While he ate, he read over a report, just delivered from the bishop, further detailing the incident at the Abbey of Saint Agnes where a hundred women of God had been murdered in a most horrible and gruesome manner. A lone survivor told a very strange story. Dubois didn’t know what to make of it. The thought occurred to him that the massacre at the abbey might have something to do with Sir Henry Wallace. Dubois couldn’t see for the life of him how a missing journeyman could be connected to this terrible tragedy, but he resolved to keep an open mind. Dubois considered paying the abbey a visit.
His meal finished, Dubois picked up the volume, A Crafter’s Guide to Metallurgy, poured himself a glass of port, and began to leaf idly through the pages. He had just finished drinking his wine when his agent arrived with news that Harrington had booked passage on a coach bound for Westfirth, leaving that afternoon.
“He is going to report to Sir Henry,” Dubois guessed, rubbing his hands.
He hastily packed a bag and made ready to travel. Before he left, he dashed off a letter and gave it to his agent with orders to deliver it immediately to the bishop.
The letter consisted of one sentence: Find out what happened at the Royal Armory!
Chapter Ten
The unknown frightens us. So we employ spies to learn what our neighbors are doing, as they send their spies to watch us. We want to feel safe, but by our own actions we help continue the paranoia. We sign treaties offriendship and deliver copies to our allies in the hands of our spies.
– Journal entry,
Lady Cecile, Countess De Marjolaine
THE COUNTESS DE MARJOLAINE WAS NOT HOLDING audience this day. She instructed her secretary to tell all who came to her salon that the countess was indisposed. She did admit one visitor, though not by way of the salon. Benoit obtained entry to the countess’ salon via the palace kitchen, where he was well known and well liked by the staff. Word of Benoit’s arrival and his urgent need to speak to the countess passed from the cook to the scullery maid to one of the footmen to a seamstress to Maria, the countess’ trusted lady’s maid, who brought the message to the countess.
Maria Tutolla was sixty years old. She had been in the service of the countess for forty of those sixty years, having accompanied the countess on her return to court following Stephano’s birth. The countess treated Maria and all her servants well. She insisted that everyone in her personal staff learn to read and write and she employed a tutor to teach them. Her servants were wellpaid; their living quarters were comfortable. Contented servants do not betray their masters. This said, the countess never permitted the slightest hint of familiarity from any of her servants. Though Maria had attended the countess for forty years, she still went in awe of her mistress.
Maria went to the kitchen, retrieved Benoit, and led him through the palace’s “servant” passages-dark, narrow, hidden hallways that led to the various dining rooms and salons of the palace’s inhabitants and guests. The myriad passages were intended for the use of the palace’s household staff, who were expected to appear the instant the mistress’ bell rang as though they had materialized out of thin air and to disappear in the same manner. Servants were not the only people who made use of these passages, however. Noble lovers found them convenient when slipping out of one bedroom and into another. The passages were often quite crowded during the night.
A plain wooden door led from the dark hallway used by the servants into the countess’ wardrobe. Maria opened the door with a key and a touch on a magical sigil entwined around the lock. She led Benoit into a large closet smelling of perfume, rosewood, and cedar. Maria lit a filigree lamp that stood on one of the innumerable chests containing overskirts and underskirts, cloaks and dressing gowns, negligees, petticoats, stockings, and shawls. Dainty and elegant shoes stood in a neat and orderly row along one wall. Maria pointed to a chair and indicated in a whisper that Benoit was to have a seat. The old retainer was well-accustomed to these proceedings and he settled himself comfortably. Maria passed through another door that led into the countess’ bedchamber and went to find her mistress.
The countess was in her library sorting through a stack of letters, dispatches, and reports from her agents, separating them into three piles: those of no importance which she would give to the viscount to answer, those which required further reading, and those which demanded her immediate attention.
Occasionally, the countess left off her sorting to look with fondness at a young girl of fifteen seated cross- legged on the floor, much to the detriment of her voluminous blue silk skirt and white lace petticoat that spilled around her in layers of folds and frills. The girl rested her elbows on the floor with the easy elasticity of youth. Her chin in her hands, she was studying a large and colorful map of the world of Aeronne. The girl’s rich chestnut hair had begun the day beautifully curled and coifed by her maids, but a romp in the hall with her spaniel had brought the curls tumbling around her face. The spaniel, a small version of the breed, with long ears and big brown melting eyes, was named Bandit, because he was fond of stealing petit fours. The dog now lay curled up asleep on the hem of the girl’s blue dress.
Her Royal Highness Princess Amelia Louisa Sophia, known as Sophia, was the third child and only daughter of King Alaric and Queen Annmarie. The king’s two sons, both in their twenties, were now serving in the military. The king was pleased to have produced two male heirs to the throne and thus began and ended the extent of his interest in them. He had shipped them off to seminary school when they were little. After that, they had attended University and then gone into the military. The elder, Prince Alaric II, was now Admiral of the Royal Navy’s fleet in the north. The younger, Alessandro, was captain of his own airship. Neither was exceptional, though the elder had a bad reputation among the sailors for being something of a martinet.
Sophia, the unexpected child, the late child, was the child the king adored. Alaric doted on her, gave her everything she wanted and much that she didn’t. The queen, her mother, a vain and vapid woman, cared nothing for the girl herself, but only for the wealthy and prestigious match she would make for her daughter. With this end in mind, the queen was always trying to improve her daughter’s looks. Her Majesty primped, curled, and fussed over Sophia’s hair, rouged her cheeks and painted her lips, and laced her into corsets in an effort to plump up her small breasts.
Sophia was required to take dancing lessons and etiquette lessons. She learned to paint and to do fancy embroidery. She was not taught to read or to write for these were skills considered by her illiterate mother to be of no importance to a woman. The queen scolded Sophia when she caught her wasting time with a book, telling her daughter that men did not want clever wives.
Between the king and queen, they might have utterly ruined their daughter. Sophia’s naturally sweet nature, a passion for music, an extraordinary talent as a magical crafter, and the countess’ tutelage saved the princess from turning out to be a spoiled and empty-headed porcelain doll.
Early in life, Sophia had developed an attachment to the Countess de Marjolaine. No one in court could understand the attraction. The cold, cunning, devious countess and the sensitive, shy Sophia seemed an unlikely match. Their relationship had begun the day when the countess entered her music room to find the little girl of five teaching herself to play the pianoforte. The countess had recognized the child’s talent and had given her lessons. Discovering that Sophia could neither read nor write, the countess had expanded those lessons to include these skills.
The countess did not relax her cold, dispassionate demeanor around the girl, never exhibited any affection toward her. On the contrary, the countess was often a stern and difficult taskmaster. Sophia knew the value of what she was learning and enjoyed her studies. She came to love the countess, though she was wise enough to keep her affection a secret. Sophia had learned at an early age that her mother, the queen, hated the Countess de Marjolaine, though it would be many more years before Sophia would come to understand the jealousy that prompted this hatred. All Sophia knew was that when she was with the countess, she was free to be Sophia, not Papa’s “pet” or Mama’s “darling.”
As for the countess, she found that teaching the girl brought her a deep satisfaction she had never before experienced. She felt something akin to happiness when Sophia was with her, a feeling she had once thought she would never know again. The countess would not admit her affection for the girl. She told herself it was her duty to see to it that a princess of Rosia should be an educated and well-informed woman. The child would certainly not learn anything from her mother, who had all the intellect of an eggplant, or her father, a man of low cunning, but no particular intelligence.
