Agent of the Crown (54 page)

“Hope, get away from the wheels,” Telaine
said.

“Hope!” Eleanor appeared out of nowhere and
snatched the girl away from danger. She looked up at the wagon as
it came to a stop in front of the forge. “Lainie,” she said. “Come
down here, Mistress Garrett.”

Telaine leaped down and embraced her dear
friend, both of them in tears. “I’m so sorry about Liam and Trey
and the baby,” Telaine whispered.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t a better friend to you,”
Eleanor whispered back.

“Don’t mean to sound like an old man, but I
think I could use some help getting down,” Ben called. Telaine
wiped her eyes and went to help, but was clasped about the waist
and lifted to one side by Jack Taylor, who gave her a kiss on the
cheek before helping her husband off the wagon. “Always nice to see
a pretty girl come to town, even if she is married to someone
else,” he said with a wink. Ben came to Telaine’s side, limping,
and pretended to shove Jack away.

“I guess they took you seriously when you
said you’d be bringing your wife back,” Telaine said in a low
voice. Greetings and congratulations were coming in from all sides
now, and Telaine laughed in joy and relief at the welcome.

Ben put his arm around her, lifted his head
and let out that pure, beautiful note she’d heard the night of Trey
and Blythe’s wedding. The crowd added their voices to harmonize
with his, leaving Telaine wondering if she would now be expected to
join in. She was about as musical as a frog.

The chord ended. “Thanks for the welcome,”
Ben said, pitching his voice to carry over what little noise
remained. “Mistress Garrett—” A few voices cheered, and Telaine
blushed—“Mistress Garrett and I are happy to be home again, and we
hope to see you all at our shivaree soon now.”

“Tomorrow,” said Eleanor firmly. “Just been
waiting on you to get back.”

“Tomorrow,” Ben repeated. “But now I think
we’d like to settle in and get some rest.”

“That what the city fellows calling it these
days?” shouted out someone in the crowd. Laughter.

“I’d tell you what the city fellows call it,
but there’s children present,” Telaine called out. More laughter.
Ben rolled his eyes.

Eleanor beat them to the front door. “We
thought you shouldn’t have to come home to Ben’s old bachelor
place. He’s tidy, but I know he eats over the sink most nights and,
well…we did what we could.” She held open the door for them.
Telaine crossed the threshold and her mouth dropped open.

She’d always liked Ben’s neat, small home and
in all her plans hadn’t thought it needed much renovation. She saw
at once she hadn’t seen the possibilities. Every surface had been
newly sanded or polished or painted. The sofa had been re-covered
and the rocking chair had new cushions. The old kitchen table was
still there, but the single chair had been replaced by two new ones
painted white to match the kitchen cupboards. The sink and stove
had been thoroughly scrubbed. A few missing stones in the hearth
had been replaced and a new set of fireplace tools sat prominently
beside it.

“Lainie,” Ben said from their bedroom door.
She joined him there and gasped. A new, wide four-poster bed took
up most of the space, sporting not one but two thick mattresses.
She ran her hand over their smooth linen casings. “It’s so
beautiful,” she said. “Lie down.”

“Lainie, they were joking—”

“Lie down before you fall down, Ben. No, take
your boots off first.” He sat heavily on the edge of the mattresses
and she helped him pull off his boots and then eased him around so
his leg was in a better position. “You stay here and I’m going to
unload the wagon.”

“I have to help.”

“You have to recover.”

“Happen I’ll never walk right again.”

“That won’t be true if you rest more.
Journey’s over. Time for our life to begin.”

She went outside and directed some of her
lingering friends in unloading, and tried not to think that there
were fewer of them. Time enough to remember lost friends later, at
the tavern.

It was fun to arrange things in her own home.
A year ago she would have laughed herself sick if someone had told
her that today she’d be putting away dishes and figuring out where
to store household linens and shouting reassurances to a
still-invalid husband. Julia had found in herself an unexpected
gift for motherhood. Telaine thought she might have a talent for
domesticity.

Having stowed everything, she laughingly
shooed her friends away and went back inside to find Ben sitting on
the sofa. “What are you doing up?” she asked.

