Part 20

“Oh, I am. But Rodvard—”

“What has he done? I’ll—”

“Oh, it’s no fault of his. You will tell no one?” She laid a cold hand on his warm one. “He has found who the heiress of Tuolén is, but does not know whether to tell Mathurin or not.”

“Who is she?”

“A child, thirteen years old. She lives at Dyolana, up in Oltrug seignory. But I do not know how long Rodvard will keep the secret. He feels a sense of duty.”

“Why should he not? What withholds him from telling?”

“I would have to teach her the patterns and everything. I do not wish it.” She shivered slightly. “And to be a witch—”

The rising shades had drowned the sun. A silence came on the garden, so utter that Lalette felt she could hear her own heart beat, and Demadé Slair’s beside her. The trees stood straight; the ruins of the flowers did not stir. In that enchanted stillness she seemed to float without power of motion. He leaned toward her, his arm close against her back, his other hand crept over her two.

“Demoiselle—Lalette,” he said in a voice so low it did not break the quiet. “I love you. Come away with me.”

Her down-bent head shook slowly; tears gathered behind the almost-closed eyes.

The arm around her back slid slowly beneath her own arm, the hand groped to close slowly around one soft breast; as though it were by no volition of her own, her head came back to meet the kiss. The tears ran down her cheek to touch his; he drew from her and began to speak rapidly in a voice low and urgent:

“Come with me. I will take you away from every unhappiness. We can go beyond finding. I am a fighting man, can find a need for my service anywhere. It does not matter; we can forget all this entanglement and make our own world. I have money enough. We can go to the Green Islands, and you will never have to use the Art again. Oh, Lalette, I would even take you to the court and join your mother. Do you wish it?”

Her lips barely moving, she said; “And Rodvard?”

He kissed her again. “Bergelin? You owe him nothing. What has he done for you? And now he will tell Mathurin about the heiress of Tuolén, and there will be no more place for you—except with me. I will always have a place for you, Lalette, now or a thousand years from now. Or do you fear him? I am the better man.”

Now her eyes opened wide on the first star, low in the darkening sky, and with one hand she gently disengaged his clasp from her breast. “No,” she said in a voice clearer than before. “No, Demadé, I cannot. Perhaps for that reason, but I cannot. We had better go in now.”

III

“Friend Ber-ge-lin! Friend Ber-ge-lin!” The voice from below-stairs brought back to a consciousness of unhappiness the mind that had lost itself in the sweet cadences and imagined worlds of Momoroso. Rodvard sprang up and threw open the door.

“What will you have?”

“Someone to see you.”

Down the hall another door closed. It would be the little old man who asked so many questions and went almost a-tiptoe, as though always prepared to look through a keyhole. From the stairhead, Rodvard could see in the evening’s first shades a figure covered with a long cloak, somehow familiar, but the face hooded over.

“Beg her to come up,” he called. The figure mounted with one hand on the bannister, in the slow manner of the old. Near the last step his mind clicked; he was not surprised when in the room the hood fell back to show Mme. Kaja. Face cold as ice, he remained standing. She came across the room in a whirl of skirts, with both hands out.

“My de-ear boy,” she said.

With the hangings at the windows, it was too dim to tell how far her sincerity went. “I am more than honored to have one of the regents—,” he said, and let it hang.

“Oh, you are the most necessary of all,” she said, and frou-froued to the best chair. “I hope you have forgiven me. It was so-o-o necessary; someone had filed an information with the provosts that I was part of the New Day, and it was such a help. Isn’t it to-o bad about the Episcopals not cooperating? But there are so many of the priests on our side.”

She had seated herself where her face was in the shadow.

“Madame, why have you come?” he asked brutally.

There was a silence in the darkening room. Then: “To help you,” said the voice that, though it might no longer sing, had not lost its silver in speech.

“I will make a light.”

She stirred. “Do not. It is better so . . . I know—you are thinking of the Blue Star. Do you imagine that I fear your using it? No.”

He sat quietly (noting with the back of his mind how the dubious nicety had dropped from her voice, and thinking that this was the woman who had been taken into the High Center). Once more she seemed to gather her forces. “Rodvard Bergelin,” she said, “do you know why I am in the High Center?”

