Labyrinth Gate

  “And a fine education Julian got from that wastrel of a father,” Laetitia interposed, turning her head to glare at Lord Felton. “Why are you laughing? Don’t you believe it?”

  “Oh, I know the tale,” Lord Felton said quickly. “One of the great scandals of twenty years past, but I believe the principals were Sir Alfred Whitmore and Lady Smallfields, although the other name does her—ah—considerable charms more justice. Left his family penniless, forced the daughters into trade and the sons into the army, although the whole lot of them is I understand as dissolute as their father when it comes to the pleasures of the flesh.” He coughed discreetly here, casting a sly look toward his companion. “Though I am sure it is little enough you would know of such things, my dear Laetitia.”

  “We will ignore your insinuations, Henry, as any gentlewoman ought, and continue with Julian’s letter. It is this section that I thought might interest you. Let me see. Broadlands—” She coughed abruptly, covering some other reaction. “Vulgar woman. And dressed the part, too. Ah, yes, his father. ‘The regiment has encamped less than a day’s ride from our valley, and Miss Cathcart and I rode over one day to investigate—’ Although what Miss Cathcart was investigating I won’t presume to discuss here. ‘—and it seemed to me that Colonel Witless—and a more self-satisfied, overweening, vain bore I have never before had the misfortune to meet—had little beyond some vague explanation of “maneuvers” to justify the arrival of his regiment in this Lady-forsaken region. You might ask a few questions, Aunt. It does not look now as if we will be leaving for another month or even two, and I confess myself a trifle suspicious of his motives.’ And the rest is gossip of mutual acquaintances whom you do not know, Henry.” She set the letter down on the side table at her right. “There. What do you make of that?”

  “When was the letter written?”

  She turned it over to look for the date. “Some five weeks ago. All his letters have taken four to six weeks to get here. I find it marvelous how swiftly one can correspond these days with the northern shires.”

  Lord Felton considered his teacup thoughtfully. “It was a cursed strange marriage for Elen to make. I’ve said it before, and I shall certainly say it again ere long. But this business of wall paintings and notions of sacrificing young women—one might well suppose our Pariam ancestors had no artists who painted as they pleased without a notion of copying stiff old rituals to the order of some stuffed-shirt minister of ceremonies.”

  “Why, Henry, I had no idea that you believed in the Pariam legends. It is not a conventional belief.”

  “My dear Laetitia. Please do not accuse me of that particular attribute. If I am a careful man, it is due entirely to my mother’s gambling habits, which left me with an inheritance of one ramshackle estate, a host of debts, and no chance whatsoever of being admitted as a suitor to this very parlor when it hosted the debut season of the Incomparable Letty. But I appreciate you sending for me today with such news.” He reached for another slice of cake, thought better of it, and sat back. “This movement of troops disturbs me indeed. It implies to me that there is something in the north that the Regent wishes to safeguard. Or gain. But what, and for what purpose, I cannot imagine.”

  In the silence that followed this remark, Lady Trent rang for a servant to refill the teapot, and she and Lord Felton waited out the interval in a companionable silence until fresh tea was served and the housemaid gone again. Laetitia poured.

  “Never a day’s illness in her life,” said Lord Felton. “Georgiana has always had a remarkably strong constitution. The only thing, dare I say, that she inherited from her mother that is of any use to her. But let us not speak ill of the dead. And furthermore, I have been forbidden to go to her at this ‘ocean retreat.’”

  “Forbidden!”

  “I have always distrusted Blessa. She was not an open child, always had secrets, and at a far younger age than I thought fitting. A sly girl, with, shall we say, precocious appetites. I do not trust her, Laetitia, but I have no proof, and only suspicions to link this regiment suddenly gone north and Georgiana’s illness.”

