A Match for the el Maiens Ch. 16

He carried the book away to one of the three tables in the room, lifting his head to see which one might be free. One had some new books, pens and catalogues on it - that would be the one the library clerk used. One was empty, only the nearest one to him was in use although they all had pens and ink and pencils and sand on them and he knew that people like Hyaline and that bird-brain el Parva came here to work.

The nearest desk was covered in papers and scrolls, there was a board standing by it with a cloth hung over it. As he walked past the table, he glanced at it, puzzled. It was clearly not correspondence that was spread over this table and he was wondering which was the desk Arianna used. Then he stopped short, staring.

He could not understand any part of the mass of symbols, diagrams and equations set neatly out on papers which were arranged in a strange constellation and even pinned to the table to keep them in place. Clair had thought one of the servants must have been allowed to come and do some private study but this stuff was beyond even his understanding and he was well-educated, he had spent a couple of terms at the King's University going to lectures. He stooped over the table and opened the drawer to it, to look for any clue to whose work this was. The drawer had some neat boxes of pencils and rubbers in it - and a large box of Soomara chocolates which he knew was far beyond the pocket of any servant because he had bought it for his own Lady wife.

He heard a sound at the door and lifted his head to see Arianna crossing the polished wooden floor, wearing the pretty blue and white cotton dress Lisette had selected for her with the turquoise earrings and bangle which he was always trying to tell her were a good match for it. Her head was back as if in defence. There was a smile on her face but it was guarded. The veiled look was in her eyes which were narrowed as if in anticipation of trouble.

"What is it?" he asked anxiously. "Are the boys troubling you?" He was still holding the sketch-book; tenderly - not to risk damaging it.

"Did they enjoy the riding?" she asked.

"Yes of course," he answered. He hurried to make her a compliment in the hopes of avoiding the quarrel which seemed to be clouding her blue eyes. "My dear, you have made a magnificent collection here. If the scientific catalogue is at all like the artistic one, Sevie Inien will be most happy to come and work here."

She said in surprise, "is this the first time has't been in here? I bought these especially... I should have thought woulds't have cared to at least look at your own library."

You bought these books on art especially for me, his heart bumped suddenly in his chest. So generous a gesture, utterly wasted because the shy animal hid in a thicket of secrets. She never gave him the least hint that she was doing such a lovely thing for him.

"I cannot imagine how you persuaded Inien to do these sketches for you," he answered her, showing her the book he held so carefully. His slanted grey eyes shone with a shy pleasure and she saw him start to give her that rare sweet smile of his. She was dreadfully anxious in case he disturbed the papers, it was awful to see that smile she longed for and not be able to respond properly to it.

"Well, my d-dear," she stuttered over the endearment, "come and look at it, then." She moved towards the empty desk.

Clair realised immediately that she was trying to get him away from the table of papers and frowned. He looked down at the papers again, the handwriting looked familiar.

"Clair," she said. She had softened out her voice, honey-warm tones drew at his attention, mellifluous, alluring. He flicked his elegant dark-haired head in recognition of her appeal and said: "Just a minute." He put the sketch-book of lovely drawings carefully down to one side of the table on top of some of the papers in order to look more closely at the others.

"Leave it!" she was by him in a sudden flurry. She picked up the sketch-book as if it was a pile of old recipes and dumped it on the clerk's desk then turned back to tenderly replace the papers which he had disturbed. He stared at her, his brows drawing angrily together.

"Whose work is this?" he demanded.

"Whose?" she repeated in surprise. "Mine, of course."

"Y-yours!" he stammered.

His eyes were wide, he stared at her lovely face. Her fresh young beauty looked back at him: blue eyes like summer skies, lips like a bowl of cherries, cheeks like a summer dawn - soft, warm, golden-pink.

"What in Heaven and Hell," he blundered. "What is it about?"

Arianna blushed. She flicked her eyes sideways and fidgeted and coughed. "Um, I am working on a theorem," she said in a constrained voice. He was used to prompting people, being - like her - a patron of artists and scientists. He raised an eyebrow and opened his arms in appeal to her. "Um, well it is about forces and matter," she said. "Perhaps we can think of them as strings by adapting partial differential equations."

