Narnia fic: "Dust in the Air" (28)

[bedlamsbard]

Title: Dust in the Air (28)
Author: bedlamsbard
Fandom: Chronicles of Narnia movieverse/bookverse
Rating: PG-13
Content Notes: language, threat of sexual assault
Summary: And the end of all our exploring / will be to arrive where we started. An AU of The Last Battle, some five years after that book begins.
Disclaimer: The Chronicles of Narnia and its characters, situations, settings, etc., belong to C.S. Lewis. Certain characters, situations, settings, etc., belong to Walden Media. Title and quote from T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets: Little Gidding.
Author's Notes: Dust in the Air uses Warsverse backstory as a general rule of thumb. All chapters of Dust are posted on both LJ and DW. Dust in the Air does not use material from The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010). Thank you to snacky for the beta!




She sees the manor house first.

White Bear Hall isn’t like some of the other country manors, the ones that have been built in the past century or so, after the Narnian heartland had finally become something other than a battleground. Those are delightful buildings, but buildings built for peacetime – gates and walls decorative if they exist at all, windows built to display the view instead of shooting arrows, a thousand points of entry instead of a few escape hatches. White Bear Hall is different. White Bear Hall had been built for war, built for sieges, built to keep the peace when the sword and the bow were the only means of doing so on the edge of Telmarine-occupied Narnia. It isn’t quite on the border anymore, though it sits at the very edge of the land that had been forbidden by the Ban. Since its construction it has been considerably renovated over the centuries, so that now instead of being merely a sword on the horizon, it’s a sword with jewels set in the hilt and an embossed leather sheath. It’s hard to say how the manor would stand up to a siege these days, though there’s still a heavy stone wall around the park. Not as well as it would have three hundred years ago, certainly.

The Vale of Bracken – once the Vale of the White Bear, which many Narnians still call it – is old Narnian land, watched over by unhappy Telmarine masters since Caspian the Seafarer had taken the throne. Leocadia crosses into the vale with a little frisson of nervous energy running over her skin, glancing automatically up at the hillside, where the enormous white chalk figure of the bear that has given the vale its name stares down at her, its mouth open in a silent, eternal scowl. Not far away, glimmering in the moonlight, are a number of odd-shaped pools that look like paw prints, as if the white bear had walked out of the Great River that ran through the vale and up onto the hillside. Leocadia has heard a dozen stories of how the white bear got there: King Edmund’s justice, Aslan’s punishment, the Queen of Winter’s sorcery, sheer laziness on the bear’s part. No one really knows; the scholars at the universities have different ideas entirely, of course. It doesn’t matter now. The bear is still and silent in the night air, ignorant of the thousands of enemy troops encamped in the valley below it; if it was ever a living thing, those days are centuries past.

She trudges determinedly down the road towards the shadow of White Bear Hall. These days the manor is the home of the Brackens, land and guardianship both rewarded to them by Florian the Faithless following the former residents’ disgrace. Lord Orichan Bracken is dead; his widow, Lady Marcia Bracken, whom Leocadia knows well, is still in Cair Paravel for the Cortes. Under normal circumstances the steward wouldn’t light up the hall like that, as if the king himself had come to stay.

These aren’t normal circumstances.

Below the rise that the hall sits on, Leocadia can just barely make out the village beneath (one of several in the vale), which is almost eclipsed by the multitude of tents set up on the empty fields to the east. The waxing moon, only a few days shy of full, illuminates the vale, reflecting off the silver ribbon of the river and the pools of the bear’s paw prints. From this distance, she can’t make out the crests on the flags, but she can tell they’re there. She goes slowly down the road towards them, too-big shoes slapping against the well-worn earth and occasionally turning up flecks of white chalk from below.

There aren’t many nocturnal species in Narnia, but there are a few; none of them appear to be on the road. Up above her she can see the dark shapes of bats and a huge owl swooping lazily after them; the owl is so large that it can only be a talking owl, but it’s hard to tell with the bats. None of them pay her any mind.

Leocadia trudges through silent villages, windows shuttered and doors locked, some with the remnants of Winter’s End decorations still hung outside, others with symbols against evil painted on the step. The vale is twenty miles from end to end, but fortunately she doesn’t have to go that far; still, it’s several hours and the first hint of dawn is rising in the east when she finally makes her weary way up to the huge wood-and-iron gates of White Bear Hall. She settles back on one heel and looks up at them, then at the small, human-size (though built to accommodate anyone from a mouse to a centaur) door set in the left-hand gate. She can’t tell if there are guards on the gate or not, but there must be – maybe Calormenes, maybe whatever men Lady Marcia hasn’t taken with her to Cair Paravel.

