Ch. 153 The Answer Beneath the Seal

Chapter 153: The Answer Beneath the Seal

Aurelia’s letter left with the morning courier.

Then Greykeep continued without consulting our impatience.

The granary roof was finished.

The wagon received a new axle.

A disagreement over firewood occupied more of my afternoon than I would have believed possible.

By the end of it, I understood that three people could agree entirely about needing dry wood while disagreeing about every other part of the matter.

Mary wrote down the arrangement.

I signed it.

Nobody appeared happy.

“Did that go well?” I asked after they left.

“They all know what happens next.”

I considered that.

“Good enough?”

“For firewood.”

Evelyn found me at the workshop later that day.

I had gone to see the repaired wagon.

I had remained because Perrin was explaining a lifting frame with enough enthusiasm that leaving would have felt cruel.

My wife waited until he stopped to breathe.

“May I borrow him?”

Perrin looked at the drawing.

Then at me.

“Yes. He understands most of it.”

I followed Evelyn outside.

“Most?”

“You can ask him later.”

“Where are we going?”

“The infirmary.”

I looked at her.

She smiled.

“Mina wants to show you something.”

Mina’s brother stood beside the window with both hands behind his back.

His sister sat in a chair several paces away.

Ilyen waited nearby.

Evelyn touched my arm before I could speak.

So I watched.

Mina placed both feet on the floor.

She stood.

Slowly.

For a moment, her face tightened.

Then she took one step toward her brother.

Another.

He moved toward her.

“Stay there,” she said.

He stopped at once.

I knew that tone.

Apparently sisters learned it early.

She reached him after six steps.

Then took his offered arm and leaned against him.

Her grin was enormous.

Ilyen brought the chair.

Mina sat with a breathless laugh.

“Well?” she asked me.

“I think your brother behaved very well.”

She stared.

Evelyn nudged my side.

“And you,” I added, “were magnificent.”

Mina looked satisfied.

Her brother looked as though he might begin crying and intended to prevent it through force of will.

He failed when she caught his sleeve.

Nobody mentioned it.

Outside the infirmary, Evelyn stood very still.

I took her hand.

“You helped do that.”

“Yes.”

She said it quietly.

Then laughed once.

“Yes, I did.”

I drew her close.

For a while, she let me hold her in the passage while people went around us carrying the work of the day.

“She’ll still have difficult mornings,” Evelyn said against my shoulder.

“I know.”

“And Ilyen says we mustn’t let her tire herself trying to prove she can.”

“I heard.”

My wife leaned back.

“But today.”

I smiled.

“Today.”

Aurelia heard about it over supper.

Evelyn told her every detail.

The chair.

The six steps.

The command to her brother.

Aurelia listened with the attention she gave things that mattered.

When my wife finished, our teacher reached across the table and touched her fingers.

“You should be proud.”

Evelyn looked down.

“I am.”

“Good.”

There was no lesson attached.

No next exercise.

Only that.

I thought my wife needed it.

The reply from Merrowden arrived nine days after our letter left.

Mary found me in the lower yard.

She carried a narrow packet and wore an expression I could not read.

“Is Aurelia upstairs?” she asked.

“I think so.”

“We should open this together.”

I looked at the seal.

The closed book.

The branches.

My first feeling was relief.

Someone had answered.

Then I remembered how little an answer sometimes meant.

Aurelia broke the seal herself.

We sat in her room because she had asked us to come there.

The lamp stood beside the bed.

Her cloak hung from a peg.

Evelyn had brought the unfinished portrait and left it facing the wall near the wardrobe until there was better light for painting.

It made the room feel occupied in a way that still surprised me.

Aurelia unfolded the letter.

Read the first page.

Then began the second.

Mary waited with her book closed.

At last, Aurelia looked up.

“She will see us.”

I let out a breath.

“When?”

“She offers three dates.”

“That seems unusually reasonable.”

“Yes,” Aurelia said.

Her expression suggested there was more.

Lady Senra Voss wrote carefully.

She acknowledged receiving Aurelia’s request.

She confirmed that the old seal appeared in the register.

She also confirmed that the record remained active.

Mary’s pen began moving.

Aurelia continued reading.

Lady Senra would permit examination in her presence. No original record could leave the house. Copies could be made where the condition of the material allowed.

Then came the sentence that had changed Aurelia’s face.

I must advise you that the instrument describes your voice as evidence requiring prior admission by this office.

Evelyn leaned forward.

“Meaning?”

Aurelia lowered the page.

“That they must decide whether I may be heard before anything I say can be entered.”

“Even your objection to that?”

“Yes.”

I looked at Mary.

Her pen had stopped.

“Did she refuse?” I asked.

“No.”

Aurelia turned to the next page.

Lady Senra had written another paragraph beneath the formal conditions.

I have found no entry showing that such admission was ever considered. I cannot tell you whether this omission was deliberate. I can tell you that it has not been corrected.

For a moment, nobody spoke.

Then Evelyn held out her hand.

“May I?”

Aurelia passed her the letter.

My wife read the paragraph herself.

“She wants us to notice it.”

