Ambergate (34 page)

She was sitting at the dressing table in a crumpled chamber robe, staring listlessly at the creams and unguents cluttering
the surface, as if wondering what they were to do with her: the shining glass bottles of milky face lotions, the fat pots
of rouge, dishes of charcoal powder, bowls of white face powder, the flat tin boxes of waxed carmine crayons. The air was
heavy with perfume from exquisite flagons, filligreed with gold. Hanging from the wardrobe door was the wedding dress she
was to wear: slippery cream satin, its sleeves and hem embroidered with pearls.

Leah was bone-pale, unadorned, her hair hidden in a pearled snood. I could see her face in the triple mirrors, puckered with
disgust and weariness, yet still so maddeningly beautiful. Her great eyes, which needed no blackening to rim them round, moved
from the array before her and fixed on me in the mirror, as if she had thought at last of what it was she wanted to say to
me.

“What is to become of me, Scuff?” she whispered.

“You will be a wife, Miss Leah,” I said with some satisfaction.

“In order to get my mother’s swanskin back, I must marry Caleb and give up Erland. That is my sacrifice.” She twisted her
hands together.

I felt an unexpected twinge of pity for her. “If the world were different, you and Erland would belong together—you are the
same. I saw it at the dance.”

“What do you mean?”

“I believe you know, Miss Leah. I think you knew when the three of us were little children, long ago at Murkmere. You wanted
to lead him into the water, to the swans’ nest—do you remember? I tried to take him from you, then—to save him from you—and
I only wish I could do so again.”

“You must hate me to say such a thing!” She buried her face in her hands.

“But it would do no good if I could take him,” I said, more gently. “I cannot change his nature. I understand that at last.
It is like yours.”

When she lifted her head, her eyes were red. “He is better than me, Scuff—much better. His nature is wholly good.” Her voice
trembled. “I fear he’ll do something foolish today. He’ll try to rescue me before I speak the vows. He’ll forget that his
duty as Messenger is to remain undetected by the Lord Protector. His first duty must be to the rebel cause.”

She turned on the stool with sudden energy. “When I first saw you, you told me you might be able to help me. I needed to see
you today to ask you—to beg you—not to change
your mind now.”—she spread her white fingers—“now that you know about Erland and me.”

I swallowed painfully. “My plan’s not changed, Miss Leah.”

“I can’t live without open water and sky,” she said with a great sigh. “I’d rather die than be without them.” She stared at
me piteously. “How can you help, though? What can you do?”

“I can’t tell you, Miss Leah.”

She bit her lip. “You must. I command it.”

I shook my head. “I’m your servant no longer.” I looked at her pale, tense face; she seemed to shrink into herself with despair.
“Will it help Erland too?” she whispered. “Only tell me that.”

Something about the bowed, tragic figure on the stool touched me, and I relented. “I have a dagger, Miss Leah,” I whispered
back. “I shall be close to Caleb at the wedding.”

She jerked upright. Her eyes widened, her hand went to her mouth. “You can’t!” she whispered. “You’ll die yourself!” She paused,
then suddenly shook her head as if in contempt. “You’ve no dagger. What a fool I am!”

I said nothing.

Her lips curled. “You’re only a child, and you’ve always been a coward. You’d never use a dagger.”

Anger burned inside me. I bent and touched my boot, with its lethal secret. Her eyes followed my hand.

“In there?” she hissed, incredulous.

I nodded.

She shook her head again, this time sadly. “Don’t joke, I beg you.”

In exasperation, I bent and pulled the dagger out, and in the same second, she snatched it from me. I thought she was about
to turn it on her own throat. “No, Miss Leah!” I cried, reaching out, my hat falling off in my agitation. “No, don’t!”

After my cry, the chamber was very quiet. We stared at each other without moving. She held the dagger behind her back.

“You must not risk your own life for us, Scuff. I know you’re no coward. You would do so.”

“It’s not for you,” I said miserably, “but to save my own skin.”

She stared.

I nodded. “I am a criminal,” I said in a low voice, “wanted by the authorities. I have agreed to kill Caleb in return for
my own life.”

“And you could do that—use this dagger in cold blood, even on such a monster?”