“I . . . think so.”

“I will tell you. It may be that in my ancestry there is a strain from one of the witch-families. It may be because I sincerely serve God. I do not know. But it has been given to me to be able to trace certain secrets of the heart.” Her multitudinous bracelets jingled as she lifted a hand to her breast. “Not as you do with the Blue Star.”

She was silent again, and he (unable to restrain an impulse toward malice) said; “Your success in understanding Dr. Remigorius was—as great as my own.”

“Rodvard, you are so-o unfair.” She dropped for a moment into the old manner, then seemed to shake herself. “I know. Your—witch will never forgive me. Not that I brought the provosts, but that I came in that day when you were on the bed. I do not care; she brings an evil Art into our New Day.”

“Do you think so?”

“Rodvard, hear me. This witch, to whom you are affected, will one day be the end of you. I have seen her but little, yet I know—it is your nature to give offense, and hers to take it. Sooner or later it will happen that she will find something not to be borne and put a witchery on you that will strike like lightning.”

(This clipped him close; with a certain convulsion round the heart, he remembered Lalette’s occasional sudden rages.) “Well,” he said, “what would you have me do?”

“Bid her farewell. Both of you can find partners better suited.”

Rodvard came to his feet and walked across the room slowly (thinking in little flashes of sweet Leece and Maritzl of Stojenrosek). Mme. Kaja sat immobile.

“No,” he said. “Better or worse, I will not give her up for anything.”

Mme. Kaja also stood. “Forgive an old woman,” she said, and gathering her cloak around her, slipped out the door.

28 EMBERS REVIVED

“We will hear the next case,” said the kronzlar Escholl.

The people’s guard opened the door to the room of the accused and called, “Bring her in,” while a sharp-faced countryman stepped forward from the rear of the court, two more guards behind him. The countryman had a merchant’s badge and so quick an eye that Rodvard gazed at him, fascinated to see what it would tell, and was therefore unprepared when he turned his head to see the accused.

It was Maritzl of Stojenrosek.

A Maritzl pale behind her red lips, still even when she moved, and much changed. (How? Rodvard asked himself and could find no answer but in a certain lessening of fibre that was expressed around the mouth, though the breathtaking thrill of her presence was still so much there that he swallowed.) The craggy-faced prosecutor stepped forward. “I present an accusation of treason against the nation on the part of the Demoiselle Maritzl of Stojenrosek, mistress of Count Cleudi, the foreign traitor. I call the innkeeper of Drog.”

(“Mistress of Count Cleudi?” and Drog?) The sharp-faced man stood forth. Maritzl turned to look at him, and as her eyes turned back, they fell on Rodvard. She started (and before she looked down again he caught from them an arrow of purest and most astounding hatred). “Tell us your story,” said the jurist president.

“I keep a good house,” said the man, twisting his cap in his hands, “and I have to be careful to preserve its reputation, because—”

The prosecutor touched his arm. “Give your condition first.”

Head bobbed. “Thank you, friend. I am keeper of the inn Star of Dossola at Drog, on the road through the Pass of Pikes in the Ragged Mountains, and mine is the largest inn there, with three upper rooms beside the general chamber.” (Maritzl was looking at him again, not now with hatred, but weariness of the world, and the thought that he, Rodvard, was as dreary as any part of it.) “It has never been necessary for the provosts to come to my place except when I called them. Now when this woman came into my inn, I knew right away that something was wrong. Late at night it was, and she in a three-horse coach with a driver, and that seemed strange—”

The prosecutor halted him again. “Explain why you thought something was wrong.”

“Look at her; she comes evidently from the court and bears the marks of it.” He jabbed a finger at the girl, but it was Rodvard she looked at (a long slow glance, in which was some decision to make a desperate appeal). “When I saw her, I think to myself, as a man often will, that this is not the place for a court woman to be, not with the court in Zenss. So I think this is a good one to watch and perhaps I will learn something, and while she is supping—she sat apart from the coachmaster in the high dining room, she did—while she was supping, I served her myself and marked how there was a little casket she kept beside herself and touched her hand to, even while she was eating.”

