Chapter Eighteen
The Reaching Vine
‘So called because of its organic, leaflike pattern, this stitch is often used to embellish edges and seams. It is not suitable for the decoration of Temple robes, as it lacks the necessary gravitas, but it can be used for clothing of other sorts.’
—An Exhaustive Compendium of Stitches
“Netta.”
I woke with a start. For a moment, I didn’t know where I was.
Mieka’s workshop? The Book Man’s? Milady’s mansion?
Images fluttered like shuffled playing cards.
No. Patrick, it was Patrick bending over me, holding a candle, his shirt hanging open to the waist, so close that I could feel the heat from his skin.
In the candlelight, his eyes looked almost unearthly.
I propped myself up on my elbows. My dyed Hair hung lank and lifeless down my back, a dead weight.
“What it is?” I murmured, still half submerged in my dream.
“He’s here.”
I nodded and groped for my cloak. Patrick passed it to me, and I shrugged it on over my clothes. I had not undressed the night before, knowing that we would be rising in the early hours.
“Ready?”
I tripped a little getting out of bed, and Patrick reached to steady me.
The little monk was waiting for us in the doorway, carrying a shuttered glim that cast only a small, focused light.
Patrick set his candle on a little table—we would have more than enough light without it.
The monk put a finger to his wet lips for silence.
We walked down the long corridor as quietly as possible, following the little monk.
It was odd, dreamlike. I was still half asleep, and our procession down the dark hallway mingled in my mind with the processions of the dead down the Corpse Roads.
I remembered the snaking line of embroidered figures traversing the great tapestry, shepherding their dead to their final resting place.
The light of the little glim the monk carried was a single yellow point in the darkness, barely illuminating anything, firefly-small.
I stumbled again, and Patrick took my hand, pulling me out of my reverie.
His hand was cool and firm; his many rings little points of sharpness and cold against my skin, like needle pricks. “Are you all right?”
“Yes. Just … not quite awake yet.”
“Are you sure?”
His face was very close to mine. Involuntarily, I remembered the Plaguenight kiss. My face burned, and I pulled my hand away.
“I’m sure.”
We had come to another door, which the monk unlocked, revealing shallow stone steps disappearing into darkness. A light breath of cold, stale air from below raised goosebumps on my arms. I could hear something dripping, far away, and smell wet stone.
“The wine cellar,” said the monk briefly, starting down the steps.
“Monks drink wine?” I asked.
He gave me an odd look. “Yes.”
We descended. It seemed like a very long way down, and we had to be careful where we placed our feet—the wine cellar had been hollowed out of the stone foundation of the monastery, and the surface was uneven.
Water dripped here and there from the ceiling above.
At last, the texture beneath my shoes changed from rock to the rasp of sand as we reached the cellar floor.
The monk swung his glim this way and that to show us the great barrels stacked high against all the walls.
“Clearly monks drink a great deal of wine,” Patrick murmured in my ear.
The monk bent down to open a trapdoor in the floor. It did not creak or shed any dust: Obviously this was used often.
“An old smuggling tunnel,” he said, almost apologetically. “We keep it very clean.”
“Oh. Good,” I said faintly, my heart pounding at the thought of that dark, cramped space. “Wouldn’t want it to be dusty.”
A hinged wooden ladder was folded under the trapdoor opening. The monk opened it up with a creak and clatter that sounded very loud in the silence, and then clambered down. Patrick followed, reaching up with an odd formality to help me down as well.
If it had been cold in the cellar, it was a hundred times colder down in the tunnel. It might have been clean, as the monk said, but it smelled ancient and dank.
“It’s not too far,” said the monk. The glim barely illuminated his face, but I could tell he was grinning. “We’re right under the scriptorium’s nose, so to speak.” He reached up and closed the trapdoor overhead, sealing us in. I felt a sick lurch of anxiety and grabbed at Patrick’s arm.
“It’s all right,” he said.
“I just don’t like small spaces.”
“Takes a bit of getting used to,” said the monk, who seemed quite cheerful and much more relaxed now that we had left the scriptorium itself.
I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d started whistling as we walked along.
“These tunnels have been here for hundreds of years. Used to be that every Temple had them underneath, and supposedly they’re all connected, but you’d be a fool to wander too far. ”
“The Corpse Roads again,” I murmured.
“What?” said the monk.
“Nothing.”
