Murkmere (9 page)

Thoughts beat like frightened birds in my brain.

I’d seen what no human eye should see. I’d discovered the real reason the tower was forbidden to the servants, the secret
in the inner room. What would they do to me? Would they have me taken to the Capital? Would they simply dispose of me, in
case I told what I’d seen? Who’d ever miss Aggie Cotter but her Aunt Jennet, and what could she do against the power of the
Ministration?

I could hear voices now, rising up the tower stairs: a man’s voice and a light, high one, a girl’s. Then the voices stopped
and all I could hear was the soft swishing of a cloak over the boards outside.

“She’ll be in here. There’s nowhere else.”

“I’ll find her for you, Sir.”

I recognized the voices of Mr. Silas and Dog. I had a sudden vivid picture of my dark footprints in the smooth white snow,
and I knew how they had found me. Dog must have betrayed me; she’d followed my footprints and then returned to report to Mistress
Crumplin, or even direct to Mr. Silas.

At first I felt relief. Mr. Silas liked me; he wouldn’t report me to the Master. But then I thought,
He’s a good, devout man; it’s his duty to report sinners
.

My eyes were fixed on the gold and green pattern of the chair cover. It blurred before me; I wouldn’t have been able to describe
it though it was so close. My hands were damp with sweat, but I had to use both to balance me now, I was so stiff with kneeling.
A whimper rose in my throat.

They had come into the room.

I heard Dog scurry around, heard her exclaim at the cabinets, at the great window-door. She’d never been here before; she’d
never trespassed like me.

Then her head came over the top of the armchair. She saw me at once. Her little eyes gleamed with triumph, and she opened
that prissy mouth of hers to tell. I shook my head violently, pleadingly; put my finger to my lips. My eyes, agonized, stared
up into hers.

“She’s here, Sir,” called Dog. “She’s over here.”

I tucked my amber away and stood up.

Dog’s face was full of spite, the steward’s expressionless. I couldn’t tell if he was angry or indifferent that I was there,
in a forbidden place.

“You may go, Doggett,” he said. “I’ll deal with this.”

“Did I do well to tell you, Sir?” smirked Dog.

“Very well. But leave us now.”

She tripped out, all smug, twinkling smiles; I heard her hobnailed boots slow on the stairs, then clang merrily across the
stone of the ground floor as she went on her way to tell the other servants.

I spread my hands out to Mr. Silas. “I wanted to read the books, Sir; I wanted to see them for myself.”

“And what did you find?”

The changing light moved over his face. Even in that strong light he was handsome. He wore no hat, as if he’d left in haste,
and his dark hair fell free and unpowdered across his brow in its glossy black curve, so like a black-bird’s wing.

“I found the books were locked away,” I said, shamefaced.

He came nearer, his cloak sweeping over the floor behind him; the fur at the hem was draggled with snow. He looked down at
me gravely; he didn’t seem so very angry. “And why do you think that is?”

“They’re old and fragile, Sir.”

“Because they are dangerous, Agnes. You don’t know how close you came to sullying your soul.”

I was bewildered, and frightened too. Why should books be dangerous? I smelled the scent of his flower water, faint but growing
stronger now he was near.

“B-but the Master reads them. So does Miss Leah,” I stammered.

“These books contain blasphemies, they tell of a time before this land was civilized by the Ministration, when men walked
the night unprotected, exposed to evil. They describe the old, bad time, Agnes; they make wicked conjecture in the fields
of theology and philosophy.”

I gazed at him, shocked.

“I’ve tried to persuade the Master to destroy them.” Silas Seed shook his head. “He becomes angry and I worry he’ll have another
seizure, so I say nothing more. But in time this place will destroy itself, anyway.” He gestured toward the stairwell, visible
through the open door. “The bricks are soft, the supports half-rotten with damp. One day the tower will simply collapse inward,
and the books will be buried beneath the rubble.”

He spoke calmly, without feeling. Then he looked down at his hands in the light, studying their clean, white tips, turning
them this way and that. “Did you discover anything else up here?” he asked softly, at last.

I began to tremble again.

In the same gentle voice, he said: “You can tell me, you know, little marigold. It won’t go further.”

I relaxed a little. Aunt Jennet had taught me that only cowards lie to save their skins. “Yes, Sir, I did.”

