The Fade

36

I never was very domestic, but I liked to try. Every so often I was seized by the urge to be like a storybook mother, the kind of strange being that relished cleaning and cooking and ensuring that the cupboards were full. The urge never lasted long, and usually ended in a vague suspicion that I was the victim of some vast conspiracy, that these people only pretended to enjoy their lives in order to fool me into copying them. I just didn't have the temperament. It all seemed so pointless.

But still the urge would come back, and when I awoke this particular turn I was seized by a feeling of immense gratitude towards my husband and son, for no other reason than that they existed. In thanks, I would make them an elaborate breakfast. Just because.

Rynn ambled dozily out of the bedroom to find me cursing at the stove, surrounded by piles of chopped spores and attending to several spitting pans. He wandered over to the huge round window that dominated our living-space, yawned and scratched himself as he looked out over the Tangles from our vantage point high up in the Caracassa Mansions. His little routine. Then he came over to me, slid his arms around me from behind, and all my frustration faded away for a moment as I melted into him with a murmur of pleasure.

'Smells like another disaster,' he rumbled in my ear, voice deep from sleep.

It was a risky ploy, but this time it made me smile.

'You'll shut up and like it,' I replied, turning to kiss his grizzled cheek.

He gave me a squeeze and disengaged. 'Make me extra. I don't know when I'll get to eat this turn.'

'Your will is my purpose,' I said, with a flourish.

'That's the spirit, wife!'

Any reply I might have made was forestalled by a particularly violent eruption of oil from one of the pans, making me flinch and suck my breath in through my teeth.

'Watch that pan,' Rynn said helpfully as he slumped down on the settee. He wiped the back of his hand across his eyes and groaned. Waking up was a dreadful experience for him. It took him most of the turn to get over it.

I went back to my cooking. Voids, how did people find satisfaction in this?

'When do you have to go?'

'On the tenhour. They'll pick me up out front.'

'You have any idea how long?'

He made a negative grunt. It was a stupid question anyway; he would be as long as it took. He'd only received the message late last turn. The usual thing: Clan Caracassa requires your services. This time he was acting as an escort for a trainload of medical supplies heading for the Borderlands. That was as much as either of us knew. No doubt there would be several other Cadre on board. Maybe it would be a straight there-and-back job, or maybe it was a cover to move them to the front so they could be employed on some secret mission or another. We both knew the score. It wasn't our place to question.

In two turns' time I was also being sent away, and I hadn't even been told my destination yet. They just said I was needed. Clan Caracassa requires your services.

'I'll square it with the minder before I leave,' I said, and felt suddenly sad. It took some of the momentum out of my temporary drive towards good motherhood. The Clan provided somebody to look after Jai while we were away, of course; but I worried that his solitary, introverted nature was our fault. So much of his life was spent under the care of nannies and minders. Would he have been more vivacious, more playful, a happier child if his parents had always been around? Or would he have turned out this way no matter what?

'There's another one of your little notes here,' Rynn said, as I tipped a pile of diced mushrooms into some egg mixture. Perhaps it was just weariness, but I thought I heard a slightly disparaging edge to his voice.

I walked over and took it from his outstretched hand. 'Found it behind one of the cushions.' he said. He wasn't looking at me.

I returned to the stove and read it while watching the breakfast with half an eye. The content was fairly banal: a short summary of what Jai had done at school the previous turn. But the real message was hidden inside. It was written in code. Our code, the secret language that existed between Jai and I. I had a dream last turn. I was in a battle. I was fighting the White-skins. There were explosions and shard-cannons. I was scared and I hid in a hole, but the White-skins were coming. Then a moth came, but the moth was you. And you said something, but it didn't mean anything. Then I realised you were talking in our code. And you said you were always with me, but you were being blown away by the wind and you couldn't stay, so in the end you weren't with me at all. I read the note again while the omelette stiffened in the pan. No telling how long ago he'd written it. I couldn't remember the last time I'd looked behind the cushions of the settee. But then, I did recall one morning when he'd woken up agitated and more distant than usual. He wouldn't talk about it then. Perhaps this was the reason.

