It wasn't much of a stage, a square platform built with leftover planks from the carpentry project that Lady Sotheby had commissioned for her new pantry, and the 'theater' happened to be a large drawing room transformed by dramatic floor-length curtains in one of the fancy townhomes along Great Pulteney with comfortable seating for fifty or so of the Lord and Lady Sotheby's closest associates.
If she imagined it just so, Saira could pretend that she would address only one person this morning. Ignoring the many sets of eyes, concentrating on the singular sitting would calm her nerves, and keep herself from searching the back of the room for the one set of eyes she hoped with equal measure that she would and would not see.
Oh for the love of all things good and natural, would you take your seat already!
That was the look that Aunty Rame gave her when she followed her through the curtains with the kettle table and found her staring out at the crowd. Saira gave a small start and lowered her gaze to the floor. She usually had herself much better together than this. Thank goodness that no one could see her expression through the veil.
Maybe it was the unexpected run in that had thrown her so much. Maybe it was that she wasn't accustomed to a room of over twenty people… this gathering was huge compared to her other public sittings and made her arms prickle with cold sweat. But then, she reminded herself, it was here that she could openly speak her mind and tell people what she Saw.
From a young age, Saira had learned to school her features, keep conversations brief, and not close her eyes for too long around strangers. She couldn't read minds, but she was inexplicably drawn to people who lived too loudly inside their own heads. The merest brush against a sleeve or the bump of a shoulder, and Saira could picture their thoughts and feelings, insecurities and worries. Sometimes, she got images from objects of great sentimental value. And on her sixteenth birthday, these brief glimpses into other people's private lives suddenly came into sharp focus.
Her aunts had assured her that she had inherited her mother's Gift, something neither of the sisters had gotten themselves. They encouraged her to learn how to use it. And then, to honor the memory of her mother, Gautami, they presented The Shroud to the upper end of Society.
For one coin, she would answer a question and vow never to tell another soul.
At first, it was a relief to speak the visions into reality and have another person confirm that the images she saw were true, and not just inside Saira's own head. It validated her, gave her peace in her heart that something of her mother's still remained in this world. She enjoyed the fleeting attention, the looks of awe and respect that had never before been turned upon her.
Then the disguise came off, and she was herself again.
Pretending that Saira Russell was unremarkable… taking her tea in the back of the shop in deference to more socially forward ladies in the window seats, getting fitted for a seasonal dress two steps away from current fashions with an easier cut and more affordable fabric, appearing at social gatherings with the infrequent invitation from overly-polite ladies who had once known her mother… and acting like the whispers behind her back about how unremarkable she had become… that was hard.
Knowing that most of the words that the locals spoke, most of the ways that they occupied their time, were all fashioned to impress upon others that they were more remarkable than their own realities and not calling them out… that was also hard.
The whole of Lady Sotheby's drawing room focused on her as she took her seat, smoothed her skirts and tried to look as mysterious as possible. Her presence here transcended the simple act of meeting friends and acquaintances in the Assembly Rooms as her mother used to do. The dark-skinned, exotic and incomparable Honorable Russell had, as they say, broken the mold of the Seer as some alley-combing street beggar. No, Saira's elegant mother had lit candles, spoken softly, and always told the truth. England had freed them in many ways. No veils. No homebound hindrances. No war-torn markets. But this country had its own set of trappings. Her mother and her aunties always found ways to ease the burdens of propriety and creatively fashion the foreign ways of the English into their own brand of social acceptability.
Saira felt the instant sting that accompanied thoughts of her mother, who had left her too early, but not before she'd infused Saira with the determination of making the most out of every day. 'The future is yours to make,'' she used to say. But what would Gautami Russell think about her daughter now, wearing a veil, standing in front of strangers, about to reveal hidden things beyond their sights?
For money?
Her mother had never taken coins or worn a disguise, but then, her mother wasn't here anymore.
Most of the people in the land of the Britains preferred their futures like they preferred common tea cakes, fully measured and tested. The idea of paying The Shroud to give them assurances appealed to their sensibilities and also loosed their purse strings.
