D Cornish - Factotum

"We ought to go to the Duke of Sparrows, Miss Europe!" he offered with little hope. "Cinnamon as good as gave an invitation-"

"I do not think the sparrow-duke will let such as I in his home, little man… Not even on your say-so."

Rossamund looked unhappily to his rhubarb.

Europe continued to regard him closely. "You are in danger wherever you might hide, and bring the same on those who harbor you. Nevertheless, I do not hold you to my service," she remarked softly and a little coldly. "If you wish it, I shall release you and you may leave for such shelter as the sparrow-man and his lord might grant you-I have learned well enough to make my own treacle since you first entered my employ…"

Blinking at her, the young factotum smarted at the subtle bitterness in her words.

"For mine, however," the Duchess-in-waiting added, "I would say that you are safest with me."

He could not agree with her here; surely the Duke of Sparrows-like the Lapinduce-could keep whole nations at bay.Yet Rossamund did not remonstrate. He did not truly think Europe would be granted sanctuary in the Sparrow Downs either. "I am your factotum, Miss Europe; my lot is with you, wherever you go."

"Bravo!" Europe smiled, warmly at first, then becoming hawkish. "There will be much going, Rossamund, for it is my intent for us to rest here for a time, gather ourselves and then return to Brandenbrass, where I shall make you safer still. What a dark shock they will have when they find that I am yet alive," she observed almost happily, then blinked. "Now, I have questions for our gracious and wide-read host, Master Plume, beyond imposing upon him further-if you are up to it, you may join me."

Twisting his middle, Rossamund declared he felt taut enough to move about.

"I shall await you in my room." Europe rose carefully against her own cracked frame and shut the door quietly behind her. Perfumed by ancient timber paneling and cold slate, the interior of Orchard Harriet felt cavernous, empty but for the murmur of amused conversation sounding from somewhere deeper. The passage to their host's file high in the northeastern wing of the manor was direct enough, though it kinked strangely as its walls went from wood panels to tinted plaster to bare stone in the space of a few strides. Though Europe held good posture, her manifold hurts kept her to a commendably sturdy hobble, for which Rossamund-stiff and sore all over-was supremely grateful, feeling very ungainly with his sharply pinching side and his borrowed wardrobe of light day-clothes a size too small.

Coming right about a corner and stepping down then up an odd double flight of steps-one wood, the other stone-Rossamund froze… For there, lying serenely in the passage and snoring lightly before a solid door of mahogany, was the largest Derehund he had ever encountered. It was bigger even than the monstrous beasts that guarded the lamplighter keep of Wellnigh House on the Wormway.

Unperturbed, Europe stepped about the giant dog without another thought.

Sitting on Rossamund's shoulder, Darter Brown did not fly off in boisterous alarm but remained, eyes squinting again in a partial doze.

Rossamund, however, took a backward step.

The dog stirred and almost immediately became aware of him. Giving a start, it sprang to its feet and turned to face the young factotum, its shrewdly pallid eyes level to his own eye, its damp twitching nose to his nose, pinning him to the wall with its proximity.The beast did not bark or even growl; it just stared.

Rossamund swallowed and tried to slide sideways, toward Europe.

"Come, Rossamund," his mistress called curtly. "You can play with the creature after…"

"Ah-hah!" He heard Gaspard Plume's voice as the heavy door at the end of the passage sprang open. "Don't be minding Baltissar! He's everyone's friend ever since Master Sparrow mended him."

Though this sounded perfectly wondrous and excellent, Rossamund's frequent bitter experience with dogs of this ilk was not so simply assuaged. He inched forward past the beast, expecting at any minute to find his head inside the massive, drooling jaws not three inches from his face. It was the profoundest relief to finally cross the threshold into their host's room.

"Shoo, sir!" Gaspard commanded the Derehund, blocking the dog's curiosity with his body. "You know you are not allowed in here, Baltissar. Go! Keep the mousers honest," he added, and shut the door on the creature's mournful face.

Rossamund relaxed as his mistress and their host traded greetings.

"I must say I was diverted by your works on the Didodumese, Master Plume," Europe observed, smiling shrewdly. "I can understand why you might choose to live so remotely after that particular endeavor. I heard that certain families have put a price upon your learn-ed pate."

"Yes, well…" The historian blanched a trifle. "Truth has few friends, madam, but those who love her do so dearly and will pay with everything to keep her at liberty."

A large space made of two long rooms, Gentleman Plume's file was cramped with the clutter of a curious mind. At various corners were globes and ambit rings, stuffed animals under bell jars, a skull in the middle of a large drum table surrounded by rolls of charts-one held open by a vase containing a single enormous turnsole. There were plush elbow chairs, a turkoman for reading, and shelf upon shelf of more books than Rossamund knew had been made. Any spare glimpses of the paneled wall were padded with rich red cloth, hung with ephemerides or daubed with loose yet exquisite paintings of animals of the common sorts, the style of the artist familiar to Rossamund.

Flanked by a massive chest of map drawers on one side and a tall bench with an equally tall stool on the other, Gentleman Plume's enormous desk dominated the second room. Behind it, draping the wall above a crackling hearth, was a large painted web of reds and golds, umbers and whites. Covering the chimney breast, it showed circles within squares within circles written over with the names of the eight winds, the old Phlegmish months, the skold's formula AOWM, and the obsolete appellations for the three original continents. A cunctus orbis, Mister Plume complacently called it-an ancient chart of the known world at the time of the Phlegms.

Painted and stitched with staggering precision, it had, as Rossamund could see, the great city Phlegmis marked with a red star in its midst, the center of the world.

By the open southern window a glossy pied daw sat upon a wooden perch above a pan of grit, ogling the arrivals with shrewd yellow eyes. Giving a feisty twitter, Darter Brown shot up to Rossamund's crown to stare and ruffle his feathers, little claws prickling at the young factotum's scalp.

"That is a fine wee bird on your skull, young sir," Plume suddenly said to him, nodding to Darter Brown. "Is it properly… trained?" he asked frankly. "Guano about the house and down one's back is not a good show, I would think."

Rossamund blinked. He had never given the notion any thought. "I do not know, sir. He came to me out of the wilds just as he is."

"It is a rare thing for a fellow to have such a spontaneously loyal creature," Plume observed shrewdly. "You are fortunate to be held in this regard… He may share a perch with Pig if he wishes"-Plume indicated the daw-"should he need."

Pig, the pied daw, blinked at hearing its name.

"Uh… Aye, sir…"

"Mister Plume, you are vaunted as a man of many parts," Europe interjected after further brief pleasantries, taking a high-backed seat before the man's spreading desk. "Do you recognize this?" She produced the four-barred mask of the Featherhead chieftain, its fastening ribbons trailing from it. "Its owner was among our attackers." She gave a brief account of the ambush, shifting a little painfully in her seat as she made mention of blows delivered and received.