Scarlet in the Snow Page 8

‘Girls,’ said my mother sternly, ‘these are not suitable questions to ask your sister about her employer. I am sure he is a good and honourable gentleman, and that is all we need to know. Isn’t that right, Natasha?’

  ‘Yes, Mama,’ I said, ‘he is both good and honourable, just not a man who likes society very much. And his household have been very kind to me.’ I shot a glance at Luel. ‘Mama, I will soon be paid the first of my wages, so you will receive some money to ease . . .’

  ‘Well, as for money,’ my mother said, gently interrupting, ‘I have some news for you, my dearest girl.’ She held up the letter, and I saw now it wasn’t a standard letter, but one of those pale blue forms from the telegraph office. ‘This is from our lawyer in Byeloka and contains some very welcoming and surprising news, which not even your sisters know yet.’

  ‘What is it, Mama?’ all three of us sisters exclaimed at once.

  ‘It is a most wonderful coincidence, actually. You remember mentioning our Byeloka neighbour yesterday, Natasha? Dear old Dr ter Zhaber, who died a few years ago?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I said, perplexed. ‘What of it?’

  ‘He was from Faustina, originally, and had no family, and indeed everyone thought he had nothing to leave anyone, for he had spent everything he had on his research, even mortgaging his house. Anyway, it so happens that many years ago, your father put up some money so Dr ter Zhaber could patent one of his magical inventions – do you remember the one he called the armchair traveller?’

  I did remember. It was typical of Dr ter Zhaber’s charming but impractical ideas: an armchair which would transport you to your favourite settings in your favourite books, at the press of a button. It had never come to anything, but as a little girl I used to dream about sitting back in the armchair and flying across the world to all those places I’d read about.

  My mother went on. ‘As you know, nothing came of it. Or so we thought. But this telegraph informs me otherwise. You see, what none of us knew was that kind Dr ter Zhaber made a stipulation that if the patent was bought, your father and his heirs should receive the proceeds. And now it appears that a company based in Faustina has bought the patent and is developing it. As Alexander’s heirs, we are due a good-sized sum immediately, which will pay all outstanding debts with enough left over to enable us to live comfortably for a while. There’ll be more to come too.’

  ‘Oh, Mama!’ shouted Liza. ‘Does this mean we are rich again?’

  ‘When do we move back to Byeloka?’ cried Anya.

  ‘Oh, Mama, I’m so glad,’ I said warmly.

  ‘So am I,’ said my mother, her radiant smile making her look ten years younger. ‘So glad, my darlings! No, we are not rich,’ she went on, ‘but we will be a good deal more comfortable, and though we cannot yet afford to maintain a house in Byeloka, we may rent one for the ball season perhaps. What do you think?’

  There were shrieks of joy from my sisters and a wary smile from me. ‘Now we have this windfall, Natasha,’ my mother continued, ‘we do not need the income from Professor Feyovin’s job, and you can come home.’

  I felt a pang as I said, ‘Oh, Mama, I would like to come home, but I cannot let the professor down. I made a promise to stay till the job was finished. I must honour it.’

  Mama sighed. ‘I understand. Of course you must, but I miss you.’

  My throat thickened. ‘I miss you too, Mama. I miss you very much. I shall be home soon.’ Luel made a sign and I knew my time was almost up. ‘Mama, I have to go, but I will speak to you again tomorrow.’

  ‘Till tomorrow then, my little one,’ said my mother, her voice growing fainter with every word as the image flickered out and then disappeared altogether. As Luel covered the mirror again in its velvet, I stood there silently. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘What for?’ she replied tartly. ‘I promised you could use the mirror. I always keep my promises.’

  ‘Including the one where you said my family would be well provided for. Because that was your doing, wasn’t it, Luel?’

  ‘Well,’ she shrugged, looking a little sheepish. ‘I had to do something.’

  If I’d thought about it at all, I’d have imagined she’d have a basket of gold sent to our house, or some other splashy feya extravagance. But she’d listened and watched and come up with the perfect solution, so that my throw-away line about our old neighbour had become the key to the perfect way to provide for my family: a way guaranteed not to make them uneasy or cause gossip that might get to the wrong ears. It would seem lucky, but not unnaturally so.