After a moment’s contemplation, she raises her fist and hammers at the door. Big as the door is, and small as her fist is, it only makes a few muffled thumps. Leocadia waits for a minute, looking around for a bell-pull or a knocker of some sort and wondering if she should hallo! the gate or not, and is just reaching to knock again when someone puts their head over the top of the gate.

“Who’re you?” the satyr demands.

Leocadia stands back a few feet and tips her head up to get a better look. He’s Narnian all right – that’s one thing that the Calormenes can’t counterfeit. He’s wearing a leather surcoat with the Bracken badge on the chest, with a crossbow balanced on the top of the wall and his finger on the trigger.

“I am Lady Leocadia of Newisle,” she announces, pitching her voice to carry. “My husband is Lord Prejun of Newisle, Lord Provost of Cair Paravel. My cousins are Lord Vespasian of Glasswater and King-in-Exile Tirian of Narnia. My grandmother is the Dowager Queen Altagracia of Narnia. I demand that you let me in!”

The satyr blinks stupidly down at her. Leocadia crosses her arms over her chest and stares up. She doesn’t look like much – her dress is poor quality, with patches here and there, her shoes look more like a peasant’s (which they are) than a lady’s, and her hair is in loose, grubby waves around her face. But her shawl is the finest silk money can buy, though she doubts that he can see it from here. Or if he can, she doubts that he has the knowledge to appreciate it.

“My lady isn’t at home,” the satyr says eventually.

“Then take me to the steward,” Leocadia demands. She lets her gaze drift upwards to rest on the Calormene banners and sniffs derisively. “Or whoever it is you’re grubbing after now. I am a peer of Narnia and I will not be denied.”

There is a long pause while the satyr stares at her, then he disappears from behind the wall. A few minutes later the small door in the gate swings open. Leocadia proceeds through it, lifting her skirts as she steps inside.

The satyr isn’t the only one there. There are three other guards, a dwarf and two minoboars, all armed and staring at her with ugly, considering expressions. She stares back, lifting her chin.

“She don’t look like a lady,” says one of the minoboars eventually.

“I assure you, I am,” Leocadia snaps. “Now take me to the steward.”

“She talks like one,” the satyr protests, ignoring her. “Like Milady Bracken, she does.”

“Milady Kingbarrow,” the minoboar corrects. “That jumped-up tramp that did for Milord –”

“Kindly cease your gossiping, you sound like old women,” Leocadia interrupts. “I am well-aware that Lady Marcia is in the Cortes this time of year. Now, take me to the steward immediately, or I shall scream. My husband is Lord Provost: he will not take kindly to hearing that I have been mistreated. Nor shall the Tisroc: I am the blood of Caspian the Seafarer. Take me to the steward!”

The dwarf glances around him, then apparently judges his odds good and steps towards her. “What’s a pretty girl like you doing out here all on your own?” he leers.

“That is none of your concern,” Leocadia snaps, standing her ground. “I order you to take me to the steward!”

“Whyn’t we have a little fun first?” the minoboar suggests, reaching for her.

Leocadia draws back her arm and slaps him across the face as hard as she can. The sound rings out across the property. “Unhand me at once!”

“Why, you little slut –”

He swings at her, and at the same time Leocadia hears a bowstring snap: before his fist can connect an arrow seems to sprout from his wrist, with a spray of blood across her face. She cries out and leaps back, her hands flying to her mouth as the dwarf screams. He falls to his knees, clutching at his wounded arm.

She stares wildly in the direction the arrow had come from, shocked to see a young Calormene man approaching, a second arrow nocked and the string drawn back to his ear. Behind him is his warhorse, with only a headstall and no saddle but no less deadly for all that. “Step back,” he warns the four Narnian guards, who obey sullenly, their eyes fixed on the gleaming arrowhead. To Leocadia, he says, “Are you unharmed, lady?”

She swipes at the drops of the minoboar’s blood on her cheeks. “I – yes. Thank you.”

He nods solemnly, lowering his bow. “Back to your duties,” he says to the Narnians.

“Fine, milor’,” mutters the satyr, while the rest of them echo him and slink off.

Leocadia scrubs the back of her hand against the coarse fabric of her skirt. “I’m Lady Leocadia of Newisle,” she says again, trying to regain her composure. She can tell from the tarkaan’s sword-knots that he’s nobility, though not of the upper caste. He’s darker than most of the Calormenes she knows; the Narnians must have missed him in the shadows. A pale Narnian man, even one of the swarthier Telmarines, would have stood out. “My husband is the Lord Provost of Narnia. Will you take me to see the steward, please? Or whoever’s in charge here?”

