Chapter 21
A punt on the Isis
“Why on earth is that something you’d know?” Edmund watched Miss Sterling, but more than that, he was trying to get that thread of Naming magic to work to his advantage. It was why he’d proposed the punt. There wasn’t anyone within a good hundred feet or so, and that made it much easier.
His workroom had warding that helped, but any of the public places— a cafe, or the JCR or anything else— there’d have been far too much background noise.
Or at least that was how Uncle Alexander described it.
Like trying to listen to a musician while people were rustling programmes and papers and such from behind.
Now, Miss Stirling’s voice was sharper. She wanted to know the answer to that question, but he could have deduced that from her having asked it.
Her overall reactions were puzzling him, honestly.
She’d agreed to come out with him; she hadn’t asked for something that looked less personal.
She didn’t seem afraid of him. He knew how to look for that.
It had been part of his training as a duellist, under Professor Fortier, for one thing.
Duellists were honest. That was the thing.
Miss Stirling was used to the cordiality of a vicarage or any other such place. But she wasn’t using that here.
The question now was how to answer that, or rather how fully.
It didn’t do to show his cards, even if he suspected she still had information that would be a help.
As well as perhaps further resources. “We touched on some of it earlier. I was born into a particular family, with longstanding roots and obligations. Knowing who else is around, what their interests might be, that is something like breathing or reading for us.”
“You don’t look much like it.” Her eyes narrowed. “You’re reading Greats.”
“Yes.” Edmund was not at all sure where she was going with this.
“Why? It’s not— what use is Greats in a world like the one we have?
” Now, she was letting him hear her irritation.
It wasn’t anger. It didn’t have that edge to it.
It was aimed at him, but it wasn’t entirely about him.
He was here as a convenient figure of focus for it.
Uncle Alexander would be pleased with the analysis later.
So would Mama. But first he had to navigate through this conversation sensibly, and not get caught up in the muck of the river bottom or the rushes and weeds at the bank.
“That’s quite a personal question.” Edmund kept his voice even.
He could do that. “But, mmm. I’ll give you a couple of reasons.
The first is that I like to think the ancients have a great deal to say about war, about peace, about how not to make the same mistakes over and over again.
The weapons we fight with are different now, but we are still as dazzled by the shiny new ones as the Trojans were by what Hephaestus made for Achilles.
And just as envious and stubbornly minded. ”
He turned his palm over, and went on, not giving her a chance to interject.
“Second, among certain people— more men than women— reading Greats and coming away with at least a Second indicates a particular sort of mind. It opens doors. I might want those opportunities later. Third, what I actually want to do is philology. Having half a dozen languages under my command, ancient and modern, can’t hurt. ”
“Where did you serve in the war? I gather you did.” Now Miss Stirling’s voice was sharp.
“Thank you for not assuming I bought my way into something easy.” Edmund nodded once, partly to give himself space to frame the next bit properly.
He could put a bit of magic behind it, to make it easier for her to take his answer at face value.
He knew how, but he also didn’t think this actually needed that.
“I was in London, doing the sort of work I’m not permitted to speak about.
Aide to someone quite senior, mostly. It was work that mattered, but I also wish I’d been doing fighting of the sort people understand much better.
” That was more than he’d meant to say, more than he usually said.
It was true and it did not touch too closely to his oaths.
If she’d been where he thought she had, she deserved that much truth.
She blinked at him, then frowned and shifted in the seat. “Which languages?”
The thing Edmund was coming to appreciate about her was that she was relentless, like a terrier in search of a rat.
There was a determination in her that shone through.
She didn’t fuss about the non-essentials.
That was it. He was drawn to it in a way that demanded further investigation.
“In order I learned them, then. English, obviously. Latin, Greek, French, German, Arabic in three dialects, and while my ancient Egyptian is not yet at an acceptable standard, I continue to improve in all three scripts. One of these days I’ll get better at Middle English.
