"Psst." The sound came from the opening of the alcove and Cain attempted to ignore it, already guessing its source.
"Psst." The odd hissing penetrated his thoughts again and he turned regretfully in its direction.
"Oi." Liara peeked out from the doorway, her head hanging over the edge. "Whattcha doing?"
"Knitting a garment," Cain sighed.
"Well to my humble eyes, it looks like you are making smoochy face with Zarina." Liara arched a sassy brow.
"I was not making...," Cain frowned deeply. "I wasn't."
"Could have fooled me." Liara countered with a wry grin. "What would Verushka say?"
That got Cain's attention and he gave her a look filled with paternal remonstrance. "I was working, Liara. Don't you ever work?" He rubbed his hand across his brow, massaging his temples.
"Hey, I think I worked pretty hard at your country party, while you were off gallivanting with the rest of the ton in their little games. Let's not forget that you couldn't even muster up the strength to attend your own engagement announcement."
Cain dropped his hand and looked at her sharply. "Verushka didn't tell you?"
Liara smiled devilishly and took one big stride into the alcove. "Tell me what?"
Cain diverted his eyes quickly, shifting his weight, no doubt in the effort to soon run away from his maid's interrogation. "Nothing that you need know about. I am just surprised she hasn't spoken about it with you."
"Well, we haven't spoken at all. Everything has been such a rush after Queen Victoria's pregnancy came out in the paper the morning after the ball, that we were all packed up and brought back to the city. To be honest, there hasn't been any time. All day was spent cleaning and baking with the influx of people coming in from all over the country, your mother has decided to give dinners and parties almost every night."
Cain walked forward, pinning Liara with a questioning stare. "Then, one would assume that you would have spoken with her seeing as you work together."
Liara rolled her eyes in exasperation. "Used to work together. You're forgetting that she is the Duke of Wyvernstone's ward now."
"Is that all she is, Liara?" Cain dragged a hand through his hair as he watched the maid squirm. "You are not a consummate courtesan yet to play such games. I know that she has been approached by the Director of Her Majesty's Secret Intelligence Service to assist in some capacity."
Liara's mouth hung open and in the dim corners of her mind she wished that she had remembered to brush her teeth.
"You know?! How do you know?" she spluttered flabbergasted.
"Come on, Li. You already know that I am an Agent. Did you really think that she could keep that secret from me?"
Liara bit her lip as she weighed her answer. "Weeell....... I guess I figured you were both independent Agents in a way." She stopped suddenly and poked him with one long broken nail. "This is exactly the reason that you have a problem with a rogue agent in the Service! Everyone knows everything and if you can't even keep the names of the people working for you a secret then you are not very good at secret-keeping! And, don't even bother asking me what Ver is doing for the Director, I won't betray her secrets for anyone."
Cain blinked a few times, digesting her words. "Perhaps you are right. It is the nature of our psyche and our work that we refuse to stop at a locked door without peering through the keyhole and finding a way in."
"Well, since that is the case your bloody Director has had to use Ver, and Mistress Veronique found me and neither of us are qualified in the least to protect the Queen. So perhaps you should look to the flaws in your own Agency." Liara squatted down in a corner, resting on her haunches and biting at a hangnail. "Look at us, you and me, the Agencies finest crouched backstage a theatre protecting Her Majesty the Queen of England."
"To be fair, you are the only one crouching," Cain commented with a smile to which Liara patted the filthy floor beside her.
Cain shook his head disbelieving that she had been singled out to be a courtesan. If Veronique had a hundred years he doubted that Liara could be altered from her foul-mouthed, brash and feisty ways into the mirror image of a woman such as Zarina. But, then again who was he to judge a Guild that had controlled the hearts and wallets of illustrious nobles throughout the last century. He sat down on the cold stone floor next to Liara, stretching out his legs in front of him and sighed deeply. "Who knows why the Director does what he does?"
