Naamah's Kiss (42 page)

He sighed in his sleep and said Jehanne's name.

I fought the urge to tweak his hair. "She's always there between us, isn't she?" I said ruefully. "More than you know. But whatever it is you seek in this mysterious pursuit, it seems only I can give it to you."

He sighed again, wordless.

"Oh, fine." I kissed his cheek. "Sleep."

On the morrow, I had another lesson with Master Lo Feng and the ubiquitous Bao and his ubiquitous staff. I thought the Ch'in physician would teach me another style of breathing, but I was wrong. He merely sat on his mat with his legs folded and bade me practice the Breath of the Pulse of the Earth.

I practiced.

It came easier this time. I got bored, but then the boredom passed. I went deeper into the earth and deeper into my own body, feeling the energy pool and gather in the pit of my groin. There, it sat and radiated, waiting to be tapped. It wasn't a sexual feeling, but almost. I liked it.

"Very good," Lo Feng said when we had finished. The corners of his eyes crinkled in that lovely hint of a smile. "Are you sure there is no Ch'in blood in the People of the Brown Bear?" He glanced at Bao. "Or Tatar, perhaps?"

"No," I admitted. "We came to Alba from far away a long, long time ago when the world was covered with ice. Is Bao a Tatar?"

Bao shot me a scathing look, his fingers tightening on his staff.

"His father was," Master Lo Feng said calmly. "It happened during a raid. Through no fault of his own, Bao is a child of violence."

Bao surged to his feet and stomped away, the butt of his staff stabbing at the grass. A moment later, he stomped back and helped his mentor to his feet, averting his face to hide an expression of rough tenderness.

"Do you ever smile?" I asked him.

"Do you ever stop asking stupid questions?" Bao retorted in heavily accented D'Angeline.

"Yes," I saidand said no more.

His lips twitched.

"You nearly did." I pointed at him. "I saw it. You very nearly smiled."

"Children." Lo Feng's voice silenced us. He shook his elegant head, casting his gaze skyward. "Will you spend your energy wastefully in foolish bickering, or will you conduct yourselves as students of the Way in dignity and discipline?"

I inclined my head. "I'm sorry."

Bao muttered.

Master Lo Feng laid a hand on his shoulder and said something soft and gentle and lengthy in Ch'in. I saw Bao's wiry shoulders hunch and tense, then relax. He propped his staff in the crook of his arm and bowed in the Ch'in manner, hands clasped, an expression of aching yearning on his face as he gazed at his mentor. It wasn't meant to be observed, and I looked away.

"Tomorrow?" Lo Feng inquired.

I nodded. "Tomorrow."

We parted, walking in different directions. I glanced over my shoulder as I made for the Academy stables and caught Bao glancing back at me.

He almost smiled.

Almost.

Raphael had arranged for an early dinner that night. After we dined, he called for his carriage and we headed out of the City. When I asked where we were bound, he said it was to a country estate owned by Denis de Toluard's family.

"He comes from a long line of Siovalese peers with a penchant for the scientific arts," he said. "Most were engineers, but his father was fascinated by the occult sciences and studied at the Academy here. He purchased this estate and modified it that he might carry on his studies more extensively."

That told me very little. "I see."

He gave me a quick look. "It's not necessary that you understand what we undertake tonight, Moirin. Only that you lend me your magic."

I folded my arms. "Yes, well, I'd like the chance to try and understand."

"All right." Raphael nodded. "You know that Blessed Elua's Companions were once divine servants of the One God of the Yeshuites? And that they forsook their posts to follow Elua?"

"I do," I said.

"During the time before they passed into the Terre d'Ange-that-lies-beyond, they taught many arts to the folk of Terre d'Ange." He ticked them off on his fingers. "Engineering, architecture, music, healing, pleasure, husbandry, seafaring, warcraft all the gifts we enjoy today. But there are other gifts they did not teach us." He lowered his voice. "And other divine entities who have not served the One God for many thousands of years."

"Why?" I asked.

"They rebelled when he set his son Yeshua ben Yosef above them, lost a battle, and fell from grace," Raphael said. "But they still possess much arcane wisdom. And there is an ancient manual that tells how they may be summoned and compelled to divulge their secrets. King Shalomon of the Habiru wrote it."

I glanced out the window. The sun was setting, gilding the landscape. I thought about watching twilight settle over the burial mound in Clunderry, the grave vigil of remembrance my people undertook there at Midsummer. "The Maghuin Dhonn learned it is not always wise to pursue such things."

"Shall all the world remain ignorant because the Maghuin Dhonn made a mistake a hundred years ago?" Raphael asked in a steady voice.

"No. I don't know." I sighed. "What manner of gifts?"

