The Continent (The Continent #1)(77)
An elderly man, looking prim and distinguished in his butler’s uniform, comes through from the dining room and stops abruptly. “Miss Sun! My apologies, I ought to have been here to greet you—we weren’t expecting you quite so soon. Please, may I take your…” He trails off, observing that I have neither coat nor traveling trunk. He clears his throat. “Well. Do you have a mind for a late supper, or do you wish to retire?” His eyes flick down to my tunic, then back to my face. “I can call the housemaid to run a bath, if you like.”
“Thank you, no—I’m not hungry, and I wish to be alone. I shall tend to myself this evening.”
He looks relieved, as though he had not been entirely sure how best to serve an eccentric mistress dressed in strange, dirty clothing. “Please ring if you need anything at all.”
“I will.”
He returns to the dining room; a moment later, the soft clink of china is to be heard. I assume he is making sure that the breakfast dishes are properly arranged; he does seem a fastidious sort, though a bit cold for my liking. Our former butler, Mr. Kincaid, wouldn’t have batted an eye had I showed up dressed like a jester all in motley, much less in the muddy, sweat-stained garments I wear now. He would merely have welcomed me and insisted I take a meal. I wonder where Mr. Kincaid is now. I wonder if he mourned for my parents, and for me.
I move to the end of the foyer, my eyes fixed on the map above the mantel. I remember so clearly the weight of it in my hands as I took it from the box at my birthday party, how silky the smooth wood felt against my fingers. What a beautiful object it was to me once—a triumph of hard work and long hours. Yet what a black thing it seems now, the mark of death woven into its very fibers. Had I never drawn it, my parents might have lived. But this is a rumination of futility. My mother and father are gone, and nothing will bring them back.
As though compelled by these morbid thoughts, I turn down the hallway to my right: the long corridor that leads to the family bedrooms. I walk slowly, absorbing each of the portraits along the walls, delicate brushstrokes long forgotten returning to my memory. I come to a halt as I reach the two doors—both closed—at the end of the hall. To the right is my own bedroom, to the left is the suite that belonged to my parents. After a moment’s hesitation, I face my parents’ door, take the cold knob in my hand, and turn it slowly.
The room is dark and deathly quiet. I switch on the lights and feel a stab of desolation; everything is so clean, so orderly, so normal, that I half-expect my mother to enter from the washroom, absentmindedly tying the belt of her dressing gown into a delicate bow. Why, Vaela! she would say, looking at me in surprise. What are you doing up so late?
Her voice was once so clear in my mind, but the memory of it is fading with time, a thought that both pains and terrifies me. What if I should forget her? What if I should forget my father? The people we love may live on in our recollections and impressions, but so much is lost. Already, my memories are not as vibrant as once they were—how I wish I could hold each one in my heart forever, safe and perfect and true.
I cross the room and lie down on the bed. The smooth fabric of the coverlet rustles beneath me as I slide to the far side, where I reach for my mother’s pillow. I clutch it to my breast and press my cheek against it, inhaling deeply, but the freshly laundered case retains no trace of the jasmine perfume she always wore. Still, the memory of the scent lingers in my mind, and I find great comfort in this.
I turn onto my back, hugging the pillow to my chest, staring up at the crimson silks draped above the bed. Tears come at last, along with the wrenching agony of grief. I bury my face in the coverlet, weeping as though all I have lost has only just been taken from me. My fingers dig into the stiff fabric of the pillow, my heart sings with torment. I cry and cry, my face wet and flushed, and I mourn once again for my mother and father and the life I once knew.
How very, very long this day has been. Was it truly only this morning that I set sail for Ivanel with Noro? I think of the map rolled tightly in my bag—a new map, much like the one I drew for the Aven’ei council—yet far more complete. It is not delicate and detailed like the work I might have completed as an apprentice cartographer, not drawn in the Astor Library with fine, expensive ink pens, but in the lamplight of the Continent with a slim goose quill. It is tactical, concise, and as accurate as I could make it from memory. Everything—everything—hinges on this map.
I hope I will not fail the Aven’ei.
CHAPTER 28
IN THE GRAND HALL OF THE CHANCELLERY, I watch as great silvery clouds gather beyond the gilded half-dome windows. The world has gone gray, and with the turn of the weather, some measure of my hope has diminished. I find it difficult to be cheerful in the gloom; even the bulbs in the chandeliers seem to burn white and cold, casting the corners of the vast hall in stark shadows.
I am seated at a slender table opposite the four Heads of State, waiting for the Chancellor to arrive. The officials—three men and one woman—are dressed in the black robes of government office; I wear a floor-length dress of ivory silk, accented from top to bottom with translucent blue beads. An awful choice in regard to the weather, perhaps, but even the stuffy old butler at the estate seemed impressed as I swept through the foyer on my way out the door.
The officials are, from left to right: Mr. Lowe, of the West, a dark-skinned man with pale eyes, an easy smile and a crackling sort of energy about him; Mr. Wey, of the East, a scholarly man of advanced years who wears a pair of spectacles at the tip of his nose; Mr. Chamberlain, of the South, a sickly-looking man with a slender mustache and watery eyes; and Mrs. Pendergrast, of the North, who looks as though she has spent most of her life sucking on a sour candy—even the smile she mustered when I first arrived had a sort of miserable, acidic quality to it. She could be the polar opposite of the sweet-faced Mr. Lowe, and indeed, I notice that the two of them never so much as glance at one another.