Liara stopped breathing for a moment and ceased the progress she had made on her nail. Trying to keep her voice flat and unconcerned she glanced up at her employer. "So, you know the Director?"
Cain watched her features for a moment with a frown before answering. "Not strictly speaking, no."
Liara forced herself to take what she hoped was a normal measured breath.
"The Director is a very important person and I imagine that less than a handful of people know his identity." Cain had known that the room was well proofed for sound when he chose it earlier, but he whispered anyway. "He is the sole connection between the Governor for the Home Office which sees to everything within England's wall and the War Office counterpart who directs our interaction with all other countries."
"Oh," Liara uttered and started again on her nail, but this time it was just something to do to avoid fidgeting under Cain's penetrating glare. She had a secret to keep and she suspected that Cain knew that uncomfortable fact.
"Why do you ask?" Cain questioned, a touch too innocuously.
"No reason. You just mentioned them and I thought you could ask them why they chose Verushka to help." Liara steered the conversation back to her friend. It always seemed much easier to distract Cain from his train of thought if she threw Verushka to the metaphorical wolves.
"I don't think that anyone questions the Director. I hear that he is a most formidable man," Cain laughed at the suggestion.
"Then perhaps you should ask Ver," Liara supplied and wiped her fingers on her apron with finality as she turned to him.
"Now you are being ridiculous," the duke scoffed.
"Why is it ridiculous?" Liara scrunched her nose up at him.
"Verushka can never know who I am. As you say, the secret of every Agent is an identity that must be kept hidden. You must not tell her what you know about me." He stopped for a moment, his face aghast. "You have not already compromised my secret, have you?"
"Relax, Cain. I haven't compromised anyone." Liara grimaced at the sad double-entendre that spoke of her depressing lack of romantic liaisons. "But, you like Verushka, don't you?"
"Of course I do," Cain softened, "but what has that to do with anything?"
Liara twisted her lips in thought. "No, I s'pose you are right. That doesn't mean anything, but do you trust her? Because if you do then you could tell her and no harm would come of it."
"As it is, I do not want her embroiled in this life. If it were my choice I would lock her in a tower somewhere, well away from harm."
Liara dusted off her skirts and stood up to look down upon the seated duke. "What good has ever come of locking a girl in a tower?"
Cain appeared confused and so she continued. "Look, Cain I don't really know what is going on with you and Ver, but you need to talk to someone about your life. Your mother, your friend, or the woman you love. From my understanding of life, though limited, you have to have at least one person who knows you completely and if you are lucky will love you still. Choose wisely."
Cain raised a brow as if surprised to hear such poignant words from his kitchen staff.
Liara shrugged. "I have my moments of brilliance and glory."
Cain stood, swiping his hands together to clear them of dust and dirt. "I care for your friend far more than I should, but despite my trust in her, she cannot know who I am. You must promise never to tell her," he pierced her with the sharp cut of his emerald eyes. "I am no idle Agent who can be swept under the rug, I am the Governor and it is far too dangerous a secret to bear."
"Then you do her a great disservice." Liara placed a palm on her ample hip and appeared unimpressed.
"How so?" Cain queried, with genuine interest.
"Pedestals and towers were not made to hold the female form. Both are cages, however differently they may be gilded. The fairer sex may seem fragile, Your Grace, but there is far more to their strength than mere sinews. If you were only to look around you, you would see the capacity that the women you already know have for passion, resilience and courage."
Liara had drawn herself to the full extent of her height and though it did not match his own, he felt shadowed by the power of her presence for a flicker of a moment. The slope of her shoulders, the tilt of her chin and the turn of her countenance had unearthed a side to the maid that he had not glimpsed before, but he knew without question that Veronique had.
"Liara," he entreated as she walked angrily away from him to the alcoves opening.
Liara turned and caught the favour before it left his lips. "I will not tell her, Cain. Not yet. But regardless of if you trust her or not, if you ever want her trust in return then you should tell her, and soon." Without another word she spun on her heel and stormed off.
