by I didn’t bother texting Val this time. I called her. If that meant dragging her out of the library and whichever book she was absorbed in, so be it.
‘Yes?’ she said, after three rings. The word had a dangerous edge to it.
‘Valentine Argentein,’ I said.
‘Ves! You found him?’
‘Val, you are not going to believe this.’
While Jay nipped back into the academy to return the painting — my having reluctantly let it go — I rushed through an only slightly garbled account of everything we had just experienced.
‘Slow down,’ said Val more than once, and I tried, but my heart was galloping and my fingers were zapping with magick and I was fit to burst with excitement.
‘She’s a painting,’ Val said at one point. ‘A painting? She, Cicily Werewode, is a painting? Ves, have you gone off your rocker?’
And later, ‘You pretended to be Mary Werewode and she bought it? Has she gone off her rocker?’
At length we got around to: ‘Valentine Argentein is a gods-damned place. That makes so much sense you have no idea.’
‘It… does?’
‘It was driving me crazy, this supposed author that vanished into thin air. But I was wrong to interpret the name as the author, not the title. The book has the air of a personal journal about it, that’s the thing. It’s hand-written, and so is what now turns out to be the title, but I previously interpreted as the name of the writer. As a work it’s informally arranged, only loosely coherent, and pretty impenetrable. And I now have no earthly idea who penned it, but maybe that doesn’t matter. The only problem is…’ I heard a rustling of papers, and otherwise silence for a while. ‘I don’t think there’s any real mention of Valentine Argentein in the book, excepting the title. So if the book isn’t really about this place Argentein, what’s it for?’
‘What else is in it, besides that one bit about magycke silver or whatever it was?’
‘A whole lot of confused ramblings. I wonder…’ Silence, and more rustling.
I ventured upon a tentative point of my own. ‘Is this maybe what the Lorekeeper was talking about? Some kind of code?’
‘Could be. Could be. It doesn’t make a lot of sense as it is, certainly, and it’s hard to imagine why anyone would bother writing down such gibberish if it doesn’t mean anything.’
‘Get Cicily’s journal back from the cryptographers. There’s nothing to find there.’
‘And give ‘em this. Right. Begs the question, though: where’s this mysterious source of Mary Werewode’s work?’
‘I got the impression it’s in Argentein.’
‘She didn’t give you any clues as to where that is?’
‘Not really. She’s a faded excuse for a person, kept blanking on us. And while I’d love to take the portrait with us and keep pumping her for information, we can’t exactly abscond with it.’
‘No,’ Val sighed. ‘I suppose you can’t.’
Her dejection echoed my own. ‘I have two ideas.’
‘Tell me.’
‘One, she seemed to think she could talk to Mary Werewode, who of course must have died long before she was born. Unless she didn’t. We think there must be a chatty portrait of Mary somewhere about, and Cicily must have got hold of it.’
‘Right. Where’s the portrait?’
‘No clue.’
‘Excellent. Idea number two?’
I hesitated. ‘I’m speculating,’ I cautioned.
‘What else is new.’
‘Fair. Look, Cicily mentioned her grandfather. She thought she might be talking to him, too.’
‘Her grandfather, the Yllanfalen?’
‘Right. The one that came from Everynden, where the Moonsilver Mines were.’
A pause. ‘You think Argentein might refer to those mines?’
‘Total guess,’ I said. ‘But yes. Yes, I do.’
‘But they were emptied by Cicily’s time, no?’
‘Exactly.’
‘Not following.’
‘Cicily mentioned the “source”, with a weird emphasis, like it should mean something to Mary. Well, the mines were the age-old source of moonsilver, or argent. What better place to put your secret moonsilver lab than an abandoned mineshaft that was once bristling with the stuff? Maybe there are traces of it still there. Maybe there’s an atmosphere, a memory — something. I don’t know, I may be talking rubbish, but it…’
‘Makes a weird kind of sense,’ Val finished. ‘I’ve another thought.’
‘Hit me with it.’
‘What if…’ she hesitated. ‘We have no idea what process they might have gone through to produce their argent, right? Except that Crystobel thinks it wasn’t alchemy.’