Last fall, Saira had done residential sittings in Bathampton with large success. The recent influx of visitors at the close of the London Season to Bath had provoked a flurry of requests from her private clients for a more open arrangement for guests to observe, and surprisingly, to pay for. Saira's aunts had accepted the invitations on her behalf, 'to fund her future', they all agreed.
"Give them their tea cake future," Aunty Rame had told her. "If that's what they want."
There was nothing wrong with a predictable future per se, except that Saira's had dried up and crumbled into pheasant food ages ago. She likened her path to be more of a risky business of creating a souffle for a birthday dinner. Their cook's maid often complained that a souffle was an invitation for potential disaster, with much anticipation beforehand, and much disappointment if any small thing went amiss. As a life plan, Saira agreed that whipping whites and setting them in the oven with only a timer and a prayer was the most unpredictable and unstable path she could have chosen.
The thing with being unpredictable was that most people wouldn't guess what she was up to until it was too late to stop her.
She fished in her skirts for the tinder box and set it next to the candle, motioning that all was in place. The basket to ensure prompt service lay at her feet, lined in black velvet. A rush of guilt always accompanied the thought of collecting coins for using her Gift. It seemed wrong to think that anyone would have to pay her for something she did as easily as breathing. Saira often tried to remain indifferent to the visions like her mother had. Those hopes and dreams, along with the games they played with each other were not hers, after all. But still, if they knew what she knew, they would not think of her as Saira Russell, the unremarkable.
Through her veil, Saira examined the room of faces, some of them familiar, like Lady Sotheby, their hostess in her high and feathered hat, and her constant companion, Ms. Winslow, who only took her tea with milk in the mornings, and only with sugar in the afternoons. Lady Sotheby had been desperate for a unique offering for her esteemed guests, and Rameswari had convinced her to call upon the Shroud for a brief morning sitting. The engagement announcement of her daughter, Lillette to a Marquess would be woven into the fine brunch that followed.
A pocket of pulsing tension radiated from the front row. If she looked hard enough, she could pinpoint the source, but this morning, she overlooked the source, preferring not to know. Under the veil, Saira closed her eyes and cleared her mind of the other stray impressions floating through the room. She steeled her resolve to do her best to give these people what they wanted, in the purest form of the truth that she could muster without offense. For the memory of her mother.
When she was ready, she opened her eyes again. Aunty Bava set the carved pillar candle between the chairs, unlit and waiting, like the crowd, for her signal. All murmuring ceased once she raised a gloved hand to indicate the first guest.
Under the watchful eyes of the peerage in the room, Lady Sotheby ushered her daughter Lillette to the platform and sat her down on the chair across from Saira. She appeared not much older than Saira herself, in a robe of white Indian muslin with sleeves of fine white-on-white needlework. Her high-waisted creamy vest was fastened around her neck with an ornamental broach, and she hid a hopeful smile behind her friendly nod.
Saira wished that Lady Lillette's earnest face matched her intention, some question of the heart where the asker already knew their answer and only required a bit of encouragement to accept it. Anything would be preferable to the dreadful lottery question. Predicting the specifics of someone's immediate future or good fortune was as accurate as a farmer's prediction for next season's weather, and Saira dreaded those common inquiries.
When the lady was settled, she pulled a single coin out of her purse and dropped it into the basket.
One question, Saira noted, and lit the candle. She offered a gloved hand. Lillette took it, and they shook in an intimate greeting over the flame.
Saira closed her eyes. Her vision appeared, a collection of smudged charcoal images blurring into one another. Lady Lillette had a lot on her mind this morning. "What is your question?" she asked so only the girl could hear, like a whispered Japa while counting beads.
"I want to know," Lillette whispered, "if accepting Lord Brighton's proposal was the right thing to do."
The charcoal image sharpened abruptly, an image of a striking young man with a breathless smile. Saira attempted to See more, gripping Lady Lillette's hand tighter. The image morphed from a picture of the dashing young man to an older gentleman with a hunting bow strapped across his shoulder, leading a horse down the road.
"When did you see your intended last?" Saira asked.
