e’d been quiet, mostly.
He might’ve known what this would be like, if he’d given any thought to it – and boemo, he’d’ve probably done it anyway. He’d given his word, and for all he was a liar wearing a dead man’s face, he held the truth dear where he could.
The window was open. The chill air from outside cut through the gathering steam, the wafting smoke from the incense burner. Breathing in, Tom thought he could taste the coming winter; he could smell the dying leaves. He could hear the last of them plucked from the bare knobbly branches, whisked across the stones and brown grass in the garden, whispering in husky voices.
The air smelled like incense, too. Patchouli, sandalwood; lavender and lemongrass. Whiffs of sage, lingering like ghosts, where Ezre had burned it before they’d begun.
Little things. His hands ached; his back ached. He’d been crouched on his cramping haunches for a good hour, now, and though he might’ve appreciated the open window for ambiance, his aching joints did not. He was glad most of the legwork with the prodigium was done, because his hands were stiff and red at the knuckles from the cold.
Not that he minded that part, being honest. That was not the heaviest thing Ezre had asked of him, today. It was not even, Tom thought, what was to come, which he’d’ve done gladly, even with all his reservations, even with the burden he’d shouldered of being the bearer of bad news.
As they finished up the last delicate lines of the plot, he felt his face like a mask; he felt his suit and his shaky hands like a costume.
Not a word had come out of his mouth that he hadn’t fit carefully into the Incumbent’s voice. Since he’d arrived, conscious of Alethia Kuleda’s wide eyes, he’d done his best to play it to the hilt.
He’d been all thin smiles, all careful, mannered politician’s talk; he’d been distant where he could be, and patronizing where he couldn’t. (I owe the young master a favor, with a languid wave of the hand, at dinner; it’s hardly…)
When push came to shove, there was nothing he could do or say to explain himself. This was utterly out of character for the incumbent; it was utterly out of character for the aloof, sneering mask he wore. He’d said little during planning; there was little he could say, without giving himself away. Distant, always; vague, aloof.
He’d waved away the scrap with as much decorum as he could manage, and he was burningly conscious of Alethia’s eyes on the back of his head as he knelt among lines and sap and a dead man’s things, trying hard not to look at the shadowed figure in the great ornate mirror.
By the time Mrs. Kuleda and Ezre took their leave, there was a thin film of bathwater at the bottom of the tub, with more pattering in from the faucet. He was gripping the chalk white-knuckled now, and the last line on that slippery tile came as a great relief.
Sighing, he braced himself on the cabinet and heaved himself up to sit on the edge of the tub. It’d been a while since he’d looked up, around; the size of the bathroom still baffled him. He might’ve gone to sit in the armchair, only it looked out of place here, with its little bookshelf nearby. It was a plain of tile and paneled wood and gilt; it looked like no lavatory Tom had ever been in, not even the Vauquelins’.
His eyes wandered, finally, to Lilanee, finishing up the prodigium on the other side. Just a bowed head, braids caught coppery in the low candlelight. He blinked, frowning slightly, at the bandage on one of her hands. He remembered how she’d looked, when Ezre had drawn the blood. She was still a little pale, though the candlelight made everything ghoulish.
He wasn’t sure what to think. They hadn’t spoken much; he tried to think if they’d ever spoken properly, Lilanee and Tom, not Lilanee and the Incumbent. For all Ezre’s reassurances, there was much he didn’t know, and much he was afraid to guess. He didn’t think his performance tonight had been particularly endearing.
As she finished the prodigium and started to rise, he thought suddenly of the statue in the foyer. He studied her half-lit face; he couldn’t’ve said if he saw a resemblance.
He looked down, away. The pot of chan, still steaming, sat on the tile some feet from the prodigium.
He crossed his arms, shivered a little in his jacket. “One last round of chan, Miss Kuleda, while our mutual friend chases the chrove?” It was meant to be funny; his voice came out flat, and he couldn’t manage a smile. “Are you all right?” he asked, more softly.
He reached out with a careful caprise.