Grizelda

GRIZELDA

By Margaret Taylor

Cover art by Kelsey King

Smashwords Edition

 2009 Margaret Taylor

Learn more about Margaret's books at

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Chapter 1

Grizelda shot up in bed the moment Elisabet started to shake her. She hadn't been sleeping very deeply anyway, hadn't managed to sleep deeply for days. She looked at the face of her friend, pale and seeming disembodied in the half-light, her expression telling everything. It's happened, hasn't it? she was about to say, but Elisabet beat her to the words.

They're at the door, Elisabet said in a terrified whisper.

In a moment Grizelda was up and at the dormitory window. Rain trickled down the glass in rivulets, lit gold from the lone streetlamp below. If she stood on her tiptoes and turned her head in an awkward angle, she could just make out the street, where two men in dark greatcoats huddled by the lamp, trying to read a piece of paper. Gendarmes.

I'll get you some clothes for the weather. Elisabet was flying, throwing open dresser drawers and ransacking their contents. Here! She threw a coat at Grizelda. Grizelda caught it awkwardly and resumed pulling on her dress and shoes. She was trying to do it standing up and was only getting herself into a tangle, but she couldn't afford to sit down, she didn't have time.

Time? She'd had bucketloads of time. Three days ago Meaven Godey the informer had found out her secret. What kind of an idiot stayed home after an incident like that?

The commotion was starting to wake up the other girls in the dormitory. They stirred and lifted their heads to see what was the matter.

It's the gendarmes, Elisabet told them. For Grizelda.

Meanwhile Grizelda had managed to get her dress on straight. Somebody go wake the mistress. I'll get out the back way.

With that she threw the coat around herself and made for the door.

I'll go with you, Elisabet said.

Together they hurried out of the dormitory, past the mistress's bedroom, and down a darkened stairway. With luck they would be able to get down to the public part of the shop before the gendarmes got inside. After that it was only a short way through some back rooms to the alley.

I'm so sorry, Liz, Grizelda said as they stole down the stairs.

Don't be.

I should have left when it happened. I've put you all in danger.

Their whispered conversation was cut off when a glare of candlelight lanced upward through the balusters along with the sound of voices. They froze, listening.

We take unfortunate girls off the streets and put them to good use. We're all upstanding citizens of Corvain. I don't know what you're doing here.

That was Miss Hesslehamer, the mistress, already awake and downstairs. Another voice, a male one, answered her. We've got here a letter of cachet. You can't stop us doing a search upstairs.

Elisabet squeezed Grizelda's hand. Quick! Use your power and hide us!

Liz, you know I can't when I'm under pressure–

She lost her chance when Miss Hesslehamer and the two gendarmes came to the foot of the stairs and spotted the two of them. Miss Hesslehamer looked terrible, with her glasses askew and a wrap clumsily thrown over her nightdress. When she saw Grizelda standing there in her coat, for a moment it looked like she would speak. Instead she turned back to the gendarmes.

What is it you're going to search, sirs? she said. It was clear in her voice she was frightened. It was the first time in her life Grizelda had ever heard Miss Hesslehamer frightened, and that scared her more than even the gendarmes did.

But the gendarmes pushed past her without speaking. Grizelda tried to bolt for it. She almost thought she was going to make it past them, but one of them snatched her by the collar.

Not you, miss. You've got gray hair. You're the one we're here to search for.

She tried to sneak in a bite, but the gendarme clouted her across the head and forced her to walk back upstairs and back into the dormitory. Elisabet followed them, wringing her hands, and Miss Hesslehamer bore the candle.

They made her stand in one corner where they could keep an eye on her. Like a nightmare, she could watch the whole scene play out but could do nothing about it. The girls were all sitting up in bed now, terrified but silent.

The taller one pointed at Grizelda. Ma'am, where does that one keep her personal belongings?

What are you investigating her for? How do you know it was even her?

Under her bed, I'll rate, said the other, and he went to the nearest empty bed and tipped out the mattress. Elisabet's bedding landed on the floor in a snarl. The gendarme pawed through it, not caring that his boots were treading street-grease on them.

She's under arrest for sorcery, said the first to Miss Hesslehamer.

I'm training these girls to be law-abiding citizens!

