Chapter 6 The Boathouse
THE BOATHOUSE
LIZZY
I watched Darcy pull his chair closer to Emma. She listened seriously as he explained, her hazel eyes wide, her elbows hugging her sides from her chill. A damp handkerchief twisted in her hands.
Harriet and Georgiana had helped her into the house, where she shrank onto a sofa. A few hours earlier, Emma had met us at Chathford House with an exuberant smile. Now, she was compressed, a shivering, frightened woman.
Harriet sat at her left, her pretty features screwed up in determined support.
Georgiana sat on her other side, occasionally quieting Emma’s restless hands with a touch of her finger.
Outside, I had felt Georgiana’s power rise—the great wyfe of song ordering whatever forces governed the world of draca.
More than emotional support passed between them.
When I touched Emma outside, she cringed and cried out. So, I stood on the far side of the sitting room. Mary stood beside me, her arms locked across her breast.
I wondered about the painting. The image of Queen Mary’s dagger had felt unpleasant—a murky chill through my hand. And dissatisfying, like a hint of flavor too faint to name. That was when Emma fled.
Emma’s shoulders rose and fell. Her voice strengthened enough to cross the room. “What do you mean, ‘great wyfe’?”
Darcy frowned, his black eyebrows drawn.
He was always more handsome when intense.
“Throughout history, wyves have risen with powerful affinity to draca. The Scots have the most recent account, but even that is centuries old. Their songs name the three great wyves. From your sensitivities, I believe you are the great wyfe of healing.”
He recited:
“To sound our claim,
the three wyves came:
Of healing, wise.
Of song, who cries.
Of war. Arise.”
I nudged Mary’s stiff elbow and whispered, “He told me the same verse. Then I accused him of attempting to collect a set of great wyves—his mother, his sister, and me. That was when I refused his first proposal.”
“They have their set,” Mary said. Her tone was caustic. “Lady Anne Darcy, the beloved and mourned mother, will be played by tragic Emma Woodhouse wearing tear-soaked silk.”
I turned and studied Mary until, reluctantly, she met my gaze.
“Why do you dislike her?” I said. “I should be the one irritated. It is my husband obsessing over her.”
“Her relationship with Harriet is arrogant. Dangerous for Harriet.”
“They seem good friends to me.” Mary’s lips thinned, so I added, “Georgiana likes her.”
Mary made a sound low in her throat, like a small bird trapped and fluttering. Finally, she whispered, “I am mundane.”
I remembered Mary upset and ignored at a ball, long ago.
It seemed another world. “That is ridiculous. Did you not see the ladies at your salon? They mimic your clothes. They straighten their hair. They even call themselves ‘Marys’! One morning, I will butter my toast and spot you leading a parade of black-clad Marys to tear down the patriarchy.”
Mary gave a hollow laugh. “They are debutantes playing at rebellion.”
I pressed her elbow with mine. “Mary. What is wrong?”
“I… it cannot be spoken. I cannot.”
“Will you tell me later?” When she did not answer, I added, “I will return soon. I wish to examine the boathouse. For the school.” Mary gave one puzzled blink before I slipped out of the room.
While I sped down the hall, I wondered why I was not worried by Darcy’s attention to Emma. I had comforted wyves infuriated or frightened by wandering husbands. Reprehensible behavior was terribly common in London.
Part of my faith was simple trust. I could visit Longbourn and leave Darcy and Emma at Chathford without a thought. Darcy’s character—his life—was a construct of honor. It made him rigid at times, but there were benefits.
And we were in love. Passionately, as I was gathering from the delicate curiosity of other, possibly envious, wyves. I remembered our trip in the coach, and the shell of my ear heated.
The cook, a stick-thin woman kneading dough and dabbed head to toe with flour, met me with a bob. My feet had retraced Emma’s flight to the kitchen. I lit a lamp and walked into the night.
Each breath became a puff of cloud. I had brought no coat, and the cold felt glorious.
I lifted my free hand to the sky, a slick of perspiration cooling my wrist. The stars were obscured, but it was not utterly dark.
The house windows glowed, and a third of the sky glistened palely—moonlight scattered through unfallen snow.
The boathouse was a void in the watery reflections of lights from the far shore. A snow-dusted path led to a buckled door. It opened with a hard shove from my shoulder.
The interior was long and empty, the roof beams shadows fifteen feet above my head.
Four carriages could have fit along the length.
The floor was packed clay. At the far end, a ramp descended to lapping water.
A wooden gate on ropes and pulleys closed the river entrance, the gate’s bottom a foot or two above the water’s surface.
Darcy had mentioned a disreputable history under a prior owner—smuggling of some sort. That had given me an idea.
I set the lamp on a shelf and turned the flame high, then closed my eyes. I inhaled and emptied my lungs. Petty distractions faded from my mind.
The world of draca opened. The tyke’s awareness was a spark of bubbling energy in the house behind me.
In front of me, the Thames was dark. I had wondered about that, as draca live half their lives in a fish-like form.
Perhaps this part of the Thames was fouled with waste.
On land, feral draca preferred the country; they did not roam London like stray cats. Water-borne draca might be the same.
For all that binding was a linchpin of social standing, most wyves considered their bound draca to be no more than a permanent, dangerous, and rather disengaged pet.
However, I was a great wyfe. I could sense draca minds over a large distance.
