Chapter 15 Csilla
Csilla
Csilla slunk into the foyer, cringing at the scrape of door over jamb that echoed over-loudly in the early morning silence. Ilan clucked his tongue as his gaze swept the walls papered in striped pink and gilt and the stained cherry wood of the stairs.
‘So this is the Varga house.’
His tone was dry, unimpressed. No doubt it was too ostentatious for his tastes.
ágnes had been right to look at her with such concern.
In these clothes, in this place, it would be hard for anyone to believe she hadn’t abandoned everything she’d been brought up to value.
Or trust how dearly she wished to go back to it.
Where should she take him? Csilla bit her lip. This wasn’t the cathedral, and she didn’t know the household’s rhythms. If she left Ilan while fetching Mihály, some servant might stumble across him and set off a panic before she even had time to come up with a plausible explanation.
‘This way, please’ she said, leading him past stone-eyed portraits of ancestors to the room she stayed in, though having him near where she slept shifted her stomach.
The bed had been made with an invitingly fresh quilt sometime in her unwilling absence, and the plumped pillows set off an aching desire to lie down and be warm.
There were new dresses draped across a chair as well, piled embroidered rose and gold and summer-sky blue, a layered cake of luxury waiting for her.
She held her head up, imagining this was her normal routine and she didn’t stink of cellar dirt.
With stiff arms she transferred the pile to the bed, resisted the plush call once more, and gestured to the chair.
‘Please sit. I’ll go get Mihály.’
Surely he could hear her heart hammer as she left. What had she done, bringing him here? If this was some kind of ruse, they’d face worse than jail with what she’d admitted. Mihály thought they had been brought together for a purpose, but there was only so long even Asten’s grace would stall.
Mihály’s room was empty.
Csilla groaned. Was he trying to find her? Perhaps he didn’t know that she’d been let go and was looking for him.
The thought unspooled a little of the frustration. It was warming to imagine someone bothering to check after her when she’d spent so long ignored in the cathedral’s corners.
And it was better than imagining he’d forgotten about her and traipsed home with someone adoring as soon as she was out of sight, not even realising there had been any fuss at all.
She shut the door and leaned back against it with a heavy breath, letting the wood take the full weight of her exhaustion for precious stolen seconds. But that was all she could allow herself with the wolf waiting.
When she returned to the room, apologies already on her dry lips, Ilan was standing over the pile of dresses, examining the lace on the sleeves of a delicate goldenrod day dress accented with fawn-brown velvet leaves.
She couldn’t read his expression – disapproval at the styles, some of which were not modest enough for Silgard’s tastes, or surprise such things would be given to someone like her?
‘They belonged to Madame Varga’s daughter,’ she explained as he smoothed out a crease in a rose-pink skirt.
‘The dead one?’
Well, he wasn’t known for tact. Csilla nodded.
He tilted his head. ‘Must be strange for her to see them on you.’
Csilla scowled, though he was right. ‘It would be a waste if no one used them.’
Ilan looked doubtful but made no further comment, so Csilla continued. ‘It seems Mihály is still out.’
Ilan returned to the chair and leaned back, seeming perfectly content to wait in silence.
He was not overly large in height or breadth, but the drape of his black cassock and the dreadful stillness of his presence was like one of the statues that peered from the cathedral facade.
They didn’t have to move to make one feel watched and small.
Unsettled panic fluttered in Csilla’s ribcage.
It could be hours before Mihály returned, and Ilan was apparently just going to sit and stare at her.
It would have been too much to hope that he could sit ten minutes without judging someone.
She’d always tried not to think about those who were drawn to Mercy’s opposite, knowing that the sick and helpless guilt she felt at seeing people split open for the Faith was her own weakness.
After all, the Church had deemed his service far more acceptable than hers.
Seconds crawled by. Csilla folded the dresses, then refolded them. She sat on one side of the bed, then the other, then finally moved to the window and pretended to be absorbed in watching the nightsoil carts making their morning stops.
Ilan continued to sit, an occasional foot-tap the only sign of any impatience.
‘Are you thirsty?’ she finally asked in desperation. The gnawing in her stomach and scratching weight of the silence trumped the awkwardness of possibly explaining to the madame why she’d brought Ilan into her home. ‘I’m sure I can find something.’
