Beneath Ceaseless Skies #46 Read online

  Issue #46 • July 1, 2010

  “The Six Skills of Madame Lumiere,” by Marissa Lingen

  “The Isthmus Variation,” by Kris Millering

  For more stories and Audio Fiction Podcasts, visit

  http://beneath-ceaseless-skies.com/

  THE SIX SKILLS OF MADAME LUMIERE

  by Marissa Lingen

  1. Keys Without Locks

  Since Madame Lumiere’s passing, many tales are told about her skills. Most of them are false. I knew her as few others did. I know her secrets—some of her secrets. With Madame Lumiere, it was not so much what she could do as what else she could do with it. Not the sex, but the smile; not the contraband, but the government’s blessing; not the fairy magic, but the continuing human life afterwards.

  Whatever world you wanted to work in, Madame Lumiere could make it work for you. Underworld, Underhill—it didn’t matter.

  Of course, there was always the price.

  Most of her associates thought Sukey and I worked for Madame because she’d asked a price we couldn’t pay any other way. They were wrong; she would never have trusted one of her debtors as close to her as she trusted Sukey and me. We could have brought her down at any time. We probably would have, too, if not for love.

  Not love of her—loving Madame was about as pointless as loving a crystal chandelier. But we loved each other, and we loved the secrets. And we trusted Madame and each other, and that was more important than love.

  Sukey ran the house in those days—as she does now, but the profits went into Madame’s purse, not ours. We didn’t mind. Madame took good care of us. In those days, no one was quite sure what I did do, but they knew I did it all for Madame.

  In truth, I was the gatekeeper. A woman like Madame has a lot of use for a supernatural concierge, and I was a natural. No one ever mistook me for one of the girls of the house, with my cropped hair and my sensible shoes. I was safe. So when a man clutching his scarf to his nose to hide his face came up to my desk, I knew it might be tedious, but not in that particular way.

  “I have a friend in need of assistance,” he said.

  “In which room?” I said. “And is natural or supernatural assistance required?”

  “She isn’t here,” he said, dropping the scarf for long enough to look indignant. He was the middle son of a rather stuffy family in the city, the first of his house to visit Madame’s as far as I was aware, but we keep track of the lineages just in case. If any grandee or scion or fae noble had come to me, I would have known them without a formal introduction—although, of course, we pretend otherwise in situations where a formal introduction might be called for.

  “In that case, what do you expect me to do?”

  He faltered. “I was told—I was told that Madame Lumiere knows how to handle difficult cases.”

  “Difficult cases are the specialty of the house, but we really must have some idea what sort of difficult case we are discussing.” I eyed him sternly. “If you are looking to place a foundling, I must tell you that once you have done so, you may not—”

  “No! Nothing like that.”

  I raised an eyebrow, no less stern than before.

  “My cousin has been—put in a delicate situation. Not the kind that results in foundlings,” he hastened to add. “The kind that results in diplomatic difficulties. She needs to stay out of the eye of the public for the season. Certain parties may be tracking her movements if she leaves her home.”

  “Hmm,” I said.

  “The season ends in four days,” he said, looking suddenly less like a stuffy scion and more like a puppy.

  “It is part of my position here to have some idea when a season ends,” I said stiffly.

  “I beg your pardon.”

  “How old a cousin?”

  “I beg your pardon?” he repeated.

  “How old is your cousin?”

  “I can’t see how it—”

  “If you knew what mattered, you would not be here asking for my assistance, would you?”

  He looked still more abashed. “Twenty-three.”

  “Maiden?” When I asked it, I thought there was a good chance he would turn indignant on me again, but apparently he had decided he was asking for my help and might as well receive it. He simply murmured, “I expect so.”

  “Well enough. And you can bring her here, or did you want that to be part of the service as well?”

  “If you could fetch her,” he murmured. “Her name is Josine. Josine Valdecart.” He gave me her address also.

  My tact returned to me, or at least my delicacy. “Will she be expecting... persons of our situation?”

  “She knows that I am sending aid. She is no missish ninny. She will go if you come for her.”

  It would be well enough. I sent him off to wait in one of our parlors, guided by one of the bare-chested boys who were ubiquitous around Madame’s establishment. The customers were honor-bound to leave them be until they had hair on their chests, even sparse hair, and our charming Sukey turned into a shrieking harpy on any customer who forgot the rule, the more so on those who pretended to forget. Other customers proved willing to help her in her wrath. The boys were both sweet and decorative in their full silk trousers; even I was protective of them, and I was notorious for my hard heart.

  Oh yes. Even then, men spoke of Lucy Brown’s heart of steel. Not for me the heart of stone of ballads and tales; stone is not hard enough.

  But I was not particularly heartless with this man, though I had not yet determined whether he might deserve it. I would find that out when I found his cousin Josine. In the meantime I would have to figure out which of our staff would help me shift her, and with what tools.

  Madame’s keys open a great many things. Foremost they open locks that did not exist, or that only thought of existing. Josine Valdecart was in such a lock. It would be a matter for me of choosing the right key.