She gazed at me; I looked away. Suddenly she reached out with her free hand and turned my cheek toward her. “I know who it
is you look like! It has bothered me ever since I first saw you here, and now, with your hat off and your hair coiled, I see
it.”

I was bewildered, unsure of the sudden change in conversation. Was this another trick to keep the dagger?

She said softly, “It is the Lady Sophia, my father’s sister, who was married to the Lord Protector. There is a portrait of
her as a young girl hanging in the bedchamber she had before she died from the Miasma.”

“I’m a nameless orphan, Miss Leah, as well you know.”

She opened her mouth to speak, and then we heard Caleb Grouted’s raised voice outside. “Out of the way, girl. I wish to see
your mistress.” There was the sound of a scuffle and a squeal of protest from the maid.

Leah, white-faced with horror, thrust the dagger into my hand as the latch lifted on the door and Caleb burst in. He was dressed
in a frock-coat of pale yellow silk, his dark hair unpowdered, but oiled in ringlets. He lurched toward Leah, his lips parting
wetly, and made a grab for her as she stepped aside. “Have you no kiss for your sweet boy on this special day? Can’t a groom
kiss his betrothed?”

“Not before the service, Master Caleb,” said Leah coolly. “Go and ready yourself, else we shall be late.”

“Yes, Leah,” said Caleb, pretending meekness. He succeeded in catching her hand, which he squeezed and slobbered with a kiss
before he released it. I saw her secret grimace as she hastily turned her face away, and he gave a whinny of laughter.

“Afterward, then. I’ll look forward to that. Eh, Leah?” He punched the air. “They think me a real man for capturing you as
my bride. That’s what they all say in the officers’ mess. Leah Tunstall of Murkmere, the most beautifu I girl in the country!”

“Even though it was your father who arranged it? And held me here under duress until I agreed? Did you tell these lieutenants
about the cage?”

He looked sulky at once. “You shan’t dare to speak to me
so once we’re married, Leah. You’ll respect me then, if you know what’s good for you.”

Leah was silent, and he turned and swaggered to the door. As he brushed past me he seemed to take me in properly for the first
time. I clutched the dagger behind my back, praying that the trumpet sleeve of my dress covered it. “Why, ‘tis the little
songbird.”

I curtseyed quickly, keeping my head down, then winced as I felt hard fingers under my chin, tilting my face toward him. He
was frowning at me. “You look different with your hair like that,” he said. He seemed at a loss. He dropped his fingers, still
gazing at me stupidly.

I did not wait for him to dwell on it.
He is within seconds of remembering me from Madam Anora’s
, I thought.
If he tells his father…

I bobbed my head and fled from the room, past the astonished maid, past the idle guards chatting outside the main doors; out
into the courtyard, where already the members of the Ministration were starting to assemble, their deep claret ceremonial
robes dissolving into the shadow cast by the high walls. When no one was looking, I slid the dagger back into my boot and
continued on my way swiftly, slipping through the busy passages. I stopped only at my bedchamber, to collect the mahogany
box. I knew I would not be returning.

In his apartment, Nate, dressed in his green silk jacket, was fitting his ratha into a new leather case, as tender as if it
were a babe. He looked up in shock to see me without
my hat, in such a state. “Can we leave now?” I said urgently.

At once he took up his ratha and the sheets of music, and we hurried out together, past the guard at the main door of the
apartment and into the dull glare of the courtyard.

One of the distinctive black coaches of the Protectorate, washed and shining, stood in the shade, waiting for us. The horses
shook their heads as we approached, making the harness jingle. The driver doffed his leather cap. “Tell him to hurry,” I begged.

We could do no more than a trot as he maneuverd through the courtyards of the Palace. Around us, people scattered from our
path, glaring around in alarm and outrage.

I hid behind the velvet curtain at the window, but as we reached the main courtyard I peered out to see that the Ministration
had increased in number: a claret-colored parliament, silent in their ceremonial headdresses. As we swayed over the cobbles,
the bird heads turned toward us—raven, rook, hawk, magpie, buzzard, jay—all turning as one to stare, eyes gleaming through
the slits. The Ministration needed no plague masks: with the bird heads in place, they had joined the Gods and were invulnerable.