He inclined his head slightly, and she jumped on it as agreement, motioning for him to follow her. Down in the sitting parlour, Csilla stared at the tarnished bell chains, her hand half-raised to pull. It was so early that even though there were likely servants up, they were also likely busy.
‘That one should call the kitchen,’ Ilan said, pointing to the right-most chain, ‘if it’s like most other houses.’ He didn’t meet her eyes as he said it.
There was no reason for embarrassment; it wasn’t surprising he spent time in well-off homes. Everyone sinned; it was just a matter of which sins you could afford and how you bought back your Brilliance.
Csilla grimaced and pulled. Within a few minutes, a maid came to the door, her breath huffing and kitchen cap askew. A smudge of white flour on her chin and egg yolk on her sleeve showed how they’d interrupted the breakfast preparation.
‘Yes?’ She caught her breath and bowed slightly, though there was well-deserved annoyance in her eyes.
‘Could you bring us something?’ Ilan interrupted before the woman could ask why she was being called. ‘Water, at least.’
The woman gestured to her dusted state. ‘I’ve just got to baking, but I can find something I’m sure . . .’
‘Please do,’ Ilan said, turning to the low lounge.
‘Thank you!’ Csilla called after.
Ilan was already sitting, one foot resting on his knee and looking strangely at home despite the incongruity of his plain cassock against wine-dark velvet. Csilla settled across from him, arranging her skirts.
‘Did you grow up with servants?’ she asked. He did have a certain commanding air.
His narrowed eyes told her he wasn’t going to answer. She sighed.
‘Inquisitor,’ she squared her shoulders, trying to appear like the lady she wasn’t, ‘if we can’t speak to each other, we won’t be able to work together.
’ He’d seemed, if not kind, at least tolerant when he’d come to her rescue, and when they’d spoken in the library.
But clearly that had only been a measure of professional respect when he still thought her a fellow servant of the Church.
‘We can certainly speak to each other,’ he said, ‘about things that matter.’
She swallowed down another attempt to be conciliatory. No one could say she hadn’t attempted to show him graciousness.
The door opened again and the servant reappeared with a tray with two cups of tea steeped to burnt umber, day-old hard bread with crumbling cheese and brown-speckled potato she hadn’t bothered slicing evenly.
‘This is all I could manage. Breakfast won’t be for hours, I really apologise—’
‘It’s fine.’ Ilan picked up the teacup and inspected the dark tea, tilting the cup so the liquid rested just under the lip.
‘Thank you,’ Csilla said again on behalf of both of them. Regardless of what the maid had said about the food, the tea was hot, and that was what mattered. Csilla took an encouraging sip; if he was drinking, he would have to stop staring at her so frankly.
He set it back in his saucer. ‘I still have questions.’
‘I can’t tell you much about the murders.’ Her voice dropped away from any chance-listening ears. ‘We haven’t gotten much ourselves.’
And if it was other information he was after, at least the Izir might be able to explain his ideas in a way that wouldn’t get them both thrown out of the city with lash-marked backs.
He uncrossed his legs and leaned forward, and Csilla stiffened as the distance between them closed.
‘I want to know why you’re working with a heretic. You’re strange, but never trouble. ágnes spoke highly of you. Your work was commendable. That’s why I was surprised when you seemed to be straying.’
And why he’d defended her to Prelate Abe. ‘You asked about me?’
Few in the Church thought of her at all unless they needed extra hands for something particularly unappealing.
‘I didn’t have to. You were one of the first things they told me about when I took my post in Silgard. A soulless girl is quite the theological question.’
He was studying her now, as if there were some sign he’d missed that manifested the reason for her difference. She bit her lip at the idea that he’d been watching her all along.
‘And you didn’t do anything?’ Surely any consideration merited a personal discussion of the very soulless girl involved. ‘You could have spoken to me yourself.’
He took a slow sip of tea. ‘By the time I came the question had already been debated to death and they’d judged you no threat to the Faith. Unlike the Izir.’
‘No threat’ must have been the kindest thing the Prelate had ever thought about her. ‘He’s no longer preaching heresy.’
‘And I’m to believe he’s dropped it? Or that you believe that? Why is it so important that you be the one to save the city?’