After a time, we came to a heavy door set in the side of the tunnel.
The monk knocked a complicated rhythm, announcing his presence, then took a key from his belt and unlocked it.
Inside was the scriptorium, but in miniature.
The same scents, even the incense; the same equipment; the same assortment of inks.
Here, however, there was much less organization.
Everything seemed jumbled, haphazard: jars, bottles, and crates everywhere.
I picked up one of the jars, peered into it, and almost dropped it when I realized what was inside.
“Patrick,” I hissed.
“What?”
“Teeth.”
Teeth of all sizes—infant and adult, animal and human. Yellow, white, and gray. Patrick made a face of distaste and took it from my hands. “Charming,” he said.
“We make use of … unconventional materials,” said someone over my shoulder. “The Temple doesn’t condone it, of course, but if you’re going to create something truly powerful … Well, the usual just won’t cut it.”
I turned and saw a young woman standing behind us.
She was tiny, perhaps a foot shorter than me, with brown skin and an abundance of hair, as if to make up for her stature—black with shimmers of red, like candlelight shining through a rich wine.
A thick, rigid apron covered her front, but the way she carried herself made it seem like a bespoke gown.
She pulled off her hide gloves and wiped her hands on it as she approached us.
“You’re a … monk?” I asked.
She grinned. “Do I look like a monk? No, I’m just a maker. The maker, down here. My name is Tamara.” She twitched back a curtain a little to reveal a small cot-bed and basin. “I live here. And work here. For certain trustworthy clients.”
“Like us?” I said.
“Enough money paid up front automatically makes you somewhat trustworthy,” she said cheerfully. “At least for the duration of the commission.”
“Money paid up front?” I murmured to Patrick, who just smiled. “You paid upstairs too, didn’t you, for the book we don’t really want them to make?”
He raised his eyebrows questioningly. “What of it?”
“Just how much money do you have?”
“Enough,” he said.
“So, what are you after?” said Tamara. She peered at me. “You’re a mage, aren’t you?”
I stammered something, and Tamara shrugged. “You don’t have to tell me. I have a knack for noticing it, though. When you’ve worked with enough of them, you recognize the tells. How can I help you folks? What kind of spellbook do you need?”
“There is a book we’re looking for, but it has already been made,” I said. “It passed through here, we think. We were looking for something more along the lines of … records. Information. Maybe letters?”
“Ah,” said Tamara, scratching her head. “Well, we can take a look, but I can’t promise anything. What’s the name?”
“Edevane. Margotte Edevane.”
She went over to a chest of drawers and starting rifling through it. “Records down here are a little … patchy, if you get my drift. Sometimes we’re paid to forget we made something. By the way, Brother Antony, any news from the surface? I haven’t been able to leave the workshop for a while.”
“Lordsmen attacked a band of Followers and killed their Priest!” said our little monk with ghoulish relish. I was starting to think he was a bit of a gossip.
Tamara’s pleasant face became shadowed and fearful.
“Followers? Do we know any names?
“I’m afraid not,” said the monk.
“I can’t believe it. Every time I hear news from up there, it gets worse and worse.
Attacks on Temples, riots in the cities, the king half dead …
and now the Followers! I used to be a Follower.
Well, my parents were. As soon as I was old enough, I got out of there …
But they’re good people. They don’t deserve that. ”
“Wait,” I said slowly. “Your name is Tamara?”
“Yes.”
“And your parents were Followers?”
“Yes …?”
“I think I may have met your sister,” I said. “She’s a Follower, too? Trained to be a Priest? I’m sorry, I don’t know her name. She said she had a sister who went to study at the school for bookmaking in Quell, and she hadn’t heard from her in over a year …”
Tears shone in Tamara’s eyes. She stepped forward and caught me in a hug before I realized what was happening. “You met Ivy!” she said. “I can’t believe you met Ivy. Did she look well?”
“Very well, and she seemed happy.”
“Wait.” The bookmaker looked suddenly panicked. “She wasn’t in the group of Followers that was attacked?”
“Oh! No, a different group, I’m sure. I met them far from where the attack took place, several days ago, and they weren’t headed in this direction.”
Tamara let out a breath. “That’s a relief. I may not have seen Ivy in a long time, but I think about her always. I didn’t mean to disappear, but in this line of work … Well, you have to, a little.”
Patrick smiled at her. “How does one get into the business of making books, as a …” He hesitated.