The Truth-Teller's Tale
We stopped at the booth where people could test their skill in throwing a blade into a target, and Gregory won a prize, a cheap bracelet hung with dangling charms. He presented it to me and I wore it for the rest of the evening. At other booths we played ringtoss or tried to determine the number of beans in a jar. They would not allow me to guess the ages of the three crones sitting on bare stools at another booth. “Not the Truth-Teller, she’s no fun at this game!” the barker cried, but he was smiling, and he made me laugh. Gregory speculated that they were each fifty years old or less, which won him no prizes but made the women blow him grateful kisses.
We listened to singers on the street corners, flutists in the parks, harpers hidden under the low-slung awnings of shops that had been closed for the evening. We ducked into the red tent of a fortune-teller who read our palms and guessed our futures. “You will find love and contentment in the unlikeliest of places,” she told Gregory. To me she said, “Everything you have ever wished for will come true.” I found myself ruing the fact that I had not been more prodigal and specific whenever I had made a wish in the past.
It was dark by the time we made our way to the small arena where the acrobats were performing, and we stood in back of the large crowd that had gathered to watch them. I spent most of the hour we were there clutching Gregory’s arm and mute with horror, expecting at any moment one of the tumblers would fall to his death from a high wire or a swooping swing. Everyone survived, however, and their flawless arabesques through unsupported air were truly amazing to see. I applauded madly once the performance was over, and Gregory handed me a few coppers to toss to the stage in appreciation. There were so many coins of every denomination being flung at the acrobats that the whole arena appeared to be under a deluge of metallic rain.
“I have never seen anything like that,” I exclaimed as the crowd began to disperse and we strolled away. “I can’t imagine that even Wodenderry has anything more thrilling.”
Gregory laughed. He had taken my hand to guide me out of the press of people, but once we were free of the crowd, he did not release me. “I’ve seen acrobats in Wodenderry, but they were no better than these fellows,” he said cheerfully. “Can you figure out why they aren’t all dead?”
“Witchcraft, most likely,” I joked. I did not believe in witches. “I can think of no other answer.”
He made as if to speak and then paused, cocking his head to one side. “I hear music,” he said. “Dance music. Is someone holding a ball?”
I pointed. “Sometimes they set up a stage on the east edge of town, and use it as a dance floor,” I said. “They don’t do your fancy numbers, though! Reels and country dances, mostly.”
He tugged on my hand to pull me in that direction. “Oh, but we have to go investigate this,” he said. “We have not danced together in a very long time.” Micah and Roelynn had stopped coming for lessons three days ago.
“You have a strange notion of time,” I commented, but I let him tow me through the streets.
He grinned down at me. It was very close to midnight now, so the city should have been quite dark, but every window was filled with candles, and special torches had been lit along all the major thoroughfares. His face was perfectly plain to see. “Some days seem a lifetime long,” he said. “Others only last an hour. Tonight, for instance. Already it is too short, and it’s not over yet.”
“I shouldn’t be out more than another hour,” I said, conscientiously remembering what my mother had told me when she agreed to give me the night off.
“It will seem like a minute,” he said.
I did not answer, but privately I agreed.
Soon we arrived at the makeshift dance hall, a thick wooden floor laid over a sturdy frame and open to the night sky. The railing that enclosed it had been gaily festooned with knots of ribbons and bunches of flowers, but that was not its most impressive decoration. All around the square of the floor were hung brightly colored globes, filled with flickering interior candlelight. They threw a muted, multihued illumination across the square of the dance floor and provided a most festive air.
Four musicians sat in a tight group in one corner of the floor, sawing away at stringed instruments that I couldn’t even identify. The music was lively, and the couples galloping around the dance floor looked breathless and delighted.
“Oh, what fun!” I exclaimed without thinking.
Gregory pulled me up the three steps that led from the ground to the wooden platform. “Then let us join in,” he said.