The man replaces the arrow in the quiver on his shoulder. “Of course, lady,” he says. “I am Emrah Tarkaan, second son of Raghib Tarkaan, of the Hayrunissa. It is some distance to the castle; will you ride?” He gestures at the horse, which comes around obediently and kneels down obediently in front of Leocadia.

“Thank you, Emrah Tarkaan,” she says. She puts one hand on the horse’s neck, comforted by its warmth, and kilts her skirt clumsily up so that she can ride astride. It’s like straddling a barrel, it’s so broad. She folds her hands into its mane as the beast rises, the tarkaan tossing the leadrope back towards her for a better hold. He doesn’t seem to need it to control the horse.

“I am sorry for them,” he apologizes as they start up the carriage-drive to the rise of the manor house. “I suspect the Lady of Bracken took the best of her men with her to Cair Paravel and left the worst here. Yasruddin Tarkaan, my commander, thought it better that they not be left to idle about.”

“There are brutes everywhere,” Leocadia says and sniffs. She pushes her hair out of her face, tucking it behind her ears. “These men are not the only ones in this part of Narnia.”

The tarkaan’s face tightens. “No, lady. They are not.” He strokes his horse’s neck as it tosses its head, nuzzling at his cheek. “Do not be offended, lady, but I admit some curiosity over what brings a great Narnian lady to a place like the Vale of the White Bear.”

“The Vale of Bracken,” Leocadia corrects.

He raises a hand and gestures at the ghostly figure of the white bear on the hill side. “Sometimes the old names are best.”

“Sometimes the true names are best,” she counters.

“What makes a name true, Lady Leocadia?”

She doesn’t have an answer for that. Broad, empty lawns stretch out on either side of the curving carriage-drive, leading up to the looming bulk of the manor house. In a few windows, she can see lights – probably the staff starting to go about their duties. There can’t be many left with Lady Marcia in Cair Paravel, just enough to keep the manor in order until she returns to the estate. They’re probably outnumbered ten to one by the Calormenes.

“I ran away,” she tells Emrah Tarkaan suddenly.

He looks up at her. “Lady?”

“I ran away. My cousin – King Tirian – he came to Cair Paravel and took me from my husband’s house. My husband is a traitor,” she adds bitterly, “but I am not. I ran away from my cousin’s camp at the first chance I had and made my way here. Lady Marcia and I have been friends for years.”

“That was brave of you,” says the tarkaan, stroking his horse’s cheek. “You know that Yasruddin Tarkaan will ask you about King Tirian.”

Leocadia looks down, carding her fingers through the horse’s pale mane. “I know.”

They’re both silent a little longer. Leocadia can see guards outside the manor house – Calormene guards this time, carrying crossbows and some kind of polearm that she can’t remember the name of.

“Does it bother you, lady?” says the tarkaan suddenly. “Betraying your own blood?”

Leocadia wonders why he cares. “I don’t dare think of it that way. My cousin can’t win. The odds are impossible. If Tirian keeps trying to do this – trying to win a war that has already been lost for years now – it will devastate Narnia. There are thousands of people in the camps – women and children, innocents – and if Tirian has his way then they’ll all die. I can’t in good conscience let that happen, not if there’s anything that I can do to prevent it.” She looks off into the distance, turns her head back and twists to see the ghostly shape of the white bear behind her. “I hope that he can understand that someday.”

“That’s very brave of you, lady,” Emrah Tarkaan says. The horse snorts a little, tossing its head, and he makes a clucking sound with his tongue, saying something to it in a fluid, lilting kind of Calormene that Leocadia hasn’t heard before.

“I don’t know if it’s brave,” she admits softly. “Right now it just feels like running away.”

They come to a stop in front of the manor doors. Up close, White Bear Hall looks like most of the Neo-Narnian manors, if less gaudy and more staid: walls covered in climbing vines, lots of windows, bear-shaped gargoyles. But behind it lies the core of the old stone keep, an ugly reminder of the hall’s past, with crenellated walls and arrow-slits, and Calormene banners flying from the tower.

Emrah Tarkaan hands her down from the horse, then says something in Calormene. It goes trotting off, hooves dull against the gravel; Leocadia watches it go and frowns, because she knows horses, and you just can’t do that with most dumb horses. But she can’t think of a single talking horse that would willingly serve the Calormenes this way. Allies, yes, but no talking horse in Narnia will be ridden, not even by the king himself, let alone by some minor Calormene tarkaan.

He says something to one of the guards in a different kind of Calormene than he’d used before, the kind of Calormene that Vespasian had called Tashbaan Calormene – the most common form. Leocadia has picked up enough Calormene over the years to know that all he’s said is an order for the man to go and wake Yasruddin Tarkaan, he has an important Narnian guest.