  ‘Thank you,’ I repeated, ‘from the bottom of my heart. That was very cleverly and kindly done.’

  Luel’s eyes twinkled. ‘It was a pleasure, my dear. I haven’t had so much fun in years.’

  ‘I had heard of Dr ter Zhaber’s armchair traveller,’ I said. ‘And I know it exists on paper at least. But then he had thought up so many things, none of which came to anything. And his legacy to my father – and the company in Faustina – that doesn’t exist in reality, does it?’

  ‘Dr ter Zhaber was a good old man from all I was able to learn of him,’ said Luel calmly, as we went up the stairs, ‘and I’m sure if he’d thought about it, it was exactly what he would have done. As to the Faustina Armchair Traveller Company, well, it exists in a manner of speaking, even if it is only as a fine letterhead on good notepaper. And it will pay out exactly what was promised to your family. Just as Dr ter Zhaber would have wished it.’

  Evasive answers as always with Luel, but still with a grain of truth in them. And a further clue that my first thought had been right, and Luel and Ivan hailed originally from the Faustine Empire. That must mean that the sorcerer also came from there, or at least lived there. Did that mean, then, that he was one of the dreaded Mancers? That was most likely, given that Luel had said he was a powerful and dangerous man. And the Mancers were both. But Luel was a feya, and feyas didn’t live there, surely, where magic was forbidden? I didn’t know enough about the Faustinians to know for sure. And I knew that if I asked Luel, she’d just evade the question.

  There was the encyclopedia. I didn’t expect much from it, for I’d seen nothing of any use when I’d leafed through its volumes. But it was worth taking a look, just in case. There had to be some reason that these particular books were in the room. Unless, I thought a little dispiritedly, Luel had just plucked them at random from some distant dusty library, to make the bookshelf look well stocked.

  Back in my room, after telling Luel I was a little tired and in need of rest, I soon came to the conclusion that my dispirited theory was most likely correct. In one of the volumes, in the F section, there was a long entry on the Faustine Empire, true, but without the kind of information I needed.

  There was also a general entry on magic, but somehow the editors of these distressingly dull volumes managed to make a fascinating subject sound about as interesting as a discussion of the weight of a Faustinian coin compared to a Ruvenyan coin, which, God help us, was a subject that covered an entire three pages. There was a brief and unilluminating entry on feyas, which read: Non-human beings with certain magical powers, found all over the world. Populations are small, as feyas are essentially solitary. It is reported that there have been less feya sightings in our day than in earlier times. Examples of feyas range from the fearsome forest witch Old Bony, from Ruvenya, to Almeric, mountain wanderer of Almain. Feyas should be approached with caution as they are considered to be unpredictable.

  There was also an entry on abartyens and in particular a slightly fuller description of the werewolf clan, the Ironhearts, which had an honoured place in Ruvenyan history. Even a plodding publication such as this could not entirely ignore the stirring story of how once, long ago, a werewolf of the Ironheart clan had braved the greatest dangers to rescue a Ruvenyan prince from certain death at the hands of a bandit chieftain. Still, the encyclopedia managed to turn the wonderful tale, which I, like every other Ruvenyan, had heard from the youngest age, into a dull procession of tedious words
, none of which was of the slightest assistance to me.

  In disgust, but unwilling to give up, I cast aside the encyclopedia and picked up the dictionary. I leafed through each page carefully, just in case there was something I’d missed. And that was how I found, jammed between two pages, the small stub of a first-class train ticket on the Golden Express, a luxury train that ran between Faustina, the capital of the empire, and Palume, the capital of the Republic of Champaine, a country to the west of the Faustine Empire. Glittering, elegant, artistic Palume was the playground of aristocrats and the wealthy from all over the world, and if Ivan came from a great Faustinian family, then it was quite likely he’d been there. I couldn’t prove the ticket was his; there was no passenger name, and no date of travel visible either, only the well-known symbol of the Golden Express with its decorated gilded locomotive.

  But in all that weary and fruitless searching, it was the first real nugget of information I’d unearthed. Perhaps, I thought excitedly, that was how Ivan and Luel had come across the Master of Crows. Not in Faustina but in Palume. It could mean the sorcerer was either a Champainian native or else a foreign exile from the Faustine Empire!