Softer still, he said, “And what was that?”

I brought my hands to my face. “It was the skeleton of a great bird, Sir.”

He was silent for so long I knew I’d done a truly terrible thing. There was only one bird whose skeleton would be so supernaturally
vast. The hairs rose on my neck.

He was very still, then he looked at me at last, his fine dark eyes full of sadness and reproach. “I’m disappointed in you,
Agnes. You’ve committed a sin, you understand that?”

“But I didn’t mean to,” I whispered. “Oh, please, Sir, forgive me.”

He shook his head, wearily it seemed to me. “It’s not my forgiveness that matters, but forgiveness from above. You’ve an inquisitive,
impulsive nature. I’d not realized that before. I believed you could set an example for Miss Leah. I thought I could rely
on you.”

I was filled with remorse at the sound of his sigh. “Oh, Sir, please, you can still do so! What should I do? Pray for forgiveness?”

“Yes, indeed.” I waited, yearning to be back in his favor. Then he said, “Your aunt’s a God-fearing woman, I know. She’s Chief
Elder in the village?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“It wouldn’t be right for her to hear of this.”

“No, Sir.”

“And no one else must know — no one here or in the village.”

“I swear I won’t tell a soul!”

“Then we’ll ask forgiveness for what you’ve done, pray together. Give me your hand.”

I let him take my hand in his long, pale fingers; his grip was cool and strong. He began leading me toward the double doors.
I shrank back.

“Please, Sir! Not in there, I beg you!”

“Here, then.” His voice had changed strangely. It was rough, thick, choked with emotion. “Come to me, you child of sin.”

He dragged me back toward him. I was completely unprepared, still overcome by the thought of how I’d sinned. I lost my balance
and fell against him as he pulled. His face was very close, looming above me. In the white cloud-light of that room his mouth
was cruel, his hair no longer immaculate in its glossy blackbird arc: it hung, disheveled, over his face, untidy as the feathers
of a carrion crow. Mixed with the flower perfume, now overpowering, was a sweet-sour smell as he breathed heavily into my
face.

He fumbled at the folds of my cloak, seeking a way to reach my bodice. “Take your amulet out. You must hold it while you pray.
Here, let me do it for you.”

I struggled to free my amber. But his hands were there already, like claws, ripping at the stuff of my bodice, tearing the
lace.

“Let go of her! Let go of her at once, do you hear?”

It was Leah, straight and tall as a cold, white flame in her cloak. She had slipped silently through the doorway in her soft
kid boots and now looked him up and down with a contemptuous fury.

Mr. Silas had freed me as soon as he heard her voice, and I, gasping with shock, struggled to cover myself. He stood back,
smoothing his hair into place and straightening the fur collar of his cloak. It was as if he’d straightened his face back
into place as well: it was once more the charming, courteous face I knew.

“You surprise us, Miss Leah. We thought we were alone.”

“And this is how you behave when you’re alone with a maid?”

“I endeavor to save all souls, whether they be those of maids or not, Miss Leah.”

“I warn you, Silas.”

“Of what do you warn me, Miss Leah?” he said smoothly, and he dusted his fingers together as if touching me had dirtied them.

She paused, then turned away angrily and pointed at the doorway. “Get out! Leave us, go!”

“As you wish, Miss Leah.” He bowed to her, but his eyes rested on me — with an expression of sorrow, I thought, though whether
feigned or genuine, I wasn’t sure. A shiver ran down my back. Did he think me damned for what I’d seen?

“Good day to you, and to your companion, Miss Leah.”

Then with a swirl of his cloak he was gone, the wet hem leaving a dark, glistening trail on the wood floor.

Leah said nothing until we both heard the door thud shut at the base of the tower. Then she rounded on me. “Fool!” she spat
out. “How could you?”

I was still trembling. I shook my head dumbly. I couldn’t
understand how she could know that I’d opened the doors to the inner room, but I couldn’t understand anything, least of all
how my noble Mr. Silas had turned into a monster.

“You were lucky to escape,” Leah said grimly. “Last year Silas forced a kitchen maid. It was to save her soul, you understand.
When she found she was with child and he wouldn’t acknowledge it — he was even going to cast her out from the estate in shame
— she drowned herself in the mere.”