Liara didn't even know why she was so furious. Everything that Cain thought and said was considered by many to be acceptable standards for men to have. For God's sake, most women felt the same way! But it irked her all the same. Women brought life into the world, they held households together, and the Queen ran the whole damn country but men still felt that the female gender as a whole was a timid species that needed to be swathed in cotton wool. If Cain couldn't see the unparalleled strength in her friend then he didn't deserve her.
But then, didn't everyone deserve the chance to grow? Maybe Cain just needed someone to confide in, since he certainly hadn't spoken to his mother about his secret existence.
'He.' Cain had said 'he.' The duke thought that the Director was a man. Was is possible that Cain didn't know that his own mother was the Director for the Secret Intelligence Service or was this just another secret he was keeping? Or maybe Verushka was mistaken in the true identity of the Duchess of Bexley, although that hardly seemed likely when she was helping with all the 'paperwork' as Ver put it. Liara stopped short so suddenly that a stage crew member slammed into her back and stumbled to the floor. She turned around and recognised the worker sprawled on the floor. "Oh, George, I'm so sorry." Liara stooped to pick up the aged man who controlled the curtains rigging. "I wasn't paying attention to where I was going."
"That's okay Liara. No harm done." He leaned heavily on her arm as he rose. "What yer got troubling that head of yours?"
Liara briskly helped him rearrange his thick overcoat and glasses, brushing away the silt from the overused floor boards. "Oh, nothing George."
George twitched his bushy, grey moustache at her and blinked.
"Okay, fine," she sighed. "Why do men think that women can't take care of themselves?"
The older man chuckled and hauled the loops of spare rope back over one shoulder. "Oh, we know that you can, well most of us do. But it is nice to feel needed, isn't it?"
Liara didn't look appeased and so he continued on while walking them into a corner further away from the busy thoroughfare during intermission. "I don't disagree with you, my dear. But apart from the few who are truly bad men, the most of us really love and care for our wives and daughters."
Liara placed a palm on his rough forearm. "I am not saying that you don't, but you think they are weaker than you."
George frowned in thought. "Yes, because they are." He held up his arms to halt the maid's furious gaze. "In physical strength, Liara. But I believe them to be stronger in many other ways. Our genders are different, it is true. Not good or bad, just different. You know my blessed Millie is a tempestuous woman who would cut off my manhood if I looked sideways at one of these dancers."
Liara's laughed as she recalled George's plentiful wife.
"But," George continued, "While she protects my heart, I protect and provide for our home."
Liara opened her mouth to say that Millie could do those things just as well but her friend stopped her.
"I'm sure that she is capable, but I do it for her because I love her. Don't you see, my girl, it's how I show her I care."
Liara frowned for a moment reflecting on Verushka's relationship with Cain. Maybe the duke was just trying to care for Verushka in the best way he was able. Ver had managed to make her own way through the entirety of her life but unlike the other two girls she was far better at accepting help. The bookish maid wielded vulnerability like a weapon and wherever she went men seemed eager to assist. It was not a talent that Liara possessed, but even she had to admit that the idea of having someone who wanted to love and protect you held some appeal.
"My, my, my. Learning the artistry of seduction at the knee of a peasant?" A melodious voice mocked from behind Liara's shoulder.
Liara swung around to greet the interceptor and spied Zarina, standing tall and regal as if she existed in the centre of a ball room. She had met the exquisite woman once before in the Guild House and the effect was no less diminished upon a second meeting. Zarina was a culmination of a thousand beautiful things strung together with elegance and poise. She was everything that Liara wanted to be and would probably never achieve. The younger maid had spent countless nights swaying her hips in an attempt to promenade in the moonlight of the abandoned bedchamber or soften her voice to echo the warmth men were reported to want to hear. But, it was all just pretend. There was no world in which she could emulate the perfection of such a creature. Her voice was always a few decibels too loud, her manner too brash and her wit nowhere near as sharp as it should have been. The only aspect she could comfort herself with was that she was kind in ways that Zarina was not, nor did the courtesan attempt to be.