Leocadia draws her shawl more tightly over her shoulders. Spring is finally here, there’s no doubt about that, but it’s still early enough in the season that there’s a chill in the air. Her threadbare dress, borrowed from another woman in the camps, doesn’t do half what it should to keep the cold off. Leocadia’s not prepared for this kind of weather, more used to the wet chill that comes in off the Great Eastern Ocean, but all her clothes are back in her own house – well, Prejun’s house – in Cair Paravel, and probably burned up to boot. There’s Tirian to thank for that as well.

Eventually the door opens again and the guard reemerges, along with a sleepy-looking centaur in a hastily pulled on shirt, his waistcoat still open. He clatters down the steps and comes to a stop in front of Leocadia.

“My lady of Newisle,” he says, bowing and kissing the air above the hand that she offers him. “We are so pleased to have you here. I am Sir Asprenas Much, Lady Bracken’s steward. If you and the young tarkaan will come inside, Yasruddin Tarkaan will be with you shortly.”

“Thank you, Sir Asprenas,” Leocadia says.

Sir Asprenas leads her and Emrah Tarkaan into a sitting room, where a maid is hastily kindling a fire in the hearth. She bobs a curtsey to Leocadia, then ducks out, returning a few minutes later with a tray loaded with a pot of coffee, three cups, and a plate of biscuits.

“I’ll see about getting you some proper clothes, milady,” she tells Leocadia as she pours, looking her up and down critically. “I’m sure Milady Marcia won’t mind; she’s taken her best things to Cair Paravel anyway. Begging your pardon, milady.”

“That would be wonderful, um –”

“Ainize, milady.”

“Ainize. That would be wonderful.”

Emrah Tarkaan stands as the door opens and a tall Calormene comes in. Leocadia realizes, with a small start, that she knows him; she’d never put the name of the general together with that of the gentleman she knows in Cair Paravel.

“My lord tarkaan,” she says, dipping a curtsey.

Yasruddin Tarkaan is as dark as his subordinate. Like Emrah, he doesn’t wear a turban, though his head is shaved smooth. There are laugh-lines at the corners of his brown eyes, and beneath his tribal scars his face is kind. Leocadia has danced with him at countless balls in Cair Paravel; she’d liked him. She’d thought, at the time, that he liked her.

“Lady Newisle,” he says, kissing the air above her hand. “I was grieved to hear of your departure from the city. Your husband –”

“My husband is a traitor, my lord,” Leocadia says. They sit at his gesture, each taking a cup of coffee; Leocadia closes her eyes as she inhales the bitter scent. Lion’s mane, she’s missed this.

“The Lord Provost, truly?” His voice is gently prodding. “I admit, my lady, that I never believed Lord Prejun to have that kind of spine; his spirit for self-preservation is too good. Begging your pardon, of course.”

“I don’t need it. I wish to begin divorce proceedings immediately, and I want Prejun arrested. I’m sure Prince Bahadur’s torturers can get some truth out of him: as you said, my lord, he has no spine.”

“You seem quite passionate, my lady,” Yasruddin Tarkaan observes.

“My husband,” Leocadia says softly, “was a fool and he nearly got us both killed. If only he’d succeeded in killing himself when he burned down our house.”

The tarkaan taps a finger on the delicate china of the coffee cup. “Tell me how it is that you came to be here, my lady.”

Leocadia tells him. It’s the same thing that she told Emrah Tarkaan, though she adds details as Yasruddin asks for them. She tells them that Tirian has moved the Narnians north, out of the Western Waste and into the formerly-Calormene fort near the diamond mines, which offers a better defensive position than the woods. Besides, she adds wearily, there are too many refugees to protect when they’re as spread out as they have to be in the Waste. They’re less vulnerable at the fort, where they can get the women and children inside actual walls, or into the mines, if need be.

“I see,” Yasruddin says when she falls silent, twisting the folds of her skirt between her fingers. “That fort is more than a day’s ride from this place. Did you walk all that way?”

Leocadia shakes her head. “The watchtowers on the old borders – Tirian has been thinking about refortifying them. He sent me out with some of his men to look at them because he knew I didn’t like the fort and he thought that getting away for a few days might be good. We made it to the Harmsford Tower –” Which is only a burned-out husk now, but Yasruddin Tarkaan knows that, of course. “– and I left last night, after dinner. I just – started walking.”

The two tarkaans both sit up straight. Yasruddin tips his head towards Emrah, who stands up immediately and slips out of the room. Leocadia can guess that he’s gone to check out her story; Harmsford isn’t very far away on horseback.

“You were not followed?” Yasruddin questions. “None of your companions noted your absence?”

