see she had been forming a wire shape for a leaf and thought how much Ana was like that fragile foliage. Without
Liam’s backbone, like silk thread without reinforcing wire, she was sure
the woman would fold in a minute.
How deep does this newfound confidence run?
What is she without Liam?
Something better, something worse, weaker, stronger?
She sighed with frustration. Faeran and mortal, mortal and Faeran, it ran around her head like a mouse in a wheel... a mouse in a wheel whose little axle was almost worn through. She tried to concentrate on Ana’s voice.

'You know, Adelina, I am truly at peace. I trust Liam with my life.’

Adelina shifted in her chair, the mouse wheel racketing around and close to shattering apart. 'How much do you know about him, Ana? Do you really talk?'

Ana looked up, surprised. 'What an odd question. Do you think we just stare passionately at each other and make love?' She cut away at pieces of lining; with each word the scissors snip, snip, snipped.

'Have you ever seen him use a mesmer or any of his special powers?' Adelina took a tiny pair of embroidery scissors, the ones with the blades shaped like a crane's bill and cut a remnant of thread.

'Yes. When he rescued me from the dunters. If he used them at other times, I was mesmered myself and wouldn't have been aware. I am not sure if he even has those powers now he has lost his immortality. I haven’t asked him. Does it matter?'

'No, I suppose not.' Taking a huge breath and feeling her heart thudding, Adelina faced Ana just as the mouse-wheel broke. 'Do you know if he has ever used his powers for ill?'

'Adelina, please.' Ana threw down her scissors and fabric. 'Has he not proved himself to you? Sometimes you make me so angry. You’re so opinionated, as if you have the right to say and think whatever you want. Have you forgotten this is the man
I
choose. And no, I am not suffering the pining sickness, he hasn’t mesmered me. This is a choice I make freely. You hear? I make it myself.’ She picked up the scissors again. ‘I don’t want to fight with you, not now, not ever. So I insist you give up this witch hunt and accept he is what he is: kind, caring,
Faeran
and my soon to be husband.’ She banged the handle of the sharp tool on the table with a thump, glaring at Adelina.

Momentarily shamed, surprised at the vehemence of Ana’s outburst,
Adelina sat back. ‘I apologise,
muirnin
. It was wrong of me. As you say, it’s none of my business. But Ana, even though you are only my highway family, I am as fond of you as if you were my own and I only want the best for you.’

‘Liam
is
the best, Adelina. I wish you could understand. Don’t you want me to have the kind of love you have with Kholi? You wouldn’t be so selfish would you, not to want that for me?’

Adelina could hardly gainsay the plea. ‘No, of course I want the same for you. Forget I spoke at all. Can you forgive me and try this on?’

Ana left Adelina not long after and hastened down to the door of the inn to take a step outside. The glitter of snow and ice was so sharp her eyes closed to slits and she was momentarily blinded, walking carefully across the cobbles that separated her from the Celestine Stairway.

The road was empty of movement, sinister snow clouds sliding back and forth over the sun, the wind taking cruel bites at exposed skin. Most journeymen had eschewed the frosted stairway for the warmth of taverns and inns. An ugly gust sent a flurry of snow flying up the walls and buttresses, baffling away at Ana’s unprotected ears. As she shrank back to the shelter of the porch and gazed at the grey and white striated distance, she heard footsteps shushing toward her - the four beat of an animal pushing through the snowdrifts. Her hair prickled on her neck, each individual follicle rising and separating, goosebumps racing up her arms as she tried to discern the whereabouts of the sound. To the left there was nothing, then to the right. Only hard shadows against the corners of buildings, impenetrable blocks of dark where neither shade nor movement could be detected. The padding came remorselessly on and she turned her head again, her feet rooted through the snow to the very surface of the mountain.

A black shape detached itself from the corner and two amber eyes moved closer. A giant dog, as dark as doom, approached quietly, his eyes burning into Ana’s and piercing her heart. She gasped with horror as the gaze slid into her soul. A tiny corner of that life-source within her crinkled a little more, as it had done when her father died. The Black Dog, the Barguest, harbinger of the victim’s end, had marked her and she spun away, her hand scrabbling at the latch of the door, shoving it open and then slamming it behind. She leaned against the portal, a shaking hand to her mouth, wincing as a shadow passed outside, rippling across the bubbled glass of the window. Violet the tavern cat arched a hackled back, spat and then ran hissing into the bar as if the Barguest would enter their tidy, happy world.

Ana closed her eyes and stood swaying as her world strained to re-orient itself. She pressed her palms against each other until everything felt right again.
She was overwrought with excitement, that’s all. Of course there were
shadows for Aine’s sake and anyway, even if it was the Barguest, was not her own betrothed an Other? Against whom none could prevail?

She snorted like a tricksy mare and raced up the stair.