"Yesterday," Lillette said. "Why? What do you see?"
Saira loosened her grip on the girl's hand and watched as the view panned over to an idyllic cottage with ivy framing the windows. An old woman came down the steps. She met the old man on the road and they embraced. Saira got a warm rush inside her chest, and let out an inaudible sigh at the unabashed affection they had for each other. When they pulled apart, the woman touched her hand to her own chest, next to a brooch of opal and silver. As the vision blurred, Saira felt a pang of loss, wanting to follow it further, but the images faded into darkness.
Saira opened her eyes and saw the ring on Lillette's hand, made of braided gold threads. When she ran a finger over it, a distinct impression of warmth and tenderness overcame her. Someone had fashioned it with care and precision, and a deep sense of affection for the wearer. Her hand lingered for a beat too long to be polite, and Saira had to press her gloved fingers into the table to avoid reaching for it again.
"It's pretty," she said.
"We are to go to London tomorrow to pick out something else, but he wanted me to have this now. He made it himself. Honestly, I'm not sure I want to replace it." she blushed a little at the admission. It was clear that Lillette both appreciated the sentiment and the effort that her fiance had put into the gesture of the handmade ring from drizzled gold strands.
Saira would not have wanted to replace it either, not after feeling all the love and dedication that had been poured into the ring. It explained the dual visions, the first from Lady Lillette depicting their romantic present, blended with her intended's vision of a long, happy life. That was the truth of it, confirmed by the brooch near Lillette's throat, the same brooch Saira saw on the older woman in her mind.
"The Marquess dreams of your future together," Saira told her in a low tone that only Lady Lillette would hear. "He intends to love you forever."
The girl broke out in a beaming smile and shook Saira's hand over the candle. Saira smiled back and extracted her hand. "Thank you!" she said. "Thank you so much!"
The room broke into a smattering of polite, curious applause as Lady Lillette left the stage, whispering guesses to each other at the goings on between The Shroud and her client on the stage.
Saira was quite breathless as Lady Lillette returned to her seat. Few sittings were that earnest and unguarded. She regained her composure during the rest of the morning, fielding more typical, disappointing questions she couldn't possibly answer, such as "Which horses will win next week's race in London?" from a balding gentleman with a cane and the irritating, yet predictable "Am I going to win the pot tomorrow night?" from a greedy-looking barrister, which soured her mood. After each sitting, she extinguished the candle and waited for the next client to take their seat.
At the announcement that brunch was served, Aunty Rame assisted the Lady Sotheby with ushering guests into the next room. Through the walls, a string quartet tuned up and began a lively gavotte to greet the brunching guests. Saira waited for the room to be empty before addressing the basket at her feet. As a result of the peerage attempting to one up each other in their generosity, it was full of coins.
Her aunties congratulated her with "well done" and "they loved you" and "did you see the Duke's son in the first row?".
Yes, Saira was well aware of the Duke's third son, the two ladies he was courting, and the one woman he wasn't, yet had formed an unfortunate attachment to. The lady of his interest had come up for her own sitting, holding a handkerchief of his, and Saira had been privy to the wanton tale in black and white images. Fortunately, the lady asked how many empty slots she should leave on her card for the evening's dance, and not about her love life, which was both written all over her adoring glances towards the front row and in her vision, which was filled with inconveniently specific details of the unchaste plans she had with him after the last dance. Saira never asked to be privy to the private goings on of others, and she often wondered if her veil was black enough to hide her glowing embarrassment after such an intimate reveal. Relief had never come so quickly as when the Duke's son declined Lady Sotheby's invitation to take the stage after her, for Saira did not require a man's perspective to fill out the scene in his lady's mind.
A knock on the door paused Saira's reach for the basket. Aunty Rame collected a stack of calling cards and then latched the door behind her. "The servants have assured us private passage from the home into the back street. But we have to hurry."
Another knock, this time from the butler, interrupted her again. He handed a note to Rameswari and retreated into the hall. "The mistress is so pleased. She would love to have a return sitting," Aunty Rame read aloud from the card.