“I – I don’t know,” Leocadia admits. “Most of the others had gone to bed – I slipped past the guard while his back was turned.” She looks down at her hands. “They might have noticed me missing when they changed shifts, but I had some space to myself, because of my sex and my rank.”

The tarkaan nods, his normally-sleepy eyes sharp. “Why here, my lady? You must have known that Lady Bracken would still be in Cair Paravel for the Cortes.”

Leocadia nods a little. She picks up her coffee cup and clasps her hands around it, the warmth stinging at her palms. “Marcia – Lady Bracken – is a friend of mine,” she says. “If her steward wrote to her and told her that I had come asking for shelter, then she’d agree to help me. The other western lords are very unreliable; it’s impossible to predict what they might do. And those who aren’t dead are all in Cair Paravel, as well. Besides,” she adds, swallowing, “I saw the Calormene banners. I had to tell someone what Tirian is planning.” She stares down at the half-empty cup, the brown liquid inside with a few floating crumbs where she’d dunked her biscuits in without thinking about it, the way she’d done when she’d been little. “You won’t hurt him, will you?”

“Not if I can help it,” Yasruddin promises. “I give you my word, Lady Leocadia.”

She nods again, freeing one hand from the coffee cup to swipe it across her eyes. She doesn’t know if she’s crying because of what she’s done, the choices she’s made, or just because she’s never been this tired in her life.

Yasruddin leans forward and carefully pries the cup out of her other hand, replacing it on the tray. “You’re exhausted, my lady,” he says, and Leocadia has a moment of blinding terror where she wonders if he’s reading her mind. “I’ll have a maid show you to a room, and we can speak further in the morning.”

“Thank you,” she whispers.

Ainize must have been waiting just outside the door, because she flits inside the room as soon as Yasruddin opens it, coming towards Leocadia and offering a hand up off the couch. She takes Leocadia out into the hallway and up a wide flight of stairs with an elaborately decorated banister – the house is too dark right now to make out the details, though it’s almost certainly bears in some way – then down another hallway and into a bedroom. Leocadia changes into the nightgown that Ainize produces and then falls into bed, asleep almost as soon as her head hits the pillow.

Maybe it’s just her sheer exhaustion, but she dreams uneasily – dreams that she’s standing alone in a crowded room, full of light and life and laughter. There are people all around her – Narnians, all Narnians, except for four human children with crowns on their heads and steel in their hearts. Everyone is in the kind of archaic finery that Leocadia has only seen in paintings and plays, only this is the real thing; fine fabrics and real gems, real gold and silver. Up around her marble columns rise to hold a vaulted ceiling in place, hung with red and gold banners. She pivots slowly on one foot to see four thrones on a raised podium at one end of the hall, illuminated by the massive stained glass window behind them.

There’s a reason that this place looks familiar, Leocadia realizes with a chill that runs down her spine and raises the hair on the back of her neck. There’s a very famous painting that had hung in the palace before Prince Bahadur had removed it, its colors still vibrant after two thousand years.

She turns frantically, barefoot on the marble, no one paying any attention to her in her borrowed nightgown, and starts to elbow her way through the crowd when she catches sight of a snatch of bright hair. Elbowing is unnecessary, she finds: Leocadia passes right through the crowd without any of them seeming to notice her falling through them, landing on her hands and knees and shuddering as a leopard walks right through her.

O Aslan, who dwelleth beyond the Great Sea –

The prayer is on her lips as she pushes herself up, trying not to shiver as someone’s tail swishes through her hip. “Your Majesty,” she calls, raising her voice. “Your Majesty! High King Peter –”

She stumbles out of the crowd onto a small balcony, catching herself on the balustrade and glad that she doesn’t pass through that, too, because it’s a long fall down to the beach below. She turns to look for the High King, the King of Summer, but he’s lost amongst the crowd. Instead she’s standing at the balustrade beside a very young Queen Lucy and a faun wearing a green scarf edged with gold whom she doesn’t recognize. Leocadia sweeps her tangled hair back from her face, approaching the queen instead. She opens her mouth to speak and finds that she can’t; she forms the words, swears that she speaks them, but can’t hear anything except her own ragged breath and the voices of the two people in front of her.

“But you mustn’t press him. After all, he’s not a tame lion.”

Leocadia stretches her hand out to the queen. Help me, she tries to beg. Your Majesty, you have to help me! But the words die on her lips; she cannot voice them.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers, and this, this she can say. “I’m so sorry.”

Leocadia wakes with a start, staring up at the carved ceiling of the four-poster bed for a moment in sheer confusion before she remembers where she is. She sits up, sweeping a hand through her hair, and looks around.

