“Ready?”
Ferdinand nodded, closing his journal. He looked distracted, but he didn’t say anything, and Rathna was not going to press. On the way back, perhaps. They were borrowing a cart large enough to take four of them to a point in the woods, to go up to a cave in the foothills of the mountains where one of the grandmothers was willing to make a petition.
None of the folk from Albion had language for this. It wasn’t a thing people did. It was a matter for the Council, if anyone was going to. Grietje was a bit more sanguine about it. The Fatae weren’t beings one talked to in the Low Countries, but the idea of petitioning them for help wasn’t entirely unheard of.
Rathna was working on instinct here - instinct and need. She’d talked it through with Gabe, as best she could in the journal, and with pauses between every comment. She kept coming back to something they’d discussed early in their relationship, before they were even betrothed. Rathna had argued, rather compellingly, that the magics in Albion were a wall, but also a container. She went through it one more time in her head, trying to peer into every crevice of logic, to see if she was, in fact, missing anything.
Richard III had made the Pact with the Fatae in 1484. It had been a mutual agreement, both sides benefiting. The Fatae had places to retreat to, where no human could come. They could build their homes in safety, not to be meddled with. There had been some particular concessions about specific locations, but none that were too much of a reach, as it turned out.
In exchange, they had given three great gifts. The gift of the Silence, which bound all of Albion, all those with magic, to silence about magic around those without it. It was arguably a chain, too, but it had, over and over, kept people safer. Rathna knew enough of the history, both in Albion and in other places. Related, the Fatae kept from meddling with people who had made that pledge, and that had saved no end of trouble.
More directly useful, the Fatae had given mortals the gift of making portals. Or at least those few, like Rathna and her guildmates, who could learn the knack. It meant that portals now dotted the landscape of Albion, easing trade and travel, rather than being in Fatae hands, or only in places the Fatae cared about.
And third, they’d given other gifts of magic, advances in healing and alchemy and materia that had allowed Albion to shoot forward in a number of ways, and keep Albion’s people that much safer. There were plenty of times the measure of that safety was small. But a farmer of Albion died less often of small cuts. Minor infections stayed minor and healed. The milk stayed sweet longer, leaving more to be sold on or made into cheese or butter. Animals and plants were less prone to illness or blight. Fewer women died in childbirth, fewer children died of the diseases of youth, more people survived the plague or cholera or whatever epidemic sprung up like fire.
It hadn’t been the same outside of Albion. There was tale after tale of the Fatae having their way with the world - angry, joyful, specific, general. Gabe had been doing research, as had several others they knew, about the sightings of the Wild Hunt in Albion since the Pact. And about how many more were reported in France, in Germany, into Spain, through the rest of Europe. It was hard to tease some of the tales apart, of course, as always.
Rathna at least had a little space where she had explored the idea that gods and naga and all manner of Fatae walked among the villages and cities of India. Her aunts in Calcutta had not only told her stories, on their second and third visits, but they had taken her to several of the temples and taught her a little of the way to make offerings. Some things were cultural, some things were negotiated, but gifts and politeness and caution braided together seemed universal. Don’t make promises you can’t keep, gifts imply obligations, and some Fatae have well and truly earned their reputation as tricksters.
These thoughts took them a fair way down the road. Grietje and the grandmother, Miren, were chattering away in French. Rathna followed half a sentence here or there, but she was still tired enough that keeping track of the conversation was far more effort than it should be. Instead, she folded her hands in her lap and looked out at the scenery. It moved from fields and trellises into the foothills of the mountains, with taller trees and rocky ledges.
It took the better part of three hours, but eventually the cart pulled up in a small copse of trees, and they piled out. They had talked, with translation running several directions, about how to do this. Rathna would make a petition of a physical offering, a bit of her magic, and the words in English. Grietje would translate them into French, and Miren would translate them into Basque. It was only polite to talk to the Fatae in their own local language. Rathna wasn’t actually sure how that worked. Did they have their own and just borrow local human languages for the occasion?
She had not been able to figure out if Alexander had even spoken directly to the Fatae. By the time the answer was particularly relevant, it was clear he was working flat out. Whatever she asked would take him away from two dozen things that needed his attention. It wasn’t likely to be the thing that decided the matter, anyway.
Rathna had asked for a few phrases, how to give her name, how to express her appreciation. Not thanks, directly, that could be touchy in a number of cultures. Not an obligation, either. Simply, “I am glad that you have listened.” More or less. Miren led them not toward the more obvious cave mouth, but sideways, curving around a bit of stone, with them moving left. Then she slipped into an opening in the rock that barely appeared to be there.
Once inside, Grietje called a charmlight, illuminating the cave, and Rathna stopped dead. The ceilings, from about waist height upwards, were filled with figures. There were dozens of horses, not the sleek and angular horses she’d come to know well thanks to Gabe and his parents. These were rounded beasts that made her think fondly of Verity, the dun Highland pony she’d ridden in Scotland when she’d met Gabe.
There were giant aurochs there, tremendous deer with massive antlers, an enormous bear, and what seemed likely to be a lion. There were other markings - both carved and painted - that were some sort of symbolic pattern, or so she had to assume.
And the whole place was made for ritual. Rathna could feel that, for all the blessings or protections or warding or whatever one properly called it was nothing like what she knew. Or mostly not like what she knew. It had a feel, if she peered at it out of the corner of her eye so as not to scare the faint sensation, of the container of the eruv.
Before she could pursue that further, something in the cave shifted. It wasn’t a sense of presence, but it had a weight to it, like some of the oldest portals. Places that had stood through wind and weather, the rise and fall of empires, the reshaping of mountains and canyons. Rathna inhaled and then gave herself over to just experiencing it, not trying to analyse it. She let herself fall into the beauty of it, the reds and ochres and umbers, but also the deep blacks she could see, the white from kaolin clay. Mostly the black and the red ochre here, but splashes of the others.
