On the other hand, I had a vast wealth of secondary knowledge. Ten thousand romantic songs, plays, and stories taken all together had to be worth something. And on the negative side, I’d seen Simmon pursue nearly every woman within three miles of the University with the doomed enthusiasm of a child trying to fly. What’s more, I had watched a hundred men dash themselves to pieces against Denna like ships attempting to ignore the tide.
Alveron looked at me, his face still showing honest concern. “Will a month be enough time, do you think?”
When I spoke, I was surprised by the confidence in my own voice. “Your grace, if I cannot help you catch her in the space of a month, then it cannot be done.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT
The Cost of a Loaf
The days that followed were pleasant ones. My sunlight hours were spent with Denna in Severen-Low, exploring the city and surrounding countryside. We spent time riding, swimming, singing, or simply talking the afternoons away. I flattered her outrageously and without hope, because only a fool would hope to catch her.
Then I would return to my rooms and pen the letter that had been building inside me all day. Or I would pour out a torrent of song to her. And in that letter or song I said all the things I hadn’t dared to tell Denna during the day. Things I knew would only frighten her away.
After I finished the letter or the song, I would write it again. I would dull its edges a little, remove an honesty or two. I slowly smoothed and stitched until it fit Meluan Lackless as snugly as a calfskin glove.
It was idyllic. I had better luck finding Denna in Severen than I ever had in Imre. We met for hours at a stretch, sometimes more than once a day, sometimes three or four days in a row.
Though, in the interest of honesty, things were not perfect. There were a few burrs in the blanket, as my father used to say.
The first was a young gentleman named Gerred who accompanied Denna on one of our early meetings down in Severen-Low. He didn’t know her as Denna, of course. He called her Alora, and so did I for the rest of the day.
Gerred’s face held the doomed expression I had come to know very well. He had known Denna long enough to fall for her, and he was just beginning to realize his time was drawing to an end.
I watched as he made the same mistakes I’d seen others make before him. He put his arm around her possessively. He gave her the gift of a ring. As we strolled the city, if her eye focused on anything for more than three seconds he offered to buy it for her. He tried to pin her down with a promise of some future meeting. A dance at the DeFerre’s manse? Dinner at the Golden Board?
Individually, any of these things would have been fine. Perhaps even charming. But taken together they showed themselves as pure, white-knuckled desperation. He clutched at Denna as if he were a drowning man and she a plank of wood.
He glared at me when she wasn’t watching, and when Denna bid the two of us good-bye that evening, his face was drawn and white as if he were already two days dead.
The second burr was worse. After I’d been helping the Maer court his lady for almost two span, Denna disappeared. No trace or word of warning. No note of farewell or apology. I waited for three hours at the livery where we’d agreed to meet. After that I went to her inn, only to find that she had left with all her things the night before.
I went to the park where we had taken lunch the previous day, then to a dozen other places where we’d made a habit of each other’s company. It was near midnight by the time I took the lifts back to the top of the Sheer. Even then some foolish part of me hoped she would greet me at the top, rushing into my arms again with her wild enthusiasm.
But she wasn’t there. That night I wrote no letter or song for Meluan.
The second day I ghosted through Severen-Low for hours, worried and wounded. Later that night in my rooms, I sweat and cursed and crumpled my way through twenty sheets of paper before I arrived at three brief, half-tolerable paragraphs which I gave to the Maer to do with as he wished.
The third day my heart sat like a stone in my chest. I tried to finish the song I’d been writing for the Maer, but nothing worthwhile came of my efforts. For the first hour the notes I played were leaden and lifeless. The second hour they grew discordant and faltering. I pressed on until every sound my lute made grated like a knife against teeth.
I finally let my poor, tortured lute fall silent, remembering something my father had said long ago: “Songs choose their hour and their own season. When your tune’s tin, there is a reason. The tone of a tune is your heart’s mettle, and there’s no clear water from a muddy well. All you can do is let the silt settle, or you’ll sound sour as a broken bell.”
I lowered my lute into its case, knowing the truth of it. I needed a few days before I could productively return to courting Meluan on the Maer’s behalf. The work was too delicate to force or fake.
On the other hand, I knew the Maer would not be pleased with a delay. I needed a diversion, and since the Maer was too clever by half, it needed to be at least halfway legitimate.
I heard the telltale sigh of air that signaled the Maer’s secret passage opening in my dressing room. I made sure I was pacing anxiously by the time he came through the doorway.
Alveron had continued to put on weight in the last two span, and his face was no longer hollow and drawn. He cut quite a figure in his finery, a creamy ivory shirt and stiff jacket of deep sapphire blue. “I got your message,” he said brusquely. “Have you finished the song then?”
I turned to face him. “No, your grace. Something more important than the song has come to my attention.”
“As far as you are concerned, there is nothing more important than the song,” the Maer said firmly, tugging the cuff of his shirt to straighten it. “I’ve heard from several people that Meluan was greatly pleased with the first two. You should focus the whole of your efforts in that direction.”
“Your grace, I am well aware that—”
“Out with it,” Alveron said impatiently, glancing at the face of the tall gear-clock that stood in the corner of the room. “I have appointments to keep.”
“Your life is in further danger from Caudicus.”
I’ll give this to the Maer, he could have made his living on the stage. The only break in his composure was a brief hesitation as he tugged his other cuff into place. “And how is that?” he asked, apparently unconcerned.
“There are ways for him to harm you other than poison. Things that can be done from a distance.”
“A spell, you mean,” Alveron said. “He means to conjure up a sending and set it to bedevil me?”
However, attempting to reeducate him would be tiresome and counterproductive. “There is a chance of that, your grace. As well as other, more direct threats.”
He dropped some of his unconcerned pose and looked me in the eye. “What could be more direct than a sending?”
The Maer was not the sort of man to be moved through words alone, so I picked up an apple from a bowl of fruit and polished it on my sleeve before handing it to him. “Would you hold this for a moment, your grace?”
He took it, suspiciously. “What’s this about then?”
I walked over to where my lovely burgundy cloak hung on the wall, and retrieved a needle from one of its many pockets. “I’m showing you the sort of thing Caudicus is capable of, your grace.” I held out my hand for the apple.
He gave it back and I looked it over. Holding it at an angle to the light, I saw what I’d hoped for, smudged