Most of London. But in the intensity of the salon, I had done something I thought impossible.
I had spoken with Yuánchi while he was at Pemberley, two days’ travel by coach.
My binding to Yuánchi was a silver thread vanishing to the north. I focused on it and cast my mind outward.
Do you hear me?
There was no sense of connection. But the remnants of Georgiana’s song lingered, melody visible as shifting, interleaved colors. The tones sang, clarifying my thoughts.
Do you hear me? I tried again, and the words were tuned and harmonious.
You are far. Yuánchi’s silent response rumbled in my mind like distant thunder.
I am in London. And you are at Pemberley. How remarkable.
I left Pemberley.
“What?” I said aloud.
You were in danger, so I wished to be closer. I crossed half the distance. No one saw. It has been miserably wet. I flew above the clouds.
Well, I could hardly scold him given why I was here. My principal danger is frustration. I met the War Secretary today. He is an irritating man.
You go to war. Yuánchi’s tone was tense.
What? No.
There was no response.
The chill had penetrated my skin. I rubbed my hands, then thought, He cannot command us. But I miss you. Perhaps you can visit while I argue sense into his head. I have found an empty boathouse. Would you fit?
Fit inside a house? Yuánchi’s tone was amused. I imagined the huffing snort he used for laughter.
It is more a hall than a house. At least twenty yards long. The response was puzzlement. A dragon did not measure yards. But Georgiana’s power still hummed, strengthening my own. I can see through your eyes when you let me. Can you see through mine?
I have never done that. With any wyfe.
Try, I thought.
I opened my eyes. The lantern’s flame was sharply bright, the boathouse a flickering cavern that faded to black by the water. I threw my mind open, like throwing my arms wide for an embrace.
Something caught hold. My interest tugged, making me look up at the rafters, then down at the floor. It was not unpleasant, but it was… strange.
I see. Yuánchi’s thought was astonished. Then it became concerned. It is blurry. What is wrong with your eyes?
I laughed. My eyes are quite healthy. This is how humans see. Our eyes are inferior to draca.
Your sight is dim as well. Show me the length.
I picked up the lantern and walked to the far end.
It is long enough, he mused. I could turn without dipping my tail.
An important consideration, I agreed.
It would be comfortable, for a time. I would like to be near. Shall I come?
Draca saw perfectly well in the dark. He could fly here before dawn. A dragon in the center of London.
I must make preparations, I thought. There is more to comfort than a dry tail. Food. You cannot hunt deer. I nibbled my lip. I suppose I should ask Darcy as well.
After all, trust went both ways. This seemed the sort of thing a wyfe would discuss with her husband.
He will do what you wish, Yuánchi thought. You are a great wyfe.
I crouched down by the water, considering. Yuánchi might hide for a few days, but not forever. Revealing a dragon would shake the world. Would the Council’s desire to use Yuánchi rise or fall? Perhaps publicity would intimidate the French. End their experiments with draca.
Yuánchi’s curiosity tugged my eyes to the smeared lights reflecting under the gate. I was not sure how long he had slept at the bottom of Pemberley lake, but it was many centuries. Even the Scottish legends did not include a dragon. What would he think of London? Had he ever seen a city?
I swept a fingertip through the frigid water, shattering the city’s light to sparks.
My vision turned black. I plunged to another world.
I knelt in a long silk robe beside a river as deep and ponderous as a lake. The night air was sticky-hot. The shore was tepid mud, soaking the delicate cloth under my knees.
My fingers, bronze-skinned and shriveled with age, nudged a paper lantern into the current. The paper was brushed with symbols in a Far Eastern script, but I knew them: the names of my husband, and my son, and my son’s family.
This was how I mourned.
The lantern spun downstream, attracting fluttering moths. A fish rose, and the candle wobbled. Behind me, the executioner stood with his sword held high, waiting to end my duty as a noble wife.
But the words of acquiescence stuck in my throat. They were caught on my anger. Treachery had killed my family. Only the perversity of respect postponed my death, an old woman disempowered and unthreatening. Unable to exact justice.
A silver thread tore through my heart. Fury.
The river exploded in mist and spray. A shadow rose, dark as char and black as pitch. Huge enough to enfold the world. Violent as the fall of an iron hammer.
I was crouched in the boathouse, my fingers sunk in freezing mud.
“What happened?” I gasped.
I am coming to you.
“No. Wait.”
I saw. I am coming. I will not wait. Yuánchi’s thoughts were inhumanly potent, piling in my mind like a fall of boulders. My vision flickered. I saw forest streaking below, lit in the peculiar violet that draca saw under a night sky.
“What did I see?” I said aloud.
It is old. The memory of a first wyfe binding. But I do not know her.
Old? Yuánchi called nothing old. Not the gnarled oaks. Not even the druids’ ruins. “Should you know her?”
I know the first wyfe I bound. This is another.
“Then how do I remember?”
I sensed rushing wind. Who was with you, before? A great wyfe touched me.
“Georgiana?” I said. Foolishly. I knew that was not the answer.
I know the wyfe of song. It was another… Yuánchi sounded wistful.
“Her name is Emma.”
Silence. Speed.
“What did I see?” I said sharply. “Who did I see? You know more than you have said.”
You saw the binding of a first wyfe. The first wyfe of war.