I stared at her. Her words didn’t make sense; I couldn’t take them in. “Mr. Silas?”

“Mister
Silas,” she mocked. “None other. The little maid, Scuff, saw him with her — what he did. No one but I believed her, poor
child.”

“He told me himself how the servant’s body was found,” I said in a low voice.

“You would have been the next one, Aggie,” she said grimly. “Don’t you see that?”

I sank down in the green-gold chair. I saw the pattern clearly now: the birds with bright wings that flew so joyously through
the lush foliage.
Silas, my handsome, elegant gentleman, who’d said such beautiful things to me, called me his marigold
— I buried my face in my hands to shut out the light, and sat motionless.

Leah left me to recover, and then it seemed even her hard, scornful heart was touched. She came over to me and said, gently
for her, “Don’t take on so, Aggie. Maids have been taken in by his looks before. But he’s a dangerous man, and a clever one.”

I was close to tears. “But his soul is pure, it must be! He takes Devotion, he wants to save our souls!”

“Have you never heard of hypocrites, Aggie? He’s all high religious talk — it’s easy to be deceived — but if you were to uncover
his soul, you’d be looking at a nasty little black thing, shriveled as a dead leaf. Stay away from him.”

I raised my head and brushed a hand across my eyes. “I’m never going near him again, Miss Leah.”

“What? Even on payday?”

She smiled. To my astonishment I realized she was trying to cheer me, she who’d been so unkind. She curled her long limbs
gracelessly into the chair opposite mine and regarded me with curiosity. “Did he ask you to meet him here?”

I shook my head. “Dog must have told him I was here.” I glanced at her enquiring face and decided to tell the truth, or part
of it. “I’d come to read the books.” I thought,
If she asks me about the inner room, I’ll confess. I don’t care what happens to me now
.

But she didn’t; she looked astounded. “You risked coming here so you could read the books? Don’t you have books in the village?”

“Not like these, Miss,” I said, surprised out of my misery. Did she know so little? “The books my aunt taught us from are
dull things, the reading approved by the Council. No folk have books in our village. Most children leave school before they
can read properly. People are too poor to lose their children to school, they need them to work.”

I was reluctant to talk, but she kept asking questions, as if
all the curiosity she’d kept inside since my arrival were finally bursting free. My misery lifted a little. I couldn’t believe
that this was my cold, disdainful mistress.

“I wanted to find out what real books were like.” I hesitated. “Mr. Silas says they are blasphemous.”

“Fiddlesticks!” said Leah. “We should be free to discuss all sorts of different ideas from our book reading, not have them
approved first by a Council, let alone a steward!”

“But the Master’s library can’t be kept secret from the Lord Protector,” I said. “What will happen when he finds out?”

She raised her eyes heavenward. “Don’t you know anything, ninny? Years ago, when the Protector married the Master’s sister,
certain books were banned. But that was only the beginning. The Protector wanted the Master’s books out of the Hall, but he
gave him special permission to have his books up here, providing they were locked up.” She gave a wicked smile. “Of course,
the Protector doesn’t know I read them now.”

“The Master gives you the freedom of the cabinets?” I said wistfully.

“I keep the key for him. The Master’s rooms are never private; he can’t have any secrets there.” She reached into the pocket
in her cloak and took out a small brass key, which sparkled in the light as she held it up to me. “He asked me about a book
yesterday. That’s why I came just now — to look for it. I keep the key in my room, in an old pot. It had chamomile face cream
in it once. Even if Dog found the key
and guessed what it was for, she’d never dare unlock the cabinets.”

“I won’t say anything to her, Miss.”

“A companion should know her mistress’s secrets; that’s why I’m telling you. But if you tell anyone else, like your precious
Mr. Silas, I’ll cut your throat, do you understand?” Her eyes blazed suddenly and I reeled back. “I’ll know if you do, and
I keep a knife under my pillow. Remember that.”

“I won’t say anything, Miss Leah,” I repeated faintly. I’d no doubt she’d carry out her threat.

She looked bleakly toward the long window where the clouds were darkening, sending shadows into the room. “If only the Master
would rid himself of Silas.”

For a moment I felt his white hands on my bodice, and shivered. “You saved me, Miss. I should thank you.”