And we did. Until this summer, I had never been too comfortable participating even in the simple dances, for I was never sure of my steps and could not always catch the cues of the music. But after the last couple of weeks of instruction—and with Gregory’s sure arm around my waist—I felt completely confident in my ability. We waited for a break in the whirling circle and then smoothly stepped in.
Later, I could not remember every dance that we performed. As I had warned Gregory, very few of the sedate formal dances were offered at such a venue, but the musicians did rollick through a couple of reels and an extremely vigorous waltz. Every once in a while, indifferent to his audience, Gregory would guide me through some rather dashing move—a twirl under his arm, a quick lift that caused my feet to flare out behind me—and we began to hear a few appreciative murmurs from the crowd. Gradually, as the hour progressed, the other couples began to pull back, giving us more room to show off our maneuvers, until finally we had the whole platform to ourselves. The musicians, on their mettle, launched into an energetic redowa that had us skimming across the whole stage in a dizzying crisscross of patterns. As the music came to a triumphant and somewhat discordant close, Gregory surprised me by dipping me backward over his arm and then gathering me back up in a flourish that had me squeezed tight against his chest. We stood there for a moment, gazing at each other, panting into the sudden silence.
“Well, kiss her, then, boy!” one of the watchers called, and the hearty mutter of approval that followed indicated that the whole crowd was in favor of this notion.
“No help for it,” Gregory said, and bent down to brush his lips against mine. The touch was as warm and unalarming as summer rain. Almost immediately, he released me, still keeping his hold on my hand. He made me a great sweeping bow, and I responded with the best curtsy I could manage. The crowd offered a light ripple of applause.
The musicians took a moment to retune their instruments, and the other dancers drifted back onto the floor to await the next number. I suddenly noticed how high the moon was, two days away from full and spilling silver into the sky. “It’s late,” I said reluctantly. “I have to go home.”
“One more dance?” Gregory begged.
“Oh—I probably shouldn’t—”
But then, simultaneously, the musicians struck up a slow lover’s waltz, and all the globes of colored light winked out. The crowd sent up an astonished gasp. In a second, our eyes adjusted. We saw that the lights had been merely muted when a series of metal hoods had been dropped over the lamps. The effect was to bathe the whole dance floor in a wistful, romantic glow.
“Ah, this one you cannot refuse me,” Gregory whispered, and pulled me back into his arms.
How could I resist? I let him hold me closer than he had ever dared during our lessons in my parents’ parlor, and I rested my head against the soft cotton of his shirt. The music seemed wrought by enchantment, coming from hands that were fey, not human. Like the other couples, we moved with a slow, intoxicated dreaminess, gliding soundlessly across the floor in small, precise circles. Only if you have ever been in love will you know what I mean when I say I wanted that dance to continue forever. I did not want to have to lift my head, drop my arms, walk back down the street to my prosaic house and my ordinary life. I just wanted to be this girl in this man’s arms, unchanging, unchanged, and pooled about with music.
Naturally, the song came to an end, and hope made everyone stand absolutely still for the longest moment. But there was no se
cond plaintive melody to follow the first; the musicians were tuning their instruments again and joking with one another about some note someone had missed in a disputed measure. Gradually, the couples pulled apart. The women shook their hair back, the men smoothed down their sleeves. The hoods were snapped back from the colored globes, which now seemed oddly garish and overbright against the darkness.
“I really have to go home now,” I said to Gregory, my voice both urgent and despondent. “I promised.”
“And I would not be the man to have you break a vow,” he said. He took my hand again and led me down the three steps. I tried to pull my fingers free, but his grip tightened, and so I acquiesced.
Hand in hand we walked the mile or so from the dance stage to the inn. We did not speak at all, but our progress was accompanied by small sounds, both near and distant—music from some other venue, conversation and laughter from three streets over, the clatter of chimes in the trees when the wind pushed hard enough. It seemed that, in every other doorway we passed, couples stood embraced together, kissing passionately. I remembered Gregory’s light kiss, and touched my hand surreptitiously to my mouth.