The gendarme gave up his search and went for the other empty bed in the dormitory.

No! Grizelda ran forward to stop him, though Elisabet tried to hold her back. The gendarme knocked her down and heaved over the mattress.

A flurry of brightly-colored papers spilled out onto the floor.

Grizelda still lay dazed, half on her side on the floor, but when she saw these she knew she was in for it. She dropped her head.

That's enough! cried Miss Hesslehamer. I won't have people treated this way in my own home! There was a noise like Miss Hesslehamer struggling, then a thud as the light went out. Somebody screamed. Grizelda felt a sharp twist of her arm behind her back, then she was dragged to her feet and made to march out of the room.

Lonnes's skyline was dominated by the massive constructions of the Auks. They had been birds. Great intelligent black birds from across the sea. They'd built their fortresses here and tried to rule Corvain and for two hundred years they'd nearly succeeded. Grizelda thought they must have been much greater than man-sized, for those high, broad doors were far too big for mere humans to pass in and out of. The smaller, human dwellings of Lonnes clustered together in their shadow. But the ruins of the old Aukish domination were painted over with the slogans of the Republic now. They were reduced to not much more than a charcoal-colored smudge, blurred by the rain and light of predawn.

Most of the streetlamps had long since gone out, but a few still made wavering pools of yellow here and there against the late November gray. The rain hissed against the cobblestones and poured off of roofs in sheets. Sogged liberty bows hung limply against citizens' doors.

Grizelda screamed and struggled at first. She kicked them in the shins as much as she was able, and cursed them for wrongly arresting her and acting against the values of the Revolution. What was this government coming to anyway, when it dragged innocent citizens out of their homes in the middle of the night in the name of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity?

The gendarmes were not at all interested in her speeches, though, and they were too strong for her. One held her arms twisted behind her back while the other clamped his arm over her face so that her screams wouldn't wake any citizens. The fight was exhausting. By the time dawn had broken, she was so drained that she mutely allowed them to drag her through the streets, head bent. The rain ran down her head and soaked through her clothing, coat and all, so that it clung to her body. She felt ashamed of herself, too. Not only had she sinned against the ideals of the Republic, but her stupid mistake had gotten all the shop tainted with guilt by association. What would happen to them now?

Oh, Corvain! she thought. The Revolution wasn't supposed to be like this!

The timber of the rain's hiss changed, deepening to a roar. The river Sarny was nearby. Grizelda looked up in fresh terror. There was a low, dark mass out where the land jutted into the river and the river took a sharp turn around it. Promontory. It had been a fort in the feudal days of the Auks and the sorcerers, but when the Republic took over, they had not abandoned it like the other buildings. They had converted it to a prison.

Grizelda's steps faltered a little when she got to the bridge. A moat separated Promontory from the mainland and this bridge was the sole way in and out. It was a narrow arc of stone spanning the gap, without railings – part of the old fort's defenses. The gendarme gave her a warning nudge in the back. She swallowed and walked forward. Early risers were just beginning to show on the streets now. Some of them stared at her as she passed but most of them hunched themselves against the wet and hurried on their way.

Long live the Revolution! somebody yelled. She looked around, but she couldn't tell who it had been.

She stumbled every few steps on the way across the bridge. Then the gendarmes stopped to haggle with the gatekeeper at Promontory's outer wall. One gendarme kept a grip on her shoulder while the other did the talking, until finally the gatekeeper opened up the door and let them into the courtyard.

There was a scattering of buildings inside looking sorry for themselves, separated from each other by swaths of sodden turf. But what dominated the view, even drawing her attention away from the firing range, was the bone clock. She had heard the stories about it, but she never thought she would be within the walls of Promontory to see it. They said it had been a sick joke of the Auks. The bone clock was a sort of sundial, with a gnomon of stone set at an angle in the middle of the courtyard. But the uprights, marking the twelve positions of the clock, were human femurs. Another reminder of who was predator and who was prey.

Grizelda wanted to retch, but she bit down on her lip, hard. Courage, Grizelda.

The gendarmes took her inside to be searched. Not by themselves, thank God. They led her to a small, brightly-lit room where they had a woman for these sorts of situations. The woman ordered Grizelda to take off her coat, her shoes, her dress and lay them on a bench. She was allowed to keep her undergarments on.

