Chapter Twenty-Nine #2
Releasing his hold on the steering grip, the Weaver King sat back.
“Adélard Drake is fascinated with you,” he said.
“In our circles, we call him the Vulture. Whenever a girl turns twenty—a year out from the cloisters—he begins hanging around.” He fluttered his fingertips, then glanced at me sidelong.
“He’s swooped in a bit early, in your case. ”
My entire body felt cold. “You brought me here to meet with Mr. Drake?”
“Not at all. Adélard is away today, as it happens.” Again, Bastian waved away my question.
Illogical as it was, I felt certain the cloisters had sensed my arrival.
I could practically feel them pitching forward, like dogs straining at a leash.
“I brought you here because there are few places in that wretched capital of ours where two people may speak privately. And because I’m sure you’re curious to know what occurs within those walls,” Bastian went on, tracking my interest. “Seeing as you are aware of the origins of us Weavers’ magic. ”
His words took a moment to register. When they had, I stiffened.
Bastian chuckled as I hastily relaxed again, attempting unsuccessfully to disguise my reaction.
“Oh yes,” he said. “I know what my son confided in you at the end of his Vainglory. He thinks he’s taught you to shield yourself from my prying, but he doesn’t realize that secrets leave fingerprints on every thought they touch.
One does not need to see the intruder to understand that their house has been robbed, after all.
They need only glimpse the broken vase, the jewelry gone missing, and—”
He snapped. I tried and failed not to jerk at the sudden burst of noise. Sighing, Bastian crossed his arms.
“Honestly, I find it nothing short of miraculous that the knowledge has remained contained for this long.”
I didn’t know what to say. My mind was still caught on the fact that he’d guessed—no, that he knew—his son had told me his secret.
For the second time, my stare twitched to the cloisters.
Had he brought me here to dispose of me?
Shut me away before I could tell anyone else about the truth I’d learned?
My palms began to sweat. I needed a strategy—and fast.
“Doesn’t it seem odd to you?” Bastian questioned, jerking me out of my thoughts.
“How willingly the public—even you girls—accepts that Weaver magic waxes as silkwitch magic wanes? Or even more ludicrous than that is the fact that, despite being perfectly able to do so, none of you attempt to expand your Wits prior to marriage. Of course, a few have happened upon the discovery by accident and had to be hushed up, but for the most part, you easily don the restraints we give you.” He clucked his tongue reprovingly.
“You’re told your gifts are limited—a single magical trick—and you accept our word as law.
It never fails to disappoint me. Do you know how many times I’ve encountered a clever girl, a particularly talented witch, and wanted to take her by the shoulders and say—test me, you idiot!
Give me something to fight against!” He held out his hand as though to shake a person in front of him, then settled back in his seat. “But you never do.”
I remained silent, peering uneasily into the yellow mist around us. Eventually, I replied.
“Witches are as fearful of their gifts as they are fond of them,” I said.
“The public is wary of us; no girl would risk stoking their ire and earning an early trip to the cloisters by attempting to push the boundaries of her Wit, especially when history and society insist that such a feat is impossible. Not to mention, from the moment their magic manifests, most girls of my kind are kept in relative isolation to prevent their hair from being stolen, and hounded to find a Weaver to marry. All our efforts go toward securing a suitor—there is no room for anything else.”
“Exactly.” My rebuttal had been bitter, but Bastian nodded at it, pleased.
“Exactly. You do not have time to consider your situation—that’s the key to all of it.
We’ve been careful to structure it that way.
” He looked over at me. “My ancestor was the first to bind a silkwitch, as I’m sure Noé explained to you,” the Weaver King said.
“After he made the discovery, Aristide—my relative—shared it with the men in his lineage, as well as a few especially close allies. He understood, even at that early stage, that a single man with the power of a witch would be an exception; a group of them, however, could become something more.” He paused.
“Aristide built the sorcerer lines out of nothing,” Bastian said.
“Once their society was large enough, they closed ranks and solidified their narrative. My ancestor knew that, more than the magic he took from his silkwitch bride, it was the secrecy of the binding ritual which gave him true power. If anyone else were to find out the truth—well then, anyone could become a sorcerer. His influence over the public would collapse in an instant.”
