“Fiery Shemesh!” cursed Uncle, his voice tingling with suppressed fury—and fear. “You’re from Four Moons House. A magister from the Diarisso lineage.”
A cold mage in our house! Behind Shiffa’s back, we skated soundlessly across to the foot of the upper stairs.
“Did you not get the message I was meant to arrive today?” His words and accent were cultured and elegant, yet his indignation soured them. It was almost enough to make my straight hair curl.
“We received no message, no warning.” The tight way Aunt Tilly choked out the words really frightened me. The house vibrated with sympathetic anger. “You can’t possibly still maintain you have a claim.”
“Indeed, we can and we do. The contract clearly states that Diarisso ownership extends until the twentieth birthday. Ownership reverts to the Hassi Barahal family only at sunset on the evening that begins the natal day, when the subject attains her legal majority.”
Bee tugged on my wrist, having more self-possession than I did. We set foot on the stairs, creeping toward the next floor.
“I believe the proper legal term is rei vindicatio,” he went on. “I am here to reclaim ownership of what you have been generously allowed to keep possession of.”
There was a man whose pretensions wanted slapping down! How he could make those words come out with such condescension was beyond my understanding. We kept climbing, working around the boards that creaked.
“You’ll have to come back tomorrow,” said Aunt even more briskly, “because she’s not here.”
We stopped, Bee and I. We just stopped, as though an unseen hand with fingers of ice had fastened itself on our shoulders and pulled us to a halt.
“I understand you may not be in charity with the terms of the settlement that were forced upon you thirteen years ago, but please do not attempt another bald-faced lie. I know she is in the house. In fact—”
I heard an even tread mounting the grand staircase. A chill mist exhaled from the surface of the mirror. Bee was ahead of me, farther up the stairs, so I braced myself, hoping my body would hide hers. For on the very first day I had come to live with Aunt and Uncle, Aunt had solemnly told me that I was to look out for my little cousin Beatrice, even though Bee was only two months younger than I was and already, at six, a complete hellhound with a temper just as bad as Uncle’s and a mean sting that she hid behind her honey face.
You know we love you for yourself, Cat. You’re never to think otherwise. This is your home now. But I lay this charge on you, that you must protect Bee, if there comes a time when she needs your protection.
Right now, with that Four Moons personage and his powerful magic climbing the stairs, with the mist rising, I was certain those words had been meant for this day out of all days.
Shiffa took a step back from the railing and raised her hands theatrically, like a dido sighting her warrior hero onstage. “Blessed Tanit! Such a good-looking young man!”
He marched into view, framed by the fading gold wallpaper on one side and the polished black balustrade on the other.
He wasn’t as handsome as he clearly thought himself to be. He was just well turned out, nothing you wouldn’t expect from a pampered son of Four Moons House. Also, he was much younger than I had taken him for from his voice.
When he spotted me, his eyes widened as if he were astonished, likely by the regrettable dullness of my soberly unfashionable dress. I shoved Bee up another step, hoping she would bolt for the door to the attic, and I took each step down with a drawn-out measure worthy, I am sure, of the great principessas of the theater.
“Yes, Aunt! I’m coming,” I said brightly. “I do apologize for taking so long to dress. You know how I’ve been wanting to attend a lecture as engrossing as one on the principles of aerostasis! Especially since we just this morning were fortunate enough to listen to a lengthy lecture on aerostatic aircraft by the very same esteemed professor we are engaged to hear tonight. Perhaps it will prove to be exactly the same lecture delivered verbatim! I can’t believe that it’s finally time to leave. Oh! I beg your pardon, Magister. We haven’t been introduced.”
We hit the first-floor landing at the same time, he coming up and I coming down. He said, “Don’t try your luck at the theater, maestressa. You may have the looks, but you don’t have the skill.”
He had a mustache and a beard trimmed tight along the line of his jaw, and he kept his hair cropped short against his dark head in the manner of professional boxers. It was the kind of style you saw in paintings brought to life fifty years ago when the scions of the House had ruled fashion. There was something very bad about a young man who dressed in such an old-fashioned and overdone style and who had such a particular way of looking down his nose at a well-brought-up girl whose lineage was acceptable in polite company, even if her family could not move in elite circles because of a few problems with money.