We were not far from the inn, and passing the darkened mouth of an inset doorway, when Gregory suddenly pulled me into the shelter of the building’s front entrance. I looked up to ask an indignant question, but he put his fingers across my lips and peered out onto the street we had just left. At first I could see nothing except inexact shadows interlaced with brittle moonlight a few yards in either direction. Then I made out two figures standing so close to the fabric shop that I had taken them to be dressmaker’s forms set in the window. They were just stepping apart from an embrace that seemed to have shaken them both, for they stood there a long moment, staring at each other, hands clasped chest-high between them, saying nothing. After a long silence, they turned our way and began slowly pacing down the street, their hands still tightly locked together.
When they were a few feet away, I identified Roelynn and Alexander. It was clear Gregory had recognized them first—recognized, too, the reckless, abandoned quality of their stolen kiss. Even by moonlight it was easy to read the wildness on Roelynn’s face as they passed by, the determination on Alexander’s. Impossible to guess what such expressions portended, except calamity.
“Well. There’s more trouble than I thought to borrow when we rode into Merendon,” Gregory breathed in my ear when they were far enough away that we could risk speaking again.
“Maybe you should go back to Wodenderry as soon as possible,” I whispered back. “Tomorrow morning.”
He looked at me a moment by imperfect moonlight. “Leaving aside the fact that I don’t want to go back to Wodenderry tomorrow,” he said, “I think I would find it difficult to persuade Alexander to agree to such a course of action.”
“You’re his master. Doesn’t he have to do what you say?”
Gregory laughed softly. “Curiously, no. At any rate, he never does. And I cannot imagine that he will heed me at all on the morrow.”
We had stepped out onto the street and were making our own way slowly down the last stretch of cobblestone. I said nothing until we had arrived at the inn and crept around back to where the kitchen door had been left unlocked for us. “Then there is nothing to be done?” I asked.
Gregory seemed to debate. “Only one thing that I can see,” he said.
“And that is?”
“Follow Alexander’s example.”
And he pulled me into his arms and kissed me again. This time his mouth was heavy on mine, and I felt the rough texture of his beard scrub against my skin. He held me so close to his chest that my garland of white flowers was crushed between us, washing us both in perfume. I felt my breath falter and my heart revolt. It was a shock when he finally released me.
For a moment, we watched each other like strangers set to duel. “So tell me, Truth-Teller,” he said at last in a low voice. “What did you think of this night?”
My hand was on the latch; I considered entering the house without replying. But at last I shrugged and shook my head. “I will never have another like it,” I said. And then I pushed the door open and slipped inside the kitchen. There were two candles burning on the counter, one for me, one for Gregory. He remained outside, as if he had something to think about and only night air would make it clear. I took my candle and stole up the stairs to the room where my sister lay sleeping. Five minutes, and I was undressed and lying in bed.
Where I lay for the next three hours, lost in remembrance, music echoing in my ears, the scent of white flowers clinging to my skin.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The next day was hot and balmy, which may have explained my lethargy. I could have blamed it on the fact that I’d slept only a few hours, or on the fact that, when I woke, I was depressed. Kisses by moonlight were all very well if they didn’t matter to you, if you didn’t care that you were likely never to see your kissing partner again, if you could be lighthearted and nonchalant about their sudden and random occurrences. I didn’t think I’d be able to manage such a thing. I was fairly certain Roelynn wouldn’t. And if, as I suspected, Adele and Micah had progressed at least to the stage of kisses, I didn’t think they would be able to shrug off such tokens of affection either.
Which made it seem that kisses by moonlight might better be avoided altogether.
