Amalthea Flint (flintlock) wrote in lightning_war, @ 2009-05-11 15:04:00 |
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Current mood: | worried |
Thursday evening, 17 September 1942, in the Great Hall of the Royal Academy...
Amalthea Flint looked up from her discussion with Cori Walsingham, Claudia Warrington, Clarissa Pucey and Lavinia Parkinson, surprised to see Mercuria Casaubon and Callista Lovelace approaching her, since it meant leaving their older brothers behind. She was less surprised to see Florian Leffoy with their older brothers, as he and Jonathan Dashwood naturally gravitated toward Martial Casaubon when neither Kyteler, Dashwood Major nor Forrester were about. Still, it meant something was up. “Hello,” she said neutrally, holding a hand up to stop the other girls in mid-conversation.
“Hello,” said Callista nervously, shifting her weight from foot to foot. “We were worried about Kat Loveday, and wondering if you knew where she was.”
Amalthea smiled at Callista, whom she wanted to encourage to spend more time with the other girls. “She’s with Professor Mathers and Professor Stuart,” she said gently. “I would have thought Leffoy told you that; he asked me earlier. Why are he and his friends so worried?”
Mercuria Casaubon squared her shoulders. “Beg your pardon, Miss Flint, but if I could cast a horary and do progressions on Kat’s chart in the amount of time they’ve had, don’t you believe they should be able to do more than me in that time?”
Amalthea frowned; she did not at all like Mercuria’s tone. “Miss Casaubon, I know you’re a Pelby girl, but I really don’t think you could do all that in a few hours. Even if you do have exceptionally good marks in arithmancy. You’re not Miss Leffoy de Marigny, you know.”
Claudia Warrington and Clarissa Pucey began to snigger at the mention of Juliana Leffoy de Marigny. Amalthea winced. She didn’t approve of Liane’s demeanour, but Liane was trying to save their collective arses, which counted for something.
“The maths aren’t that difficult,” Callista said flatly. She knew the theory, though it had never particularly interested her. “Does she really need to be with them while they work on it? It’s supposed to be dangerous anywhere but here.”
“I don’t like it either,” said Amalthea, and her hand instinctively went to the flintlock she had strapped to her leg. She’d have felt a lot better if Jenny Popescu were around, but there was only one Popescu and there was a lot of castle to cover. “But the professors make the rules.” She took a deep breath. Everyone knew she didn’t like Kat Loveday, but she wanted Kat to stop being a tomboy; she didn’t want Kat to die in the lightning because she was up in the tower. “We can talk to Chattox again, but she’s going to say the same thing.”
Claudia Warrington gave Callista a dirty look. “Leffoy just wants her down here so he can pretend he’s courting her,” she opined.
“That’s enough, Claudia,” said Flint, and gave her a warning look. “And I don’t think he’s pretending. He’s not your brother after all.”
Claudia frowned, and then glared at Flint; she hated being reminded of James’ indiscretion, and Amalthea knew it.
Amalthea sighed; Claudia was getting above herself, and had now been duly deflated. Time to deal with the actual problem. “Let’s go. You might as well get Leffoy and your older brothers…” Alastor Mablin, Dylan Vieira and Justin Kyteler had joined Leffoy and Ambrose Lovelace; Martial Casaubon was over at St Hilda’s, talking with someone it took her a moment to recognise. “Though it looks like Martial’s gone over to talk to that Canadian boy in St Hilda’s…why is he talking to him?” She frowned.
“He’s a friend of Dio Starn’s, isn’t he?” Mercuria glanced at Callista. Dio’s interest in maths was more along the sorts of things Callista did than her own and she wondered if maybe Callista knew who Dio’s other friends were. Dio was supposed to be friendly with Delia Hawkwood, but Delia was playing whist with her boyfriend, and she was also supposed to be friendly with Chandra Lockhart, but he was sitting with Anjali and Rajinder Ayyar at one of the Caerleon tables.
“Yes, but I don’t know him very well,” Callista said. “I think they work together in the compounding lab helping van Rensselaer sometimes. I’m sure he’s worried too.”
“Oh,” said Amalthea, “that’s right, Starn’s up there too.” She frowned. “But Starn’s in fourth year—and she is a Starn.” The Starns could take care of themselves, and if you tried to take care of them anyway they were just as likely to bite as to smile.
“I’m sure that Starns are not immune to lightning, Miss Flint,” said Mercuria dryly.
“Please, can you help us find them?” Callista said, a bit desperately.
Amalthea frowned; did they actually know something? If so, why didn’t they just spit it out? “If you actually did a chart, you should tell me. Chattox has people looking for a lot of people who are actually missing. As in, we don’t know where they are at all and we know that no-one who knows them knows, either. If there’s reason to add Kat and Dio to that list, we’ll be better received. You didn’t, did you, though?”