He leaned forward, bracing his forearms on his knees. "The hidden qualities of herbs and minerals. The ability to speak the tongue of animals. The ability to forge friendship between foes. Does that sound so terrible?"

"No," I admitted.

"One of the greater spirits holds the secret of the commanding the wind and seas," he said in awe. "The very gift the Master of the Straits once wielded!"

"Aye, and hid away for a purpose," I reminded him.

"If he'd meant it to be lost forever, he would have destroyed it," Raphael said. "But mayhap there's another way to find it. Think on it, Moirin!" His eyes shone. "Ever since Gautier and Jean-Philippe de la Courcel vanished seeking the missing pages of the Book of Raziel, Terre d'Ange has been fearful and overcautious. King Daniel ascended the throne at a young age, unready and hesitant. Now he's torn between mourning his first wife and indulging his second. The rest of the world outpaces us, establishing trade with Terra Nova while we indulge in gossip and dalliance. A gift of such magnitude could usher in a new Golden Age."

I frowned, unsure. My diadh-anam pulsed inside me as it always did in Raphael's presence, but it offered no guidance. When I thought about the Maghuin Dhonn Herself, Her gaze was level and measured, neither forbidding nor encouraging.

This choice, I had to make myself.

"That's a dream writ large," Raphael said softly. "If we have any success at all, and we've not to date, I imagine it will come on a smaller scale with the lesser spirits. But do think on it, Moirin." His voice caught. "Such a gift might have spared my parents. It might save others from meeting the same fate."

I reached out and brushed a stray lock of hair from his brow, remembering the horror of those deaths at sea. "All right. I did promise."

We reached the de Toluard estate in blue dusk. It looked like a pleasant placea gracious manor house with tall cypress trees surrounding it like sentinels. I breathed in their sharp, piney fragrance, willing them to lend me their proud strength in whatever was to come.

"Lady Moirin." Denis de Toluard gave me the kiss of greeting in the foyer. He looked far more serious than I remembered. Even his curly brown hair looked subdued. "My thanks for consenting to assist us. Come, I'll introduce you to the others."

There were six of them all told, all of them in their mid- to late-twenties. Later, Raphael told me they had all studied together at the Academy of Occult Philosophy. I greeted the first one with a shock of recognition.

"We've met," Lianne Tremaine said in acknowledgment. "Welcome, my lady."

"What further gifts might the youngest King's Poet in the history of Terre d'Ange possibly seek?" I asked, genuinely curious.

She tilted her head, lamplight making her topaz eyes flare. "There are always further thresholds to cross. I seek words of such surpassing beauty that they might melt the hardest heart of stone."

"Oh."

I met the other three. Balric Maitland, a silversmith with broad shoulders and strong, sinewy hands. A quiet, unassuming archivist and language scholar named Claire Fourcay, who cast longing glances in Raphael's direction when she thought no one was watching. The last was another linguist, Orien de Legasse, a pretty, fragile-looking lad whose pale blond hair put me in mind of Jehanne. He wore glass spectacles with gold rims that made his eyes look owlish.

The Circle of Shalomon.

There were no servants present in the parlor. Denis de Toluard poured us cups of a strong, fiery cordial himself.

"To success," he said, raising his cup in toast. "To knowledge !"

I echoed the toast dutifully and drank.

Raphael's eyes glinted. "The hour's nearly upon us." He laid one hand on my shoulder. "Shall we?"

Claire Fourcay sniffed. "What exactly do you expect her to do , my lord de Mereliot?"

"Oh, I don't know." He smiled at me. "But wondrous things seem to occur when Moirin summons her magic. Give her a chance, won't you? We've tried everything else."

She sniffed again. "She makes our numbers wrong."

Raphael ran his hand down my arm and took my hand in his, entwining our fingers. "Consider us one flesh."

"Let's just get on with it," Balric Maitland said curtly.

Denis de Toluard beckoned. "Come."

We followed him to a hidden doorway and traipsed down a set of stone stairs to a lower level. I felt man-made stone closing all around and above me and shivered. Raphael's fingers tightened on mine.

"Breathe," he whispered in my ear.

I breathed.

There was an antechamber that might have been a cellar once. I smelled the faint, lingering odor of root vegetables. Now it was lit by a handful of clear-burning lamps, shadows flickering in the corners. There were shelves with garments of white linen laid ready and waiting, and a standing washbasin in the center of the room. The water smelled of an herb I didn't know.

"Hyssop," Raphael said in response to my inquiring glance.

One by one, the members of the Circle stripped and donned the white linen robes, then washed their hands and faces in the basin. I followed suit. The flagstones were cool and moist beneath my bare feet. The water felt good. And then the silversmith Balric went around, handing out engraved medallions on silver chains.