There was much to do in the kitchen and the garden, so, once I forced myself out of bed and got dressed, I was able to keep myself busy all through the day. Adele, who could pass whole weeks without speaking, seemed desperately silent this day, as if she knew secrets so explosive merely to open her mouth would be to detonate them. She had never told me in so many words that, in trade for my night off with Gregory, she would take this evening and spend it with Micah, but her troubled urgency led me to infer that this was the case.
We did not see Gregory or Alexander all day. The Summermoon ball was tomorrow night, and a few last clumsy souls were trying to learn in one day all the rhythms and graces they had not been able to master in the previous three and a half weeks. The sound of the music box never stopped; the door to the parlor never opened except to admit new students. We left trays of refreshments on a table in the hall and picked up empty plates later. I imagined all parties would be exhausted by day’s end and ready to vow they would never dance again.
Adele stayed long enough to help me serve the evening meal to the other guests, but I cleaned up dinner on my own. I assumed she had slipped upstairs to change clothes, but if she did, she didn’t pause in the kitchen on her way back downstairs to show me what she had chosen to wear. It crossed my mind that she might not have left the inn at all, merely hidden herself in some hall closet or attic corner to wait for the night to pass. It would have been just like her.
It was somewhere between nine and ten that night before everything dirty had been washed, everything fresh had been put away, and everything that could be prepared for the morning had been diced, mixed, or started. “Well!” Mother said, surveying the orderly kitchen. “I believe I’ll find your father and see if he would like to stroll out and sample what delights might be available at this hour of night. You’ll stay?”
“I’ll stay,” I confirmed.
She took off her apron and hung it on a hook. “Bob!” she called, pushing through the kitchen out into the hall. “Where are you? Let’s walk down to the pub.”
There was always more to do, of course, so I polished good silver and ironed napkins and looked over a recipe that Constance had lent me. I was tired enough to go straight up to bed and fall asleep, but generally we tried to make sure that one of the family members was awake till midnight, particularly during holiday seasons, in case a guest needed something. I could hear occasional noises from the second floor, and the sound of voices as people came back through the front door.
No one came looking for me till almost midnight, when Gregory stepped through the door that connected the kitchen to the dining room.
“O
h, good,” he said in the most casual voice, and pulled out one of the chairs around the table. “I was hoping someone would be here. Is it too late to get a cup of tea?”
Wordlessly, I shook my head. I had been standing by the pantry, debating which spices needed to be replenished and which we wouldn’t need to restock for at least two weeks. Five steps, and I was at the great stove, moving the kettle over to the heat.
“And one of those cherry tarts, if there are any left,” he added. “Now that’s something they don’t know how to make at the bakeries in Wodenderry.”
I assembled a plate, a mug, and the foodstuffs to go with the crockery, then set them all down in front of him. I still hadn’t spoken, and I kept my eyes mostly on my tasks.
“I hope you’ll sit here with me while I eat,” he said in a wheedling voice.
There was no way to refuse. I couldn’t very well leave my post until my parents or my sister came home. I might as well have tea. I poured myself a cup, decided I wouldn’t be able to choke down a tart, and sat down at the table across from Gregory.
He lifted the mug to his mouth and studied me over the rim. “Or am I wrong?” he teased. “Is this the silent sister? The one who keeps all her thoughts to herself?”
I found my voice. “Now would be an awkward time to begin to get us mixed up,” I said.
He laughed and took a sip. “Perhaps I have had you confused all along,” he said. “Perhaps I have been courting Adele on half the days I thought I was courting Eleda.”
Courting. A strong word. “She wouldn’t be the one to tell me if that were so,” I said.
He smiled and took another sip of his tea. “Isn’t it strange to you,” he said, “to live in the same house, share such a small space, such a confined life, with someone who is so exactly your opposite? We all know people who are more like us or less so, whom we feel comfortable with because their beliefs are similar to ours or whom we don’t entirely trust because they are so very different from us. And yet Adele is your sister. You are closer than any two sisters I’ve ever seen. How do you manage that, I wonder? Does it ever make you despise each other? Try to change the other?”