“Got bored,” he said. “See how I’m sitting
instead of wandering around?”

“I was going to have you move anyway so I
could make the bed.” She rapidly tucked in sheets and spread the
quilt over the mattresses, and chuckled, thinking of her first
night in Longbourne and her struggle to fit the sheet to that worn,
dirty mattress.

“What are you laughing at?”

“Myself.” She sat next to him on the sofa.
“Now what?”

“I could make supper.” He paused. “You could
visit Mistress Weaver.”

“Right now? You don’t mind?”

“Didn’t see her in the crowd. Happen she’s
waiting for you to come to her.” Ben started rummaging in the
cupboards. “You rearranged everything. And there’s no food in the
pantry. Guess we’re eating at the tavern tonight.”

Telaine went down the street to Aunt Weaver’s
house and knocked at the back door, then let herself in when there
was no response. She heard the loom going in the front room, but
not the spinning wheels, and found Aunt Weaver alone at the loom.
“Hello,” she said, suddenly not sure what else to say.

“Heard you were back. Excuse me for not
coming out, but I’ve got an order to fill by end of this week,”
Aunt Weaver said, pitching her voice over the noise of the
treadles. The shuttle flew back and forth.

Telaine looked around, found a chair, and sat
where she could see her great-aunt’s face. “I never did thank you
for taking me in.”

“No thanks needed. Did what young Jeffrey
wanted, and not with much grace either.”

“You did more than you had to. I’m glad
you’re here.”

Aunt Weaver grunted. Telaine took that as
“thanks.” “I understand you’re still my non-royal father’s
half-sister,” she added.

Aunt Weaver grunted again. “Seemed the best
way to handle it. Other options were more complicated.”

“Yes, I suppose telling everyone you knew I
wasn’t your niece would have made them ask why I’d come to stay
with you in the first place. And you couldn’t say you were related
to my royal mother.”

“Right.” They fell silent. The clack of the
arms and the gentler thump of the treadles filled the place where
their conversation had been.

“Happen I told you once about my havin’ to
move around,” Aunt Weaver said abruptly.

Telaine nodded. “I remember.”

“Told you I moved about every ten years.”

“Yes.”

“That I’d been here going on seven years.
Almost eight, now.”

“I know.”

Aunt Weaver pursed her lips. “Thought maybe
it was time for a change. I could probably stay another ten years
before people notice I’m not aging. Longbourne’s not a bad place to
live.”

“Not a bad place to raise a family,” Telaine
said.

“That too.” She stopped the loom and looked
at Telaine with those sharp blue eyes. “Happen you’ll come by some
days, say hello.”

“Happen I will,” Telaine said.

The corners of Zara North’s mouth curled up,
ever so slightly, in a smile.

The clear
spring air carried with it a thousand beautiful smells, pine and
flowers and the distant scent of a mountain river. Alison heard it
at the edge of her perception, a murmur like that of a palace ball.
She closed her eyes and pictured it, the Spring Gala with all those
men in pale suits and cravats matching the pastel blues and pinks
and yellows of the women’s gowns.

How fashion had changed in sixty years. Now
they wore thin muslins and laces with puffy short sleeves and low
necklines over silk or satin slips with narrow skirts. They’d put
so many dances out of style, some of them her old favorites—but
then it had been her doing that the corset had gone out of fashion,
so she could hardly complain.

“You were always so beautiful, no matter what
you wore,” Anthony said. She could imagine his breath tickling her
ear, hear his marvelous baritone smooth and warm like melted
toffee.

“I still prefer trousers to gowns,” she
whispered back to him. No sense startling the driver, who probably
needed all her attention to keep the carriage on the narrow
mountain path.

“Even more beautiful with your dress off,” he
teased, and she smiled at the old joke and wished she could lay her
head on his shoulder—but of course, he wasn’t there, he was a
memory, and a beloved one. She could hear his voice more clearly
every day.

“I don’t mean this as impatience, but do you
know how much longer until we’re there?” she asked the driver.

“I think it’s another half-hour until the
valley, milady Consort,” the woman said, “and the man at the
stables said it was another half-hour from there to Longbourne. Are
you comfortable?”

