Corambis (25 page)

I could not simply keep running from the fantôme; like the remorseless ticking of the Clock of Eclipses, it could follow me no matter how deep I went into my dreams. I had to fight, even though I had no idea how.

My construct- Mélusine was bare of briars, but also barren, like the stones of a house left standing after a fire, and all the gates were now standing wide, a series of panoramas I did not want to see. I made the circle, grimly dragging them shut, though the effort jolted all the way up to my shoulders and made my hands ache dismally. When I paused in front of Horn Gate, afraid to look through at the Khloïdanikos but equally unwilling to cut myself off from it, the fantôme said from behind me,
Is this thy fortress, Felix? It cannot keep me out.
And all around the circuit, the gates slammed open, one after the other, in the order in which I’d closed them.

If I went into the Khloïdanikos, it would only follow me, and I had already done enough harm there. I turned around, hating each individual motion, and found the fantôme standing on the black glass circle that was all that was left to represent the Mirador. It was wearing Isaac Garamond’s face.

Who are you, truly?
I said.
I am rachenant,
it said, as if that were an answer.
Rachenant?
The spirit of vengeance,
it said. Its eyes were not Isaac’s eyes; they were

red as blood and black as slaughter and not even remotely human. And then I jerked back, realizing how close to it I’d come without even noticing.

Felix,
it said in mock sorrow and spread wide hands that a moment before had been reaching for my wrists.
Dost not trust me? I wish only to serve thee.

I do not want your ser vice.

Thou canst not lie to me,
it said, and Isaac shifted into Malkar.
I can see the truth of thee. Beloved.
I want you,
I said carefully,
to leave me alone. If you can see the truth of me, you can see that I mean it.
Dost
think
thou meanst it,
the fantôme agreed with Malkar’s worst smile.
But in thy heart, thou dost desire me.
The idea came to me as sharp and sudden and brilliant as a lightning bolt, and I acted on it in the same instant. Instead of retreating, I charged the fantôme. It could take Malkar’s appearance, but it didn’t have his mass, and I drove it backwards, south, into the stagnant black tarn that was both the Sim and my madness. I pinned it, my hands locked in claws around its throat, and I held it under with both my weight and my magic, forcing it to follow the rules of the construct it had chosen to follow me into, forcing it to drown. When at last it lay still and limp, not Malkar any longer, not anyone, I shoved the body out until the undertow caught it and dragged it down.
I slept peacefully and well the rest of the night.

Corbie was prompt the next afternoon, and her anxiety made my throat hurt. “Let’s go up to the roof,” I said and ignored the look that Mildmay gave me. It was no business of his.