"What?" he said blankly.

"I think we might think of forces and matter as strings," Arianna asserted. "B'dar disagrees with me," she tossed out the name of the most famous scientist in their land as if he were some casual friend. Clair realised in a flash who it was that the packets and letters from the H'velst Mountains were from. "He put me forward for a post to go and teach the mathematical students at the University in the H'velst Mountains where he has his own laboratory but of course I cannot go." She looked at him, her face was anxious. What would he say of it, that she was a mathematical mind.

"H'velst Mountains?" he repeated stupidly. "You would think of taking Arkyllan to V'ta? You would have protected status if you were a scholar at the University but do you not realise that he would not?"

"Because of the terms of our settlement I cannot take ... Of course," she said hurriedly. "That is why I cannot go, it would not be safe to take Arkyllan with me."

"Although," he said slowly, "he is not a baby. You could leave him with me and go - like Sevianne. Angels! what will they say of it," his face lit up suddenly with laughter. "el Maien van Sietter left at home with the babies while his wife goes to work with his lover's lover in B'dar's laboratory!"

Arianna looked cross at this flippancy. "I cannot go," she said shortly. "If I did I would not be working in the laboratory messing about like a scientist. On any road, there is not enough time to work on these ideas. There is too much else to do."

"What is there to do?" he scoffed. "Housekeeping? Why do you pretend to be busy working in the house when you could be doing this? You will lose the path of your thought if you do not spend time every day considering these questions, is it not?"

"I do spend time on it every day," she answered. "I read while I drink my chocolate in the morning and while Lisette does my hair and face; she takes such a time! Even if there is no one here to see it, apart from you. It does not matter to you if my hair is up or down, does it."

But he suddenly frowned at this. "You are the future sworn Lady of the region," he answered. "And you are a proud beauty, my dear. Surely you realise the importance of dressing such beauty with propriety?" Her mouth bunched uncertainly at this and her blue eyes looked anxious. He remembered him that when they were growing up, she and her younger brother and sister had had their spirits unreasonably repressed because of their mother's reputation. He tried for a lighter tone: "Tashka and I are fine dressers, you know, we like to see our family well turned out. I like to see your beauty properly set out."

"I should know you are fine dressers, the amount the pair of you have cost me!" she exclaimed, blushing and avoiding responding to his compliment.

"Yes," he said reflectively, "I am sorry for it that my father tricked you into taking on our accounts. I know we are expensive."

"Oh well," she said, "Tashka has his army salary and when he is married van Sietter will have to give him some estate as marriage settlement to pay his income. Tashka is not so expensive as you because he wins so much money at cards."

"Surely you must long to be here in your library working on this theorem?" he asked.

"Ye-es," she said. "But then there is my other work. On the region, I mean."

"What, some nonsense about the Knights and Dames quarrelling or wanting their daughter placed in the Bishop's orchestra or whatnot?" he asked.

"Um, yes," she said. "I find it fascinating." Her eyes came glimmering up to him with the laugh glinting behind that veiled look. He had thought he had finally got behind that veil and found out her secret but when she laughed like that he knew there was some other game afoot. His eyes lit up and sparkled at her. He liked to play a good game, especially if there might be a kiss at the end of it.

"You have your stuff about art," she pointed out. "You put that aside to come home to Sietter."

He laughed. "My little theory on Northern architecture!" he said in his warm husky voice. "I do not think it is in the same rank as your work on, er, strings of stuff."

"Forces and matter," she said crossly. "So I know a bit more mathematics than you. Is it architecture workest on? I did not realise ... But knowest more of art than I do."

"No I do not," he answered. "You are the particular patron of Hyaline and have commissioned this gorgeous work from Inien. When we fight about art you display a knowledge and understanding that at least matches mine. We have different taste but we are both renowned patrons of art."

"Well, is it any matter?" she asked.