The woman picked up each garment and rubbed it, looking like she'd been asked to handle old seaweed.

What's this? she said, holding up the sleeve of Grizelda's dress.

There were spools running down the length of the sleeve in a line, attached by delicate leather thongs so they would wind freely when the thread was pulled. It had been Grizelda's own idea to sew the spools on, so she could keep the thread handy in Miss Hesslehamer's shop. She clenched her fists, wanting to snatch it back from her, but she did not.

It's just so I could have my thread, she muttered.

Hm.

The woman removed a pair of scissors from the dress pocket and dropped them into an envelope. There was nothing else offending, so after she had patted Grizelda down, she gave the clothes back.

Grizelda pulled her dress back on, inwardly relieved. The woman hadn't found her little packet of needles, in the inside pocket of the bodice. So she had something sharp on her. She had no idea what she might do with them, though.

Write your name here. The woman handed her the envelope, all folded up and sealed.

Grizelda took the pen. Why?

To identify you. You can have this back when you've served your term.

Not likely, Grizelda thought. It was only under exceptional circumstances that someone ever came out of Promontory alive. Somebody with connections, with a powerful or a rich family to buy them out of jail. Not like her. Still, she signed her name on the packet and handed it back.

Somewhere in the Fish District, three rats trotted down the pitch of a rooftop. It was midmorning and the rain had still not let up. But it had softened to a steady patter, and out in the street the light would have been strong enough to read by. On the rooftop, shielded by heavy foliage, it was as good as night. Any rain that managed to filter through the tree's leaves collected into heavy, fat raindrops that exploded on impact. The rats didn't give the water a moment's notice as they cleared the gutter and landed on the top of a wall. From the wall it was a quick scurry downward to the surface of the street.

They stood there a moment, sniffing the air. It was only an instant – they were just checking that the coast was clear. Then as if on a cue, they all three slipped into a storm drain one after the other.

One would have to be sharp-eyed indeed to have even seen the rats. But if anyone was watching, in that moment when they were exposed on the street, they might have sworn they'd seen somebody riding them.

Chapter 2

They took Grizelda to a dungeon. It had been a dungeon originally, anyway, in the days when Promontory was the Auks' fort. After the Revolution some industrious defenders of the Republic had stripped the room out and sanitized it and called it an interrogation chamber. A table and two chairs huddled in the corner for that purpose. The room was much too big for its new function, but the officer already seated in the far chair didn't seem to mind.

He gave Grizelda an icy smile as she was thrust into her chair by the guards. So.

What do you even want me here for?

You should know that better than most.

A fresh pang of guilt. Betrayer of the Revolution. Idiot, for having let Meaven Godey see. No. She would not give this man in uniform the satisfaction.

I'm not a sorceress! If that's what they've been telling you… She gestured angrily at the guards.

Another flash of that smile. Officially, you're under arrest for counterrevolutionary activities, he said. But we have an abundance of evidence that you're also a sorceress and therefore a royalist and complicit with the Auks.

I've never even seen an Auk in my life!

That seemed to take him by surprise. "How old are you?"

I'm fourteen!

They get younger every day, muttered a guard.

Oh, you've seen an Auk, then, you're just too young to remember it, said the officer. You're the first prisoner we've had who can't remember the Revolution.

I'm not a sorceress, Grizelda said.

We have a denunciation on file, you know.

Grizelda couldn't help a little intake of breath, though she tried to suppress it. They know. No. She gripped the edges of her chair. Courage, Grizelda.

When? she said.

Three days ago. Citizen Meaven Godey saw you practicing sorcery in the dressmaker's shop when she went in to buy some thread, Friday past. She went right back out again and reported it to the police. So there's no point in denying it any more. We have eyewitness testimony.

The rim of her chair was metal – probably mass-produced in some goblin factory. It slipped under the sweat of her hands as she picked at it, running her hands forward and back. Why did she even bother? They were going to kill her whether she confessed or not. It was a pointless game, but they still weren't going to get her to say it.

I'm not a sorceress.

They ate people, you know, the officer said, changing tack. The sorcerers helped them.

I never had anything to do with the Auks.

Who knows but you might have, said the officer. You're a war orphan, aren't you?