Liam had spent time alone, sitting at the window staring at the iced
escarpments of the Goti Range. The forbidding edifice echoed the unease in his mind because the game had taken a turn, changing drastically as if the rule-book had long since been torn up and thrown out the window to be blown up to the crags. He wanted to win, but to win what? And against whom? Adelina? Himself? With Ana as the prize? A valuable enough trophy to be sure, but did he really want to marry her? Then again he could do worse for surely her devotion knew no bounds. The thought of that unlimited affection, of the yearning that brought them together in a silent paroxysm shook him to the soles of his boots, making him doubt his own game-play. And when doubts crept in, it was those moments that caused marriage offers and such. As if he lost control of the game utterly.

‘Liam, Liam.’ Ana’s voice called up the staircase.

‘I’m here.’

Ana flew in on wings, grabbing him, sparking with a brittle light. ‘Come on, let’s go out, take me to the mews. I need to stretch my legs, they are wound tighter than a spring.’
She pulled him after her and he was struck by the frenetic edge to
her manner.

‘Ana, is anything wrong?’

‘No, no. I have cabin fever, that’s all. All this snow and staying indoors. I need to breathe.’

They had reached the foot of the stairs, entering the bar on the edge of Ana’s odd mood, the air crackling and shifting around the two. Onlookers could assume it was excitement and love as they informed their friends they were going out, reaching for the quilted coats they had necessarily acquired since taking residence in Star. Bundled up, twice as rotund and with leather boots and fur hats, they called farewells and headed into the remains of the grim day.

‘Ah well, kegs and ale
to be shifted so I’ll get on. Here,’ Buckerfield pushed over two goblets of wine.

‘I knew I loved you for a reason.’ Adelina patted the big hand as he turned away to serve more customers. She picked up her drink and joined Kholi by the window. ‘You know, this really was my favo
urite place when I was young.’ She spoke quietly to Kholi as the inn filled around them. Dulcit chatter, as yet unfuelled by alcohol, created a murmuring backdrop to their conversation. ‘Buckerfield’s not that much older than I and when my parents stayed here on their journeying, he always included me with his local friends. After the horrors of Severine’s company and not having a brother of my own, let alone a sister, Buckerfield was always special. I remember he taught me how to make snow angels. One winter we lay down and made dozens all the way up the Stair. We were wet through when we got back. It was such fun.’

‘
Life has its moments, my love, most assuredly. And I think Ana’s will improve now
. Aine knows she deserves something good after her terrible traumas.’ Kholi raised his glass in a toast.

Adelina gave a crisp little laugh frilled with the sharp timbre of sarcasm. ‘And you think a Faeran can supply that? Kholi, you live in a dream world.’

A Raji expletive shot across the table, along with Kholi’s hand as it grasped Adelina’s wrist. She stared in shocked silence at the fingers pressed around her wrist and then she shifted her eyes to his face.
She saw anger where she had expected none. Once before he had
shown such ferocity. At the campsite when she had raged at Liam on Ana’s disappearance. As then, Kholi’s calm constancy changed, as explosive as a firestorm. With a sick heart she knew she had pushed his calm to breaking point.

‘Adelina, enough. Let this whole matter go.’ His eyes burned. ‘You have had days of opinionated rhetoric pouring forth from your mouth till I swear I could sail away on it. And Aine it has become boring. He has done nothing wrong, do you hear me?’

‘But I don’t want her to marry him. Kholi, you have no idea. He is duplicitous and cunning. You have only ever seen the affable side, I have seen the reverse.’

Kholi’s eyes bored into hers so deeply she looked away as he spoke.
‘I will not listen. He has proved himself more than enough to me. I would be happy if Lalita chose such a man. By afrits and foliots, Ana is a grown woman and I’ve said it a dozen times. Adelina, she has made her choice.
Let her alone. She deserves to have love.’

‘You think maybe to compare what we have with what they have? Please.’ Adelina spat back.

Kholi’s hand tightened further. ‘You profess to be her friend. Not her mother, nor her sister, not even her mentor. To me, and it galls me to say this because I have loved you so much these last few weeks, you seem rude and insensitive. A friend wishes to share in her friend's happiness. I compare nothing with nothing because right now, Adelina, that is what we have. I have no intention of tying myself to someone so mean-spirited. Not so different I think from your vile friend, Severine.’ He placed his drink down firmly and left the table, slamming the door behind him.

‘Oh,’ Adelina gasped. ‘Oh.’ Nausea welled up in her throat. Their journey had been remarkable for Kholi’s gentility, support and unconditional affection. She had come to rely on his companionship, falling asleep cocooned in his broad arms and to wake as a finger trailed like a skein of silk down her backbone from her neck to her buttock.
She shivered as she remembered, reminded also of the intellectual span of
his mind, of his poetry, his prose. He was no dullard, as capable of assessing men as she was in determining her own view. So could he be right?

She growled. What was it about Liam that caused war-drums to beat and sabres to rattle? 'Fight me,' he urged. 'Fight me and I will win.' She pounded her fist on the table.
Kholi says I am wrong. If I say I am not and we dispute still, might he leave me?
She shrugged her shoulders.
So? I have been alone before and I can be again.
But then she remembered him
touching her and drawing her along in exquisite passion, whispering how she would be the home for his heart, the key for his soul, the scabbard for his sword.

She ran to the door and wrenched it open.
‘Kholi,’ she shouted as she pounded up to their room. ‘Kholi, wait.’