Kushiel's Avatar - Jacqueline Carey [315]
If I could not share the Name of God with him, I could tell him of the Tribe of Dân, and that I did, at length—of the union of Shalomon and Makeda and the Covenant of Wisdom, of Khemosh's folly and the flight to Tisaar and the Lake of Tears, of the Ark of Broken Tablets on the island of Kapporeth. These things he recorded eagerly, and his wife Adara looked on with indulgence and interest.
In such ways did my Bitterest Winter pass.
I spent long hours composing letters, replying to a year's worth of correspondence. Although my letters would not go overseas until spring, I wrote to Nicola L'Envers y Aragon in Amílcar, to Kazan Atrabiades in Epidauro, who had written to tell me of his new appointment, to Pasiphae Asterius, who is the Kore of the Tenemos. I studied, obsessively, everything in my library on the angel Rahab, which I had spent ten years compiling, and learned nothing new. I thought about the confrontation to come. Few guests called upon my home and few invited me to theirs during this time. I received several offers of assignations from such people as would never have dared inquire in the past— disreputable merchants, a petty lordling suspected of molesting his household servants. These I burned without deigning to reply.
The City of Elua was waiting to see if Ysandre would forgive me.
Every week, a representative of the Queen came to the house to ensure that Imriel was in good health and good spirits—Guillen Baphinol, a young Eisandine nobleman who had studied medicine at one of Eisheth's sanctuaries. I treated him with unfailing politeness. At first, he made a show of inspecting the house and assessing its fortitude, testing the bars on the doors with a grave demeanor. Joscelin watched with amusement; Imriel with simmering resentment. Although it issmall, my house is as secure as any manse within the City. I have always taken care with such things, ever since my lord Delaunay and my foster-brother Alcuin were slain within their own home. In time, Guillen warmed to us and I consulted him on such small bits of herb-lore as I have garnered in my travels.
But he never gave any indication of Ysandre's mind.
Not everyone I had known turned their back upon me. Once the gossip reached her ears, I had regular letters from Cecilie Laveau-Perrin, my old mentor in Naamah's arts. Some years ago she had closed her salon for good and retired to her country estate of Perrinwolde, which, alas, lay a day's ride outside the City walls. Nonetheless, it cheered me to receive her letters, and we resumed a lively correspondence.
I received an invitation, too, for all of us to call upon Thelesis de Mornay, the Queen's Poet, and that I accepted, for she was in seclusion at the Palace and I might visit her without breaking my pledge.
It had been mayhap three years since I had seen her last, and I was shocked at her condition. Touched by the fever of that first Bitterest Winter, Thelesis had never recovered completely. Her quarters has always been maintained at a nigh-uncomfortable warmth; now there was a fireplace in every room and multiple braziers and pots of boiling water suspended over the flames added moisture to the air, rendering it as hot and steamy as the plains of Jebe-Barkal in the rainy season. A servant in Courcel livery tended them with quiet diligence.
Thelesis looked older than her years, her hair streaked with grey, her skin grown sallow and loose on her small frame. But if her dark eyes were sunken, they still glowed, and her voice held a ghost of its rich musicality. "Phèdre nó Delaunay," she whispered, giving me the kiss of greeting. "It is good to see you once more."
I leaned my cheek against hers, feeling the frailty of her. "You are kind to do so, Thelesis. Pray, don't let us overtax you."
"Nonsense." She held me off, smiling. "And you, Joscelin Verreuil! Come here and let me feel your strength, Queen's Champion."
"No longer," he said, returning her kiss. "But it is good to see you, Queen's Poet. I hope you are keeping yourself as well as may be."
"As you see." Thelesis waved a hand, indicating the