Ch. 197 Chairs Arranged with Flour

Chapter 197: Chairs Arranged with Flour

The three riders stopped well short of the western gate.

One raised both hands.

The other two dismounted and waited beside their horses.

Eliza did not open the gate.

“What business?” she called.

The woman in front answered.

“We have a notice from the high court. We would like you to read it before we take it any farther.”

“Who are you?”

“Ressa of Southmere. This is my brother and the clerk who brought it.”

The third rider looked uncomfortable.

I had some sympathy for him.

It was difficult to deliver a notice when the people receiving it had decided to remain behind a closed gate.

Eliza asked for their names again. Mary wrote them down. Only then did the gate open.

The notice concerned the healers gathering at Greykeep.

It said that any instruction given in Aurelia’s name required recognition by the high court. Until that recognition was granted, the healers were to cease meeting.

Ressa watched Mary read.

“We have a healer in Southmere,” she said. “She was coming next week. The clerk told us she might lose the right to practice if she came.”

The clerk straightened.

“I was told to deliver the notice. I told them what it said.”

“You also told her to wait for permission,” Ressa replied.

“That was my understanding.”

Mary laid the notice on the table.

“We should find out whose authority it claims.”

Maelin joined us in the council chamber.

She read the seal first.

Then the last line.

“This was issued from Othellos’s office,” she said.

“Does that give him authority over village healers?” Evelyn asked.

“He will say it does.”

“What does the notice say he can actually do?” Mary asked.

Maelin read it again.

“It threatens to withdraw recognition.”

“Recognition of what?”

“Their right to practice under a divine name.”

Evelyn folded her arms.

“They practice because their neighbors need care. Several were doing it before they ever heard Aurelia’s name.”

“Yes,” Maelin said.

She looked at the clerk.

“Were you given instructions beyond the page?”

“Only to deliver it to the villages on my route.”

“Did you see the order written?”

“No.”

He glanced at Ressa.

“I should have said that.”

Eliza offered the riders food and a place to rest while we considered our reply.

The clerk hesitated at the offer.

“You can leave afterward,” she told him. “No one is holding you here.”

“That is not what I expected.”

“What did you expect?”

He looked at the notice in Mary’s hand.

“I was told Greykeep would be angry.”

“We are,” Mary said. “You should eat before you ride again.”

He accepted a bowl of stew.

Ressa’s brother accepted two.

Evelyn took Ressa to the chapel.

The morning’s lesson was already under way. Ilyen had set clean cloth and a basin of water before the six healers. One described a patient whose fever rose after an injury. Another asked what he would check first.

Ressa stood at the back and listened.

Afterward, Evelyn introduced her to the others.

“My healer asked me to see what you were teaching,” Ressa said.

“Tell her she can come and see for herself,” Ilyen replied.

“She’s worried about the notice.”

“We’ll send her an accurate account of what happened today.”

Aurelia carried the used cloth to the washing basket.

Ressa looked at her.

“Are you Aurelia?”

“Yes.”

“Does she need your permission to help our neighbors?”

“No.”

Ressa breathed out.

Mary drafted a reply that afternoon.

She read it to the council line by line. Evelyn and Ilyen had reviewed the description of the chapel’s work. Maelin had checked the high court’s language.

We stated who had attended the lessons and what they had been taught. We stated that no village healer was required to use Aurelia’s name. Those who chose to do so could ask her directly what she wished her name to mean.

“We should send a copy to every village that received his notice,” Evelyn said.

Mary had already made a list.

“And one to Othellos?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Will he read it?”

“He will have difficulty claiming he did not receive it.”

That was answer enough for Mary.

The riders left the following morning with their copies.

The clerk took the road toward the high court. Ressa and her brother rode south.

Eliza watched until they passed beyond the lower bend.

“We’ve made the route useful,” she said.

“What route?”

“The one his clerk has just taken. We know where he’ll stop, and those villages will have our account before he reaches them.”

I looked at Mary.

“How many copies did you give Ressa?”

“Enough.”

“She asked for three.”

“She learned about two more villages while she was eating.”

I wondered when Mary had found time to write them.

I had watched her all evening and still could not tell.

At noon, I discovered that my birthday was approaching.

Mary had left a calendar open in the council chamber.

My name had been written beside a day not far away.

Beneath it were three smaller notes.

One concerned flour.

One concerned chairs.

The third said, in Melody’s hand, Do not ask him.

I looked up.

Melody stood in the doorway.

“You could close the book,” she said.

“You could have chosen a subtler hiding place.”

“It was closed.”

“Mary left it open.”

“Mary has betrayed us.”

She came over and shut it.

“I only read the top of the page,” I said.

“That was too much.”

At supper, I mentioned the calendar.

Evelyn paused with Carol’s cup in her hand.

“Did Melody show it to you?”

“Mary did. By accident.”

“What did it say?”

“Flour. Chairs. A warning not to ask me.”

“Then you know very little.”

“I know someone is arranging chairs.”

“We arrange chairs every week.”

“Do we arrange them with flour?”

“Sometimes.”

She returned Carol’s cup before our daughter could take Garrick’s.

I looked at Aurelia.

She was smiling into her tea.

Apparently the whole table knew more than I did.

We had done very little for my twenty-first birthday.

I could remember a breakfast Evelyn and I had eaten together before the day filled with visitors, a dispute about the eastern road, and a lesson neither of us had managed to finish. Mary had left a small parcel on my desk. Inside was a new pen and a note promising that its first use would not be a decree.

I still used the pen.

It was and is a good pen.

That evening, we had a small gathering. Supper that ended with chocolate cake and the appropriate amount of candles. A few gifts given.

I had thought that was all right.

Now I wondered whether she had.

The next morning, I found her in the nursery, folding the twins’ clothes.

“You don’t need to make up for last year,” I said.

She set down a little shirt.

“I know.”

“I enjoyed the breakfast.”

“So did I.”

“And the pen.”

“Mary will be pleased.”

I sat beside her.

“I don’t want everyone interrupted because I’m turning twenty-two.”

“The chairs will not interrupt anyone.”

“You admit there are chairs.”

“There have always been chairs, Uriah.”

She smiled, then took my hand.

“Last year, we kept saying we would find an afternoon. I would like us to keep this one.”

I held her hand.

“All right.”

Aurelia’s lesson that afternoon began with no weights.

Maelin stood on one side of the room.

Caldris stood on the other.

Thesra opened the door to the passage, then left it open.

“What am I holding?” I asked.

“Yourself,” Aurelia said.

“That sounds more difficult than the weights.”

“It may be.”

Maelin called to me without speaking.

I felt her power touch the edge of my attention.

Caldris did the same from across the room.

Then a third call came from beyond the castle.

I had not expected it.

My power answered before I chose to use it.

“Where are you?” Evelyn asked.

“In the training room.”

I could see her beside the table.

The third call remained.

It was farther away than anything I had heard that morning. I felt a person in trouble, though I could not tell who they were or where to send help.

“I don’t know enough,” I said.

My power pressed outward.

Thesra looked toward Aurelia.

“Can you let the question rest?” Aurelia asked me.

I tried.

The call grew clearer.

For a moment I heard water rushing over stones.

Then a voice.

Please.

I caught the edge of the table.

Aurelia stepped close.

“I hear it too,” she said.

“Where?”

“West. Near the river road.”

“Can we help?”

“Yes. We can tell Eliza what we know.”

The urge to reach toward the voice did not disappear.

I had to gather my strength back from the distance one part at a time.

Evelyn kept her hand against my wrist.

When I could hear only the room, I nodded.

Caldris opened the door wider.

We went to find Eliza.