(Her face now outwardly held the appeal, but a plan was building in her mind; he could see it grow stone by stone, but not clearly what it was, because little hate-flashes kept jagging across the picture.)

“So I said to her that if her casket was that precious, I ought to hold it in the strongbox of the inn, there being so many wandering soldiers about. When I said this, her ladyship—” he grinned a vulpine grin to show this was intended for a joke “—said no, she would as soon lose her life as the casket, which being so small, I think it must have in it something beside jewels. So I said to myself, here is some mystery, but if anyone can unlock it, it is my friend Khlab, that was a provost of the court at Sedad Vix till it was broken up. So while her ladyship was at the dessert, I slipped out to find my friend Khlab, and let him walk past the door to look at her. The minute he saw her—”

“One moment,” said the prosecutor, and addressed the court. “I present the former provost Khlab, now a people’s guard.” He motioned to a man behind, who took the innkeeper’s place. “Tell your story.”

“Yes, your—friend. I saw her through the door as I went past and I knew her at once for Maritzl of Stojenrosek because I had seen her before. She is the one Count Cleudi brought to Sedad Vix to be his mistress after the spring festival. I told this to friend Brezel, and he said if she was as close as that to Cleudi, she had no business in Drog. So we went in and under pain of the sword, made her give up the casket. It had some jewels in it, but underneath the lining was the letter.”

“The letter is here,” said the prosecutor, handing up a parchment, partly torn, but bearing the unmistakable blue star seal. “It is a document already famous, in which Cleudi beseeches the aid of the Tritulaccans in return for cessions of territory. Most treasonable matter.”

“Hm—hm,” said kronzlar Escholl, looking at it as though he had never seen it before. The Zigraner jurist craned his neck. (Her plan was complete now;) she took one step forward and in a low urgent whisper said; “Rodvard, help me.”

(It was an entreaty, and as though she knew of the use of the jewel, she was projecting a promise behind the entreaty; and the plan was behind the promise. But it was as though that “Help me” laid a compulsion on him.) Rodvard turned round, as Escholl was handing the parchment to the third jurist. “Your pardon, kronzlar.”

A frown. “Very well, I will see it.”

Rodvard stepped to the bench and whispered; “She is thinking of some sort of plan, I do not know for what. I think I could find out, if I could question her alone. I knew her in the old days.”

“I see.”

Escholl addressed the court. “This is perhaps the foulest piece of treason in the history of Dossola; and we have proof that the message is no forgery in the recent march of the Tritulaccan shars over the southern border, and the delivery to them without a battle of the castle of Falsteg. It is evident that the accused had full knowledge of the contents of this letter, and is therefore guilty of taking part in a vile conspiracy against the nation. But this court is required to follow every treason to its source, not merely to establish individual guilts. We will postpone this matter for inquiry, and pass to the next case.”

II

Rodvard sprang up as she was led into the room, hurrying to get her one of the comfortless chairs from the row against the wall. The guard leered at him (with a thought so nasty that) Rodvard’s tongue stumbled as he said; “She wants to—tell me something in private.” The guard laughed, glanced at the barred window and slammed the door.

Maritzl said; “Rodvard, I do not want to go to the throat-cutter.”

“What can I do?” said he.

Her hands clenched, fingers entwined in fingers. “Take me away. You are the writer to this court. Can you not make an order or something for my release to be transported elsewhere?”

(This was the plan, but it was not the whole plan; and yet under the magic of her presence, the words seemed to count more than what lay behind them.) “It—it would be very difficult,” he said. “The order would have to be countersigned, and—”

“And you are a writer!” A note of scorn in her voice.

“You mean—I should forge the signature?”

“Why not? This regency of yours is hopeless. I have been confined, but even I know that. How many shar of soldiers do you order? Enough to fight the court and all Tritulacca?”

(Now it was Rodvard’s turn to be uneasy, for he had asked himself these questions.) “The people will rise,” he said.