How did they know that?

We … think I am.

What do you mean, you think you are?

They said they found me during one of the riots, Grizelda said, with difficulty. She didn't want to talk about this, not to him. The girls at the dressmaker's. I was lost, crying for my mother…

Yes?

Nobody ever came to pick me up. She picked at the chair.

So for all we know your parents might have been sorcerers killed in the Revolution. You have the witch-mark.

Grizelda put a hand to her head. Gray hair. It had gone gray long before she could remember it, and it was the reason she always went out with a headscarf bound around her head. Physical abnormality was often the sign of sorcery, though God knew there had been plenty of beautiful sorcerers. When she wouldn't tell the girls at the shop her name that day they'd picked her up, they had just called her Grizelda, which meant gray.

When the officer saw she couldn't answer, he went on. Your denunciation went through the Committee of Public Safety, and they unanimously voted to bring you here. Your case will be decided in trial next Monday, which you need not attend. If you make a written confession it might go better for you, but otherwise the denunciation and that hair are enough to send you to the firing range. Will you confess?

She balled her hands into fists. I don't believe you. I'm done for no matter what I say.

Fine! He slapped the table and stood up. Take her to a cell, and I'll write a report of this.

The guards came forward to take her away. Grizelda fought them for a little while, but finally she let them pick her up, by the crook of each arm. As they led her out of the room, the officer turned away and rubbed his face in frustration.

Ratriders hate the damp. They're fey people and therefore made mostly of fire, so wet is hard on their systems. And after the wetness they had just endured on their latest raid, Geddy, Tunya, and Kricker were absolutely miserable.

Tunya and Kricker took it out on each other.

You're remembering it wrong! Tunya insisted.

Kricker half-turned in the saddle, then thought better of it and decided to look where he was going instead. No, you're the one remembering it wrong.

Tunya slouched. Her rat could sense that her energy was sapped and was taking full advantage of it. No matter how much she prodded it, it took its own sweet time, lumbering indolently along the bottom of the pipe. Three times she'd wrung herself out since she'd reached the safety of the sewer and she could still feel it. A clammy prickliness on her skin, cloying like bad perfume. Blech.

She threw up her hands. You know what, never mind. This is stupid.

Fine.

They continued their travel in silence for a little while. It didn't last long. A few seconds later, Tunya couldn't resist the temptation to sneak in one last jab.

"It was just a kitten, though."

Kricker reacted as could be expected. That cat was a monster! That cat was the cat from hell!

Meanwhile, Geddy rode ahead of them a few rat-lengths. Up till now, he'd suffered their argument in silence. Now he chimed in.

"Kricker, I was at the belling the cat incident, and that cat was no monster."

Hey, whose side are you on here?

Geddy didn't give that a reply. Instead he stopped his rat by pulling in on its reins. I've had it with this. Let's cut across.

Tunya frowned. I thought we weren't doing that anymore.

There's no rule against it.

"There's people in those tunnels. We could get seen!"

I don't care. I'm wet and I want to go home.

Kricker reined in his rat, too. Well, I'm going. The two of them scurried down a side tunnel.

You're disagreeing with me on purpose! said Tunya as she chased after them.

At first the gendarmes took Grizelda through a network of passages like intestines through the heart of the old fort. They were all too high, too broad, built for wings and talons, not human hands and feet. This part of the prison had not been retrofitted with modern electric lights from the goblins or even gas lights yet. Instead the gendarmes had brought along their own lamp. It didn't even begin to illuminate the cavern's high ceilings. The tunnels were drafty, they were damp, they were medieval. They were exactly what one would expect the inside of Promontory to look like.

But that wasn't the reason Grizelda was shivering right now. She'd heard rumors about this place. Only rumors, of course, because those who actually saw the inside of Promontory rarely ever came out. Rumors that the defenders of the Republic, not content with the old Aukish design, had improved upon the prison. And added to it.

The gendarmes who had her did not seem to share in her terror. They pushed her around a sharp corner and down a long flight of stairs.

Grizelda gasped. A dizzying, empty space yawned below her. It was like a warehouse, or maybe more like a kennel. The room she had just entered was three stories high and as long as a street, her stairway a mere afterthought running down one wall. All down the walls on either side there were cells, row upon row. The