Sunlight spills in through gauzy curtains. It’s a very nice room, the kind of room used for extended houseguests or visiting nobility – a large bedroom with a hearth (cold now, though there’s a brazier at the foot of the bed) and comfortable-looking armchair, with a vanity and a full-length mirror against one wall. An open door reveals a sitting room, while two closed ones likely lead to a bathroom and a water closet. A clock on the mantle reveals the time to be well past noon.

Leocadia twists around and slides off the bed, the carpets – Calormene, probably imported – warm against her bare feet. There’s a gown laid out for her on the armchair, along with underthings. The gown is several seasons old, probably one of Lady Marcia’s that had been left here. No shoes – she and Marcia have vastly differently-sized feet – but a pair of soft slippers is waiting on top of the gown. Fortunately she and Marcia have similar coloring.

She scoops up the clothing and carries it towards the first closed door, which turns out to be the water closet. That means the next one is the bathroom, so Leocadia dumps the clothing over a towel rack and ducks back into the water closet to use the facilities. In the bathroom she gives herself a quick sponge bath, casting longing glances at the claw-footed bathtub – tonight, she promises herself, if she isn’t in chains and on her way back to Cair Paravel by then – before dressing. She sweeps a brush through her hair, damp from washing, and pulls it back into a few simple braids.

When she emerges from the bathroom, there’s a tabby cat lying on the vanity. Leocadia reaches over to stroke it, smiling as it purrs. After a moment it stands up and stretches, then leaps off the vanity and curls up by the brazier. She picks up the piece of paper it was lying on, looks it over, and slides it into the lit brazier, where it flares briefly into flame before dissolving into ash.

She sweeps a few loose strands of her hair back behind her ears, takes a deep breath, and goes out into the hallway.

Before it had belonged to the Brackens, White Bear Hall had belonged to the Whitebears, and the building still bears – no pun intended – their touch. The Brackens had only been ennobled half a century ago, not long after the Whitebears’ fall from grace, and while there are bits and pieces of the Bracken touch around the manor, most of it still belongs to the Whitebears, tapestries and paintings and the décor in the manor, the snarling bears that chase each other down the carved banister as Leocadia descends.

She stands at the bottom of the stairs and looks around – at the wide, empty entrance hall with its expensive statuary prominently displayed in nooks, at the doors that lead off to sitting rooms and libraries and at least one ballroom, to the service corridors neatly concealed behind not-quite-matching wooden paneling and tapestries that aren’t worth as much as the others in the manor. There’s no sign that the Calormenes have been here at all – not even muddy boots abandoned by the big double doors. Well, they aren’t utter barbarians.

A maid carrying a vase of snowdrops emerges from a hallway and blinks at her. “Afternoon, Lady Newisle,” she says, setting the vase down on a plinth and rearranging the flowers with a practiced hand. “Lord Yasruddin had to go out. Shall I show you to the dining room, milady? I’m sure Cook will be happy to make something up for you.”

“Yes, thank you,” Leocadia says immediately.

The maid makes one last adjustment to the flowers, then turns through one big door. Leocadia follows her through several rooms which are evidently not in use into a dining room with a huge ebony table whose feet end in bears’ claws. Windows stretch from floor to ceiling, revealing a vast garden maze outside. Leocadia can see a small army of gardeners hard at work. The room has a hearth large enough to roast a full-grown bull, were the lord of the manor so inclined. A decorative silver shield with the Bracken family arms on it hangs over the hearth, and the walls are hung with the kind of paintings that Prince Bahadur has stripped from private homes in Cair Paravel – paintings that show Narnia of old, the Kings and Queen of Summer, Aslan and Caspian, Narnia in all her splendor.

The maid flits off as Leocadia takes a seat at the massive dining table, looking curiously around. The Brackens, and the Whitebears before them, are one of the wealthiest families in Narnia – had been even before the Calormene Occupation. The manor drips with opulence, though fortunately not the kind that Leocadia is only too familiar from her occasional social visits to Goldhouse Row and the South Bank back in Cair Paravel. Old blood and old money, sunk deep into the roots of Telmarine Narnia.

The maid comes back shortly, carrying a covered tray and trailed by a tall, horse-faced woman in plain skirts and a man’s waistcoat carrying a leather folder. She sits down at Leocadia’s left hand while the maid uncovers the tray, pouring them both tea and laying out Leocadia’s belated breakfast – half a chicken golden with herb butter, a plate of scones with cream and jam, and a bowl of millet risotto with thin slices of orange squash on top.

“Just ring the bell if you need anything, milady,” she says, pointing to the silver bell-pull in the corner of the room. “Or give a shout.”

She bustles off, leaving Leocadia staring after her.