“Have they risen yet? Where are their weapons? How many leaders do you have who can set a battle in order? Pavinius will never fight with the Tritulaccans; they’ll compose.” (Now genuine black anger jutted from her eyes.) “All you can do, here in this little dream-world, is lay the ground for vengeance on yourselves.” She was near enough to reach out a hand and touch him. “Take me away. I do not want to go to the throat-cutter, and I do not want you to, either.”

“And you would have me betray . . .?”

(Her eyes flashed a resolve;) before he could say more, she was out of her chair, arms around his shoulders, cheek caressing his head. “Ah, Rodvard, I will make it up to you.”

He stood up in the circle of her arms; her head tilted back, the long lashes lying on her cheek over veiled eyes. (Mistake, he thought, a sudden rivulet of cold running down his spine. It cannot be true, you were hating me a moment ago; I think I see your plan now.)

He held her off with rough hands on her shoulders. “You are Cleudi’s mistress,” he said.

The liquid flesh changed to brass, the eyes snapped open as she shook herself free. “Yes, I am Cleudi’s mistress,” she cried. “And whose fault is it? I was a good girl once; I would have given you everything and remained good, no matter what I did for you. You did not want me.”

She was down in the chair again, crying through her fingers. “You are too much like him,” she said, and he (wrung by the thought of that fair neck delivered to the executioner) laid a hand on her shoulder and said; “I will do what I can.” Now kronzlar Escholl must be persuaded, if possible, that though there had been treason, it was treason done for love and could be passed over.

III

Rodvard came in late, and had had no supper save some bread and cheese caught at an inn with the two people’s guards who accompanied him, Demadé Slair having left long before. Lalette was arranging her hair before the mirror, with a candle on either side, and did not turn round. (At the sight of her lifted graceful arms, a wave of tenderness swept over him.) “Lalette,” he said, almost lilting the word.

“Good evening.” She still did not turn, and the voice was formal.

He hurried across the room in long steps and turned her around. “What has happened?”

There was an impatient movement. “Don’t. You will spoil my hair. Nothing.”

“Lalette, there is something. Tell me.”

She kept her eyes away from him. “Nothing,” and then, as he merely stood, waiting in burning intensity; “A small thing, truly. You need not be troubled. Only I know now who it was you were unfaithful to me with.”

(He was hot and cold together.) “Who says I was unfaithful?”

“‘Will you come with me now?’” she quoted. “Rodvard, you may be able to read some of my thoughts, but do not forget why. Is she a witch, too? She must be, or my Blue Star that I lent you would be dead. Or did she give you another before you shared her with Count Cleudi?” (She wanted to hurt him as she had been hurt, to make him regret and feel that no regret in any fashion could replace what had been lost.)

“Shared her with Count Cleudi?” (He could feel honest indignation now.) “Lalette, who are you talking about?”

“I am glad you saved her life,” said she, still not looking at him. “It is a pity my hair is dark and my skin muddy. When these troubles are over, you can have a good time with her on the estate. It is in ’Zada, isn’t it?”

(The indignation no longer needed to be pushed; all he could think of was how he had rejected the shell of that Maritzl once desired.) He said; “Lalette, I swear to you that I have never been with Maritzl of Stojenrosek, if that is the one you mean. I swear that I never will, I don’t even want her.”

(The accent of sincerity was making her doubt, but the bitterness persisted beneath, she had only lost the line somewhere, and was not yet ready to release him.) “If you are really in love with her, you may go. Only I’ll not be one of your—casual contacts.”

(He was invaded by despair of making her understand, with or without the fullest tale of the maid Damaris and the witch of Kazmerga.) “Why,” he cried, “it would seem to me that it is asked of any pair who live together to protect each other from casual contacts by one means or another. But this is merely not true. Will you listen to every talebearer who tries to split us apart for reasons of his own?”

She lowered her head (melting a little, knowing he knew of Demadé Slair’s desire, if not of her own temptation). “There are some tales you might have borne to me yourself instead of letting me learn them by hazard. Why did you betray me by telling Mathurin of the child of Dyolana, Tuolén’s heiress?”

Now he took her strongly by the shoulders. “Lalette,” he said; “I never told him. You accuse me of being liar and betrayer, do you think I am a fool as well? If Mathurin knows of her, he has learned it through some other source; you are the only one I told.”