  * * *

  2. Fairy Vegetables

  Heretofore neglected in the discussions of our complicated relationship with the lands beyond are the fairy vegetables. Much has been said, by many, about the fairy fruits that tempt and change the children of man. Very little has been devoted to their more stolid cousins.

  And why not? Who, indeed, can wax poetic, breathless, with lips parted, on the fairy rutabaga? The fairy cabbage, while it will certainly change your soul, will also result in the sort of undignified personal emissions that its more earthy relation produces. Even the fairy cucumber is faintly eccentric, more odd than enchanting.

  And yet.

  And yet that same fairy carrot, the very same fairy turnip that seemed so uninspiring, carry with them at least the same power as the fairy peach, the fairy strawberry, the delicate fairy pomegranate seeds that were once so much trouble.

  If she was like other rich young ladies, Josine Valdecart would not know much about fairy vegetables, which was all to our benefit, for we could feed her enough of them to blur her identity while we moved her. The stuffy young man had claimed that his cousin was not a missish ninny, but given the outstanding magnitude of missish ninnies he had to compare her to, in his social situation... better safe than sorry. And better a willing girl than a balking one.

  Sukey and I put on very sedate striped morning suits, mine in blue and hers in cream, and went to call on Miss Josine Valdecart. I carried a parasol with a nasty blade in the handle and a handkerchief filled with useful herbs. Sukey carried a basket filled with cold meat pies made with fairy vegetables, so while we looked very respectable, we smelled a bit like a sidewalk vendor. The Valdecart housekeeper noticed when she admitted us. She did not sniff haughtily, but her nose twitched.

  Sukey put a g
loved hand on the woman’s arm. “We mean no harm to those who live within,” she said, “and if it is within our power we will do none.”

  “Nor to those who work within, either,” I said with a little glare at Sukey. We should never forget our roots so much as that. The distinction matters.

  The housekeeper gave both of us a bemused look. “Well, I thank you, and my lady certainly will too. Is that the reason for your visit? To express your goodwill?”

  “We were sent on this errand by a member of your lady’s family,” said Sukey.

  The housekeeper’s smile thinned. “How nice. It wasn’t my lady’s aunt, Mistress—”

  “A cousin,” I said. “A male cousin.”

  “Ah.”

  I took a chance. “A feckless male cousin.”

  She nearly smiled. “Ah yes. In that case.”

  The housekeeper ushered us into a parlor that had been recently and hastily redecorated. The materials were all the sorts of things purchased by people who are used to only the finest quality—we would not have scorned to have wallpaper by that maker in Madame’s house, though not, I think, in that sunshine-colored hue—but thrown together in something of a panic. Sukey sat down on the straw-colored divan. I chose a pale blue armchair and regretted it instantly: it was the sort of chair one put in a parlor to encourage importunate aunts to go home.

  I was glad to have the excuse to get up again when Miss Josine Valdecart entered. She was taller than Sukey, almost as tall as I am, and she wore her hair in a tidy brown knot in the back of her head. I looked down: sensible shoes, sturdy, durable. Always a good sign.

  “Miss Valdecart,” said Sukey. “Miss Brown and I are here to assist you. Our methods are not always orthodox, but I assure you we can effect your removal from the premises until persons of interest are no longer—”

  She fumbled for a word, and I supplied, “Interested. Just give her the pie, Sukey.” Sukey pulled it out of the hamper with a clean linen handkerchief and attempted to hand it over to Miss Valdecart.

  “I don’t think that’ll work,” said Miss Valdecart, eyeing the cold meat pie as though it was a hissing adder.

  “If your cousin thought you could get yourself out of this, he’d not have sent us,” I said tartly.

  “I suppose that’s true, although he is a bit dim,” she said, “but that’s only fairy vegetables, and it’s the Rust Lords who have taken an interest.”

  Sukey took a step back, taking the pie with her. We looked at each other. We must have looked a pretty pair of fools then, trying to addle the Rust Lords themselves with pies.

  “I’m sorry,” Miss Valdecart added humbly. “He means well. I don’t think he understands the gravity of the situation.”

  Sukey recovered quickly. “If he did not, he wouldn’t have delivered you to our keeping. We will get you away from the Rust Lords. The pies will not do, but our lady teaches us much that is useful in a crisis, and she expects us to use what we know.”

  The housekeeper spoke up. Miss Valdecart started, clearly having forgotten she was there. Sukey and I did not forget, but we did not expect what she said: ”I could eat one of the pies.”

  “Do you understand what we made them with?” Sukey asked gently.

  The housekeeper bobbed her head. “Madam, I have lived in this city from birth. I know a fairy vegetable when I smell one.”

  “And why would you eat of them?” I asked, less gently.

  “If I had one and left the house, some of the Rust Lords might follow the blurred trail, just to see whose it was. Then there would be fewer for you to deal with.”

  “Then we could make our escape to our lady’s house in the Underhill ways,” said Sukey. “Oh, brave soul. Well thought. I would ask if you knew what they might do to you if they caught you out, but as you say, you have lived here since your birth.”

  “I know them well enough,” said the housekeeper. “And I am a member of the Yoke and Nail. I am beyond their destruction.”

  “Brave soul,” I echoed, nearly against my will, for while that august society will keep a good servant from death at the hands of the great lords, it will not spare her torment.

