“The second…” He paused for a long time, and his hands, clasped behind his back, tightened. Something hardened his voice, lending it an edge. “The second is that such efforts require assistance — namely, the services of a scryer, one who can see the presences when they come. My former companion and I have parted ways, and I have found no suitable replacement for him.”
The first point did not worry her; the second did. “Can you not work without such assistance?”
“No.” Dee turned back to face her. His jaw was set, as if against some unhappy truth. “And I will be honest with you, Mistress Montrose. At times I doubt whether I have ever spoken with an angel, or whether, as they accuse me, I have done naught but summon devils, who play with me for their own amusement.”
Her mouth was dry. All her hope crumbled. If not Dee, then who? A priest? Invidiana had destroyed priests before. And Lune did not think a saint would answer the call of a faerie.
“Mistress Montrose,” Dee said softly. Despite the lines that had sobered his face, his manner was compassionate. “Will you not tell me what has happened?”
A simple question, with a dangerous answer. Yet some corner of Lune’s mind was already calculating. If he were not the sorcerer she had expected, then a charm might bedazzle him long enough for her to escape, should all go poorly. She would be destroying Anne Montrose, but no life remained for that woman regardless….
She truly was thinking of doing it.
“Can I trust you?” Lune whispered.
He crouched in front of her, keeping space between them, so as not to crowd her. “If it means no harm to England or the Queen,” Dee said, “then I will do my best to aid you in good faith.”
The door was closed. They were private.
Lune said, “I am not as I seem to be.” And, rising to her feet, she cast aside her glamour.
Dee rose an instant later, staring.
“The Queen of faerie England,” she said, every muscle tensed to flee, “has formed a pact with Hell. I need the aid of Heaven to break it. On this matter rests not only the safety of Michael Deven, but the well-being of your own kingdom and Queen.”
He did not shout. He did not fling the name of God up as defense. He did nothing but stare, his eyes opaque, as if overtaken by his thoughts.
“So if you cannot summon angels,” Lune said, “then tell me, Doctor Dee, what I should do. For I do not know.”
Within the mask of his beard, his mouth was twitching; now she read it as a kind of bitterness, surprising to her. “Did you send him?” he asked abruptly.
“Michael Deven?”
“Edward Kelley.”
The name ground out like a curse. Where did she know it from? She had heard it somewhere….
“When he came to me,” Dee said coldly, “he offered to further my knowledge in magic with faeries.”
Memory came. A human man with mangled ears; she had seen him once or twice at court — her own court — and heard his name. She had never known more. “I did not send him,” Lune said. “But someone may have. Who was he?”
“My scryer,” Dee replied. “Whom I have long suspected of deception. He came to me so suddenly, and seemed to have great skill, but we so often fought….” Now she recognized the note in his voice; it was the sound of affection betrayed. This Kelley had been dear to him once.
“He is gone now?” Lune asked.
Dee made a cut-off gesture with one hand. “We parted ways in Trebon. He is now court alchemist to the Holy Roman Emperor.”
Then he truly was out of reach. Lune said, “Please, Doctor Dee. I beg you.” Never in all the ages she could remember had she knelt, as a fae, to a mortal, but she did it now. “I know I am no Christian soul, but Michael Deven is, and he will die if I cannot stop this. And does not your God oppose the devil, wherever he may work? Help me, I beg. I do not know who else to ask.”
Dee gazed blindly down at her, distracted once more. “I have no scryer. Even Kelley may have given me nothing but falsehoods, and I myself have no gift for seeing. It may be that I have no more power to summon angels than any other man.”
“Will you not try?” Lune whispered.
With her eyes fixed on him, she saw the change. Some thought came to him, awakening all the curiosity of his formidable mind. The expression that flickered at the edge of his mouth was not quite a smile, but it held some hope in it. “Yes,” Dee said. “We will try.”
THE ONYX HALL, LONDON: May 8, 1590
Thirst was the greatest threat.
Deven tried to distract himself. The room, he came to realize, was Invidiana’s presence chamber. Larger by far than Elizabeth’s, it had an alien grandeur a mortal queen could only dream of, for in this place, fancies of architecture could truly take flight. The pillars and ribs that supported the arching ceiling were no more than a decoration born from some medieval fever dream; they were not needed for strength. The spaces between them were filled with filigree and panes of crystal, suspended like so many fragile swords of Damocles.
Beneath and among these structures wandered fae whom he presumed to be the favored courtiers of this Queen. They were a dizzying lot: some human-looking, others supernaturally fair, others bestial, and clad in finery that was to mortal courtiers’ garb as the chamber was to mortal space. They all watched him, but none came near him; clearly word had gone around that he was not to be touched. How much did they know of who he was, and why he was there?
Lacking an answer to that question, Deven decided to test his boundaries. He tried to speak to others; they shied away. He followed them around, eavesdropping on their conversations; they fell silent when he drew near, or forwent the benefit of being so near the Queen and left the chamber entirely. The fragments he overheard were meaningless to him anyway.
He spoke of God to them, and they flinched, while Invidiana looked on in malicious amusement.
She was less amused when he decided to push harder.
Deven took up a position in the center of the chamber, facing the throne, and crossed himself. Swallowing against the dryness of his mouth, he began to recite.
“Our father, which art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy Name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in Heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen.”
The chamber was half-empty before he finished; most of those who remained were bent over or sagged against the walls, looking sick. Only a few remained untouched; those, he surmised, had eaten of mortal food recently. But even they did not look happy.
Nor did Invidiana. She, for the first time, was angry.
He tried again, this time in a different vein, dredging up faded memories of prayers heard from prisoners and recusants. “Pater noster, qui es in caelis: sanctificetur Nomen Tuum…”
This time even he felt its force. The hall trembled around him; its splendor dimmed, as if he could see through the marble and onyx and crystal to plain rock and wood and dirt, and all the fae stood clad in rags.
Then something slammed into him from behind, knocking him to the floor and driving all breath from him. His Catholic prayer ended in a grunt. A voice spoke above him, one he knew too well, even though he had heard scarcely a dozen words from it. “Should I cut out his tongue?” Achilles asked.
“No.” If the Latin form had shaken Invidiana, she gave no sign. “We may yet need him to speak. But stop his mouth, so he may utter no more blasphemies.”