  He reached into the pocket of his coat and removed a pair of spectacles. “It is no secret,” he continued, “that Blessa has long dabbled in the arts of the mage, but how long and how deep I have never before attempted to discover. I am neither curious about nor any kind of intimate with the means of sorcery. I feel that it is now time to investigate the full range of her ambitions. But that is a matter for another day. For now, I must excuse myself.” He fit his spectacles carefully over his nose and got to his feet.

  Laetitia rose as well and extended one hand. “Then I will see you tomorrow, Henry.”

  He took her hand and kissed it with a fond and playful reverence. “Nine o’clock, my dear. Have we ever missed a Harvest Fair celebration together?”

  She let him retain her hand in his grasp. “The art of the fan is sadly lost in these callow times,” she said severely, “else I would rap you smartly on the knuckles for your impertinence. One does not remind a lady of her indiscretions. And certainly not at our age.”

  “The pleasure of such a reminder must be greatest at our age, don’t you think?”

  “Out,” she said as he relinquished her hand, but she smiled. “And be careful.”

  “What do you mean, he walked all the way into my inner suite before anyone stopped him?” The Regent’s voice snapped with the force of a blow across the breadth of the room. The servant who had brought the message recoiled a full two steps before the door brought his retreat up short. “I hope that you had the sense to detain him there,” she continued in a tone that boded ill for that man who had not.

  “Yes, highness,” he murmured, bowing deeply.

  She removed her gloves, straightened her skirts with a brisk shake, and strode out past him to the hallway that led to her private rooms. The servant followed ten paces behind. She could feel his trembling, his fear, as if he were actually touching her.

  In the outermost room of her private suite she found Lord Felton tied tightly to a chair. He surveyed her calmly as she entered and halted before him. Her face was impassive, betraying no emotion at all.

  “I fear I thought you had left the palace for the afternoon,” he said in an even voice. “Or else I can assure you that you would not have caught me here.”

  “Do you think I leave my most private places unguarded?” she replied, at once coy as a flirting woman and firm as a general interrogating the enemy. She crossed back to the door, where the servant waited. “Go to your quarters.” She did not lower her voice. “Bring me back the razor you shave yourself with. Make sure it is sharp. And be quick about it.”

  He scarcely bowed before he was out the door.

  “My dear Blessa,” said Lord Felton smoothly. “You know that at my age death holds no especial fear. I will be quite blunt about my purpose in coming here.”

  “I have no intention of threatening you or torturing you.” She walked past him into the second room. Two drawers had been opened in her vast desk. She went on into the farthest chamber, but its precise arrangement of strangely angled furniture and carefully placed cards, plant clippings, and animal skins had not been disturbed. Satisfied, she returned to the outer chamber, where Lord Felton waited with the patience of a crafty old politician.

  There were no windows in any of these rooms. The Regent took her place next to a painting of her mother, in which the old queen had posed in a pantomime recalling St. Maretha as the Harrower of the Infidels. After contemplating the painting for a long, silent moment, she turned slowly to regard Lord Felton with equally careful scrutiny. She said nothing.

  “I do not care,” said Lord Felton, “what practices you choose to engage in, your highness. My concern is for Princess Georgiana.” He waited politely for her response. She did not make one. “Then I will be frank. I suspect you of some collusion with the Earl of Elen.”

  “I am well aware of your suspicions.”

  “Then you also know that
I will do everything in my power to insure the safe, whole, and undisturbed ascension of the princess to the throne of Anglia.”

  The Regent paced with deliberation twice across the room, halted behind his chair, and turned it so that its back, and thus Lord Felton’s, now faced the door to the hall. “I wonder,” she said in a musing tone, “if you ever felt any reservations about the inheritance passing through the male line, Lord Felton.”

  “I obey the law of the land, your highness. I am an administrator, not a lawmaker. That job I leave to those Our Lady ordained for such tasks, and mind in my stead those for which I was ordained.”

  “Ah,” she said. Turning, she watched as the door opened and the servant entered. With a bow he handed her his shaving razor, a long, sharp blade.

