The Mortality of Queens

14 - M is for Maraziel

Stanton

Cotteridge looked up when his Minister entered the offices with an Umbra asleep on his shoulder. Cotteridge had seen Maraziel rarely in person. Stanton suspected there was a secret file on her, compiled with the help of Jenny Moonshine and others. He had expected Maraziel to return to the Other Realm once the business with the Chancellor of Balliol concluded, but she had offered a trade.

'Sir has forgotten something, I fear.' Cotteridge's eye fixed upon Stanton's shoulder.

Stanton was momentarily at a loss but rallied. 'Clear desks, Cotteridge. Maraziel attends me with good reason. We have made a discovery, I think, and must now pursue it.'

'Indeed, sir, so your meeting with the Chancellor; it went well?'

Uncertainty clouded Stanton's features, 'Of some help, I think, but mainly he has engaged Maraziel's interest and she is here – mayhap briefly – to help, in return for information on the signing of the Queen's Treaty.'

The delicate delay before Cotteridge's 'Just so, Minister,' was enough to inform Stanton that this was not any kind of way for business to be conducted in a Ministry.

'Bring maps of England and Wales. Do we have maps of the Other Realm?'

'We have diverse sketches with holes in them that appear, coagulate and recede, sir. I would not call them maps.' Cotteridge left the room to discover them.

'What nonsense would you have me do?' Maraziel yawned and displayed her customary lassitude as he set her carefully on the desktop and began clearing it in readiness for charts.

'Ministry business.'

'You are aware that I have made my required appointment for the day and can return to my bed at any time?'

'I'm surprised you have not already done so.'

'Does this task require more parley with Jenny Moonshine and her Englishman, who is one of the silliest creatures in all Albion?'

'Rest assured, Lord Pitt will not be attending. I want us to work together, Maraziel. Firstly, on my business and then on who was and wasn't present at the Treaty signing. I would know about this Umbra who murders others, possibly to kill their English, Highlands or Welsh allies.'

'The first I thought of... well, I only know that she can set out a plan with the aim of killing a particular Umbra. This is of itself unusual, as she kills to a design; most slay by mistake, for gain or because they are unduly bored.'

'She? This is a member of the fairer sex?'

'If you mean my sex, then yes, and it is well that you believe me fair. It reflects on you creditably.'

'And her name?'

'I am reluctant to betray her. I rather admire her, and she is no friend to Nymphs. Give me your other demands first and we will see?'

'I wish to understand the working of your realm. Twoshrews has given me some answers.'

Maraziel's head raised and she twisted some of the madness of hair away from her face. Through its hazy entanglement he found a formidable violet eye claiming him.

That eye took him back. He was thirteen again, sitting upon his bed reading when he first became aware of a presence beside him, first beheld those transfixing violet orbs. He had flinched away from the intensity of their scrutiny. Whereupon they had blinked and the creature beholding him had yawned and apologised for arriving late. Only then did he deduce the dark nightmare that dwelt beneath the eruption of hair, the hint of horns, the glimpse of the disfiguring rooty growths around the jawline.