He'd taught me the code on the condition of absolute secrecy. Of course I agreed to his terms. I was pleased that he wanted to share this with me alone. It made me feel special to be singled out this way, and proud that he had come up with something so clever. It was an impressively complex system for a twelve-year-old to devise.

Ever since, we had been leaving notes for each other around our chambers. Usually they were entirely pointless, phrases and poems and little stories that meant nothing out of context. As we got better, the notes got longer, and so did the coded messages beneath.

At first they were simple phrases, created only for the satisfaction of having the other decode them: How are you this turn?; My name is Jai, what's yours?; There is a hole in my shirt. Please fix it. Later, we actually started to make meaningful communications through the notes. He would write long letters about things he wouldn't say verbally. As if the medium of code had opened a channel through the defences he had erected around himself. There's a girl in my class I really like…

Rynn had asked about the notes, of course, but I told him they were just a game we were playing. He wasn't convinced. He pretended not to be bothered by it, but I could see he felt annoyed at being excluded. He felt he was being laughed at, perhaps.

It gave me a small and uncharitable sense of triumph to see his reaction. Cheap, but there all the same. Maybe if he'd been more understanding with Jai when he was ten, he wouldn't be shut out of our son's inner world now he was twelve.

It was only natural that Jai should choose me for his partner in this. I had always been the one who encouraged his inventiveness, whereas Rynn had barely praised him at all these past two years, since he failed the Cadre tests.

Jai came out of his bedroom as I was dishing out breakfast, arranging it so as to best conceal the burnt bits. Mushroom omelette, roasted sporebread, kebab of black bat, and a bowl of spicy stew. A jug of sugar water stood in the middle of the table, and three ceramic mugs. I'd done my best, but somehow the result still ended up far less impressive than it had in my imagination. Once again, I had decided that this perfect domestic wife act just wasn't for me.

'Ah! He emerges!' Rynn grinned. It was meant to be a bluff greeting, but Jai took it as a dig. It was the kind of misunderstanding that was becoming more and more frequent between them.

'It's not that late,' he said, looking at the brass clock on the wall.

'Come and sit down,' I told him, with a smile. The sight of him in his morning robe, dark hair in disarray, brought back a surge of that grateful warmth which had inspired me to cook in the first place.

He took his seat. Rynn had already begun to eat. He had quite an appetite, and he wasn't fussy. I loved that about him.

'Your father has to go away again,' I said as I sat down. Jai was loading up his plate. He paused, looked inquiringly at Rynn.

'That's right,' Rynn said, between forkfuls. Then he slapped Jai on the shoulder. 'But you're a young man now, eh? You'll cope.'

I caught the wince that crossed our son's face, before his expression fixed into the reassuringly grave frown of a boy acting a role beyond his years. 'Of course. It'll be, what, a few weeks? Voids, I'll be fine.'

'Don't curse.'

'Sorry.'

'I'm sure it won't be that long,' I said. 'One of us will be back pretty soon, I bet.'

He gave me a quick little smile. It's alright, Mother. But the smile didn't reach his eyes. He couldn't quite hide the disappointment.

I watched the two of them as they ate. Rynn oblivious, comfortable with the silence. He never spoke unless he had something to say. But Jai was all coiled up, wanting to speak but not daring to, knowing that he wouldn't be understood. He was palpably awkward around his father, and I suffered when I saw him that way almost as much as he did. He was so desperate for the approval that had been withdrawn from him, but he didn't know how to get it back. Just being near Rynn was torment, and yet being away from him was worse, because then there was no possibility at all of redemption.

Rynn was only aware of it because I'd told him. But he didn't know what to do, either. Jai was too smart to fall for false compliments or feigned encouragement. Rynn was too honest to give them. Jai couldn't deny that his truest desire was to be an inventor, not a warrior. Rynn couldn't deny that his son – the only child we would ever have – didn't match the image of manhood that he'd dreamed of. Between the two of them, they were at a stalemate.