  “You might at least tell me,” said Lord Felton evenly, facing away from this exchange, “what you mean to do with Georgiana.”

  Blessa, princess of the realm, was a deft woman. With a movement so swift and controlled that Lord Felton perhaps did not perceive its coming, she slit his throat.

  Blood sprayed onto the carpet, but she had positioned herself in such a way that none of the blood touched her. After a moment he slumped over in his bonds, dead.

  She got no pleasure from the act; neither did it revolt her. She was above all a practical woman. Lord Felton’s suspicions endangered her plans—but she was never one to pass off a distasteful job to others, especially when it was vital that the task be accomplished successfully.

  She tossed the razor onto the blood-soaked carpet and turned to the servant. His face was pale.

  “Send for two of my women to clean this up,” she ordered. “The carpet will have to be discarded. And the three soldiers the colonel left here can dispose of the body after I have finished with it. In the river, I think.” She nodded and was about to dismiss him when another thought occurred to her. “And I must contact Nastagmas.” She went abruptly into the second room and took from one of the open drawers a written report detailing Lord Felton’s movements in past months. Bringing it back into the outer room, she set it on a side table. “I will have further use for the soldiers,” she said, as much to herself as to her servant. “No news of this must carry to any of those in the earl’s party. They are the only real threat left to me.”

  The servant shuffled slightly, his shoes scuffing the floor, and the Regent’s eyes rose to scrutinize him with more interest than before. He was, like all her male servants, well formed, fair of face, and young.

  “And when you have done with these tasks, you will return to the inner chamber. You know what is expected of you.”

  He bowed, quivering with some emotion he could not put into words.

  “You, and a woman attendant as well. Now go.”

  He left quickly. She went into the inner room, retrieved her deck of Gates, and returned to kneel by Lord Felton’s body.

  “Now,” she said, “we will prepare to set the illusion.”

  At ten o’clock on Harvest Fair night, Lady Trent sat in her parlour flipping through a deck of old and well-worn cards. When the door to the room opened, she laid down the cards expectantly and looked up. A footman entered.

  “My lady.” He inclined his head respectfully.

  “You have been quick, James,” she said. “For that I thank you. You reached Felton House, then? Any news?”

  “Lord Felton left at half past ten this morning with instructions that tea was to be laid at five, my lady. Tea was laid, but his lordship did not, and has not, returned.”

  “Ah,” she replied. Her voice quavered a little on the sound, but she controlled it. “Have Master Coachman bring the carriage round. You will attend me.”

  He bowed and left.

  Now she turned her attention with real intensity to the cards, picking them up with reverence. Her hands were pale with age, patterned with veins blue and prominent under her skin, but they did not tremble as she began to lay out the Telling known as The Directions: six cards surrounding the center, which is the seventh.

  “The east.” Her voice was low with concentration and full with the power that seeks only self-knowledge, not domination. She laid down a card, and smiled. “The Harvest Fair. Yes, that is the place he and I first met.

  “To the south, the Lover.” The faintest of flushes edged her cheeks, giving her an air of youth that echoed the innocence of a blushing girl who, leaning from a high window to smile down at her paramour standing below, marked the card. “His companion. A long time ago.” She shook her head and continued.

  “In the heavens, the Heiress, aiding. And below, attacking—” she frowned, placing the card. “The Midwife? Yes, I see. Laboring to birth an unholy scheme from the womb of the Daughter. And then north.”

  She breathed out sharply as she laid the card down. “The Labyrinth. It turns back in upon itself. And to the west,” a pause, “the River. And last, the center.”

  The pause here was longer, as if she was reluctant to reveal the card to herself, but at last she turned it onto its place.

  The Drowned Man.

  “Oh, Henry,” she whispered, and even the calmness of great age, the experience of the many strange, horrible, and wonderful events that life had cast in her way, could not prevent her voice from cracking with sorrow now. She sat quietly with hands folded on the table, and she mourned him. A few tears slipped down her aged face.