"The Shroud doesn't do return sittings in the same neighborhood," Bavagna said from the corner. Saira had forgotten she was there.
Rameswari agreed. "We have…" she counts the cards… "too many calls for private appointments. We must cull them down to no more than five." She looked at the sack that Saira was still trying to lift. "Ten. Ten appointments, and no more."
"Let's not be greedy. Saira still has eleven months before she is of age to do anything with that money." Bavagna said.
"Don't speak her name out loud in this place!" Rameswari stage whispered.
By the time her aunties negotiated between themselves about Saira's risks versus her rewards at accepting so many sitting appointments in the town where she also lived, Saira had transformed back into a boy of the streets. She adjusted the cropped wig in the mirror, noting the tear in the place where… he… had grabbed it off her head. Aunty Bava would have to repair it before her next appointment.
With all of their belongings packed, the two aunts lifted the black velvet bag and shoved Saira's shroud in to mute the clinking coins. Then they fastened it around Rameswari's belt underneath her skirts. "Tough legs," she said, and then, "pass me my cane."
Saira watched her aunty hobble into the hallway with the morning's earnings and then slipped out through the servant's entrance to hail a coach and four. She would never speak of Lillette's love match, or the Duke's errant trysts, or anything that she'd Seen tonight to anyone. Aunty Rame's skirts were filled with payment for her to keep it all within her own confidence. Saira's heart hurt for the people's struggles, and also rejoiced for those whose dreams had come true. The weight of the town hung on her conscience, the only consolation being that Saira the unremarkable wouldn't have to live out her days in squalor when she turned twenty-one and her father's estate went on the market.
And that, she and her aunties would never speak of as well, because no one needed to know.
Once outside, Saira heaved a sigh and shook the melancholy away. There had been more downs than ups that morning, which was often the case, and all she wanted to do was go home and walk the gardens, where the silence of the flowers washed away the noise of the town before she had to do it all again that evening. Eager to be on her way, she wordlessly stood in the middle of Great Pulteney Street and threw her left hand in the air as a hackney approached, ignoring the jarvey's call, "Chits and chum tickets, boy! Get the devil out of the way!"
He pulled the horses up short just as Aunty Bava and Aunty Rame exited the building, Rameswari shook her cane at the jarvey and shouted, "How now, young man!"
The jarvey looked startled, but maneuvered the coach for the older ladies to approach, and then made a blanched face as Saira got in herself, ahead of them.
She could hoist herself onto the boot and give the jarvey an earful, venting her frustrations about the balding man and his under-the-table bribery to a member of the House of Lords during the horse races, or the nimble-fingered barrister who counted the number of teaspoons he'd secretly lifted at Lady Sotheby's previous brunch (going for an even dozen this time), but that would be an impropriety her family couldn't afford. Instead, she sat next to her aunties, pouting wordlessly under her cap. She never spoke of what she Saw, and her aunties knew better than to ask. Saira might not like taking money for her Gift, but by the end of a sitting like this one, she felt like she'd earned every shilling.
Coins for questions. That was what they paid for, and Saira kept the rest of it to herself.
That was the hardest part of all.
"That went well," Rameswari heaved the shifting bags of coins underneath her skirts as she climbed into the enclosed carriage to take them home.
"Do you think the old man is about this late in the morning?" Aunty Bava asked.
"Not likely. He's usually holed up in the study by now." Aunty Rame said.
Her father's foul mood greeted them more often these days whenever they returned from an outing. If he'd gotten into the wine cellar with no one to temper him, they'd have to deal with his own temper as well. When he wasn't making himself available, he kept to himself in his study, which the women of Avonburgh House preferred, or took long trips to London without any notice, which they dreaded. When he did appear with civility, her aunties always had the most tolerable excuses for their absence: 'the brunch went late', 'we had to wait for the second wave of carriages', or the esteemed Lady of the House wouldn't cease chatting and we didn't want to be seen as rude or ungrateful guests'. Never 'Saira was off doing a sitting', because Saira's father would not approve like he once had for her mother, years ago.
