Armand’s First Letter. Amelia’s First Letter.

20 November 1018
Bois-de-Bas, Armorica

My dear cousin Amelia,

I have a great surprise in store for you—and alas, I am late in telling you of it, for the surprise is that I have declared Jérôme Lavigne a journeyman of the Armorican Former’s Guild, and as you have received this letter by his hand I will assume that you already know all about it.

I was pleased to declare him a journeyman upon his request, for he has spent the past year diligently pursuing both every lesson I have to teach and every investigation of his own. And so, as it is undeniably suitable for a journeyman to journey I am returning him to L’École du Sorciers with my best wishes. Perhaps he might someday return to Armorica to receive his mastery—and I shall always receive him with pleasure—but for now he is content.

I am sorry to lose him; it has been a luxury beyond all telling to have a colleague at hand with whom I can discuss the heights of my craft. But he has been eager for some months to return and participate in your explorations and discoveries, as I am sure you already know from your own correspondence.

Regarding your discoveries, I find them fascinating and hope you will continue to regale me with them; but I have little of substance to add. Clearly you will want to extend your survey to others of the Old Worlds; and with Jérôme to help you may be able to double your efforts. I stand ready to build another caravan for his use, should L’École wish to purchase one—and should they not be able to procure one closer at hand. I know that John Netherington-Coates was much taken with your home-from-home.

I have two requests for you.

First, what news of my mother and Grandmaster Netherington-Coates? Though I am in regular correspondence with both, neither has mentioned the other in some months; nor has your esteemed mother said anything. Have they had a falling out? Or, perhaps, have they had a falling in, as it were, and fear to say anything to me? I do assure you, I should be delighted if they have at last come to terms with each other, for I do wish Mama to be happy, and I do believe that John is both capable and eager to make her so. Please enquire of my dear auntie, for I’ve no doubt she will write more freely to you than to me.

And second…I hesitate to ask, and I assure you it is a matter of curiosity only. There is a man in Mont-Havre that I first met under the name of Sabot; we both had rooms at Madame Truc’s boarding house. He vanished when Le Maréchal’s soldiers came to Armorica, and did not pop up again until about six or seven weeks ago, when it was revealed to me that Madame Truc had known him in Provençe as the son of the Comte de L—.

He had fled here at his father’s wish at the beginning of The Troubles, so he told us, to preserve his life. The Comte his father was subsequently executed, and so Sabot now would be the rightful Comte if such a thing were to be tolerated in today’s Provençe.

He came to us dressed as a gentleman, as I had always seen him, but as a gentleman who had fallen on very hard times; for he was gaunt, and his garments were threadbare. Yet he would take nothing from me; and indeed, I am entirely unsure why he sought me out.

Your brother, more suspicious than I, had him followed; and it seems that he is a man of several names as well as a man of parts, for he was shortly thereafter to be seen pursuing his business much cleaned up and very well-dressed, looking quite the top of the world.

I do not know the reason for his subterfuge, nor what name he is currently living under, but it isn’t Sabot or I would have heard of his continuing presence in the city long since. His new persona is so different than his former that I think even my fellow boarders would be unlikely to look closely enough to spot him; and as he was exceedingly retiring during his time at Madame Truc’s it is unlikely that anyone else would.

I say again, I do not know what he is about; and after my experiences with Mr. Trout in years gone by I admit I am more than curious to know. Madame Truc assures me that it can be nothing bad, that he is a gentleman of the finest quality—and yet, I wonder.

Do you suppose you might ask Maximilian to enquire discreetly at the British Embassy as to the late Comtes de L— and his heir, and what might be known of them?

Your concerned and curious cousin,

Armand

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