Corbie followed me without complaint, but when we reached the privacy of the roof, she said, “You’re gonna say no, aren’t you?”
“Corbie, it’s not that I don’t
want
—”
“Oh fuck you, of course it is. I don’t blame you, but don’t lie about it, all right?”
“I’m not the right teacher for you,” I said desperately. “I don’t know anything about Grevillian thaumaturgy. Anything I taught you, you’d just have to unlearn anyway.”
“Who fucking cares about thaumaturgy?” she yelled at me. And to my abiding horror, she began to cry.
“Oh fuck it,” she said; she was already digging out a handkerchief. “I wasn’t going to do this, I swear I wasn’t, but I thought I had it right, I thought I . . . I thought you
liked
me.”
“I
do
like you. Corbie, it’s not about
liking
. It’s just . . .”
“Just
what
?” she snarled.
And, horrified, I heard myself say it: “I had a teacher. He abused me. And I don’t want . . . I don’t trust myself, Corbie. I know I
can’t
trust myself. And I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Too fucking late.”
“I know. I did this all wrong. I . . .”
Don’t I rate an apology?
“I’m sorry.”
She sighed and said, “C’mon and sit down. I can’t think with you looming over me like this.”
“I don’t loom,” I protested.
“You’re most of a foot taller than me. Of course you loom. C’mon.
Sit.
”
I felt as if I owed it to her; I sat beside her, leaning against one of the chimneys.
She blew her nose and glared at me. “So. Tell me about this teacher of yours.”
“Corbie!”
“What?”
“I can’t just . . .”
“It ain’t that hard. Look, you said you liked me, and Mildmay said you liked teaching. So I really want to know what the problem is here.”
“Okay,” I said. “You want to know? His name was Malkar Gennadion. Or one of his names. He was a blood- wizard. He was at least a hundred years old, maybe more like two or three. I don’t know. He bought me. From the brothel I was working in, when I was fourteen. And he took me to this place called Arabel, which was, oh I don’t know, fifty, sixty miles from Mélusine, farther from home than I’d ever been in my life. We stayed on the estate of a friend of his. Insofar as Malkar had friends. And sometimes, every few months, he’d . . .” I’d never told anyone this, and the words were drying up in my throat even as they were forcing themselves out. “He’d give me to his friend for a night. In ‘payment.’ And then one night he suggested they share me.”
She was watching me, her eyes serious but not shocked. I swallowed hard and went on: “I don’t mean to imply that this was the first time I’d ever been used by two men together. But Malkar had told me he loved me. He’d told me I was special. He’d told me he ‘loaned’ me to Hestrand— his friend— because he had to, that he had no money to pay rent. But then that night . . .”
I couldn’t go on. I couldn’t. But my mouth opened, and I said, “Malkar was fucking me up the ass, and he’d got my hands behind my back, and Hestrand was fucking my mouth, and Malkar says to Hestrand, ‘Do you know the story of how I found this trea sure?’ And Hestrand says, ‘No,’ and Malkar tells him. He tells him the whole thing, fucking me slow the entire time, and then he says— I remember it word for word—‘He’s a clever little beast, but his true aptitude is always going to be for being fucked.’ And they proved it that night. They did things to me . . .” I managed a jagged sort of noise that might have been a laugh. “And the next day, when I tried to talk to Malkar about it, he just said, ‘Don’t make a melodrama out of it, dearest. It’s not worth it for a molly- toy like you.’ And I felt . . . It wasn’t about the sex. It was the betrayal, the way he didn’t even bother to
lie
to me.” I shook my head, trying, again, to shake away the past, and said, “That was my teacher. That was the man who taught me everything I know.”
After a moment, she said, “Is that what you sounded like? Before?”
I listened to my own words again in my head and winced at the way my vowels had slid into the Lower City. “Yes. Only worse. Worse than Mildmay.”
She nodded, her eyes thoughtful. Still not shocked. She said, “But when I tried to tell you I couldn’t learn real magic because I was a jezebel, you got mad at me.”
“I . . .” I realized my mouth was hanging open, and closed it.
“So you’re not like him,” she said, as Mildmay had said. “And we know you’re not going to fuck me anyway, because you don’t do women. So what’s the problem?”
“Corbie, I can’t—”
“You keep saying that,” she said. “But I think what you mean is, you’re scared to. And that ain’t the same thing. So, all right. I ain’t gonna force myself on you. You decide what you want, and when you do, you let me know. I’ll be at the Brocade Mouse.”
“Corbie—”
“Shut up, Felix,” she said, and then smiled at me, a real smile, though tired and too old for her. “You got some shit to work through. I get that.” She patted my knee, very gently, and then was up and away as light on her feet as a butterfly.
I sat shivering for a long time after she was gone.

The day before we were to leave Esmer, the eve ning post arrived while we were having tea, and Murtagh, as he generally did, opened his letters in between bites of pound cake. He frequently provided commentary, sometimes scurrilous, sometimes merely informative, and I listened with almost painful attentiveness, knowing that what he was really doing was educating me in the finer points of Corambin— and particularly Esmerine— politics. He was also still negotiating with Vanessa Pallister and her brothers- in- law over a marriage he seemed determined to push through; although it made me deeply uncomfortable to find myself cast as the bride and Murtagh as my father, was not as if I could have done anything about it myself. Even more uncomfortable was the realization that I did not truly have the option of refusing, unless I wished Murtagh to hand me over to either Caloxan or Corambin justice. And in that I found myself following my sister Isobel, who had not had the option of refusing the marriage I had negotiated with Murtagh. She could have entered a convent, as I remembered saying to her more than once, but a woman less suited than Isobel to the life of a contemplative was hard to imagine, and I had known that full well. I was ashamed of myself, both for doing such a reprehensible thing and for never once, in twelve indictions, stopping to consider what I had done. No, not until it happened to me, and then I was all indignation and hurt and anger.
Then
I found it reprehensible.