The stranger adds two lumps of sugar to her tea and stirs it in with a spoon topped with a bear’s head, then levers a scone onto her plate and splits it efficiently to pile on clotted cream and jam. She doesn’t look like a Calormene, but she’s certainly not the kind of woman that Marcia Bracken would employ, and Leocadia can’t imagine what else she’d be doing here, at White Bear Hall. She’s not one of Tirian’s people.

“I don’t believe we’ve met,” Leocadia says finally, piling food onto her plate without regard for propriety. Whoever this woman is, Leocadia can’t bring herself to care if she sees her stuffing herself.

The stranger adds a final vicious dollop of cream to her scone, pushing it around. “I’m Dolichene Cooper,” she says. “General Yasruddin’s secretary. The General wants me to ask you about the rebels.”

“But you’re a Narnian!” Leocadia says, startled.

Dolichene tosses her black hair – Telmarine hair, thick and coarse, and held back by a band that seems to be threatening to snap at any moment – and says, “So? You’re a Narnian, and yet here you are, begging for scraps at the tarkaan’s table.”

“That’s not –” she protests, feeling the heat rise in her cheeks. “That’s not what I meant at all. I – I just haven’t seen many Calormenes employing Narnians, especially as – as secretaries. And I wouldn’t have thought there were many Narnians who would work for them.”

Dolichene’s expression grows, if anything, even harder – not at all the understanding that Leocadia had been hoping for. “I was at The University,” she informs Leocadia, with a bigger, angry edge to her flat voice. “Calormene language and literature. But my patron, the stupid bastard, had to go and get himself executed for treason against Prince Bahadur and I lost my scholarship. General Yasruddin offered me a job.”

“Oh,” Leocadia says, never having thought of this particular consequence of rebellion before. “Oh, I’m sorry. I – I didn’t know.”

“Why would you have?” Dolichene says boredly, fitting the two halves of the scone together like a sandwich and biting into them. “You’ve never met me before.” She taps one sticky finger on the leather folder. “Eat quickly, milady, so I can do my job.”

Leocadia puts her head down and eats steadily. It’s better food than anything she’s had since she left Cair Paravel, and certainly more filling – even on Winter’s End, there hadn’t been enough food to go around, not for everyone. Dolichene watches her eat with sharp black eyes, chomping her way steadily through the scone and half of a second one. Leocadia tries to ignore her, picking the chicken clean of the bones and scraping her spoon around the now-empty risotto bowl, before moving into the now-cold scones.

“Done?” Dolichene inquires, wiping her fingers clean on a napkin and tossing it aside. She drags the leather folder in front of her and opens it up, uncapping a small flat inkwell and dipping her pen into it. Leocadia watches her write the date at the top of a blank page, along with her name and location. She has wide, looping handwriting.

“Very well,” Leocadia says, since it doesn’t seem that she has any choice in the matter. “Ask me your questions, Miss Cooper.”

Dolichene throws her a sharp, annoyed look, frowning at her tone, but says, “Repeat what you told General Yasruddin last night, please.”

Leocadia pours herself another cup of tea and gives the account for the third time, pausing for bites of her scone as Dolichene’s pen scratches away, covering three pages back and front. She pours herself more tea as the strain of talking so much catches up with her throat. Once she’s finished that, Dolichene has a seemingly endless array of further questions for her – questions about the rebel camp and their number, about Tirian’s strategy or lack thereof, about their supplies, what remaining Narnian nobles they have dealings with, if they’re in communication with the Long Table in Cair Paravel and King Eian in Archenland. Leocadia answers what she can, which clearly isn’t enough for Dolichene’s tastes, at least judging by the suspicious looks the other woman gives her as she dips her pen and keeps writing.

“What about these stories about the Kings and Queens of Summer allying with Tirian of Narnia?”

Leocadia hesitates.

She’s kept from answering by a crash from the hallway. She and Dolichene both start out of their chairs, Leocadia’s hand closing on the knife she’d used to cut her meat.

“You stupid girl! Ignorant, clumsy, stupid piece of marsh-wiggle trash! I ought to throw you out on your arse, breaking milady’s things, that vase is worth more than you are –”

“I wish you would, you dumb bitch, I don’t want to be here anyway, your stupid milady can kiss my wiggle arse!”

There was a sharp crack that echoed through the house, then a feminine shriek and a shout.

“It’s that bloody marsh-wiggle girl,” Dolichene spits, bolting for the door. Leocadia picks up her skirts and follows her through the empty rooms with their sheet-covered furniture, towards the sound of screaming.

“What marsh-wiggle girl?”

“Some urchin Emrah brought back from patrol,” Dolichene says over her shoulder. “Some charcoal-burner’s brat with a sob story.”

