Naamah's Blessing (15 page)

I laughed and kissed him. “Aye, I do. Fat, happy babies.”

“Exactly.”

The tides of public opinion continued to sway back and forth. For a mercy, they began to swing in our direction. The appointment of Sister Gemma, and the support of Eisheth’s Order that accompanied it, were the first stroke of good fortune.

The second stroke came the following day, or more precisely, very early in the morning of the following day, when Bao and I were awakened by an urgent summons from one of the young acolytes in the temple.

“Forgive me,” she apologized as we gazed sleepily at her. “But it’s Messire Benoit Vallon from Atelier Favrielle to see you, and he’s in a considerable state of irritation.”

I yawned and tried to shake the cobwebs from my thoughts. “Oh, is he?”

Her lips quirked. “Considerable.”

I clambered out of bed and splashed water on my face, fumbling for clothing. “Best send him in, then.”

Benoit Vallon swept into our bedchamber with a satchel in one hand and a scowl on his face. He was a tall, lanky fellow who moved with loose-limbed grace, and every line of his long body expressed his considerable irritation.

“Well met, Messire—” I began.

His scowl deepened. “Yes, yes! It’s my fault for hiring my idiot nephew. He should never have turned you away.” He made an impatient gesture. “Come now, my lady! It’s less than a month’s time until the oath-taking ceremony, with the Longest Night hard on its heels. Strip!”

“Ah… is that customary, Moirin?” Bao inquired.

“It’s all right.” I began removing the sari I’d hastily pinned in place. “Messire Vallon needs to take measurements.” I glanced at the couturier. “You
are
here to accept a commission?”

Benoit Vallon favored me with a saturnine smile. “I’m not letting it fall to Eglantine House, that’s for certain. Atelier Favrielle has a reputation to maintain, and you’re surely one of the more interesting creatures I’ve dressed over the years.” He plucked up the sari I’d let fall, stretching out the unwieldy length of embroidered, sequined silk. “This is gorgeous fabric. It’s been a while since I’ve seen Bhodistani work so fine. Have you more?”

“Aye, but—”

“But what?” He shot me an impatient look. “It’s gorgeous, yes, but you cannot run around the City of Elua in midwinter looking like you’ve escaped from some pasha’s harem, Lady Moirin. So show me what you have, and let me find a way to incorporate it, hmm?”

I nodded reluctantly. “All right. But not
all
of it.”

“Fine.” Benoit began taking my measurements with a cloth tape, jotting down figures. When he was satisfied, he turned his attention to Bao. “So this is the infamous juggling physician-prince husband?”

“Tumbling,” Bao supplied.

“Tumbling.” The couturier repeated his impatient gesture. “Strip.”

Bao blinked. “Me?”

With a sigh, Benoit Vallon indicated Bao’s loose-fitting Bhodistani tunic and breeches. “Must I repeat myself, messire? All
you
need is a turban to play the part of the pasha from whose harem your wife escaped. Now strip, please.”

“We talked about this,” I reminded Bao, pinning my sari back in place and opening one of our trunks. Ironically, it contained the crimson turban Bao had worn at our wedding.

“You did not tell me it involved stripping for strangers,” he complained, but he obeyed, shucking his clothing.

“Hmm.” Benoit circled him, gazing intently. “Very nice. Lean, yet muscular. An excellent physique for well-tailored attire. No more baggy, ill-fitting atrocities for you, messire.” He took in the gold ear-hoops, the tattoos marking Bao’s forearms like streaks of jagged, black lightning. “Very… piratical.” He pointed at the latter. “Are those some sort of tribal markings?”

“No.” Bao didn’t elaborate.

“There’s a certain brooding darkness about you,” Benoit said shrewdly. “A roguish glamour, one might say… but it’s somewhat more, too.” He hoisted his measuring tape. “May I?”

I rummaged through our trunks, putting to one side those saris with which I did not want to part, like the crimson one I’d worn at our wedding and the mustard-yellow one that had been Amrita’s first gift to me, keeping half an eye on Bao as he suffered himself to be measured.

There
was
a faint aura of darkness that clung to him, and there had been ever since he had died and been restored to life. I could see it more clearly in the twilight, but I could see it in daylight, too.

I’d never known anyone else to remark on it.

Finished with his measurements, Benoit Vallon gestured for Bao to clothe himself once more. “Very good. Do you remember what I told you at our first consultation, my lady?”

