The Queen's Rising(35)

I sighed, time no longer hastening about me but stalling, moving slow as honey in winter.

“In the meantime,” he continued, “you should resume your studies, keep your mind sharp. I will not be here to guide you, but I have faith that you will continue to master on your own.”

I tilted my chin so I could look at him, my hair spreading out around me. “You will not be here?” Of course, I knew this. All the arials left for the summer after a passion cycle, to vacation after seven solid years of teaching. It was only right to let him go and relax, go and enjoy himself.

He angled his face to meet my gaze. A hint of a smile was on his lips when he said, “No, I will be away. But I have already told the Dowager to alert me as soon as she finds your patron. I want to be here when you meet them.”

And I wanted to exclaim that I would never get a patron. That I should never have been accepted to Magnalia. But it was the grief that wanted my voice, and I would not give it power to speak. Not when Cartier had given so much to me.

“That is kind . . . that you would want to be here,” I said, casting my eyes back to the clouds.

“Kind?” he snorted. “Saints, Brienna. You realize that I wouldn’t dare let you leave with a patron I have not met face-to-face?”

I glanced back to him, wide-eyed. “And why is that?”

“Must I answer that?”

A cloud passed over the sun, covering us with gray, drinking away the light. I decided I had lain here long enough and rose to my feet, brushing clumps of grass off my skirts. I didn’t even bother with my shoes and stockings; I left them and began to walk, choosing the first path that opened to me.

Cartier was quick on my heels, drawing close to my side. “Will you walk with me, please?”

I slowed, inviting him to adjust to my pace. We took two turns in the path, the sunlight returning with vengeful humidity, before he spoke again.

“I desire to be here to meet your patron because I care about you, and I want to know where your passion leads you.” He glanced at me; I kept my eyes ahead, afraid to yield to that gaze of his. But my heart was like a wild creature inside of me, desperate to escape its cage of bone and flesh. “But also, and perhaps more important, so I can give you your cloak.”

I swallowed. So he was not going to give it to me yet. Part of me had hoped that he would. Part of me had known that he wouldn’t.

The thought of my cloak came about me as gossamer, and I stopped in the grass, trapped in a web of my own making.

“I cannot help but tell you, Brienna,” he murmured to me, “that your cloak is made and is tucked away in my satchel at the house, waiting for when you are ready for this next step.”

I looked up at him. He wasn’t much taller than me, but in that moment, I felt hopelessly small and fragile.

I would not be impassioned until I received my cloak. I would not receive my cloak until I gained a patron. I would not gain a patron unless the Dowager actually found one who saw my value.

My thoughts fell into this downward spiral and I forced myself to keep walking, if only to give me something to do. He followed, as I knew he would.

“Where will you go this summer?” I asked, eager to move on to a different topic. “Will you visit any family?”

“I plan to go to Delaroche. And no, I do not have any family.”

His words made me pause. Never had I imagined that Cartier was alone, that he did not have parents who fawned over him, that he did not have brothers or sisters who loved him.

I met his gaze, my hand moving to my neck, to the broken collar of my dress. “I am sorry to hear that, Master.”

“I was raised by my father,” he said, opening his past to me as if he were a book, as if he—at last—wanted me to read him. “And my father was very good to me, even though he was a grieving man. He lost my mother and my sister when I was very young, so young I don’t remember them. When I turned eleven, I began to beg my father to let me passion in knowledge. Well, he did not like the thought of sending me off to a House, away from him, so he hired one of the finest passions of knowledge to teach me privately. After seven years, when I turned eighteen, I became impassioned.”

“Your father must have been so proud,” I whispered.

“He died, just before I could show him my cloak.”

It took everything within me not to reach out to him, to take his hand and lace my fingers with his, to comfort him. But my spine remained locked in place, my status still a student beneath his mastery, and to touch him would only unfetter the longings we both felt. “Master Cartier . . . I am so sorry.”

“You are kind, Brienna. Saints know I have grown up quickly, yet I was saved from much. And I found a home here at Magnalia.”

We stood together in the quiet incandescence of morning, a time made for new beginnings, a time spun between youth and maturity. I could have stood with him for hours, hidden among green living things, sheltered by clouds and sun, speaking of the past.

“Come, we should return to the house,” he said softly.

I fell into step beside him. We walked back around to the front courtyard, where I saw in horror that the caricature of him was sitting upright in my basket. I rushed to turn it over as I looped the basket on my arm, praying he did not see it as we ascended the stairs into the quiet foyer.

His leather satchel sat on the entry bench, and I tried not to look at it, knowing my cloak was tucked within, as he took the bag into his hands.