  The housekeeper looked at Sukey and me first. “Tell your lady,” she said distinctly, “that the daughters of the ones who sewed for her last time will not forget.”

  I pursed my lips. Sukey said, “And she’ll know what that means?”

  “She will know.” The housekeeper turned to her mistress. “Miss Josine, child, follow the paths that these two show to you, and if you must choose between trusting them and trusting your cousin—chose them.”

  “But he—”

  The housekeeper sighed. “Will you believe that I know more of their world than you do?”

  “Yes,” said Miss Valdecart humbly.

  “Very good. Trust them.”

  “All right.”

  The housekeeper took the pie from Sukey. “The ones who sewed for her last time,” she repeated.

  “We will remember,” I said.

  She bit down, then smiled around the mouthful. “I had forgotten how good these are, how savory and fine.”

  “We do our best,” said Sukey.

  “And we pray that it will be good enough this time,” said the housekeeper, taking another bite. “Give me a quarter of an hour. Then go.”

  She left us without any fuss, though Miss Valdecart stretched a hand out wistfully after her. “Well,” said Miss Valdecart, “you may as well call me Josine, if you know of the Rust Lords. That, I should think, would be at least as good as a personal introduction.”

  “I am Sukey, and this is Lucy,” said Sukey. I nodded briefly.

  “Shall we take the back stairs?” asked Josine. “Or—there is a garden that—”

  “We will not need doors, my dear,” said Sukey, smiling kindly. “Not the way we’re going.”

  I didn’t have time for kind smiles, as I was already treading out the carpet to prepare a gate into the Underhill ways. In any case I often didn’t make the time for kind smiles even when there were not faerie realms to gently invade.

  * * *

  3. Underhill Ways

  Madame is quick from place to place. Madame knows. The places that will not lie still from one second to another make paths for her, smooth and easy and quiet, so quiet. The cave walls of the Underhill have the grain of wood, oak and kingwood, but they are not wood. The wood-like grain swirls and twists around us. Wood is kinder to human voices. Sukey and I have been known to sing on the paths, which makes them a little bumpier, just a little, but the bumps are much easier to bear than the quiet.

  On this occasion, we sang as cheerfully as we could manage, though the Underhill ways tend to twist our harmonies into something more melancholy. We are used to the sadness that comes of mortal feet in fairy lands, but I suspected Josine was not. Soon I had my suspicions confirmed.

  “I have never,” said Josine a bit breathlessly, “never, never been here before.”

  “I expect not,” I said.

  “How did you—I saw the glowing gate,” she said.

  “The gate of bone,” I supplied.

  “How did you get that to come to you?”

  I winced; she had hit the nail precisely on the head. I had not created a gate, I had summoned it, with my footsteps and my words and my will. But it, too, had a will, more of a will than I was comfortable with in something that was not supposed to be living, or not any more.

  So did the ground under my feet.

  “Madame teaches many things,” said Sukey, letting me off the hook for the moment. “It’s convenient for her if her assistants are able to act with substantial independence.”

  “How do your parents feel about that?” asked Josine.

  Then it was my turn to let Sukey off the hook. “We are not either of us in a circumstance where our parents have had a great deal of interest in our doings for some years now. Before we came to Madame’s service.”

  Josine shook her head wonderingly. “I hav
e been chaperoned every moment. Nearly every moment.” She scrambled over a hillock in the path, created by our conversation as the gentler bumps were by our singing. “I have barely been outside our own lands except in a carriage on the way to friends’ houses.”

  I held my hand up for silence, and Josine stopped talking without needing an explanation. I whistled down the path in the silence. The whistle came back almost right. Almost. I frowned. I couldn’t pinpoint quite what was wrong with it. I glanced back at Sukey, and she put an arm around Josine, able to guide her without noise. I whistled again. The echo sounded normal.

  I turned to them and shrugged. “I can’t find anything wrong right now. But a minute ago—there was something. I don’t know.”

  “Maybe best not to go home for a bit,” said Sukey.

  Staying Underhill had its risks. We were not alone there, and as well as Madame had taught us the Underhill ways, they could still warp around us. But on the other hand, if our ruse had not worked with the Rust Lords leaving the Valdecart home, better to find it out now than to be trapped Underhill surrounded by Rust Lords, or even by the more easily thwarted fairykind.

  I found a cavern where we could wait and shielded it against magic eyes. Its walls were pressurized carbon, and it glistened with moisture. Most people do not see caverns full of wet diamonds in their lifetimes. The Underhill ways are filled with many stranger things, and my first reaction was annoyance that we would have to sit on such a hard, wet surface or remain standing. But Josine’s eyes were wide, her lips slightly parted.

  “Like it, do you?” I asked.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said.

  “What did you do to anger the Rust Lords, a little homebody like you?” I continued.

  “They’re not angry,” she said softly, running a finger along the dripping gem and then wiping the water on the hem of her dress.

  “Then why are you running from them?”

  “They’re not angry,” she repeated, and for a moment I was about to demand that she answer my question. Then I saw the point.

  “They like you too well.”

  “Too well indeed,” said Josine.