I smiled. “I do, messire. You advised me that autumn hues would flatter me best, and that if I must wear color, to avoid bright hues in favor of deep jewel tones. Oh, and that I should never wear stark white, but ivory instead.”

“So I did. Well done, child.” He picked through the piles of fabric I’d heaped on the bed. “I’ll take this, and this…” A pair of squares of embroidered silk I’d set to the side caught his eye, and he picked them up to study them. “Interesting. These were never Bhodistani work, were they?”

“No,” I said. “Ch’in.”

There were two squares, one embroidered with a pattern of flowering bamboo, the other with a pattern of black-and-white magpies. I had purchased them both in a Ch’in village called Tonghe. The first had been embroidered by Bao’s half-sister; the second, by his mother.

Benoit glanced up at me. “They’re lovely.”

“They are,” I agreed. “But I fear they’re not available.”

“Why not, Moirin?” Bao asked softly. I looked at him in surprise. “Such things were meant to be used,” he said. “To be worn, to be enjoyed and admired. It is what my mother would have intended.” He smiled at me. “Even though you are apt to hoard your treasures like a dragon with his pearl, it is what she would have wished. And I would wish to honor her; and my sister, too.”

“These were made with love, then.” Benoit Vallon spread one long-fingered hand over the squares, the expression on his face somber. “If you allow me to take them, I will do justice to them.”

Bao and I looked at one another.

I nodded. “Take them.”

For the balance of the day, Bao and I went our separate ways. He kept his standing appointment with Desirée and her tutor, improving his grasp on the western alphabet, before meeting with the tumblers of Eglantine House to counsel them further on the spectacle they were planning.

I met with Lianne Tremaine, who served me fragrant tea and unveiled her latest poem pushing back against the narrative the unknown poet in
Night’s Doorstep had advanced, accusing the Lady of Marsilikos of taking advantage of the controversy to promote House Mereliot’s influence.

I studied the rough draft, sketched on foolscap. “You’re holding back.”

“Do you think I should have been more aggressive in challenging the notion of Jehanne and Raphael as star-crossed lovers?” she asked dryly. “Moirin, the problem is that they
did
carry on a very long, very infamous affair, and everyone in the City of Elua and I daresay the entire realm knows it. You even said so yourself. To argue against it would be… un-D’Angeline. And I cannot assail Raphael’s character on the grounds it deserves without dragging you into the fray by implication.”

“You, too,” I noted.

“Precisely.” Lianne tapped the foolscap. “So, as you say, I’m holding back. Sometimes discretion is the better part of valor.”

“I understand.” I took a deep breath. “About Raphael… tell me, how did he seem to you after the… incident?”

She was silent a moment. “We didn’t have much contact with one another for a long time afterward,” she said at length. “None of us did. Knowing Raphael, and knowing how I felt, I can only guess.” She gave me a fleeting glance. “Mainly, horrified. Horrified by the results of our failure, horrified at what befell Claire Fourcay.” A shudder ran over her. “Horrified at how much worse it might have been. And as to how Raphael felt about
that
, I cannot even begin to guess.” She shuddered again. “He had that, that thing’s essence
inside
him.”

“That thing had a name,” I said. “Focalor, Grand Duke of the Fallen.”

“I know that!” Lianne Tremaine snapped at me. “Name of Elua! Do you imagine I could ever forget it?”

“No.” I did not say what I was thinking, which was that the fallen spirits were no better than things to the Circle of Shalomon, useful tools they hoped to wield. If they knew the spirits’ names, it was only for the purpose of binding them. Still, the memory was a heavy burden to carry. “No, I do not.”

Both of us were silent, remembering. I didn’t know if the poetess had seen what I’d seen in the fallen spirit’s incandescent eyes: staved hulls and storm-tossed seas beneath a raging sky; hundreds, mayhap thousands, drowning; mayhem and destruction for the sheer joy of it. Whatever she had seen, it was enough to horrify her.

I thought, too, of the last glimpse I’d had of Raphael de Mereliot; of the faint spark of Focalor’s lightning I thought I’d seen in Raphael’s eyes. To this day, I didn’t know if I’d imagined it or not. “Lianne… did you ever have cause to suspect there was aught of Focalor’s essence that lingered in him?”

Her face turned white. “No! Gods, no! Do you think it did? Is that even possible?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But I would not have thought it possible for my
diadh-anam
to be divided.”

