F is for Fair Mark
It was impossible that Mosca the Housefly could be sitting in a carriage on a cushion of white watered silk. It was impossible that the highwaymen should be letting them leave – she could hear Blythe outside telling the carriage driver what secret signals he should give if other men in the same gang accosted the coach. She felt sure that at any moment Clent’s words would slide off the highwayman like magic dew, leaving him clearheaded and choleric.
The coachman gave the horses a long, looping whistle. The carriage rocked on its wheels, then rumbled into motion. Someone thumped goodwill and a farewell into the wall by Mosca’s head, making her jump.
It was impossible that she and Clent were to arrive in Mandelion in a carriage, flanked by footmen, cushioned in white velvet like two horse chestnuts in down-lined shells. No doubt the pair of them would wake up and find themselves sleeping under a sycamore sacred to Dorace of the Whimsical Dream. Or the carriage would try to cross running water, and would collapse into a pile of dandelion seeds while their hostess spread swan’s wings and took to the sky.
Two pearls were watching her. In the lap of the lady in white lay an embroidered box, the lid adorned with a stuffed ermine stoat whose arched back served as a handle. Instead of glass eyes, small pearls had been placed in the sockets. As the rain lashed the lace curtain, the lady gently stroked at the fur along its back with a gloved fingertip, as if it was a living pet.
‘Remarkable.’
The lady did not raise her eyes, and for a moment Mosca thought she was addressing the stoat. It was a moment before Clent found his voice.
‘Ah, it was of course a labour of delight to be of service to Your Ladyship, and, if I may say so without offence, my oratory was inspired by the thought of one whose beauty might, ah, give voices to the very pebbles…’ There was something about Clent’s hopeful expression that made Mosca uncomfortable. His beaver hat offered little complaints as he bent the brim this way, that way.
‘Really? I thought that you were inspired by the prospect of employment and preferment. Come now, sir. Make your requests plainly.’
‘I had hoped, Lady Tamarind, that you might hire me to write an epic tale of your family’s fortunes. The rise of the dukes of Avourlace, their wise rulership of Mandelion over the centuries, their tragic exile during the war and the Years of the Birdcatchers, and then your brother’s triumphant return to reclaim his ancestral rights…’
Mosca’s eyes became round as she realized she was staring at the sister of the Duke of Mandelion.
‘Very well.’ Lady Tamarind’s words were soft and as crisp as a fox-print in snow. ‘You shall write it, and you shall be paid for it. I assume I need not read it.’
‘And… ah…’ Creak, crick went Clent’s hat brim, his eyes bodkin-eager. ‘Ah… I would request a letter of introduction, that I might mix with the, ah, better sort of personage.’ Mosca felt immediately that the letter meant more to him than the money.
‘In Mandelion the high and the fashionable may be met with in the Honeycomb Courts, which surround my residence in the Eastern Spire.’ Lady Tamarind paused, as if con-sidering. ‘I shall send you a letter vouching for your character and advising that you be allowed into the Lower Honeycomb Courts. I will do no more for a man I know so little.’
Clent gave a little exhalation of satisfaction.
Silence followed. The rattle of rain and the crack of stones under the wheels had no power to keep Mosca awake. Her eyelids drooped.
She tried to plan ahead, but thoughts gave under her feet and became dreams. She dreamed that she had found her father in Mandelion. He had been running a school there for years, and had not really died at all, and it turned out that Mosca had lots of brothers and sisters, and they were all studying at the school and waiting to meet her. It was time for her to attend her first day at that school, but Mosca was terrified, because when she tried to touch anything it burst into flames. She knew that there was a pair of white gloves that she had to wear which would make her safe, but Clent had stolen them, and she could not find them. She tried to explain everything to her father, but he would not look at her or speak to her. Instead, she ran to Clent and demanded her gloves back, but he sat there, smirking and smoothing the white gloves over his large hands, until she itched to grab him by the jowls and char him to a cinder.
The carriage wall rapped reprovingly on the back of Mosca’s head, and she found herself staring at the deeply sleeping Clent, the dream so vivid in her mind that she felt sparks might leap from her eyes and settle on his cravat.
‘Hate has its uses, but it will serve you ill if you wear it so openly.’
The quiet voice jarred Mosca into wakefulness. Lady Tamarind was looking directly at her and, snatching for a fistful of her wits, she struggled to explain.
‘He-’
‘Your grievances do not interest me. Your master’s request does. Why is he so keen to mix above his station?’
Sparks of hate crackled in Mosca’s mind.
‘Spying,’ she hissed recklessly. ‘He’s a mangy old nook-gazin’ spy. ’S got papers, signed by the Stationers – I
Lady Tamarind’s immaculate mask of a face hung in the dusk of the coach and looked at Mosca. For several moments her features showed not the slightest motion. Perhaps she disapproved of Mosca’s indiscretion. Perhaps she did not believe her.
‘A Stationer spy,’ she murmured at last, very quietly and without rancour. ‘What is his name?’
‘Eponymous Clent.’
‘Eponymous Clent.’ There was an odd, distant note in Tamarind’s voice that Mosca did not understand. ‘How a name changes everything!’ Her gaze never moved from Mosca’s face. ‘A man’s face tells you nothing,’ Tamarind continued in her usual tone, ‘but through his name you… know him. Eponymous. A name suited to the hero of a tall tale. But such heroes are seldom to be trusted. And you – are you a spy, like your master?’
‘Not me, he din’t even mean me to see them papers.’
Mosca stiffened as one of Clent’s snores became a nasal hiccup. Then his sonorous breathing resumed, and she relaxed again. ‘I’m jus’ his secretary till I got something better. I’m going to school,’ she added. ‘I can read.’
Now Lady Tamarind’s arctic stare held real interest. When she spoke again it was in a softened, urgent tone that reminded Mosca of velvet rubbed the wrong way.
‘You seem interested in my pearls, girl. Would you like to have one?’
Mosca suddenly felt that to win just one of them she would willingly burn down Chough in its entirety, mill and malthouse, kiln and kitchen. She wanted to keep it, stare into it like a tiny, eider-grey crystal ball, and understand this strange new whiteness before it slipped out of her life again. She shrugged, not meeting the lady’s eye.
‘If you do something for me, and do it well, you may have a pearl, and perhaps “something better”. How much courage do you have, girl?’
‘Enough to pluck the tail of the Devil’s horse, but not enough to ride ’im.’ Mosca whispered the old Chough adage automatically.
‘What is your name?’ The lady sounded as if she might be pleased.
‘Mosca Mye.’ As soon as the words were out of Mosca’s mouth she remembered that she was a fugitive from justice. But how could she refuse to answer this snow queen? Giving a false name was unthinkable. Nobody ever lied about their name. Names were what you
‘I am. What would you say if I told you that even the sister of the Duke has powerful enemies? Dangerous enemies.’
Mosca remembered the conversation in the Halberd.
‘Locksmiths!’ she breathed excitedly. Lady Tamarind’s fingertip paused in its stroking of the stoat’s forehead. Mosca hurried on, ‘Heard the bargemen talking at the Halberd. Yestereve, when they thought I was drowsed. ’Bout how the Locksmiths wanted to take over Mandelion… like they did Scurrey… but how you’d never let ’em. Who are
