You must see that you will bring about the thing you most fear, if you continue.
Yours sincerely
R
As I finished I found Shadow behind me reading it over my shoulder.
“Hmm,” he said.
“Curse it. What does it all mean?” How could I have gone to all this effort and still be none the wiser?
“Lady Klea has had a baby very recently,” said Shadow. “I recognised the signs of prthigutklye depnkhthen.”
“Yes. She told the family it had died.”
Hagen snorted. “That makes her a liar.”
He’d followed us up out of the tunnel.
“How dare you?” I snapped. What really annoyed me was that he was probably right. The ‘she’ in the letter was clearly the baby, which was safe and well. So why did she lie? A new baby, a baby girl would cause jubilation throughout the family. I didn’t understand what was going on.
“I think she’s given her baby to this R to bring up.”
“Why would she do that?” I snapped. “What are you doing here anyway? Go back to the house.”
He held up the quenched lantern. “Have you got a match? I haven’t.”
Shadow took a bundle of matches out of his pack and passed one to Hagen.
“In our country a parent alone without a settled income sometimes adopts the children out,” offered Shadow. “Often the parent sees it as best for the children.”
I stared at him. “The family would never let her or the child go hungry. Especially not a girl. You can’t give a child to strangers, who might not care.”
“I’ll wager that’s not what’s happened here,” said Hagen. “This R will be some wealthy merchant. She’ll pass Lady Klea’s daughter off as her own. She might even be a blood relation, if a brother is the sire. Since Lady Klea has been in Crystalline these past two years, that’s quite possible. She was away on a cruise around the Islands last winter. No one saw her then. She could easily have hidden a pregnancy and given birth.”
“But why?” This whole conversation was so shocking. I couldn’t imagine why Klea would do such a thing. What possible reason could she have?
“When Lady’s Klea’s daughter is of age there’s half a chance she will be a mage and that... Think of it. These merchants will have a noble in their family, one of their own to represent their interests in the Great Council. Political power. I’ve heard rumours of merchants buying the children of impoverished nobles, but I’d always thought they were myths.”
“Buying?” I remembered how Toy had said money had changed hands, and what did the letter say?
“Look here. It says we have returned it. That’s money, isn’t it? Is that how she can afford to live outside the family? Was Toy right? This is awful. No, you must be wrong. Klea wouldn’t do something like that. Would she?”
Hagen took my arm.
“Shine, I’m not saying she did the right thing, but I’m not saying she did the wrong thing either. She has good reasons for not wanting her child to be brought up in this family. Her experiences at the hands of Radiant and Flara were dreadful.”
“Why? What happened?”
“It’s Lady Sparklea’s story. Not mine.” Hagen struck the match on the side of his lantern and lit the wick.
I grabbed his arm. “Tell me. No one will tell me.”
“No,” said Hagen. “I’ve told you quite enough. More than I should have.”
He pushed me firmly aside and went away down the tunnel. I stared after him.
It was all too much. I didn’t know what to think.
“Do you think Klea could have done such a thing?” I asked the ghost. As if he would have any idea, poor outlander.
“How can I know? But it seems to me she truly regrets what she’s done. Look at how she has been: the tears and terror.”
“But if she told the family the truth, they would get the child back for her. There wouldn’t even have to be a scandal. They’re the Imperial Family.”
“There is clearly much more to this than we know. We should go,” he added gently.
“Yes, yes! Sorry,” I said to the ghost. I gave him a pat on the shoulder. “You’re right.”
I didn’t know what to think. Was Klea really the sort of person who would do such an awful thing? She must have had a reason. Suddenly thinking was too hard.
In a sense, it didn’t matter what I thought anyway. We were well below Klea’s level—mere mundanes.
Time to get back to the matter in hand. It wasn’t safe to stay here. I crouched down and started crawling under the tree ferns towards the path.
SHORTLY AFTER WE came out into the open Katti stopped and sniffed the air.
Cat, she said.
“Keep a track on it,” I said. I had given the spear to Shadow to carry and now I pulled my bow off my shoulder and put an arrow in it.
And why would I want to do that? said Katti, sticking her nose sarcastically in the air. She didn’t like obvious advice.
“Oh, forgive me,” I snapped at her. “I’ve had a bad day.”
She flicked her tail at me and looked away.
“Yes, you have, so I see,” said Shadow. “Your hands are shaking.”
“Can’t be helped,” I said. “We have to keep going.”
I wanted to scream at both of them, scream from frustration and shock. So I strode on as fast as I could, making them both run to keep up with me.
Still I couldn’t stop my hands shaking. I knew it was fright over what had happened with Illuminus. And every time I thought of Klea... I tried not to think about her, but thoughts of her and this child kept coming back into my head unbidden. Klea crying and all that stuff she’d asked me about mothers last night. Lady of Light, it must be true. How could she? How could she? What an awful, awful thing to do. A hard core of dismay settled in the centre of my chest, as if a black hole had opened up full of echoing darkness. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to forgive such an action. I wasn’t even sure I should try. Had she really done it for money?
After I’d been stomping along for a while, I noticed the ghost was trying to talk to me.
“What?” I snapped.
“Um, So I gather you have to be a mage to be part of the Great Council,” he said.
“That’s right, you have to be noble.”
“And the Empress and the Great Council make most of the decisions.”
“All of them.”
“I suppose they’re the ones with the power, yes?”
“That’s right.”
“So what if you’re rich or powerful in some other way?”
I turned on him. “How is it you’ve got so much breath for questions? Aren’t we walking fast enough for you?”
“I’m trying to understand what happened back there. You and Hagen suspect Klea of selling her child to a family of rich merchants, right? So they will bring her up as one of their own, and if she turns out to be a mage, they will have someone to send to the Great Council to promote their interests. It seems a great risk to take.”
“Merchants have been trying to get more power in the Great Council for a long time. They seem to feel that money should have some say in government—that nobility isn’t enough. Eff would probably agree. She thinks everyone should have a say. Usually merchants sponsor mages. Or try and breed with them. A couple of mages have become consorts to merchants, though it’s social death for the mages.”