A smattering of Welsh. That’s just enough to be polite in Trellech shops, I’ve never studied it properly. ”
Miss Stirling’s mouth opened, then she closed it with a tight snap, staring at him. “And you keep all of that in your head?”
“Also in a range of grammars, dictionaries, and so on. I turn out to have the right sort of head for languages, and for the ways they relate to each other. I’m expecting to make a trip to Greece and Italy this summer.
That will be a bit more practice and a chance to add at least tourist Italian.
” Edmund held still, waiting to see what she did with that.
The comment about the trip brought her chin up, as if she almost said something about it. Instead, he saw how she changed her mind, and said instead, “Your apprentice master?” That was a question with no specification, but well, Uncle Alexander provoked that sort of thing routinely.
“Responsible for the Arabic and Egyptian. He’s half-Egyptian.
And most of the French, besides a lot of help with the others.
Though Papa’s German is more idiomatic. He spent a few months snowed in after an avalanche in the Austrian Tyrol.
Also time in Berlin and Vienna before the Great War.
” Edmund could do this kind of quiet banter all day, honestly, and not need to touch anything at all private.
Miss Stirling nodded, then focused on the food. She selected another scone, taking her time adding more of the fig preserves to the top, then eating it. He liked very much that she was appreciating the food. It was only after she’d finished half of it that she said, “Pen.”
“Beg pardon?” He thought he’d heard that correctly.
“You may call me Pen. If you’d like.” She coughed, then added, “Edmund.”
“Pen.” Edmund smiled at it. Not that he hadn’t known her name. There were lists in the Gazette and in the Academy’s circular, for one thing. As she’d known his. But being given permission to use it, that was something particular. “Did you have another question?”
Pen nodded, though she finished the scone, swallowing it and having a sip of the Pimm’s, before she said anything else. “What does it mean, seeing who else is around?”
“Ah.” Now he had to figure out how to explain that. “You know parts of it. Albion as a community is not that large, relatively speaking. A couple of hundred thousand. Far larger than any one person will know, but far smaller than Britain.”
She nodded. “I am familiar with demographics as a field, yes.”
“Right, that makes this easier.” Edmund considered.
“Now, there are three hundred fifty people at Schola at any given point, as students. That’s quite a lot of people to keep in my head, so I might not put a name to everyone there when I was.
But I know a number by sight, and many more whose names are at least familiar.
Sometimes the combination, looking at someone and placing them because of a brother or sister or cousin.
” He considered, then gave an example. “You’d have overlapped with Rowena and Anthony Edgarton.
He’s younger than I am. You’d not have had classes or anything with him. ”
“But they look alike, yes. You knew they were related just from seeing them, even if they didn’t make it obvious.” Pen nodded. “Easier example than some.”
“They’re Eurasian in looks. Their mother was born in London, but to Bengali parents.
Their father’s family goes back further than we do here in Albion.
They’re friends, for what it’s worth.” He felt he ought to say that.
Both to demonstrate he had friends, and that they were good ones, for all he was rather closer to Anthony.
Again, this wasn’t anything private. There’d been more than enough profiles in the paper about the Edgartons at this point.
“But you can actually see it in their faces, as much as the colouring. Me, well, all of us are blonds and our eyes are quite similar in shape and colour. And the noses and chins, though the mouths vary a bit more.”
“All right. I’ll concede the general point.
But that doesn’t explain not knowing someone.
There are, as you have pointed out, many people who were not at Schola.
” Now she was leaning forward, elbows on her knees, focusing ferociously on the conversation.
It wasn’t ladylike, but it was the sign of an academic whose mind was fully engaged on the problem at hand.
“Right, so the next bit— I don’t recall all the maths.
But a number of those people in Albion are much older or much younger.
It’s more complicated right now, with people coming up to Oxford whose plans were changed by the war.
People who enlisted after a year or two as a student, people like the two of us who came up after the war ended, and whatever we were doing.
So we’re talking about a range of, oh, six or seven years, rather than three or four.
Maybe as many as ten.” Edmund waved a hand.