(Suddenly and dreadfully, she knew where that other source was—that night in the garden, when she herself told Demadé Slair, Mathurin’s voice and sword.) She moved close, putting both arms around him in a convulsive gesture. “Oh, Rodvard,” she said, “I am afraid. He is having her brought here, and will make her a witch himself—that little girl.”

She began to cry then. That night, as they sought and received from each other whatever comfort passion could give, she touched him and said; “It is true. I am a witch and your partner. The great marriage.”

29 NO AND YES

“You helped me so much before,” said Lalette.

The widow Domijaiek contemplated her tranquilly from among the husks of characters who never lived. “Yet you are again in need of help.”

“The Myonessae. I could not—”

“You could not give up the desires of this false, material world for the God of love. However, it is not necessary to agree with everything that is done under the rule of the Prophet, and when the mattern and the diaconals tried to force you to an advancement for which you were not ready, they were also submitting to the rule of Evil. It is asked only to take steps we are prepared for.”

“Yes,” said Lalette.

“I do not know whether I can help you. Let us examine circumstance. Are you still stricken by lack of money?”

“I had not thought of it. Rodvard touches the fees of the court where he is writer. Our needs are small.”

The widow’s smile was approving. “That is an element of progress. But he receives these fees because he uses the witchery of the Blue Star, does he not?”

“Yes.”

“Then that is an element contrary to progress and very dangerous.”

Lalette looked at the floor. “I know. Everything seems to be a danger. I am so afraid of Mathurin. He keeps those guards around Rodvard, but I think they are more like jailers.”

“One thing you must not do is let fear enter your heart; for it will breed fearful things. Remember that all in this false material world is only the reflection of your thoughts. Have you any word from your mother?”

“Yes. A man brought a note. She wants me to escape and join her at the court.”

“Do you wish to go?”

“I would like to see her again. . . .” Lalette looked up to see Dame Domijaiek watching her attentively, though she remained very quiet, and under the pressure of that silent scrutiny, the girl moved. “She is under Count Cleudi’s protection. And I told you about Demadé; he is very kind and gay, and I think he is in love with me, but—”

“Go on.”

“He told Mathurin about the little girl, the heiress.”

“He was also trying to do the best for you, in his own way. Do you want to go? Or would you rather stay with Rodvard?”

In a small voice, Lalette said; “I think I would rather stay with him. Is it wrong?”

“Not if it is done in love and good will, rather than for any hope of gain. Have you asked him to take you away from the city?”

“No. This—regency is so much to him.”

The widow stirred. “You will find help, child. Come to me again when he makes a plan.”

She stood up, but before the words of farewell could be pronounced, the door was flung open and the boy Laduis burst in, crying; “Mother! I was at the market, and—”

“Laduis, we have a guest.”

He looked embarrassed and made to Lalette the bow of a miniature courtier. “Oh, I remember you,” he said. “You are the Princess Sunimaa, only you are not cold any more. I am glad to see you.” He turned again. “Mother, everybody at the market is excited. They say there has been a battle in the Ragged Mountains, and Prince Pavinius has beaten the Tritulaccans and taken three of their generals, and the rest of them are all running away.”

II

She had gone quietly to sleep; Rodvard had to rouse her with the finger-touch behind the right ear that wakens without shock. Even then, she tried for a moment to draw him close until he whispered; “We must hurry.”

Beyond the window there was only cold wintry starshine and little enough of that; but Rodvard had hoped for snow or rain. Lalette gathered her smallest of bundles; he led along the balcony three windows down, to where the trellis was, and stepped off backward into night, resting a moment on each step before taking the next. Lalette’s dresses almost made her stumble on the last steps; she sank into his arms with a little gasp at the bottom. They had carefully worked out the matter of getting over the garden-wall, from the barrel to the shed-roof, the shed-roof to the wall itself.

It was too late for the bracket-torch on the back street to have remained alight. As soon as she was down, they dodged shivering past the plane-trees, across, around a corner and into the appointed alley. Something jingled; the man said; “Are you the travellers?”

“Dame Domijaiek’s travellers,” said Rodvard, as agreed, and; “Here is your horse and your let-pass,” the other.