“As comfortable as these old bones can be,”
Alison said. Her voice was so creaky these days, like the rest of
her. She’d turned eighty-three six weeks before and considered
herself fairly hale for such an old woman, even if her joints
creaked as much as her voice did and her formerly smooth skin was
dry and wrinkled as old paper.

Jeffrey had been horrified when she proposed
this trip, but he of all people knew why she had to make it. “I’m
surprised you didn’t do this earlier,” he’d said, “fifteen years
ago.”

“Fifteen years ago my granddaughter didn’t
give me an excellent excuse for the trip,” she’d replied, “and I’ve
kept this secret too long to risk revealing it, even now. The
Norths are strong, but no sense stirring up scandal.”

He’d shaken his head, but hadn’t argued
further. Imogen had been more aghast even than her husband, and
Alison wondered if she suspected there was more to this trip than
the desire to see Telaine and her family in their own home. But she
was still Alison North, with a will of iron and the determination
to see things through, and now here she was bouncing up the pass
toward Steepridge.

It was actually a fairly comfortable ride,
less jolting than the Device Jeffrey had imported from Eskandel
that drove you around the city without horses. It was a novelty, a
child’s toy, but Alison had observed how easily it handled, how it
didn’t leave piles of dung wherever it passed, and predicted
Tremontane was seeing the birth of a Devisery that would change it
forever.

“We’ve seen so many changes,” Anthony said.
“I wonder what changes our children will see.”

“What changes they’ll make,” she said
quietly. “Telaine has already made a name for herself, even in her
little village. When she gets her hands on that Devisery…imagine
this trip made twice as fast. She already keeps the passes clear in
winter.”

“I’ve seen them all through your eyes.
They’re quite the legacy.”

“Yours and mine.”

She napped in the spring sunshine and woke
when the carriage’s pace changed, became less bumpy and faster, and
sat up to look around her. Now she understood what Telaine had
fallen in love with. If she’d come here fifteen years ago, she
might have stayed herself. Green grass stretched out in both
directions, coming up against the darker green of evergreens in one
direction and the silvery coins of aspens in the other.

The sound of rushing water faded somewhat,
but in the far distance she could see a thread of white water
spooling down the face of a mountain that still had snow on its
peaks. Mount Ehuren was visible beyond that, its darker gray stark
against the pale blue sky. The road wound on through the gentle
rise of the valley, branching off toward unseen villages elsewhere
in the barony. “Stop,” she told the driver. “I want to stretch my
legs, then ride on the seat with you.”

“Are you sure you’ll be comfortable enough,
milady Consort?”

“If I’m not, it will pass, and I want to see
Longbourne on my own terms.”

She needed the driver’s help to emerge from
the carriage, tottered around until she had full control of her
body, then climbed up onto the seat and held on to its edge as the
carriage continued along the road.

“You might take my arm instead of that
splintery seat,” Anthony said. She smiled, but didn’t reply. Ahead,
she could see the sun glinting off the blue-gray slates of roofs.
Longbourne. It grew up around them, outlying farms becoming houses
and then the two-story businesses that lined Longbourne’s main
street.

The horses’ hooves went from thudding on
hard-packed earth to ringing out with the same sharp taps they did
on the stone-paved streets of Aurilien. Telaine had written with
great excitement about the paving of Longbourne’s streets four
years ago, how it had replaced the gravel. Alison had tried to
imagine the life her oldest granddaughter lived now, she who’d been
raised wild and then tamed into a society belle, or so they’d all
thought before she was revealed as an agent of the Crown. No wonder
she’d thrived here.

The carriage came to a stop near the forge,
where the sound of metal tapping metal and a hot crisp smell of
glowing coal said Ben Garrett was at work. The forge was attached
to a two-story house, which in turn was attached to a shorter
building with large glass windows that would let in enough light
for the most precise, finicky work. A couple of men standing at the
forge rail turned to look at the newcomer, idly curious. Of course
they’d have no idea who she was. The driver helped Alison down.
“Where shall I take your bags, milady Consort?”