Lianne gave another violent shudder and made an old-fashioned gesture to avert ill luck. “I didn’t see Raphael until after…” She hesitated. “After Jehanne’s death. And he was well nigh as broken as his majesty. She’d refused to see him, you know. After the summoning.”

“No,” I murmured. “I didn’t know.”

She nodded. “Jehanne was furious at him—truly furious, not like one of their usual spats.” There was sympathy in her gaze. “She blamed him for nearly getting you killed.”

“It was my choice,” I said. “And Claire Fourcay
was
killed.”

Lianne shook her head. “Claire took the risk willingly; we all did. Not you. Raphael blackmailed you into it.”

“I know.” That final summoning had been the price of saving my father’s life; but it was still my choice. “So Raphael never saw Jehanne again until…?” It was still hard to say the words.

“On her death-bed.” Lianne supplied them gently. “The King sent for him before the end. He tried to save her.”

I knew; I’d seen his majesty’s memory. But I hadn’t known it was the only time Raphael had seen Jehanne since I’d left. “Stone and sea!” My voice shook a bit. “That’s hard.”

“It is,” the poetess agreed. “So you can see why I’m reluctant to
assail their tragic affair.” She cocked her head. “Moirin, if I may ask, why do you care? Why such an interest in Raphael de Mereliot?” She lowered her voice, eyes widening. “Do you really think a part of Focalor resides in him?”

I traced the rim of the tea-cup that sat on the table before me. “Truly, I don’t know. I only know that Jehanne came to me in my dreams and told me that I have unfinished business with him.” I glanced up at Lianne. “Does that sound too absurd for belief?”

“From you?” She smiled wryly. “Hardly.”

I sighed. “My lady Jehanne says she doesn’t know
why
, only that it’s so. And she cannot pass on to the Terre d’Ange-that-lies-beyond or to rebirth until it’s done. She says I’ll need her before the end.”

“Did she bid you serve as Desirée’s protector?” Lianne asked. “That would add a fine twist to the tale.”

“No.” I shook my head. “I’ve not dreamt of her since before leaving Bhaktipur. She asked me only to promise that I would tell her daughter good things about her mother, things no one else knew, things no one else would tell her.”

Her mouth twisted. “Like the fact that Jehanne tried to protect you from being killed by Raphael and the Circle of Shalomon’s ambition?”

“Aye.”

“And she did, didn’t she?” Lianne mused. “She sent aid because you left a note for her that day telling her what we were about.”

I nodded. “Raphael had made me swear not to
speak
of the matter, so I didn’t. It took me a while to find the loophole.”

Lianne eyed me. “Most sensible folk would simply have broken their oath.”

“I swore by the sacred oath of the Maghuin Dhonn,” I said simply. I touched my chest. “If I had broken it, my
diadh-anam
would have been extinguished forever, and I would no longer be Her child.”

“You and your bear-goddess,” she said, but the words were uttered in an amiable enough tone. “Well, assuming your dreams are indeed true ones, I suppose you’ll find out what unfinished business lies
between you and Raphael when Prince Thierry’s party returns in the spring.”

“I was surprised to learn that he went,” I said. “Raphael lost both his parents in a boating accident. I wouldn’t have thought he’d embark on such a long, dangerous sea voyage.”

Lianne shrugged. “I told you, he was a broken man after Jehanne’s death. When his sister Eleanore succumbed to illness a year later, I suspect it was the final straw. Raphael de Mereliot didn’t care if he lived or died. As I heard it, when Prince Thierry asked him to accompany the expedition as their official physician, he accepted it without hesitating.”

“Anything to flee his sorrow,” I murmured.

“I suspect so.”

We sat a while longer in silence together with our memories. “I don’t want to hurt him,” I said eventually. “Raphael’s been hurt too much already. He’s made mistakes, aye, but fate’s dealt him cruel blows in turn. I wish I knew what this was about.”

The former King’s Poet met my gaze, a furrow of concern etched between her brows. “If it
is
a piece of Focalor’s spirit inside him… Moirin, what in the name of Blessed Elua and his Companions will you do?”

I lifted my tea-cup and drained the dregs, peering at the leaves plastered to the bottom of the cup, turning it this way and that, and finding no answers there. “Truly? I haven’t the faintest idea.”

She gave another wry smile. “Well, that’s comforting.”