She was like a prism. Every moment she turned her head she became a different facet casting off a different coloured light. At one moment the shy girl on the edge of a flirtation, the next the hot clean brain of the mathematician, then the mature woman with a deep warm sense of humour. He felt he did not know her at all, he had wasted years looking at one flat side of her character. Clair looked into the blue summer skies of her eyes. He felt the temptation, to give her some caress, allow her to lure him off into kisses, laugh with her, run away from this extraordinary business of her intelligence and the fear that it might lead her away from him. Instead he went and fetched the chair from the clerk's desk and sat down by her desk.

"Will you tell me of your work?" he invited.

She looked thrilled. Her eyes shone suddenly clear, her proud head dipped and then lifted and her full sweet mouth parted with excitement. She drew up her chair and began to explain, twitching the cloth off the board to reveal yet more symbols and diagrams chalked up there. She was extremely bad at communicating her ideas to him, or else the subject did not fit easily into sentences. He hardly understood a word but he loved to watch her wide red mouth bunching up as she talked and to hear her voice. There was something hilariously sexy about the fact that she talked about things which were so beyond his understanding. Eventually, though, she became irritated with the ignorance of his questions on the subject and put the cloth back over the board, saying the boys would be coming out of the stables and she must go and supervise their bath.

He laughed as he rose from his chair. She was carefully replacing her papers, weighting some of them down with heavy gold and silver chess pieces. Clair suddenly recognised them from a set they had been given as a wedding present. All these years she had been using them in her work. He reached out to give her cheek a caress. She looked up in a shy startled flick of a glance, he smiled on her and left her to her papers.

He went to the castle offices and chatted briefly with Laran and Tarra about the upcoming meeting with the King's man for taxes. Their own men for taxes were all returned for the year, ahead of winter when travelling would be impossible. The money was all collected and the King's share apportioned but he supposed there would be some dreary difference between their estimates and hours of discussion to come to an agreement.

"Not so, sir," Tarra said cheerfully. "These days our meetings are brief, owing to the formula Lady el Jien has designed to calculate the taxes."

Of course! She was a mathematical brain. No wonder that his regional economy was so efficiently run. He had always given Laran and Tarra the credit for it but it was her.

He turned to go, delighted to hear they would not have to waste a whole day on meeting the King's man for taxes, then he turned back and said: "Is it not so that my Lady has received a report from an Iarvian merchant? Have you a copy of that report I can read before I go to dinner?"

Laran and Tarra shot a quick hard glare at each other. Clair just caught sight of their startled anxious faces out of the corner of his eye. Tarra looked out of the window. Laran said: "Is it so?" gathering his papers together and putting them away in a drawer.

Clair sat down on the chair in front of Laran's desk and put one booted ankle on his knee in the old jodhpurs, sitting back with lordly arrogance in the set of his leg.

"Tarra," he said. "Fetch that study for me now, I prithou."

Tarra looked at Laran and Laran nodded. Tarra went to the shelves of reports behind his desk and fetched down a box which he unlocked with an awkward fumble. He found it difficult to hold down the lock with just his left elbow and the key slipped in his right hand. Clair watched with a frown shadowing his brow.

The former Lieutenant, who had lost his arm fighting under Clair's command in the war with H'las, looked up at him with an apologetic smile. He knew the Commander would be thinking he must get the locksmiths to design something more appropriate; Tarra ought to have considered asking about it himself then the Commander would not have to be troubled about it. He sometimes became so absorbed in the daily business of his work that he did not take sufficient time to look about him and consider what he might need to make his work easy and pleasant. Finally he got the box open, took out a neatly rolled scroll and handed it to Clair. Laran watched with hooded eyes.

Clair took the scroll, unrolled it, read the first paragraph, rolled through on the wooden batons to the last few paragraphs, reading some parts in the middle as he went. His mouth pursed in a soundless whistle, he looked up at the banners hanging behind Laran's desk and his face was thoughtful. He got up, tucked the scroll under his arm and turned to go.

"Set aside some time for me to meet with my Lady," he said coolly. "Angel three-day will do, since we will not have to spend so long with the King's man for taxes." Tarra looked nervous but Laran saw a laugh flit through Clair's grey eyes.

~#~*~#~

Arianna looked with a frown at the castle diary, lifted her head and said: "Tarra, there is some mistake. Has't writ down a meeting after we are to meet the King's man for taxes but there is no one for my Lord and I to meet."