  When the door opened to admit the footman James, she swept the cards into a neat stack, fastened her hat on her head and, as she rose, pulled its black lace veil over her face. He escorted her to the carriage and helped her in.

  “River Street,” she commanded:

  “So late, my lady? It will be dangerous.”

  “Then bring two more footmen, and arm yourselves and Master Coachman with pistols.”

  As they travelled, carriage rattling over the cobbled paving of Heffield streets, Lady Trent could hear the thanksgiving hymns and calls of the almsgivers, dance music and rousing drinking songs, that marked the Harvest Fair celebrations. The sounds of festivity faded as they reached the dockside districts. She rapped with her cane and the carriage halted, and footman James appeared at the window.

  “We will proceed carefully now,” she ordered, “with all lanterns lit. We are looking for a man thrown on the river’s edge.”

  “My lady.” He looked a little shocked, but schooled his expression quickly to impassivity. The carriage moved along River Street slowly, looking in the darkness like some ponderous animal attended by fireflies that swooped and rose and circled in and out around it. Water, smelling not so sweet, lapped here the street’s edge and there the rotting pilings of an old wharf. A snout-faced loiterer hurried away into the safety of a black alley as they passed, its footsteps pattering wetly over the damp stones. A gentle misting rain began to fall.

  The first body they found was that of an emaciated woman who had obviously been adrift many days before the tide threw her high on the shore. Her face was unrecognizable. The second was of a young man profusely scarred in the face and dead from stab wounds in the back. The third was Lord Felton.

  “He must ha’ drowned, your ladyship,” said footman James as she knelt, heedless of her fancy gown and fur-lined cloak, on the muddy bank. “There’s not a mark on him.”

  “Nonsense.” She reached out with a hand to touch the slack face tenderly. When her fingers met the water-pale skin, her own skin took on a kind of nimbus, a faint, luminous glow. The unscarred throat of the corpse shimmered slightly, like a heat mirage rippling in the distance, and steadied back to whiteness.

  In a neat line around the curve of his neck, the skin was parted as a piece of meat parts to the cut of a butcher knife. It was as clean as immersion in the river could leave it; all the blood had drained out.

  The footmen gathered above gasped and muttered to each other. Lady Trent withdrew her hand, and the corpse’s neck appeared clear and unmarked again. She rose, leaning on her cane. In that movement her years sat clearly on her, an
d footman James had to help her up, one hand solicitous on her elbow as he escorted her back to the carriage.

  “We will bring him to Vole House,” she ordered. “Have Mistress Housekeeper lay him out as is proper, and Master Butler to inform his heir and relatives of his death. By drowning.”

  It was a silent trip back, with Lady Trent seated on one side of the carriage, Lord Felton’s body propped up by a footman on the other. When they arrived at the entrance of Vole House, the initial flurry of activity—summoning Mistress Housekeeper, calling for housemaids to open the back parlour for the laying out of the body, sending a kitchen boy out to Felton House—kept Lady Trent separated from her butler for some minutes, so that when a footman opened the door into her front parlour so that she could sit for a time in quiet, she was unprepared for her visitor.

  She stopped on the threshold of the room. For an instant, like a hallucination, she seemed to blaze with a luminosity that bathed the dim room in a suffusion of light. As quickly it was gone, and she appeared a frail old woman who has seen the death of too many of the dearest companions of her youth.

  “Your highness,” she said, curt. She sketched the merest fragment of a curtsy.

  The Regent turned from her contemplation of the fire and the painting above the mantel of Our Lady and Her Son. “Lady Trent.” She too wore a lace veil. She swept it aside with one hand. “I will be brief. By the powers vested in me as regent in this realm, I confine you to the walls of Vole House for the rest of this year. You may have correspondence with no one, may receive no visitors, none of your peers or relatives or acquaintances.”