Jai took a breath to speak, but he was interrupted by a frantic rapping at the door.

'It's Liss,' he said. Rynn groaned.

I got up, knowing that Jai had guessed right. The second barrage of hammering proved it. Nobody else ever assaulted our door with that kind of agitation.

'What's that woman want now?' Rynn said.

I cast him a sharp look. Don't disrespect our masters in front of our son. He fell to his plate again, grumbling. 'More trouble than it's worth knowing those two,' he muttered around a mouthful of omelette. He'd long forgotten that the only reason we had a son at all was because of the twins.

I opened the door and Liss threw herself into my arms, wailing. She was in a particularly flamboyant fashion phase, her thin frame swathed in layers of bright colours and her hair dyed green and orange. Thick red and yellow makeup had run down her cheeks.

'Hello, Liss,' Rynn said, deadpan, as if her melodramatic entrance was the most normal thing in the world. Jai suppressed a laugh.

Liss threw him a haughty look, sniffed, and wiped her eyes, smearing her makeup further. 'Let's go elsewhere,' she hissed. 'I have a deadly and terrible secret!'

I was worried about her, a little; but this last line, delivered with absolute seriousness, almost made me crack up. I turned it into a cough instead. She was so ridiculous sometimes, it was easy to forget how dangerous it was to offend her.

I didn't need to ask where Casta was. Liss was only ever seen alone when Casta disappeared on one of her periodic absences. The abandoned twin was more than usually woeful and lachrymose during those times, but she was doubly excitable when Casta returned.

'We're having breakfast,' I told her, though the protest had little force. As a Bondswoman, I was at her beck and call. I was just hoping she'd understand and put her own crises aside for a moment.

She didn't. 'Never mind them. Come on! There are lives at stake!' She took my hand and tugged me towards the corridor outside.

'I'll see you when I get back, then,' Rynn said. Cold.

I was suddenly angry at him. What right did he have to take that tone? As if I was responsible for Liss's shitty timing. As if I had ruined things.

But I knew what he was thinking. He disapproved of my friendship with the twins. He thought I should have made an effort to distance myself from them. And this was the result. Hence, my fault.

I didn't trouble to reply. I'd only have said something snappy. It hurt me to leave this way. We were both passionate people, and that meant we had our arguments; but we always resolved them before we went to bed. Now I would be replaying that last comment over and over the whole time we were apart, constructing arguments, imagining what I'd say when we next met. I should have just been able to forget it, but I never could. I hated the idea that he'd scored a point on me without giving me the chance to defend myself.

And what was worse, I hated the idea that he might die with this faint thread of poison hanging between us. If he was to die, I wanted it to be with the absolute certainty that I loved him.

I followed Liss out into the corridor, glaring at her back. The good mood I had woken up with had soured. I felt a failure as a mother and as a wife.

This had better be good, Liss.

I tried to ask her what was wrong, hoping to get it over with quickly so I could get back to my family. She hushed me. 'Too many ears and eyes,' she said, and wouldn't be drawn further.

She took me high up into the Mansions, to her chambers, blind to my obvious impatience. The twins' rooms were embarrassingly opulent but messy, an uneasy fusion of Liss's extravagance and Casta's more restrained personality. She led me by the hand past the door guards, through the reception rooms with their gaudy curtains and pools stocked with bright fish and eels, into the bedroom where the twins slept.

The enormous bed was in disarray, and Liss's clothes were draped over any place that would serve as a hook or a hanger. Casta's influence was evident in the carefully organised ornamental figurines that populated the bedside table and window sills. Shinestone lamps of coloured glass gave the place a cosy ambience, although there was still a faintly creepy tinge to the room. Something to do with the idea of the two of them sleeping together.

Liss threw herself down on the bed and I perched next to her. 'So tell me,' I said. I could still catch Rynn outside the Mansions if Liss's latest problem could be dealt with quickly.

She rolled onto her side and gazed at me hard. 'I received a letter,' she breathed.

