I had told Merei my suspicions. I had told her how I believed the Dowager had accepted me for some mysterious reason, not because I held potential. And Merei had witnessed firsthand that second year I had struggled in music. She had sat beside me and tried to help coach me when Mistress Evelina seemed overwhelmed by how poorly I played. Never had a violin sounded like it wanted to die.
“Why didn’t he refuse me when I asked him to take me on as his arden?” I continued, scrubbing my face. “He should have said that three years was not enough time for me to master this. And if I had been smart, I should have chosen knowledge from the very beginning, when I was ten and had plenty of time to learn all these wretched lineages.” The blue paint was not coming off. I tossed the washcloth aside, feeling like I had peeled half of my face away, revealing the true bones of who I was: inept.
“Need I remind you, Bri, that Master Cartier hardly makes mistakes?”
I cast my gaze to the window, watching the rain streak as tears on the glass, knowing that she was right.
“Need I remind you that Master Cartier would not have accepted you as his arden if he thought for one moment that you could not passion?” She took my hand, to draw my attention back to her. She smiled, half of her curly black hair caught by a ribbon, the rest loose about her shoulders. “If Master Cartier believes you can passion in three years, then you can. And so you will.”
I squeezed her fingers in silent gratitude. And now it was my turn to ask after her passion. “How is your latest composition coming? I heard a bit from the Art Studio. . . .”
Merei dropped my fingers and groaned. I knew from the sound that she felt as I did . . . overwhelmed and worried. She turned and walked back to her bed and sat, propping her chin in her palm.
“It’s horrible, Bri.”
“It sounded lovely to me,” I said, remembering how her music had trickled down the halls.
“It’s horrible,” she insisted. “Mistress Evelina wants me to have it ready in time for the solstice. I don’t think it’s possible. . . .”
I knew from my seven years of rooming with Merei that she was a perfectionist when it came to her music. Every note had to be exquisitely placed, every song must be played with fervor and rapture. If her fingers or bow so much as let a screech slip over the strings, she was irritated by her performance.
“Do you know what this means?” I asked, smiling as I reached for the elaborately carved box on one of her shelves.
Merei lay back on her bed, overly dramatic as she claimed, “I am too tired to play.”
“We have a pact,” I reminded her as I opened the box on our communal table, drawing forth the checkered board and the marble pawns.
Her father had sent this game of cheques and marques for both of us, a game Merei adored and had grown up playing on the island of Bascune. As the years had gone by at Magnalia, as Merei and I had become progressively more preoccupied with our impassionment, we hardly had time to play anymore. Save for the evenings when we were both overwhelmed and worried. We had vowed to bring forth the game then, as a way to remind ourselves that the impending solstice wasn’t everything.
“All right.” She relented, as I knew she would. She rose from the bed and walked to our table, gathering a few loose sheets of music and setting them aside.
We sat across from each other, our colorful pawns gleaming as I lit the candles and Merei flipped a ducat to see who had the first move.
“You start, Bri,” she said.
I stared at my pawns, lined up obediently. Cheques and marques was a game of strategy, the goal being to remove all three of the opponent’s red pawns. I decided to begin on the edge, shifting my yellow pawn forward to the first marque.
We always started the game quietly, granting ourselves time to adjust to moving in rhythm with each other. I tended to make the bold moves, Merei the cautious moves. Our pawns were scattered all over the board when Merei broke our silence by asking, “Have you heard from your grandfather?”
I claimed her first red pawn, one she had defiantly floating toward our line of impact. “Yes. I’ll have to let you read it later.”
She began to shift toward one of my red pieces. “Did he tell you a name?”
“No name. The usual response.”
“That your father is unworthy to note?”
“Yes, those very words.” I watched as she swiped one of my red pawns. She also had me blocked with her yellow pieces. I began to weave between them. . . . “What about your father?”
“He wrote a few days ago. He says hello, and that he hopes you come with me to visit him after the solstice.”
I watched her jump over my blue pawns, landing in the middle of my territory. A bold move from her always baffled me; she tended to play so carefully. I retaliated, mirroring her, and asked, “Would you rather have a very handsome patron who had bad breath, or a very ugly patron who always smelled good?”
Merei laughed. “Nice try, Bri. I am not that easily distracted.”
“I am not distracting you,” I insisted, trying to hide a smile. “These are very important things to think about.”
“Mm-hmm.” She swiped my second red pawn. “I would have to go with the ugly patron, then.”
“Same,” I responded, trying to break through yet another ring of her yellow pawns.
“If we are going to play this game, then you have to answer a question.” She moved her black pawn to an odd marque. “Would you rather fall in love with your master or your patron?”
“Both are horrible, foolish choices,” I muttered.
“You must answer.”
I stared at the board, trying to see a way out of the knot she had me in. “Fine, then. I would rather fall in love with my patron.” My face warmed, but I kept my eyes on the marques. I was almost to her second red pawn. . . .
“I have to say I would go with the master.”
I glanced up, surprised at her answer. She smiled; her eyes locked with mine as she effortlessly claimed my final red pawn.
“You always beat me at this game,” I lamented.
“You lose because you never protect your side, Bri. It’s your one weakness. I beat you with an oblique move.” She waggled my defeated red pawn. “Shall we play again?”
I made a noise of objection, but she knew that I wanted to. We reset our pawns on their origin marques, and then I waited for Merei to move first.
We asked no questions this round; I was too focused on trying to outwit her, by employing this oblique tactic she always championed me with. So when she cleared her throat, I looked up, startled to see she was about to claim my last red pawn.
“Now,” Merei said. “On to a very important question.”
“And what is that?”
She paused, trying to hold back her laughter as she defeated me yet again. “What are you going to tell Master Cartier when he asks why your face is stained blue?”
FOUR
THE THREE BRANCHES