"This has nothing to do with seduction," Liara rebuked.
Zarina sighed with weary condescension. "Everything, has to do with seduction."
Liara was about to respond when a voice from above distracted them from their conversation as the set changed and George was needed in the lofts. Actors bustled about them as he fought the tide to reach his station and Liara was left bouncing between the flurry of feet as each cast member and musician tried to once again reach their places. Eventually she was pushed back amongst the hanging rigging and stacks of wooden crates and she grabbed wildly to stop them crashing to the floor. With both arms hoisting angled boxes and one foot flaying wildly in the air tangled among ropes, her mortification was complete when she heard Zarina tut patronizingly several feet away.
"Really? This is the best that Mistress Veronique could do. Such a pity."
Liara gave a giant heave disentangling her leg and pushed her well-cushioned bottom against the crates threatening to fall. With an unattractive grunt she grappled with her predicament before turning back to the other woman. "I think Veronique knows what she is doing."
"Where you are concerned that is doubtful, very doubtful." She strolled in a circle around Liara observing her from the tips of her split ends to the scuffs on her boots. "Nevertheless, that will all change when I am one day Guild Mistress."
Liara's eyebrows shot up. "You are going to be the next Mistress of the Crimson Guild?"
"Of course," Zarina answered, triumph shining through her cobalt irises.
"Does Veronique know?" Liara gave her usual sass. Just because she admired the other woman's class didn't mean that she had to like her. In fact the two feelings were often mutually exclusive in Liara's experience.
"Of course she knows," Zarina spat and for the first time Liara felt that her face took on an expression of something other than beauty.
"I have been groomed for the position ever since I was a young girl. There is no one better suited than I and none as worthy as myself."
"I hear that you have recently fallen out of favour with our Mistress," Liara couldn't help but retort. She regretted it instantly as Zarina's eyes narrowed upon her.
"You hear a lot for one so young."
Liara raised her head and stood tall. If there was one thing she had learnt so far, it was how to fake it until such a time that the lies became reality. "Is not that the highest praise one can offer a member of our Guild?"
The shaded mauve edge of Zarina's lips curved into a smirk. "You have promise, I shall give you that much Liara. But you are still young in many ways to our art. It is best you leave the course of our Guild to me."
"And where exactly would that course lead us?" At that moment Liara spied the Queen seated in her Royal box through a momentary gap in the curtain and Zarina's gaze followed her own before she could avert her eyes.
"Ah, you know more than you reveal, sister." Zarina's eyes flickered over the false endearment and Liara knew there was no point denying the truth that Zarina had gauged with just one gaze.
"We all have our own secrets," she answered.
"No sooner have you entered, than you had been entrusted with the deepest mysteries that we possess.... How interesting." Zarina stopped at Liara's shoulder and scrutinised her expressions.
Liara didn't think that the accomplished courtesan looked 'interested'. She looked furious and understandably so. Zarina was not a foolish woman, in fact, the depth of her insight was so unfathomable that she was able to glean secrets that Liara had not even spoken.
Acting purely out of instinct Liara calmed her racing heart and turned only her head to the self-proclaimed future mistress. "Perhaps it is not that she particularly trusts me, but that she does not trust others."
Zarina took a step back, her glittering chiffon overlay sweeping the dusty floor. "I have heard of some of the other girls speak your name. You may currently be in Mistress Veronique's favour but while girls like you come and go, one thing remains the same. And that, is me."
"You are so sure of yourself," Liara's tone was as dry as week old bread.
"Well, of course," Zarina gave a soft bubble of laughter. "Come look at this, Liara." She gestured for the maid, drawing her to the slim opening between the fall of the curtains and Liara reluctantly acquiesced.
"What do you see out there?"
Liara looked out to the light blazing upon the stage of the second act of the Barber of Seville. "I see the hero Almaviva climbing up the balcony into the window of his love Rosina."