The chief clerk lifted his head from the sloping desk where he was making a copy of a confidential report on the taxes to send to Lord van Sietter. "It is the Commander, Lord Clair," he answered. "He has asked for a meeting with you."

"A meeting with me?" Arianna exclaimed in astonishment. "What does he want to meet me about?"

"He took Master Lein's report away to read," Tarra said.

Arianna's mouth pursed up. She turned back to the file she had come to see, made a quick note on it, put it on Laran's desk and went to look for Clair.

She found him in the armoury, walking slowly about the wooden floor, inspecting the racks of weapons and humming a Northern lullaby to himself. There was no one else in the armoury, he had not gone there to practice anything. He was just strolling about, looking at the gleaming rapiers, broadswords, lances and daggers in their racks in a home-y sort of way.

She stood in the doorway and watched him.

He was wearing an old pair of patched jodhpurs, riding boots and a thick black woollen jumper. He stood easily relaxed in front of a rack of rapiers, humming his song softly between his teeth, staring meditatively at the oiled blades and drinking coffee from his small bowl with the horses and dogs running round it.

He moved with grace, at ease as he strolled about in his armoury. In the armoury he could be just a careless fighting young Lord and officer. He would think only about how clean the weaponry needed to be or fighting steps and techniques. Outside the armoury he must face up to the troubles that haunted him, the uneasy balance of his mind. He was often bored, he had to constantly find complicated things to occupy his mind: a theory on Northern architecture, lyric poetry, abstract art. Sometimes, after everything he had been through, the balance of his mind tipped over and all he could bear to think about was washing some dishes or going down to feed the pigs on the farm.

He looked suddenly up and saw her staring round the doorway. In her simple green woollen dress she looked like a little girl on the edge of another child's playground. He raised an eyebrow at her, with a smile. She stepped into the armoury with her head held high: Lady el Jien van Sietter, with the hot calculating brain that had come up with a formula that meant they out of all the regions never had trouble with the King's man for taxes.

"Halloo, flower," he said casually with the sweet smile that went up from his thin mouth and made his grey eyes unusually warm and tender.

She was startled, she even cast a quick glance behind her to see if there was someone-else coming in then she blushed. He pretended not to notice but the smile fell quickly from his hardening mouth.

"Clair," she said.

"Mm," he peered at a speck on one of the rapiers.

"Has't ... has't asked to meet me on Angel three-day."

"Oh yes," he said in careless tones, picking the speck off the blade. "It is so, I did."

"Is it ...? It is about the report from Master Lein in Carneo, Iarve."

He looked over his shoulder at her and grinned a different, a wickedly amused smile. "Yes," he said lazily, "I want to meet you about that entirely unimportant and trivial piece of work you are doing with your brother Hanya and some merchants, a piece of work far too insignificant for Laran to bring to my exalted attention of course. Do you want to talk about it now or can you wait till Angel three-day?"

Arianna's eyes snapped into a furious glare. Her face frowned like a thunder-cloud at him.

'Oh Hell!' he thought, 'fool that I am!'

"Surely," she said in freezing accents.

"Because what I want to do now," he went on, desperately trying to keep up the light teasing tone he had intended, "is play chess. Come and play chess. Er, I mean, I prithou, of your courtesy, to play chess."

"I have insignificant and trivial business to attend to," she said scornfully, turning with a proud toss of her head to walk off.

Clair ran across the room and stood in the doorway, saying: "Anna, Angels' sake! It was only a stupid tease! Do not take it like so. I meant to make you laugh, that is all." She looked to one side, a brittle nervous glance. She clasped her long fingers together, feeling like a foolish girl who has got the game wrong - again. "Anna, my flower," Clair said in his husky warm voice. "I love to watch you laugh, how can I make you laugh?"

"I ... do not want to laugh," she lied, embarrassed and anxious. "We have serious business we should talk of."

"Very well," he said. "Talk with me of the merchant's report."

"I do not have my papers," she said stiffly.

He repressed his amused grin and said: "You do not need your papers. You have your brain. I know what it is you are about. I have read Master Lein's report and I know you and your brother Hanya.