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“I invited him in, Father. It is hot outside. It was a matter of simple courtesy.”
Lucien bowed. “I would have returned, in any case, and waited until you gave me audience, sir.”
Deogal raised his chin. “What do you want from me, then?”
“The chance to learn from a master alchemist, my lord.”
“Do you, now?” Deogal came closer and waved a hand at Isidora. Her nerves on edge, she tried not to spill as she poured him some wine, after a liberal dose of water in the bowl.
He sat beside her on the bench as if she needed protection, and looked Lucien up and down. “I have had students before. They invariably proved themselves either fools or corrupt, and had to be thrown out on their heads.”
Isidora closed her eyes against the flood of painful memories those words evoked. Not so many years past, Kalle, her father’s last partner in the Work, had brought Deogal’s wrath crashing down upon himself by his betrayal. Her father had beaten Kalle nearly to death. Then he had shoved her mother out onto the street…and lived to regret it the rest of his days. Isidora bit her lip.
She well remembered the look of rage, aye, and loss on Kalle’s bloodied face. She shivered despite the warm day. He was an enemy worthy of the fear he inspired. And her father, strong as he once had been, was no match for the cunning and evil Kalle was now rumored to be capable of.
Isidora eyed Lucien appraisingly. She had to consider that he might make himself useful as a champion to Deogal, and protect him from harm in ways Isidora could not. He seemed honest…but Kalle also had sounded sincere at first.
Lucien had remained standing. “I do not believe I am particularly corrupt or all that foolish. But I cannot promise that one day you would not be tempted to throw me out, on my head or otherwise.”
Deogal grunted a laugh. “We shall see, then, just how badly you want to be my student. But do not bother Isidora, do you understand? She is too trusting by far, to have spoken to you and allowed you entrance. Sometimes I regret raising her as the Franj do and giving her such freedom, instead of keeping her hidden away.”
Isidora refrained from groaning out loud. What freedom? The freedom to go to the marketplace and purchase supplies for his Work? And why must Father delude himself into supposing that a wealthy stranger might take interest in her?
After all, she was dark, and too outspoken. Often as not, folk mistook her for one of the servants. However, she knew who she was—the proud daughter of a noble house, and it mattered not what anyone else thought.
Lucien crossed his arms, as if closing a door around himself. A bastion not easily swayed. “I have no intention of bothering your daughter, sir.”
Then, the rogue disproved his words with but one look. His lips parted slightly and his eyes glittered with the light reflected from the fountain’s waters. His gaze swept Isidora’s skin in a hot wave and made her cheeks catch fire, as if she stood naked in the public square. How dare he show such insolence!
Isidora had to force herself not to jump up and run off to hide in the house—just to avoid losing control and slapping him. But she would not give Lucien the power to affect her so, or give her father cause to either worry or question her actions.
Chapter Two
L ucien came every day after that. He spoke but little as he sat and waited for her father to emerge and accept him as a student of the Work. At first his friends accompanied him to the gate. But as time passed and he still made no progress, one by one they fell away, until he remained alone.
Leaving his sword in Marylas’s charge, he would bow to Deogal but say nothing. His request did not need to be made out loud, for it seemed he was asking with his whole being.
Day by day his face lost some of its air of ruddy confidence. But he had a presence that seemed to take up more space than he did physically. He wore sumptuous clothes and his surcoat of raw, red silk and fine leather boots added to his princely air.
Despite Lucien’s silence, or perhaps because of it, Isidora wanted to know everything about him. Where his home was and what kind of life he led there. But she could not bring herself to ask him directly.
He was quiet, but seemed bigger than life—as though his skin couldn’t quite contain him. He made her nervous, and he might mistake her inquisitiveness about the rest of the world for a personal interest in him.
Each day she offered him unleavened bread, dates and butter, figs and honey and wine, which he occasionally accepted. But of course that was only a matter of courtesy on her part, not concern.
Lucien was polite, without ever paying her enough attention that she might engage him in true conversation. His mind was always upon his goal. He would not endanger it by “bothering” her, she was certain. But she was also just as certain that eventually he would tire of waiting and leave them in peace.