  Pulling out the notebook, I opened it to a fresh page. I took out the small pot of stamp-glue from the desk, carefully stuck the Golden Express ticket down on the page, picked up my pen and wrote:

  Is Sorcerer based in Palume?

  1(a) If from Champaine, could he be a kaldir like Dr ter Zhaber, except evil of course? Kaldiring is a more common form of magic in Champaine than any other country, and as I remember it, Dr ter Zhaber himself had been partly trained in Palume. 1(b) Is that why Luel gave me that odd look yesterday when I told Mama that my supposed employer was a kaldir? Did she think I guessed something? 1(c) Why would Ivan be in touch with a Champainian kaldir? Was there something he had come to Palume for?

  2(a) If sorcerer is from Faustina, he may have come to Champaine to be safe from persecution as an illegal magician, and Ivan might have met him by chance. 2(b) He could be a Mancer in the diplomatic service, keeping an eye on the Faustinian Ambassador and others? 2(c) If the latter, did Ivan discover something that the sorcerer was up to, which caused him to be silenced in this monstrous way?

  I put down my pen and looked at what I had written. Yes, I was sure there was something in it. But it was no good asking Luel; she’d only evade my questions. I had to speak to Ivan himself. But I could not wait until he was ready to see me. I had to go in search of him. Right now.

  All the time I’d been here, I’d not explored the first floor beyond my room. I didn’t even know if Luel and Ivan had their rooms on this floor. Now, clutching the notebook, I set off nervously down the long corridor that led away from my room and the stairs.

  Luel had said I needed patience. Time. But not only is it not my nature to wait, I had the strong feeling that we had little time – that something was getting closer and closer all the time, and that if all we did was hide behind the wall, sooner or later it would get in . . .

  I came to a door and knocked quietly. No answer. I tried the handle and found it to be unlocked. I opened the door and peered in. It was obviously Luel’s room, for I could see her black coat lying on the bed. For a moment I thought about going in and poking around to see what I could find. But I thought better of it and, closing the door behind me, continued down the corridor.

  At the very end was another door, and discovering it too was unlocked, I opened the door. Behind was not a room, as I’d expected, but a narrow set of wooden stairs that twisted up to the third floor. I set off up the stairs; they creaked terribly, making me halt more than once, half-expecting Luel to come storming up after me. But I reached the top without challenge and found myself at the entrance to a corridor. And halfway down that, a door.

  I took a deep breath. Half of me wanted to turn back, suddenly afraid of how I might find him. Luel had said he was ashamed of how he’d behaved that first day. What if he’d locked himself away because the darkness had returned and the beast-rage was strong within him again? But the other half of me scorned such fears. Come what may, I’d pledged my word. Ivan was now my friend. If I wanted to help him, I had to show him I wasn’t afraid. I had to make him understand he could trust me. So I walked to the door and rapped quietly. No answer. I tried the handle but it was locked. I could hear him behind the door. Or rather, I could hear his silence. It was as tangible as though he’d spoken.

  ‘Ivan,’ I said, in a voice that only just managed not to quaver. ‘Ivan, it’s me. It’s Natasha. Won’t you please let me in? I need to speak to you.’

  I heard a quiet intake of breath.

  ‘Please. I don’t want to force you to come down or anything. I – I just need your opinion. I’ve written a story and I want to try it out on someone. And Luel isn’t interested.’ It wasn’t at all what I’d planned to say, but the instant I said the words, I knew this was much better, because it would surprise him.

  It did. ‘You need my opinion? About a story?’ he said blankly.

  ‘Yes. I need to read it to you. To tell me if it works.’

  ‘Now?’ he said faintly.

  ‘If I have to change it, I’d rather know now,’ I said. ‘Luel says I should wait, but I don’t have any patience.’

  ‘No, you don’t,’ he said, and I could hear a very slight smile in his voice, which made my heart lighten with relief.

  ‘So, are you going to open up,’ I said sharply, ‘or do you propose to make me tell you the story through the keyhole?’

  ‘I don’t think that’s necessary,’ he said, the smile now stronger in his voice. ‘Wait a moment.’ I heard his steps move away and then return moments later. There was a rattle of bolts and keys as he unlocked the door, and in the next instant, there he was, standing in the doorway.