‘Right.’
‘Nothing in Cicily’s journal. Nothing in any of Mary’s letters that might hint at it, even allowing for deliberate obfuscation and bizarre code. In other words, we have no evidence that such a process exists.’
It was my turn to say, ‘Not following.’
‘Maybe it doesn’t exist. Crystobel told the truth. You can’t manufacture argent.’
‘But Cicily said—’
‘Cicily didn’t deny the existence of a source of argent. That doesn’t mean it has anything to do with alchemy.’
‘She— I did ask her if she’d discovered the secret of argent, or if her son had, and she said no. That there was no need, because it was Mary’s own work…’
‘But she never said there was an alchemical secret?’
‘She… no, she didn’t.’
‘Maybe because there wasn’t. Whatever they did, it wasn’t alchemy, or not in the way we’ve been thinking. They weren’t reciting mumbo-jumbo over blocks of silver, or immersing them in chemical solutions. They weren’t waving magick wands over them or drowning them in charms. They weren’t transmuting anything, in short.’ Val was talking faster and faster, working herself up to one of her genius crescendos. ‘Ves, what if you’re right?’
‘I like being right,’ I said — doubtfully, being still far behind wherever Val’s scintillating intellect had taken her. ‘What am I right about this time?’
‘The mines. Maybe they weren’t transmuting some base substance into argent. Maybe they found a way to — to restart the mines.’
‘Restart the—’ I stopped, because she was right. I’d spoken just a moment ago about a lingering atmosphere, or a memory. Entrenched magick. An entire network of mineshafts bristling with argent must have held an entire ocean of magick, so to speak, before we’d finally chipped away the last block. But what of the rock that remained? What if it could be… encouraged? Enchanted?
‘Moon-bathing,’ I said, apropos of nothing. ‘The portrait activated under moonlight, with a bit of magickal fizz to help it along.’
‘Okay. Maybe Mary’s moon-bathing wasn’t about restoring her own youth. Maybe she was talking about the mines.’
‘We need to go there.’
‘At night.’
‘Right.’
‘Ves, one thing though.’ More rustling. ‘The Elvyngs. If they know about this, then anything you find down there is likely to be under their control.’
‘Got it.’
‘You realise what that means?’
‘Opposition.’
‘To say the least. They won’t welcome anyone’s snooping. It’s a literally priceless secret.’
I paused, and thought. My instinct was, as always, to barrel in and look around and figure out the details once we got there. But Val had a point. Jay would be dead set against such foolhardiness, and for once I knew he’d be right without having to be talked into it. So then, what? How to proceed?
‘I think it’s time to pass the buck,’ I decided.
‘Mm. Get back here. I’ll see if I can rouse Milady.’
‘Milady sleeps?’ The idea, for some reason, astonished me. Maybe because one doesn’t picture a disembodied voice having physical needs like the rest of us.
‘Who knows?’ Upon which enlightening comment, Val hung up the phone.
An hour later (or so) saw us huddled in Milady’s tower, us being me, Jay and Val. At that elevation, the air was stiflingly hot, even past midnight. Insufficient windows had a lot to do with that, and since its principal occupant must be impervious to either heat or cold, nobody bothered with incidental practicalities like trying to keep it at a habitable temperature. I sat wilting in the chair House had politely set for me (the thing bulged out of the wall in a gloriously grotesque display, if House ever gets tired of hosting the Society I think it has a career in horror films). Fanning oneself with one’s own hand really doesn’t achieve much, but you probably knew that.
Val looked as cool as ever, reclining at her ease in her poison-green chair. I was somewhat relieved to notice beads of sweat upon Jay’s brow, and an appearance one might (if one were as ruthless as Val) term reminiscent of a “wrung-out dishcloth”. In the face of Val’s effortless cool, it was nice not to be the only person dripping all over the place.
Anyway.
Milady had heard our three-way report calmly, and fallen into one of her thoughtful silences. I’d had ample time to scrutinise both of my companions, plus the floor, the ceiling, the walls and the rose-damask upholstery of House’s choice of chair (stylish, House, can I keep it?) before Milady finally spoke.