Along one side was a small flat table, near enough an altar, though it was currently bare. Miren bowed respectfully before it, then took a step back and to the right, gesturing for Rathna to do the same. Rathna took a deep breath, then she stepped forward. She had made offerings thousands of times by now, and she placed what she had brought on the altar.
She had given careful thought to this. She’d chosen gems from her set of working stones, but they needed to be ones she wouldn’t need for the work on the portal. Two stones from that, and she had pried the aquamarine out of her Guild pendant. That stone she’d worn since her third year at Schola, when Morah Avigail had presented her with a proper stone for her House necklace.
Rathna had so many other gifts from her, she could give this one as a token of her truth. She knew it was the right thing. The other two, though, were easier to put down. First the good quality piece of jade, then a pearl, then finally the aquamarine.
“I give you greetings, ancient ones full of magic.” She waited for the dual translation, the sound bouncing and echoing in the cave. “I know the smallest touch of your magic. I bring these offerings.” She went on, pausing after each sentence. “The great net of portals in Paris has been damaged. I will gladly tell you what I know of how that happened. We also seek your help to return home. Please, if you are willing to speak, send some sign.” She had to come to this as a competent professional, seeking to give information to those who deserved to have it, by right and nature.
They stood there in the flickering of the light. Rathna counted her heartbeats. Gabe had taught her that one. Don’t make any assumptions for at least the count of twenty-one. Three times seven, the magical numbers. The number of the Council. The number of completion, in some systems. If you ask a question, allow the terrifying magical being time to answer.
She got up to seventeen before anything changed. There was a flicker of light, entirely separate from the charmlight, then the entire cavern lit up in a soft glow like the last hour before twilight, golden and perfect. The offerings on the altar disappeared entirely in the blink of an eye, and then four charcoal marks appeared, one after another.
Rathna blinked, and glanced at Miren, who counted off on her fingers, and said something in French about St. John’s Day. The solstice, in two days’ time.
“Four days from now?” Rathna asked, to confirm. The lights dimmed and rose again, as if in agreement, like a great figure far above nodding, changing the angle of the light.
“We will return in four days.” Again, the light dimmed. At least that held some promise that when they did, Rathna might be able to speak for herself. Then, the light faded slowly, and they were alone in the cave again. Surrounded by figures and echoes and the weight of centuries. None of them moved for rather longer than twenty-one heartbeats. Finally, Rathna made one final bow. “I am glad to have been heard.” Then she retreated, backing up the way they had come, until she was well into the neck of the cave entrance.
The others followed, one by one, to come out blinking in the sunlight. The sun had moved significantly. They had got here before noon, with the sun overhead, and now it must be closer to three or four. Plenty of time to return to the farm enclave, given the long hours of sunlight, but Rathna would have said they’d been inside only a few minutes.
Ferdinand wobbled once, and she put out a hand immediately to steady him. “All right?” She kept her voice quiet. She couldn’t imagine speaking loudly yet.
He shook his head, the negative, but she gave him time for a few breaths. Grietje went to the cart, where the cart horse was nibbling amiably on the last bits of grass he could reach from where they’d tethered him. She brought back a flask of water, and then brought out the smaller one of the alcohol she carried. Ferdinand eyed them both, then nodded, taking a swig from the brandy before chasing it with a bit of water. Rathna didn’t hesitate before doing the same.
Once they’d done that, they could at least set off for their current home. Grietje drove along in silence, while Miren watched them carefully, as if that had not gone as she’d expected. Rathna had had that impression, but how did one ask about that? There were so many underlying principles and assumptions that might be the same between them and others that might be entirely different.
It wasn’t until they were a good way back, perhaps two hours, that Ferdinand cleared his throat. “Mistress Rathna. I learned this morning that Mama had been interned. Taken to a camp, with others who aren’t....” He didn’t have to finish the sentence. ‘Enemy aliens’ was the phrase used. Rathna had caught some of the discussion about it from her journal. People had been classified months ago, but most had been allowed to keep having their lives. Now, though, well. Things were changing, and terribly fast.
“I’m so sorry.” Rathna reached out, almost without thinking about it, though Ferdinand was, in general, not someone who welcomed touch easily. This time, he turned his hand so she could take it in his without twisting. “Do you know how she’s doing or where she is?”
“She’s not permitted her journal, just letters, but my father and brothers have visited her. They didn’t want to worry me, but then they realised I’d write to her. And not hear back.” From the expression on his face, it had taken them long enough he had worried, indeed.
She had not pressed for more about his family. It had been so clear from what he’d shared already that he loved his mother, even when her interests made him uncomfortable. Rathna just held his hand. “If you’d like to talk about it, when we get back, you let me know. And I hope, very much, we will find our own way home soon. And you can go see her.”
“It’s allowed?” He said it warily. “I’m an apprentice. In a sensitive line of work.”
Rathna let out a long breath. “And we know people who can do the truth enchantments. Richard, for one, Geoffrey for another. They’d be glad to recommend half a dozen people who don’t know you and don’t like me much if you want something more neutral. For my part, I think you should get to see your mother and I will do everything I can to make that possible. Starting with getting us home and going on from there.”
It came out fiercer and sharper than she’d meant to. Her own desire to get home was rising higher and threatening to breach the narrow banks she’d nudged it into. But that was not to the bad here. The other two women in the cart didn’t comment, didn’t even look up, but she suspected they entirely understood.
Ferdinand fell silent again, but he didn’t let go of her hand, not until they were turning up the road toward the enclave itself.