“Yes,” Mary said.

“Then perhaps she wants it corrected.”

“Perhaps,” Aurelia replied.

She looked toward the window.

“We should let her tell us.”

There was an enclosure.

A copy of the register’s entry.

Not the testimony.

Only the headings under which it had been filed.

Authority.

Complaint.

Witnesses.

Finding.

The last heading was Answer of the Named Party.

Beneath it were three words.

No answer received.

I stared at them.

Aurelia had stood before those people and explained herself.

She had described the storm.

The people she reached.

The limits of what she could do.

Somewhere, a hand had written that she had not answered.

Evelyn set the page on the table.

Very carefully.

“They heard you,” I said.

Aurelia nodded.

“And wrote this.”

“Yes.”

I stood.

The room suddenly seemed too small.

Mary watched me from beside the hearth.

I went to the window.

Below, a gardener pushed an empty barrow along the path.

A perfectly ordinary sight.

I tried to remain with it long enough to speak sensibly.

Behind me, Aurelia said, “Uriah.”

I turned.

“I want to see the record.”

“We will.”

“I want to know who wrote that. What they were instructed to write. Whether anything of my answer remains.”

I nodded.

She met my eyes.

“Then help me get there.”

I returned to the table.

We chose the middle date.

It allowed time to arrange the journey without leaving so late that winter weather might decide for us.

Sabine offered to meet us on the Caerwyn road and accompany us to Merrowden.

Mary would come.

So would Eliza and Melody.

The Castellan prepared copies of the seals and the passages we had recovered at the Hall of Accord.

Aurelia examined each page.

She corrected nothing she could not remember clearly.

At one point, she rested her hand beside a line and said, “I think that happened before the second sitting.”

Mary waited.

“Think?”

Aurelia looked at her.

Then nodded.

“Leave it as uncertain.”

Mary did.

The journey raised a question none of us could answer by looking at a map.

Could Aurelia remain with us for several days away from Greykeep?

She had stayed at the castle overnight.

She had joined us at Orselle.

She had slept in the boat after Tern Reach.

But those things did not amount to certainty.

“I can withdraw and return through you,” she said.

Evelyn nodded.

“And if you need rest?”

“I will tell you.”

I looked at her.

She lifted an eyebrow.

“I have been listening to my own advice. Occasionally.”

“That will please Ilyen.”

“It will astonish her.”

We practiced in the little south sitting room.

Aurelia stepped away from us.

Her presence thinned.

Then vanished.

I disliked the empty place immediately.

Evelyn took my hand.

We reached together.

The warmth answered.

Aurelia appeared beside the window with one hand on the sill.

For a moment, she looked tired.

Then it passed.

“How was that?” my wife asked.

“Easier than before.”

“For you?”

“For all of us, I think.”

I nodded.

The connection had required less force.

More recognition.

Like finding a familiar voice in another room.

That evening, Aurelia asked Evelyn to turn the portrait around.

My wife hesitated.

“It isn’t finished.”

“I know.”

She set it where the lamplight could reach.

Aurelia sat with the twins held against her.

The children were younger in it.

Smaller.

Evelyn had kept the moment as it had been.

The face remained partly unfinished, but the hands were there.

One supporting Garrick.

One resting over Carol’s back.

Aurelia looked for a long time.

Then she touched the edge of the easel.

“I had forgotten how small they were.”

“They haven’t become especially large,” I said.

Evelyn glanced at me.

“You carried both downstairs yesterday and complained.”

“About the stairs.”

“Of course.”

Aurelia smiled.

Then grew quiet again.

“Will you finish it when we come home?”

Evelyn’s expression softened.

“Yes.”

We told Helena and Garrick about the journey after supper.

They listened.

Asked how long.

Asked which road.

Then Helena began discussing the children’s days with Evelyn.

Garrick drew me aside.

“Anything you need done before you leave?”

I thought about the nursery chest.

The room down the corridor.

The castle full of work that would continue while we were gone.

“No.”

He studied my face.

Then rested a hand on my shoulder.

“Good. You can spend tomorrow with them.”

I had been preparing to say there were arrangements.

He seemed to know.

“Mary can find you.”

So the following morning, I sat on the nursery floor.

Garrick pulled himself upright against my arm.

Carol crawled toward Evelyn, changed her mind, and came toward me instead.

Our daughter had become unexpectedly quick.

I caught her before she could investigate the strap on my boot.

Aurelia sat beside the window, folding a small blanket that did not need folding.

After a while, she put it down and joined us.

Carol immediately climbed into her lap.

Garrick considered this.

Then attempted to climb over my leg to reach her too.

“There,” I said. “You have been admitted.”

Aurelia looked at me.

For one awful moment, I wondered whether I had made the wrong joke.

Then she laughed.

Evelyn reached across and squeezed my hand.

Aurelia’s reply was dispatched that afternoon.

It accepted the date.

Named those who would accompany her.

Confirmed that the originals would remain at Merrowden.

At the end, she had added one sentence in her own hand.

I spoke then. I will speak again.

Mary read it before folding the letter.

Then placed it inside the covering sheet without changing a word.