Two miles northeast of town, Saira's home was conveniently located far enough from the bustling city center to warrant a carriage, but close enough for an hour-long stroll along the canal if good weather allowed. As the fourth son of the Earl of Wiltshire, the Honorable George Russell afforded the modest lifestyle after selling his commission upon return to England from his post in India, where he'd met and married Saira's mother, a daughter of a wealthy Nizam's courtier.
The carriage turned onto the road to Avonburgh House, a modest seven acres with a garden and a carriage house, and a roomy eight-bedroom interior, big enough for the four of them to comfortably live with the servants, yet small enough to manage without a large staff. The shared gardener paused his trimming to wave at them, taking his rounds between Avonburgh and the other smaller estates dotted along the countryside, an arrangement that suited all parties involved. A low-trimmed hedge with an assortment of late-blooming flowers heralded the last of the fading summer and beckoned to the coming autumn.
They had been happy there, the five of them. For a time. If she tried, Saira could vaguely remember warm family dinners and stories that her father would read while bouncing her on his knee. His hilarious Hindi accent made all of the folktale characters' names sound wrong, and Saira remembered that she used to think he was funny. Saira also remembered that he used to smile. At her. At Gautami.
He had lost a wife, but Saira had lost a mother, and she wanted someone to keep those memories alive with. Any mention of her mother at all would set her father off, locking himself in his study, or disappearing to London for days without a word. Because of his ever-increasing apathy, Saira's aunts had taken up running the estate in his stead, making her keenly aware of just how much their home suffered under her father's neglect.
Four years of her father's terrible melancholy had run the value of the estate into the ground. Irresponsible gambling and excessive London ale had forced their annual dividends to go straight from the bank to his creditors. The absence of entailment wouldn't secure her a place to live when her father passed on. Not if the estate carried a debt inheritance that she would never be able to repay.
Lady Lillette Sotheby was one of the lucky few to have found a match with someone who was both honorable and deeply in love with her. But Saira had Seen the character of most of England's men. She would not gamble her future on that sort of man, or any man at all. All too often, she wondered what her mother had Seen in George Russell, and whether he had been more honorable than he was at present.
As they rounded the bend, Saira's turbulent thoughts quieted to the murmurs of her aunties discussing lunch plans, enhancements to her props for a more "mysterious atmosphere', and the way they would have to repair Saira's wig and costume before her sitting that evening at the Crescent. She allowed her thoughts to wander along the roadside, returning to the man she ran into on the streets, the one that she'd grabbed, having lost all of her good senses.
It was like standing too close to the window when lightning struck. Instead of burying her head under the duvet, she'd rushed closer to feel it in her bones.
Blinding color had burst into her mind's eye, a flash of vivid, stunning images: a high garden wall with stones marbled in grays and browns, covered with thorned vines in brilliant hues of greens. Between the two bricked columns checkered in varying shades of orange and red, an ornately wrought gate led to somewhere beyond. It was the beyond that had drawn her in, the obscured, blurred, unSeeable beyond the gate, where the source of all of his secrets hid.
His green eyes had bored through her, demanding her to reveal what she'd Seen. But all she could discern was that he had secrets so big that they spilled out of him like rays through a prism, radiating outward and coloring everything in their path. She wondered if the moon would even eclipse them, or if he glowed as brightly at night as he did in the daytime in the middle of the coffeehouse... where she'd touched him and gotten that jolt...
... and none of that should matter.
What in the actual world was wrong with her?
All morning in the back of her mind, Saira had been trying to reason out the shocking vision. Maybe it had nothing to do with him. She had just turned twenty, after all.
Perhaps her aunties never mentioned the possibility of her Gift changing because they never had the Gift as her mother had. It was the only reasonable explanation. And she had almost… almost convinced herself that it could be true, that it had nothing to do with him whatsoever, and she had been overreacting to the whole… interaction. But by the end of the morning, when her only surprises comprised of Lillette's well-placed happiness and the Duke's son's polite refusal to take the stage, Saira had come to the disturbing conclusion that there was more to whatever had happened between her and the mysterious man with all his secrets.
Because none of her visions had ever been in color.