Others were joining them, stepping out from the wide dark doorway of :he Protector’s apartment. There was the Lord Protector
himself, in deep purple robes, holding his Eagle head under his arm; Caleb Grouted, the sun shining on his oiled ringlets
and the yellow silk coat; Mather and Chance,
spruce and sinister in their dark gray military uniforms, ceremonial swords glittering at their hips. They were all waiting
for Leah.

Our driver, nervous, must have flicked the horses with his whip, for we picked up speed as we rattled by, and clouds of dust
and grit and dried mud flew up under our wheels. We almost ran over Chance, who was standing closer than the others, and spattered
his clean uniform with filth. I wasn’t fast enough to pull the curtain across the window. As we passed, his furious eyes met
mine and widened.

Then we were past the long line of waiting carriages, their Eagle emblems gleaming in the hazy sun. I could see the drivers’
faces shining with sweat as they waited patiently. It was suffocatingly hot in our own coach.

“Sacred wings, what’s happened, Scuff?” said Nate as we left the gates behind us and the horses began to canter.

We clung to the armrests as the coach juddered from side to side. Warm, clammy air blew through as I jerked the window further
open.

“I may be in danger, Nate,” I gasped between the lurches. “I don’t know for sure.”

He looked more apprehensive still, and puzzled. “I don’t understand! You could escape. We’ve left the Palace.”

“I’ve sworn a sacred oath—I must keep it. I owe the Eagle that much this time. I’ll be safer in the Cathedral. They’ll be
busy with the nuptials.” But as I looked at Nate’s nonplussed face, my heart was beating fast and my mouth dried, so that
I had to keep swallowing.

A small crowd had gathered in the Cathedral square. A row of Enforcers and armed guards stood by the entrance, ready to deal
with any sign of disturbance, but after yesterday the people were subdued, their faces sullen and wary. It would not be long
before the Curfew would drive them away, if the heat did not do so first. The late afternoon sun seemed to fill the whole
sky, staining it a thick, dark orange; the air was so dry it seemed to crackle.

Before we left the coach Nate passed me a plague mask. “There have been more deaths in the last few days. Wear it until we’re
inside again.”

He wanted to carry the mahogany box for me, but I wouldn’t let him take it and alighted with it under my arm. I felt most
uncomfortable at the prospect of passing before those miserable, ragged people in my fine silk dress. And the first person
I set eyes upon was Titus Molde, hat well pulled down, hunched over a stick like an old beggar, with a bulging sack on his
back.

He looked up briefly, and gave me such a look it chilled my blood, even in such heat. I could not mistake the menace in that
look in the rolled white of his glinting eye. I thought he would confront me, but he turned away, his silent message of threat
delivered.

I’d scarce had time to recover when a woman jumped out of the crowd and tried to snatch the mask from my face. Her face was
greasy, her tattered dress marked with sweat. “It’s us needs protectin’, not you grand folk from the Palace!” she shouted.

Around her, others started muttering. The guards, alerted, moved forward; to my horror, one cracked his pistol butt against
the woman’s cheek. She staggered back, her hand to her bloody face.

Titus Molde had disappeared.

Nate took my arm and almost pushed me inside the entrance of the Cathedral. It was dark inside today, as if the light was
too thick and heavy to penetrate the windows; the air was almost icy against my hot face when I pulled off the mask. The altar
was brilliantly lit with candles, but the aisles and chapels were full of shadows, and in the shadows, the black lines of
the empty pews and the lurking soldiers, ever watchful.

A small, chittering figure capered up to us from the darkness and touched my skirt. “Gobchick!” A huge relief filled me that
he was safe. For a moment, I hugged him; I could feel his heart thudding in its cage of bones. Then he peered up at me, his
eyes mournful, frightened, as if he knew what I had to do, and ran off.

One of the soldiers saw him. “Shall I go after him?” he said to his companion.

The other gave a contemptuous laugh. “He’ll not harm no one. He’s naught but the Protector’s lunatic fool, with a head full
of fancies.”

The musicians passed us, on their way to set up their stands: elderly men and women, somber-faced and shabby. Nate went to
speak to the Master Musician about the program. I sank down in a pew, the box at my feet, and tried to compose myself.

What can I do
? I thought. Both inside the Cathedral and out, I was beset by enemies.