Would not even be able to apologize to Isobel. An I did, she would box my ears. And I would deserve it.
But this afternoon, Murtagh had mostly notes from Bernathan potentates, expressing their sorrow that he was leaving, their hopes of future good relations, “et cetera et cetera,” said Murtagh. And then the brisk sounds of letters being opened and unfolded and stacked to one side ceased. “Hello,” said Murtagh. “This is different.”
“What is?”
“This,” said he, and I heard the faint crinkle of paper being flourished, “is a letter from one Intended Marcham, of Our Lady of Marigolds in Howrack.”
“Intended Marcham?” My mouth had gone dry; I found my teacup and burned my tongue on too large a swallow. “What does he want?”
“Interesting that you should ask. His handwriting is nearly illegible and if the man was ever taught to spell, it clearly didn’t take. He says he’s very concerned because . . . Kay, I can’t make this word be anything but
verlain
. Can that possibly be right?”
“Yes,” I said, and my voice sounded as hollow as I felt. “He’s talking about the engine.”
“Which is
verlain
? What ever
verlain
means?”
“Yes. It’s a country word. It means ‘forbidden.’ ”
“Ah. That explains why he’s talking about a curse in the next line.”
“A
curse
?” I had feared he was writing to protest the dissolution of my penance.
“Yes. He says that’s what killed Gerrard and the others and struck you blind, and he says now it’s punishing the people of Howrack for not stopping you. Everyone’s sickly, he says, and the crops are slow, and he’s quite sure it’s because of this curse.”
“And he thinks what? That you can do something about it?”
“Well, I’m not sure about that, either. I swear his spelling is getting worse as he goes along. He seems to think I
should
do something about it. Either that or he thinks
you
should do something about it. I can’t quite tell.”
“He’s the intended. Why doesn’t he do something?”
“You want me to
ask
?” Murtagh said, and he sounded so utterly appalled that I started laughing.
“No,” said I. “I wouldn’t ask that of you.”
“Good. Because I wouldn’t do it. You’ve met the man. Is he actually a lunatic?”
“Did not meet him under the best of circumstances,” I said. “But, no, I did not think him mad.”
“Then,” said Murtagh, “I’m afraid his wits have turned. Happily that problem is neither mine nor yours. It belongs to the unfortunate people of Howrack and, I suppose, to their margrave.”
“Murrey.”
“Couldn’t happen to a nicer fellow,” said Murtagh with satisfaction, and I heard him wadding the letter into a ball and pitching it into the fireplace.

The Brocade Mouse was lavishly appointed but not— I noticed as a skinny not- quite- teenage girl led me back toward Corbie’s room— particularly clean. At night, no one would be able to tell, and the customers were the last people in the world to care. Corbie’s own room, though not much larger than a pocket handkerchief, was perfectly tidy and smelled pleasantly of rosemary and lavender. She was mending a layered cerise skirt when my guide opened the door and said, “Gentleman for you, Miss Gartrett.”

“Call me that again, Nell, and I’ll take my hairbrush to your backside,” Corbie said without looking up; then she raised her head and squeaked. Then coughed and said, “Felix. How nice to see you. Come in and sit down.”

This parody of politeness was far worse than belligerence. But I sat where she directed, on a spindly chair with a patchwork seat cover that was certainly not original, and folded my hands to keep from fidgeting.

After Corbie had stared Nell into closing the door again, she shoved the skirt aside and gave me a sidelong, wary look. “So. You’ve made up your mind, then?”

“I, um.”
“You
haven’t
made up your mind?”
“No, I have,” I said hastily. “I just . . .”
She waited a moment. “Are you trying to tell me you don’t want to teach me, or that you do?”

I couldn’t meet her eyes. I stared at the tattoos on the backs of my hands and managed to force the words out: “I do.”
“You don’t sound like it.”
It was what Malkar would have said, merely in order to prolong the agony for another round. But I looked at Corbie, and she didn’t look like she was enjoying this any more than I was. “No, I do,” I said. “I’m just . . .” The words stuck like fishhooks, but I had to say them: “I’m afraid I’ll fail.”
I’d been taught never to fail, by the scars on my back, by Malkar’s ingenious cruelty that left no mark, by the avid eyes of the Mirador, predators and carrion- eaters waiting to take their comrades down. I had learned never to admit the possibility of failure, to carry everything off with a lofty air of omnipotence and a smirk. But if I didn’t want to be Malkar— and I didn’t, desperately didn’t— I couldn’t treat Corbie like that, couldn’t close the gates with her on the outside.
“Well, I’m afraid I’ll fail, too,” Corbie said. “So we’re even.” “I guess we are.” I stood up. “Unless you have an objection, we’re leaving for Esmer tomorrow morning.”
“That’s awful quick,” Corbie said, but she didn’t sound upset.
“Is it a problem?”
“No.” Her smile was sudden and radiant: still not my type, but she was lovely when she was happy. “I’ll be glad to be gone.”