But one day Deogal emerged from the workshop, his blue robe sooty and smelling of sulphur. “Tell me again why you want to partake of this Work, boy.”
Lucien jumped to his feet. “Because I must, sir. It holds the greatest fascination for me. I sense…I know—that there are worlds of knowledge waiting to be discovered through the arts of alchemy, through the patience and persistence of those who dare venture past the mundane and into the arcane. I cannot believe that my life’s achievements are only meant to be what my father envisioned—nothing but breeding and a series of acquisitions by force of arms.”
Deogal looked down his aristocratic nose at Lucien. “You are dissatisfied with your lot? With your enviable position of privilege, rank, honor and wealth?”
Lucien gazed at Deogal and spread his strong, lean hands. “I am not ungrateful, Master Deogal. I simply cannot bear to accept that I might miss something else, something so huge and divine and all-enveloping that I cannot see it without the guidance of a man like you. Beyond that, I cannot put it into words.”
Deogal raised one shaggy gray brow. “And what makes you think I have the means to guide you? Why should I be anything other than a bad-tempered old fool puttering with substances better left alone?”
“I have heard talk…but beyond that, I felt it, from the moment I stepped over your threshold. This is the place I belong. And you are the one to teach me.”
Isidora had to hide her amazement. This cool, aloof young man had such eloquence, such passion? Only for the Work, she reminded herself.
Deogal let a smile spread across his face like the slow rising of the sun. “Then so be it, Lucien de Griswold. You will take the oath revealed to Isis and swear by Tartarus and Anubis and Cerebus and Charon and the Fates and Furies. You will do as I instruct you, and you will go to your grave with the secrets I reveal—”
A numbing cold spread through Isidora, freezing her lungs, her heart… To see her father smile like that—to hear him offer his trust, his sacred knowledge, to this stranger who had only waited a fortnight for what she had waited her whole life—it was beyond bearing.
After all that had happened, how could he trust someone who might turn out to be another Kalle—perhaps even worse than Kalle? Then the numbness gave way to a fury she did not know she possessed. To a shameful jealousy, unworthy of her.
It took her off guard, like a blow from behind. Kalle’s apprenticeship had never produced such a reaction. He had never won her father’s love.
Isidora’s body shook, she could barely breathe, and she was possessed by a sudden, dreadful hope that Lucien would collapse in fits from the glare she bestowed upon him, before leaving this house for good.
Did he not deserve it, for reducing her to such a wretched, despicable state? But he never saw her daggered look. His eyes were shining with joy and his full attention remained on her father, waiting for him to finish.
Deogal frowned at Isidora. “You, child, should not be here listening! Go to the scriptorium and find something to copy!”
“Father…” she whispered before her throat tightened beyond words. She refused to look any longer at Lucien. The hateful usurper! Her face burned as if she had scrubbed it with nettles. Yet again she was banished from all that was important to her.
But she loved her father, no matter what, and would serve and protect him as long as he needed her. Whether he wanted her to or not.
“Excuse me.” She stood and forced herself to walk slowly, with decorum. But once out of sight, she grabbed her skirts and ran through the house, up the stone stairs and into her haven. In the tiny scriptorium, a sense of calm gradually enveloped her. Here was her Work.
Isidora blinked, sniffed, swallowed, and as her heart slowed its wild beating, she regained the control that had long stood her so well. She looked at the scrolls and piles of parchment on the shelves, the bowls and bottles of colored inks that she mixed herself, from oxgall and ground lapis and all sorts of ingredients, both rare and common.
She had produced ornate manuscripts and painted portraits that had been purchased by princes and bishops and satraps. She wrote letters for those who could not do so themselves. It was how she best helped her father, for ingots of silver and vials of mercury did not come cheaply. Nor did the gold leaf or vellum she used in her finest scribing.
Isidora slipped onto the wooden seat behind the slanted table and reached down to open the small cupboard behind it. She felt for the folio inside and brought it out into the light of day. Carefully she opened the heavy leaves.