‘Delicate,’ she mused. ‘I do not think I have encountered so thorny a problem in some time.’
‘See?’ I said, feeling vindicated. ‘The way forward is by no means clear.’
‘Oh, I believe it is,’ said Milady.
All right, then.
‘There can be no doubt that the mines must be investigated, if there is the smallest possibility that they might be able to furnish us with what we need. The modulator must be our priority.’
‘Agreed,’ I said, and Jay nodded.
‘As a second point of some importance. Have any of you uncovered any concrete evidence that the Elvyng family is aware of Cicily’s secret, and that they continue to exploit it?’
I had to think about that for a moment. So twisty and turny had been our path to this discovery, I’d forgotten what evidence we’d found — and which of our theories had been based wholly on speculation. ‘There’s Cicily’s last will and testament,’ I offered. ‘When she “died”, she certainly left all of her papers, including presumably any books, to her Elvyng son. And he probably inherited her enchanted portrait, too.’
‘But,’ said Jay, ‘that may no longer be relevant. If Crystobel Elvyng was right, and Cicily had nothing to do with the argent in the end, then her personal papers aren’t relevant now.’
‘True.’
‘And Mary Werewode may have left no books either,’ said Val. ‘Cicily’s behaviour strongly suggests she communicated with her ancestress directly, or near enough. We previously assumed there must have been extant books or letters only because we were not yet aware of the painting issue.’
‘The paintings are interesting,’ said Milady. ‘Jay, what do you know of those?’
Jay’s knowledge had already been offered up as part of our report. He’d betrayed some small discomfort during that part of our narration, which I put down to a degree of guilt over having snooped through prohibited books. But at Milady’s words, he cast a sideways glance at me, and shifted in his chair. ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ he said, transparent as glass. ‘I’ve already told you everything.’
‘Come, Jay. This is important.’
Jay gave a tiny sigh. ‘They teach it, at the academy. Only the theory, naturally there are no practicals. But they regard it as a functional art.’
‘You didn’t mention that before,’ I said.
Hence the sideways glance — guilt at keeping secrets from me. He did it again. ‘We were bound to the deepest secrecy,’ he said. ‘Such classes would certainly be closed down, if the Ministry got wind of them.’
‘So you didn’t stealth through the secret archives for forbidden books?’ I felt obscurely disappointed.
Jay coughed. ‘Well… I did that, too.’
‘My hero.’ I beamed.
‘To be fair, every self-respecting Academy student did. I suspect the professors knew, too. A ruthless zeal for knowledge is kind of a prerequisite for attendance.’
‘Makes one wonder about the other paintings at the academy, doesn’t it?’ said Val, wisely cutting in on this rambling sideline.
‘Rather,’ I agreed. ‘I wonder if they have Mary’s.’
‘Returning to the question of evidence,’ said Milady. ‘Do you know them to possess any images of Mary Werewode?’
‘No,’ I said.
‘Anything else that might offer proof of their knowledge of her work?’
‘No,’ I said, but I was looking at Jay. So was Val. He was the only one of us who had any depth of knowledge about the academy, after all.
‘Don’t look at me,’ he said, holding up his hands. ‘I attended the academy, but that gives me zero special knowledge of the family, or any of their private doings.’
‘Crystobel Elvyng’s visit here is suggestive of some special interest in the subject of the argent,’ I said. ‘But that is not proof of prior knowledge, either. We know of no absolute reason why Cicily might have hidden something so important from her family-by-marriage, nor any absolute reason why she might have shared it. So in short, I don’t think we have anything concrete.’
‘In that case,’ said Milady, ‘I believe we will take a small gamble.’
‘Small?’ I echoed. ‘
‘If you are not too tired, I believe an excursion to the mines cannot be undertaken too soon.’
Excitement flared in my eager little heart, and I sat up, my heat-related sufferings forgotten. I hadn’t truly expected Milady to give us the go-ahead to explore the mines. She had to navigate some delicate political waters, after all, and making an enemy of the Elvyng family could do the Society no good.
But she really, really wanted that modulator.
So did I.