Mercuria sighed. “In here, with all this noise?”
Amalthea shrugged. “I’m sure it’s noisy where Professor Rosenthal and…Miss Leffoy de Marigny are now. I imagine they’re doing their work anyway.” She shrugged again. “We can talk to Chattox. I don’t think you’re wrong to be concerned about Loveday,” she admitted rather grudgingly. “But she’s with two professors and she isn’t actually lost—I can’t promise that Chattox will take it seriously.”
“All right,” Callista said, relieved. She just wanted everyone to be safe. “Thank you.”
Claudia Warrington and Clarissa Pucey were sniggering at Mercuria. “I don’t think Mercuria is big enough to do the kind of figuring Miss Leffoy does,” said Claudia under her breath.
“Imagine,” said Clarissa Pucey, “being a Leffoy and marrying someone like Rosenthal. Because you have to. Which will probably happen, if it hasn’t already.” She rolled her eyes at Claudia.
Amalthea glared at them. “That’s enough, Miss Warrington.”
Mercuria rolled her eyes and glanced at Callista. “Idiots,” she said under her breath, a little more softly than Claudia had. “Michel is brilliant.”
Callista nodded and smiled weakly. Girls like that made no sense to her at all.
Amalthea stood up and beckoned to Florian and the older boys. “Come on,” she called out to them. “We’re going to talk to Chattox.”
Florian looked up at the older boys, who nodded and followed him. Amalthea was, as always, taken a little bit aback by Florian Leffoy’s ability to take command of almost any situation he was in, even when he was the youngest member of the group.
“I’m sorry about Forrester not showing up,” Amalthea said to Florian when he reached them. “He’s a terrible prefect, and don’t think we don’t all know how much of his work you’ve been doing. It will all be accounted for in the end.”
Florian sighed. “He’s not that bad,” he said half-heartedly, but he was upset, and she could see it. Poor little thing. Always being left in charge; perhaps he’d just got used to it. She supposed that could happen to someone with parents like his.
“Yes, he is,” said Amalthea. “You don’t have to defend him.” She glanced at Ambrose Lovelace and Alastor Mablin, as if to ask them why they hadn’t taken charge of this group. “He doesn’t.”
Ambrose shrugged. “Maybe Chattox shouldn’t pick prefects based on their marks,” he said softly. “Or whatever measurement it is that she’s using. Even Josiah Trelawney is doing a better job, honestly.”
“I just want Kat to be okay,” said Florian, in a tired and rather forlorn voice that made Amalthea want to stroke his hair, although she did not, because he looked like he was just enough disgruntled to be snappish, and she knew how much faerie was in him, or at least she could guess. “I know she isn’t. I just know there’s something wrong.”
Callista looked at him worriedly. “Oh, I hope not.” She still didn’t understand why the teachers had needed to take them away now of all times.
“It’s not logical, I know,” said Florian.
“Maybe you’re just afraid because your big brother got ill so recently?” Mercuria asked softly. She’d heard about Yvon’s illness, both from Florian himself and also from Kat Loveday.
Florian’s expression grew grim. “I’m sure that’s part of it,” he agreed, with a surety that Amalthea found chilling.
“Come on,” said Amalthea, who was liking this less and less. “Let’s go.” She caught her cousin Ianthe’s eye, wordlessly asked her to look after the girls—Ianthe hated her, but would probably do what she had to do—then led her small party over to Emily Chattox’s table.
Chattox was speaking quietly to Charis Leffoy and Aurélien Jeannot, who was acting prefect, and doing a better job than he’d done as an actual prefect. She looked up sharply, pausing mid-sentence. “Yes, Miss Flint?” Her expression said this had better be good.
Amalthea frowned. It wasn’t, and she knew that. “We were just wondering if there had been any word from Professor Mathers and Professor Stuart,” she said. “Florian Leffoy is very worried about Miss Loveday.”
“She’s not back yet?” Charis Leffoy blurted out, glancing at her younger brother with immediate understanding. “Kat’s not back down here yet? That’s not good!”
Chattox frowned. “She’s with Mathers, Miss Leffoy. Surely you can’t believe Mathers of all people means Miss Loveday any harm—”
“He hates my whole family!” Charis snapped loudly. “You can’t believe he means her well—”
“Don’t take that tone with me, Charis,” said Emily in a low voice; Amalthea could see she was looking at a list of names, people whose whereabouts weren’t accounted for, and of course that awful slag Olivia Goulston was right near the top of it. “You know perfectly well that Mathers is very fond of the Pen—of the Lovedays.”
“And Kat’s not going to be a Pen-Loveday after we’re married,” said Florian stubbornly.
Emily Chattox scowled at him. Amalthea frowned. That had not been a good thing to say to her. “Dracaena wouldn’t.”