A painting of an exquisite face smiled at her from the calfskin surface. Luminous brown eyes, skin like the petals of a dusky rose, jet hair peeking from beneath a silken veil.
Here was her treasure…an image she had created, of Ayshka Binte Amir. Of her mother, as she had once looked. Before Kalle FitzMalheury had begun her death… Before her father had completed it…. Isidora swallowed the tears that threatened.
Unlike the fabled Elixir, her art was real. People could see it and feel it. It had meaning and value. Creating it was a solitary occupation, by its very nature, but such was her lot in life. Like Marylas, who had lost everything, to hope for more, for a loving father, much less for a loving husband, or children, was to ask too much.
She had seen the suffering of the truly unfortunate. What she had should be enough. Aye, she should be grateful for the bounty she possessed. Her sight, her limbs, her very life. Enough to eat and a place to sleep…even alone. It was best that way.
Why think twice about a man like Lucien? So what if Deogal wanted him to stay? So what if he brought Deogal some companionship in his labors—was that not a good thing?
Nay, not if it is at my expense!
But it was wrong to think thus.
She had her path and Lucien had his. They would be parallel for but a short time. The inevitable divergence would come, no doubt when al-Kond Herri called the knight back into service, and she would be rid of his enviable presence.
Isidora rested her cheek on the cool surface of the table and gazed out the window. Just beyond the walls of the city, the sea glistened as the afternoon waned. The sail of a returning fishing boat slid by, gilded and backlit by the sun.
Isidora gave thanks for the beautiful sight and made up her mind to banish all selfish thoughts. Her father was getting old; he needed help with the Work. God had sent him Lucien, and whether she liked it or not, she had to accept it. Just as most women had to accept so many things.
She thought of her once-beautiful mother, Ayshka, ravaged by disease and now dead. The unwelcome tears stung her eyes at last. She knew passion was possible, that true love existed. Even after banishing Ayshka, Deogal had loved her with an unseemly desperation, and that was what had fueled his love of the Work. That was what still fueled his guilt.
The Work had been his lady-wife’s last hope for a cure, short of a miracle or the touch of a saintly king…. The Work could provide the Elixir, and the Elixir could cure all ills. Even the worst—that which had afflicted her mother.
A dread disease that carried with it a terrible stigma of implied dishonor, which tainted the whole family. Indeed, it might be the real reason no man had ever asked for Isidora’s hand.
For her mother, shamed by one man and turned out of her home by another, had been visited by God’s cruelest wrath of all…leprosy.
Chapter Three
Acre
The palace of Henry, al-Kond Herri, King of Jerusalem
High summer, 1197
“M y lord Henry…can you be serious? To ally yourself—a bastion of Christianity—with Sin
n, the heathen Grand Master of the Assassins? It is unthinkable!” Kalle’s fist thumped the table.
The company of Henry’s knights and noble advisors stirred, murmuring their disapproval of this outburst. Lucien remained silent, as he had throughout the meeting, but narrowed his eyes as FitzMalheury took a visible grip on his temper. “Surely it is not necessary for you, appointed as regent here by Richard himself, to make a pact with such a one?” Kalle asked.
Henry leaned back in his great chair and stared at Kalle. “You of all men should know the value of an alliance with them. They are deadly, but capable of reason, for they pay the Templars to leave them alone—and you should have seen what took place during our conversation at al-Kahf. Sin
n demonstrated his power—he ordered two of his men to leap from atop the fortress. They did so without an instant’s hesitation and fell to their deaths upon the rocks below. I had to beg him not to repeat the spectacle…but I will ask you, Kalle—would you have shown me such unswerving loyalty?”
Henry tilted his head and did not wait for a reply. “Sin
n offered me another sample of his skills…he thought surely there must be someone I would like them to murder.” Henry leaned toward FitzMalheury and smiled good-naturedly. “I declined, but of course, dear Kalle, you came to mind as a first candidate, being commander of the garrison as well as my closest rival.”
At this the company roared with laughter, but Lucien saw that Kalle’s mirth did not reach his eyes. The knight cleared his throat. “You flatter me with such a designation, my lord. But how you came by this opinion is quite beyond my understanding.”