She storms out into the main hallway, where the shattered pieces of a delicate Terebinthian vase are being trod on by a pair of screaming women – one a satyress in a cook’s apron, the other a teenage marsh-wiggle with her hair in greenish-brown dreads which the satyress is dragging on while the wiggle makes a concerted attempt to, apparently, scratch out her eyes. Leocadia stops dead, staring, but Dolichene wades in without hesitation, yanking the two women apart. She’s tall for a human woman, easily the satyress’s height, and stronger than Leocadia would have thought for a scholar.

The wiggle girl hisses like a cat and twists around to strike at Dolichene, who lets go of the cook to knock her hand aside. “Stop that, you stupid brat,” she snaps, gripping the girl’s wrist. “Maybe you don’t want to be here, but we’re not terribly keen on you either. That doesn’t mean you can go around breaking Lady Bracken’s things or roughing up her staff just to make a point. You understand?”

“I didn’t break the ugly thing on purpose,” the wiggle says sullenly, wriggling in Dolichene’s grasp.

The satyress draws herself up, fixing her mobcap back in place over her small horns. “I want that creature out of Lady Bracken’s house,” she says haughtily.

“Take it up with the General,” Dolichene says rudely. She shakes the wiggle a little, the way she might a naughty dog. “Apologize to Cook.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s the polite thing to do.”

“I doubt that creature even knows the meaning of the word,” the satyress – Cook, apparently – sneers.

Dolichene raises an eyebrow. “You, apologize too.”

“I’ll do nothing of the sort –”

“You will,” Dolichene snaps. “Both of you! Then you’ll clean this mess up. Fine show you’re giving Lady Newisle here.”

Both Cook and the girl look over at Leocadia, apparently noticing her for the first time. The wiggle sneers, while Cook goes a little pale and bobs a curtsey.

“Apologies, milady, we didn’t mean to disturb you –”

“I did,” the wiggle says, finally shaking free of Dolichene’s grip. “And I don’t even know who you are, just because you’ve got a ‘lady’ in front of your name –”

“This is the Lord Provost’s wife,” Cook spits at her. “Lord Glasswater’s ward, the King’s cousin, the blood of the Lion –”

The wiggle doesn’t look impressed.

“It doesn’t matter, really,” Leocadia murmurs politely.

Dolichene sweeps her mass of black hair out of her face with one ink-stained hand. At someone point the leather band holding it in place had snapped. “Just apologize and clean this up,” she orders. “I’m sure you both have things you’re meant to be doing. Lady Newisle and I have business.”

“Hmmph,” says the wiggle, crossing her arms over her chest. “I’m not apologizing to that stuck-up bitch –”

“This good-for-nothing doesn’t deserve an apology –”

“Or shall I take it up with General Yasruddin and Emrah Tarkaan?” Dolichene inquires.

There’s a moment of heavy silence.

“Bitch,” says the wiggle under her breath. “I’m sorry I broke your stupid vase,” she says finally and vaguely, staring over the satyress’s shoulder.

“That’s not an apology –” Cook began, then wilted under Dolichene’s withering glare. “Fine. I’m sorry I slapped you. Even if you did deserve it.”

Dolichene rolls her eyes. “Close enough,” she says, turning away. “Come on, Newisle.” She shoves past Leocadia on her way back the way they’d come, wiping her hands on her skirt. Leocadia looks back at Cook and the wiggle, who are already engaged in a harsh whispered argument, and hurries after her.

“You handled that very well. Better than I would have.”

“Sibs,” Dolichene says shortly. “Six of them, five younger. And I nannied while I was in university for extra money.”

“Who’s the girl?” Leocadia inquires curiously.

Dolichene pauses with her hand on a doorframe. “Her name’s Sullycloud. Emrah got a tip that her master was mistreating her and dragged her here kicking and screaming – literally. The General has a soft spot for strays, so she stays for now. Aslan knows what will happen to her when we leave the vale; I doubt Lady Bracken will have much use for her. Emrah might bring her with us if he thinks he can train her to something useful, I suppose.”

“Haven’t you tried to get in touch with her family?”

She snorts. “Marsh-wiggle this far west? She probably ran away from her family. Her clan might be looking for her, I guess. I’ll make a note to send a bird to the Northern Marsh.”

By now they’ve returned to the dining room. Dolichene resumes her seat as if nothing has happened, dipping her pen in the inkwell again. Leocadia sits down slowly, touching the rim of her now-lukewarm teacup.

“Where were we?” Dolichene says, but doesn’t glance down at her notes before saying, “Of course. The Kings and Queens of Summer.”

“The Kings and Queens of Summer?” Leocadia repeats. “A university woman like you ought to know better than to believe peasant stories, Miss Cooper. They don’t exist.”





Part One 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17
Part Two 00 | 000 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | Interlude | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31