"How very like Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, wouldn't you say?" Zarina asked with an artful arch of her brow.
Liara frowned and looked back at her. "Yeah, I s'pose so, except that I don't think that these two die," she surmised, not having seen the play before.
"And why would you say that?"
"Well, for one thing this is a comedy and I doubt it would be very funny if either of these lovers die because they killed themselves at the end." Liara answered sarcastically.
"True," the courtesan smirked. "But as the audience is about to find out, Almaviva is no love struck boy without a plan. He is entering Rosina's house under subterfuge, pretending to be her music teacher. And, when that fails him eventually, he possesses the great wealth required to buy his way into hearts of those that control her hand in marriage and the countless others that adore her. Rosina is worth nothing less than the unflinching devotion of every man that surrounds her."
"So, what are you saying? That you are like Rosina, wanted by countless men?" Liara struggled to see her point.
Zarina gave her a pitying look. "No, child. I am Almaviva. Nothing will stand in my way and I am no stranger to the subterfuge required to win. Rosina represents the Crimson Guild and I will have her, make no mistake."
"And you are willing to deceive Veronique to win it?" Liara asked dumbfounded.
Zarina flicked the long end of her sash across her shoulder unconcerned. "Don't be silly, Liara."
Liara clenched her fist and growled. "You know, I've had quite enough of being called silly tonight."
"Well then stop acting as such," Zarina tossed carelessly. "One does not overthrow our leader with a simple plan. I guarantee you that Veronique has dozens, all laid out more carefully than the next."
Liara wanted to fling another question at the exquisite courtesan but she paused and forced her mind to work past its slow and sluggish pace until she caught at the fluttering tails of a thought in her mind. "Almaviva had money too."
Zarina cast a glance over her shoulder and smiled with a secret. "Very good. Very good indeed Liara." She strolled back to the young maid and looked at her with greater appreciation than before. "Yes, I have money too."
Liara's brow furrowed. "But why would you tell me this? Surely you know that my allegiance lies firmly with Veronique. I will not keep your secrets... unless," Liara paused as she spoke. "You want me to tell her?" The inflection at the end of her sentence made her words a question but it did not have to be. The truth shined clearly from the rich ocean of Zarina's eyes.
"I am very grateful to our Mistress for giving me the assistance that she did in my early life. I will not challenge her, but there will come a time, much like in the monarchy, when the Queen must step aside for the next in line."
Liara caught quickly at the thread of the conversation. "You are saying that our Queen's time must pass too?"
Zarina's beautiful face was once again a serene placard of emotion as she drew nearer still, looking over Liara's shoulder through the slit in the curtains. "When I asked you what it is you see out there, you looked only as far as the stage. And that is the reason you are just a maid, and will always be just a maid, for if you wish to rise above your station you need to set your sights a little higher." She tilted Liara's chin up with the silken pads of her gloved fingertips and Liara's eyes fell on the Royal Box.
Queen Victoria sat upon a velvet throne enraptured by the performance. She was bedecked in jewels that Liara could only have dreamt of, in a gown of the deepest of blues. Prince Albert sat immobile, a firm constant support to her left and to her right was a man that Liara did not recognise. He bore some resemblance to the Queen in the rounding of his cheeks and the shape of his brow but his thick moustache and receding hairline gave away his slightly advanced years.
"That," Zarina hummed in her ear, "is the half-brother of our dear Queen. His name is Carl, 3rd Prince of Leiningen and he is in the deepest confidences of Victoria... and I am in the deepest confidences of the Prince." She gave a throaty laugh that echoed with the pleasures of the bedroom but Liara was starting to grow tired of the innuendo.
"What do you know, Zarina?" Liara swung around to face her with a burning ferocity.
Zarina's staccato laugh echoed onto the stage and earned her the angry disapproval of the nearest actor. "That, my dear, is information that you could not hope to pry from my lips."
"Is that what you told Cain?" Liara hissed.