He then gave Lucien a direct look. One that pierced him with its enmity and stirred his own desire for revenge. “There are other candidates for elimination. Indeed, there is a man present who spends so little time amongst his own kind, one wonders whose side he is on,” Kalle said softly, still looking at Lucien.
Lucien replied, his voice as velvet as Kalle’s, “And there is another present who gives his personal ambitions priority over the interests of his lord.”
“Enough,” Henry said firmly. “Sin
n is someone I want to be close enough to that I may keep an eye on him. I need not adopt the ways of the Assassins, only learn what I may about them, to ensure the safety of others.”
Kalle stood and bowed. “As you will, my lord. I am yours to command, as ever.”
At Henry’s nod of dismissal, the group began to break up. Lucien was halfway to the door when Kalle stopped him.
“Never challenge my honor like that again, Lucien, or I will make you sorry you were ever born.”
Lucien squared his shoulders and looked down at Kalle. “Just be advised, my lord, I am loyal to Henry, and he knows it. And just because you have made an enemy of Deogal does not mean he is anyone else’s enemy.”
Kalle’s smile struck a perilous chord in Lucien. The man was like a rabid dog. And should be dealt with as such.
Kalle continued, “I shall have to pay the old man and his daughter a visit one of these days, hmm? See what progress he has made with the Work? Or perhaps you’d like to tell me yourself and spare him the pain?”
Lucien bristled. “Stay away from them. I will cut you to pieces if I catch you.”
Kalle laughed. “Of course. If you catch me. A very small likelihood. But nay…the thought of playing inquisitor with you appeals to me much more. After all, Deogal would not last more than a day or two as my…guest. And what Isidora is likely to know is hardly worth the sweat of finding it out…whereas you, Lucien, could prove entertaining, indeed. So have a care, the next shadow you see might not be your own, eh?”
Isidora wondered at the change in Lucien when he returned from the court of al-Kond Herri…his somber moods, his rude questioning of her servants about who they saw and to whom they spoke from outside, his pacing and restless nights….
His evident distraction even caught her father’s notice. “What is wrong with him?” Deogal frowned as he dipped a piece of bread into his bowl of sauce.
Isidora shrugged. “Perhaps he is ready to move on, at last. Perhaps he longs for home.”
“He cannot! Not at this stage of the Work. We are just purifying the red essence of— Never mind. Just tell him I want to see him after vespers.” Deogal pushed his half-eaten food aside and stalked back to his quarters.
Isidora stared at the carved marble bowl her father had abandoned and worry yet again twisted within her. He ate less and less, looked more and more haggard. She felt so helpless. How could she stop his decline? He paid her no attention, found her concern an annoyance.
“Isidora?”
That smooth voice, from behind. Lucien. She closed her eyes and did not move. She could not quite face him with her fears still so evident. “Aye? There is food left, should you want it.”
“Has all been quiet? Nothing amiss?”
“Nothing.”
“Why do you keep your back to me? What is wrong?”
At last she turned around. His beautiful face was limned by the golden glow of the oil lamps, accentuating the hollows of his cheeks. He, too, was in a decline. “Why don’t you tell me? You are the one who knows what is going on, Lucien. You have known for months and are making all of us miserable as a result.”
Lucien put his hand to his brow and pinched the bridge of his nose. His fingers quivered, and her alarm grew. “What is it? What has happened?”
He met her gaze. “Tonight you will hear a clamor, for the city will be in mourning, as soon as word spreads. Henry is dead.”
A sense of cold struck her, as if she had jumped into the winter sea. “What? How can this be?”
“He fell to his death…from a window in his palace. Kalle FitzMalheury has taken charge, only until a succession is sorted out, or so he says. I have little hope that this was an accident, Isidora. You and your father are in danger with Kalle now free to run wild.”
“He is no threat to us. We have friends more powerful than he, and well does he know it.”
“You do not know what he has become, Isidora. He is growing inside of himself, like an abscess of pride and corrupt power.”
“Then lance him,” she replied, shocked at her own bluntness.