  I only just repressed a cry, for in that first glimpse I thought his face had been blotted out in a white blankness, like the pictures. Then I realised he was wearing a mask, a white silk mask, which covered his face but for his eyes. He was again dressed in the black velvet robe, pulled tightly around him so only a little of the dark-coloured shirt and trousers he wore underneath could be seen, and there were boots on his feet and thick gloves on his hands.

  ‘I’m sorry about this,’ he said, and pointed at the mask. ‘But my skin is . . . peeling . . . and I would spare you the sight.’

  Through the slits in the mask, his eyes met mine. They were not yellow any more, or at least not fully yellow. Though there were still patches of that feral colour in his eyes, the deeper shade I’d seen in them yesterday had grown, so that now it was clearly discernible as green, a very human grey-green. It could be the real colour of Ivan’s eyes, I thought, with an odd little skip of the heart. And set so strangely in the white silk of the mask, without the brutal beast-like features around them, his eyes spoke to me more directly than at any time before.

  I laid a hand very briefly on his velvet-clad arm. ‘If you prefer it, then of course.’

  ‘Thank you,’ he said, stepping away quickly, but not before I’d felt him tremble slightly. ‘Please, come in.’

  The room he ushered me into wasn’t a bedroom but a kind of antechamber, bare of any furniture except for a chair. There were two doors leading off it, one ajar, the other closed. Ivan walked over to the half-open door and stood aside to let me in.

  ‘Oh!’ It was a beautiful but plain, restful sort of room, painted in shades of cream and the palest caramel, and filled with light. This came not from windows but from a large skylight in the ceiling. Almost directly under the skylight was a long wicker settee set with pale cushions, and facing it, a small low table on which reposed the music box I’d seen yesterday.

  Ivan heard my exclamation and his eyes smiled. ‘Please, sit down.’

  ‘You too, then,’ I said, mock-severely when he showed no sign of doing so. ‘I can’t read a story to someone who’s looming over my shoulder like that. It puts me off.’

  ‘Very well,’ he said, and sat d
own at the furthest edge of the settee from me. I opened my notebook and said, ‘Now you must tell me honestly what you think; it’s no use telling me it’s good and leaving it at that. Mama’s always telling me that, and it’s hard for me to know if she really means it or she’s just saying it to me because I’m her daughter and in her eyes everything I do is good. And as for my sisters, they will never sit still long enough to listen properly. Not that I ask them very often.’

  ‘I can see indeed,’ said Ivan, and there was a laughing lilt to his voice that I’d never heard before. ‘I give you my word, Natasha. I’ll be an honest critic.’

  ‘Good.’ I cleared my throat. ‘In a warm and pleasant country, where bright flowers bloom much of the year, and skies are blue as Our Lady’s robe, lived a young girl called Rosette,’ I began. As I went on, I could feel his eyes fixed on me, but he made no sound nor gesture. After a moment, I stopped reading. ‘You don’t like it, do you? I can stop right now if –’

  ‘No, go on,’ he said in a voice that was quite without expression.

  So I went on, but when I reached the part where the Master of Crows tells his nephew that he sent white roses to Rosette as an apology, I could hear my own voice quavering. I must be mad, I thought. What on earth had possessed me to read this story to him? It would have been far wiser to choose The Three Sisters, pretending that’s what I had written last night, for that would have no echoes for him; it would merely be a pleasant distraction. I sneaked a look at him and saw that his eyes weren’t fixed on me any more. He was looking away and his hands were no longer shaking; they were knotted together, so tightly that the bones stood out sharply against the cloth of the gloves. And every rigid line of his body showed that he was desperately holding himself in check against some violent emotion.

  But I did not stop. To stop would make things worse. So I stumbled on with my story, inwardly berating myself, not only for my foolhardiness but also for my insensitivity. I’d called myself his friend and yet here I was telling him a story that was hardly calculated to make him happy. I’d destroyed that fragile bubble of lightness that had existed between us in the moments before. He must think I was a tower of witless self-regard, first to use his own tragedy as inspiration for a stupid made-up story, and then to inflict it upon him, apparently out of mere vanity. Miserably, I trailed off to the ending, stuttering to a stop.