"The Duke of Bexley?" Zarina fluttered her darkened lashes. "I told him what he asked of me. We are old friends, him and I, but he plays the game on an entirely different level. I suppose we all need that gallant knight to cross the board and make things interesting, but what lies in that small space between the King and Queen is what interests me."
Liara took a step closer to the courtesan, enough to breathe in the intoxicating blend of her jasmine perfume. "He does not know what you have heard from Prince Carl?"
Zarina offered an enigmatic smile. "Everyone knows just what they need to. After all, there is no fun in playing unless the odds are even." Her beatific features contorted for a moment into the rage of a woman scorned and she gritted her teeth before adding a chilling addendum. "You tell Veronique that she should not have overlooked me. I have years of hidden agendas and secrets pooled from countless years in her service. 'Zarina' should have been the one she turned to, to serve the Queen."
"It sounds to me that 'Zarina' serves herself before anyone else." Liara met her cold rage without fear.
Zarina's rage dissipated rapidly and she smiled with coy deference. "Yes, perhaps you are right."
Liara attempted to slow her breathing, unsure of how it had become so uncontrolled again. When she looked back to the courtesan, Zarina was once again tranquil as she gazed out onto the stage. "You are not what you seem," Liara noted.
"No one ever is," Zarina remarked profoundly.
Liara took one last glimpse at the monarch in her box before she turned to leave. It was, after all, the first and likely the last time she would ever see the Queen in person, and such opulence and refined elegance was a thing of beauty.
"You will see her again, you know," Zarina observed. "The Queen is a creature of habit, as was her grandfather King George III, whose assassination attempt was right in this very theatre, in that box."
"What?" Liara asked confused.
"It is not hard to know the whereabouts of our monarch at every hour of every day. For example, in the late afternoons she favours an airing with Prince Albert in Hyde Park." Zarina fell silent again and Liara had to wonder at her motivations and machinations.
When it seemed as if she would not speak again, Liara took a single step in the direction of the stage door.
"You know, I am not a bad person," Zarina commented idly, halting the maid's retreat once more.
"I'm sure that you believe that." Liara commiserated. The light of the stage fell softly across Zarina's cheekbones, gleaming against the locks of her ebony hair like moonlight on the ocean's surface. She was still as stunning as before, but perhaps a touch less so for blackened edges of her heart.
Liara twisted on her heel and ran for the exit just as the Rossini's last aria filled the air and the star crossed couple found their resolution in marriage. She would have loved to witness the end but the warmth of the Bexley Pantry called and she had had some news to share with her friends that could not wait a moment longer.
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A/N:
Did you like it??? Please let me know if you did. I have to be honest, keeping all the secrets straight is confusing even me. I don't know how the Duchess does it! Zarina does seem like a bit of a cow, doesn't she? I am looking forward to writing more about her and Liara's interaction in Liara's book later on.
Sorry if this chapter seems a little slow but it is setting things up for the main event soon. So many threads dangling in the air. I don't know what I would do without my editor @AV_Hart who has saved my work from countless errors.
Also, thanks for being patient with me. I try to write when I feel inspired so that the joy comes through and not just the effort. I have also just had my wisdom teeth out and so am feeling a bit sorry for myself as I eat through a straw. If you can't find me on wattpad, this is where to look:
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Glossary:
Prince Carl 3rd Prince of Leiningen (1804-1856) was the son of Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld (Victoria's mother) from her first marriage to Emich Carl, Prince of Leiningen (1763-1814). He had a sister- Princess Feodora of Leiningen (1807-1872) who was also very close to Queen Victoria.
The Barber of Seville. Gioachino Rossini's opera was considered one of the greatest masterpieces of comedy within music. Even after two hundred years, it remains a popular work. It truly was the play which Queen Victoria watched the night before her assassination attempt. As in this story, she was attended that night by Prince Albert and Prince Carl.
I love mixing historical reality with fiction, and I hope you are enjoying it too!