Inversions

You took a moment to seat yourself just as you wanted, moving your sword so that it was comfortable, placing your booted feet just so. Then you said, "I am told you have asked the King to release you from your post."

"That is correct, Guard Commander."

You nodded for a moment. "That is probably for the best."

"Oh, I'm sure it is, Guard Commander. Oelph, don't just stand there," she said, turning to look at me. "Continue with your work, please."

"Yes, mistress," I mumbled.

"I would dearly love to know quite what happened in the chamber that evening."

"I am sure you already do, Guard Commander."

"And I am equally sure I do not, madam," you said, with a resigned sigh in your voice. "A more superstitious man would think it must have been sorcery."

"But you are not so deceived."

"Indeed not. Ignorant, but not deceived. I think I can say that if I had no other explanation I would be sorrier the longer the matter went unexplained and you were still here, but as you say you are going…"

"Yes. Back to Drezen. I have already inquired about a ship… Oelph?"

I had let drop a flask of distilled water. It had not broken, but the noise had been loud. "Sorry, mistress," I said, trying not to burst out crying. A ship!

"Do you feel your tithe here has been a success, Doctor?"

"I think so. The King is in better health than when I arrived. For that alone, if I can take any of the credit, I hope I may feel… fulfilled."

"Still, it will be good to get back amongst your own kind, I imagine."

"Yes, I'm sure you can imagine."

"Well, I must be going," you said, standing. Then you said, "It was strange, all those deaths at Yvenir, then good Duke Ormin, and those three men."

"Strange, sir?"

"So many knives, or blades, at any rate. And yet so few found. The murder weapons, I mean."

"Yes. Strange."

You turned at the door. "That was a bad business the other night, in the questioning chamber."

The Doctor said nothing.

"I'm glad you were delivered… unscathed. I would give a great deal to know how it was accomplished, but I would not trade the knowledge for the result." You smiled. "I dare say I will see you again, Doctor, but if I do not, let me wish you a safe journey back to your home."

And so, a half-moon later, I stood on the quayside with the Doctor, hugging her and being hugged and knowing that I would do anything to make her stay or be allowed to follow her, and also that I would never see her again.

She pushed me gently away. 'Oelph," she said, sniffing back her tears. "You will not forget that Doctor Hilbier is more formal in his approach than I. I have respect for him but he-"

"Mistress, I will not forget anything you have told me."

"Good. Good. Here." She reached into her jacket. She presented me with a sealed envelope. "I have arranged with the Mifeli clan that you have an account with them. This is the authority. You may use the earnings on what pleases you, though I hope you will do a little experimentation of the type I taught you —»

"Mistress!"

"— but the capital, I have instructed the Mifelis, the capital only becomes yours when you achieve the title of Doctor. I would advise you to buy a house and premises, but-"

"Mistress! An account? What? But what, where?" I said, genuinely astonished. She had already left me what she thought might come in useful to me — and what I might be able to store in a single room in the house of my new mentor, Doctor Hilbier — from her supplies of medicines and raw materials.

"It is the money the King gave me," she said. "I don't need it. It is yours. Also, there is in the envelope the key to my journal. It contains all the notes and the descriptions of my experiments. Please use it as you see fit."

"Oh, mistress!"

She took my hand in hers and squeezed. "Be a good doctor, Oelph. Be a good man. Now, quickly," she said, with a desperately sad and unconvincing laugh, "to save our tears before we both become hopelessly dehydrated, eh? Let us-"

"And if I became a doctor, mistress?" I asked, in a far more collected and cold ma

She had started to turn away. She turned halfway back, and looked at the wooden decking of the quay. "No, Oelph. No, I… I don't think I'll be there." She looked up and smiled a brave smile. "Goodbye, Oelph. Fare well."

"Goodbye, mistress. Thank you."

I will love you for ever.

I thought the words, and could have said them, might have said them, perhaps nearly said them, but in the end did not say them. It may be that that was the unsaid thing even I did not know I had thought of saying that let me retain a shred of selfrespect.

She walked slowly up the first half of the steep-set gangplank, then lifted her head, lengthened her stride, straightened her back and strode up and on to the great galleon, her dark hat disappearing somewhere beyond the black webbing of the ropes, all without a backward glance.

I walked slowly back up the city, my head down, my tears dripping down my nose and my heart in my boots. Several times I thought to look up and round, but each time I told myself the ship would not have sailed yet. All the time I kept hoping, hoping, hoping that I would hear the slap of ru

The ca

I ran back down the way I had come. I thought I might be too late, but it was not too late, and by the time I could see the docks again, there was the great vessel, all bulbous and stately and moving towards the harbour entrance under the tow of two long cutters full of men heaving on stout oars. There were still many people on the dockside, waving at the passengers and crew gathered near the stern of the departing galleon. I could not see the Doctor on the ship.

I could not see her on the ship!

I ran around the dockside like a mad man, looking for her. I searched each face, studied every expression, tried to analyse each stance and gait, as though in my lovelorn lunacy I really believed that she had indeed decided to quit the ship and stay here, stay with me, this whole apparent departure just a maddeningly extended joke, and yet, on relinquishing the ship, for a jest had decided to disguise herself, just to taunt me further.

The galleon slipped out to sea almost without me noticing, letting the cutters come creasing back across the waves while she, beyond the harbour wall, let drop her creamy fields of sail and took the wind about her.

After that, the people drifted away from the quay until there were just a couple of sobbing women left, one standing clutched in about herself, her face quite covered by her hands, the other squatting, face raised to stare emptily at the skies while the tears coursed down her cheeks in silence.

… And I, staring out at the gap between the harbour light-towers towards the distant line that was the jagged far circumference of Crater Lake. And there I stood, and wandered, stu