His speech broke off. “And the cloisters…?” I asked.
“The cloisters support our narrative,” he answered, seemingly coming back to himself.
“Too many witches running about unmarried, and one of them would be bound to realize that her Wit held far more potential than what society told her. Of course, the Virtuous Parliament is ignorant of that logic, but they allow the institutions to remain in Weaver hands because the management of silkwitches terrifies them, and Drake allows a cut of the magesilk which his girls produce to flow into the general market.”
I couldn’t stop my nose from twitching. At the sight of it, Bastian smiled.
“Such revulsion,” he said. “Adélard is an odd man—a man with odd tastes is perhaps more accurate—but he, at least, has a collector’s appreciation of silkwitches.
He likes to polish you up, to ensure you are looking your best when he places you on his shelf.
” His expression darkened. “There are worse villains to face. Women like Lucie Dabos, for instance. Do you know, she attended the opera the same night we did, not so long ago?” He frowned.
“Now, she does not have a collector’s eye at all.
She’s more like a banker—she only enjoys the arts if she feels she can extract a profit from them. ”
His chin angled in my direction. I forced myself to meet his gaze. It should have unsettled me, his mention of Lucie, but curiously I found myself unsurprised. His son, after all, had noted the Councillor’s presence at the opera house. Why should Bastian alone have remained ignorant?
I suddenly felt as though he knew everything.
That every move I’d made since my engagement to Noé had been watched and tracked by him, and this was the result.
“Her attacks on me have increased in frequency since you and I last spoke,” Bastian resumed.
“I thought you might find her latest one interesting.”
From the folds of his jacket, he withdrew a rolled-up newspaper and passed it to me. I found the article he was referring to easily. It was an opinion piece, Lucie’s name in the byline. The headline ran: A Treatise on the Equitable Use of Silkwitches.
I skimmed the column…Find it shocking that I must once again assert the deep injustice of allowing our nation’s most valuable assets to remain concentrated in the hands of a few wealthy men.
The continued prosperity of Balmoore hinges upon the production and distribution of magesilk, yet these numbered elite have been given leave to set the prices which govern the whole of our economy.
I ask you, should access not be fairly divided amongst the people?
My throat tightened. The next paragraph veered into a tangent; a few lines down, Lucie returned to her main argument.
Weavers would, and have, argued that they must retain sole management of the witches and their hair, as only they possess magic sufficient enough to subdue such creatures while they retain use of their Wits.
Yet are there not mundane ways to ensure obedience?
Unlike sorcery, the Weaving of silkwitch hair does not require any magical skill—only knowledge of the process, which the Weaver lines refuse to share.
Perhaps they fear that if given the opportunity, the free market would prove itself to be a far more capable—and productive—warden.
“You believe that women like Lucie Dabos are your allies.” Bastian’s voice caught me off guard—so low that I wondered, for a moment, whether he’d slipped the words into my mind.
“Yet she is not of your kind. Without the Weaver lines to limit the amount of magesilk entering the market, she and her flock would milk you like cows for your magic.”
I shifted away from him. His eyes were dark, pounded metal, his brow arching as he observed me. “Which is the better fate?” he asked. “To become a bride, elevated and valued, or a cog in a great industrial machine?”
I shivered. So this was why he’d brought me here. “You oppress us and steal our gifts,” I countered. But my intonation was weak, and I knew he would not be convinced by it.
Sure enough, Bastian merely shrugged. “Long ago, your people and mine collided,” he returned evenly.
“My ancestors won the battle, and out of that victory, our respective situations were formed. Is it really fair to blame the champions for the other side’s loss?
Perhaps you should turn your judgment on those who allowed themselves to so easily be duped. ”
He sighed, twisting Mariéprix.
“I’ll share something with you, Miss Lovett.
Reformers fight for your kind in the way that industrialists fight over resources.
They see how greatly the sorcerer lines have benefited from controlling you, and they wish our fortunes were theirs.
If you controlled them, they would cut you down as they attempted to do centuries ago, before the marriage accords. ”