'And?' I was annoyed, and it slipped into my tone.

'You're not listening to me!' she snapped, and then her head slumped down on the bed and she sulked. 'You don't care.'

I took a steadying breath, composed myself. Being thorny wouldn't help my cause. Better to just go with it. 'Forgive me,' I said. 'I didn't mean to be curt. I just have a lot on my mind.'

'You hate me,' Liss accused, lip trembling.

'No, I love you,' I said, stroking her hair. It was hard to stay mad when she looked so pathetic. 'We're friends, aren't we? Aren't I the one you come to when Casta's away?'

Liss sniffled and nodded. She was like a child: infuriating, selfish, but ultimately innocent. She didn't think about other people; it wasn't in her nature. She didn't know any better.

'Tell me what was in the letter.'

Suddenly animated, she flung herself upright and drew out the letter from inside her dress. She presented it to me proudly.

'I have a suitor!' she declared.

I blinked. This was the cause of the tears? She certainly didn't seem too sad about it now. I took the letter.

'Open it!' she said. 'It's from Thulia Iolo. He says he wishes the pleasure of my company at his mansion in the Rainlands!'

'Well, that's good,' I said, reading. I looked up. 'Isn't it?'

'Yes! He loves me, he loves me! And I love him!'

'You do? Have you met him?'

Liss waved that away. 'When two people are meant to be together, they just know.'

'He's certainly a rich man,' I mused. 'Good political match. I can't see Ledo objecting.' I managed a smile. 'I'm happy for you, Liss.'

Her face clouded with dread. 'Oh, but you don't know, you don't know. You don't know how Casta gets.'

'How does she get?'

'Murderous! Murderous angry!'

'She doesn't know?'

'No! No, no, no! How could I tell her?' She was pacing around the room now, agitated. She opened the door and peeked out in case Casta should be listening. Once certain that we couldn't be overheard, she became courageous. 'And why should I? She goes away and never tells me why, but what about me? If I want to go away, she forbids it! If I want to have a husband, she says she'll do terrible things! Just because she hasn't got a suitor. Who could love her?'

She cringed and then ran to me, clutching me for protection. She'd gone too far and was afraid that her sister would somehow know. 'I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I didn't mean that. You know I didn't mean that, don't you?'

'I know you love your sister,' I reassured her. 'And she does, too.'

'Where does she go, when she goes away?'

'Perhaps she's looking after Clan business. After all, if something should happen to Ledo, she'll become Magnate.'

Liss snarled. 'She always acts the older sister. Older by a few minutes! That's all! If I'd come out first it would have been different!' Then she became maudlin. 'She doesn't keep any secrets from me. Not from me. Only this.'

'Will you go to the Rainlands, do you think?'

She nodded. 'I'm ruled by my heart, Orna. Nobody understands the love that I feel. I'm helpless in its grasp.'

'And will you tell your sister?'

'Never!'

But I knew she would. Liss was too weak-willed to keep a secret from Casta. I wondered if Liss's fears about her sister were founded in anything factual, or if she was just overreacting. Certainly, Casta was possessive. But dangerously so? Who could say?

Thulia Iolo was either very brave or very ill-informed.

Then Liss was away on another tack, rhapsodising about how she felt like a woman at last, now that she was the object of a great man's affection. My hopes of seeing Rynn before he left dwindled to nothing. I settled in and resigned myself to a long session of counselling. The needs of a Bondswoman were secondary to the needs of her masters and mistresses.

Once, my life had been simple. So very long ago. Once there had been a farm, a mother who cooked wonderful meals and a father who was invincible and would never let anybody hurt me. Once we told tales by firelight and I didn't have a care beyond what games I would play with my little brother. Once the White-skins were only a story to frighten children into obeying their parents.

I wanted those times back. I wanted a world that was straightforward and clean, a world where I didn't have to kill anyone and nobody tried to kill me and I could be a mother to my son and a wife to my husband.

But that world, if it existed, had passed far beyond my reach.