“Oh yes she would,” said Florian fiercely. “If Kat will. And the Bradburies will. And they will.”
Charis sighed heavily. Amalthea shot her a rare sympathetic look. Probably Charis Leffoy had never wanted to have this discussion with Chattox; it would not incline Chattox to listen to anything she or her brother had to say.
Emily Chattox looked up at Charis. “Is he—?”
“Yes,” said Charis wearily. “There are ancestral curses affecting both families and one of the things it is thought might prevent them from destroying us all is if one of us gets married to one of them. I’m a lesbian, Yvon is engaged to Alessio, and Liane, you may have noticed, is also off the market.”
“Your brother will have to endure the shame of losing his arithmantic goddess to the man who made her what she is today,” Ambrose said sotto voce to Mercuria, who laughed a little, even though she was pale with shock.
Alastor Mablin rolled his eyes at Lovelace. “My cousin wouldn’t have married any of you anyway,” he said, shaking his head, and Dylan Vieira chuckled a little.
Chattox held up a hand. “Wait,” she said. “I’m going to have to have words with Dracaena, it’s ridiculous enough to let someone Juliana’s age get married, and to her former professor no less, it’s a scandal, but Florian—?”
“You’re missing the point,” Charis said quietly. “Curses. Us. Them. Kat in the tower.” She crossed her arms across her chest. “I’m sorry Liane’s not here, maybe you’d listen if she wrote you a proof!”
“Miss Leffoy,” Chattox began, but there was no bite in it. “Miss Leffoy, you don’t really believe—”
“Of course she does,” said Ambrose, glancing at Florian.
“Magistra Chattox,” said Florian in a soft voice, his expression shrewd and subtly angry, “there has been known to be…collateral damage. Are you quite sure that Mathers and Stuart are all right? If something is affecting Kat it may well be affecting everyone with her.”
Amalthea was impressed. She’d seen that look on Charis’ face, but never with such a calm, soft voice attached to it. She hoped that Chattox had noticed, as well, and took it as seriously as it deserved to be taken.
“Of course she isn’t.” Everyone looked up; the voice which had cut the air belonged to Professor Hypatia Scalara. She had apparently been watching them all for a little while. Amalthea tensed. She did not like Scalara much, and neither did anyone else, but for some reason, Scalara had taken their side.
“How can she be sure when none of us have heard from them?” Scalara shook her head. “Jennie Stuart has never spent more than an hour over a chart in her whole life,” she said scornfully. “She doesn’t use logs, she uses the tables—she didn’t even use the ones Michel redacted ‘til I told her about them—and if she can’t factor it out, then she fudges. She’s a horrid astrologer. If she’s doing anything up there, they’re laying out endless rounds of tarocchi, hoping to get a hand they can play.” Scalara snorted. “Where’s Magnusson? She can draw runes; it’s not mathematical, and I don’t normally trust it—but it’s faster.”
“She’s helping Will and Forrester on the perimeter,” said Emily Chattox, frowning. Amalthea wondered if she was beginning to take this thing seriously.
“Never mind,” said Scalara. “I can do most of this in my head. In my sleep, even. Give me Miss Loveday’s numbers, and Mr Leffoy, if you wouldn’t mind giving me yours—”
“I don’t mind,” said Florian Leffoy, and tore the flyleaf from the first book he pulled out of his pack—a copybook, Amalthea observed with small relief—and took the pencil Mercuria Casaubon offered him wordlessly. “But I’m going to be too…” He struggled for the word, scribbling as he wrote down numbers and astrological symbols. “Too enmeshed for control? You’ll need to read for both of us.”
“Read me for control,” said Mercuria quietly to Scalara. “Read me. And let Ambrose or Martial do a second chart to compare; they’re not magistri, but it would be good to have some redundancy.”
“This is a waste of time,” Charis grumbled, and glanced at Alastor, who seemed to agree with her. Amalthea wasn’t sure they were wrong. “We should just go up and get them back.”
“I’ll go,” said Scalara sharply. “There is no need for the children to go.”
“You won’t get her back without me,” said Florian Leffoy, swallowing hard; he looked very upset, and Amalthea felt for him more than she wanted to. “I don’t know how I know that. But it’s true. Jonathan and Mercuria and Callista should stay here, everyone else should be older, but I have to go.”
Charis had opened her mouth to object, before even Amalthea could, but Scalara was already looking at his chart and with nothing more than a sigh, she agreed. “Yes. You do. I am taking him, Emily. Don’t even think about arguing.”
brightmechanism, lamerveilleuse, loveanddarkness, madimi, prince_florian, sabedoria (Hypatia Scalara),voci_umbrarum (Emily Chattox, Ambrose Lovelace, Clarissa Pucey, Claudia Warrington) and flintlock