by Karin Biggs
Why did I think being surrounded by my enemies would be easy?
“Hey, you okay?” asked Ari.
“Yeah,” I said, holding back the tears that threatened to fall. “It’s just…well, this is all so new to me and…”
And I was a fool to believe I could handle the shock of Mondarian culture.
“Are you’re homesick?”
Homesick? Ill of one’s residence?
The fire popped in the break of my confused silence.
Ari shifted on his log. “Because it’s okay if you are—this is an adjustment for sure.”
I broke my stick in half. “Even for you?”
He nodded. “Yeah, of course. You think I’m used to all this hoopla? I’m the guy who’s refused to have a haircut in over a year.”
I laughed and sent the stick pieces to their death. “I assumed you loved all this, like everyone else.”
He shook his head. “I love playing drums. And I need the money.”
“For carpentry school, right?”
He scratched the back of his head. “Well, ideally, yes. But I plan to send my first Season stipend money back to my dad. He, um…got himself into some trouble so I need to help him out.”
“What did he do?”
“Lied.”
I sensed there was more to the story but Ari didn’t divulge any more details.
He tapped a stick against his palm. “Anyway, what’s your plan?”
My plan? Surely, he didn’t mean my plan to find my mother and reinstate her as the queen of Capalon. “What do you mean?”
“Say the king keeps you here for all four Seasons. What are you going to do when you’re done?”
“Nothing,” I said, mesmerized by the reflection of the flames in his eyes. “I would go back home.” I tore my gaze off his face and looked at the fire.
“And do what?” he asked.
As soon as I completed my match ceremony, I would be assigned to my area of focus in science, technology, engineering or math and take direction from the queen’s requests for research. If my plan worked, I’d be taking direction from my mother and not my sister.
I sighed. “Whatever my mother needed me to do.”
“Does she run a family business or something?”
I chewed the inside of my cheek. “Yes.”
“Is that what you want to do?”
“I don’t exactly have a choice.”
The fire popped, sending a burst of embers into the air.
I had the urge to say more. To keep talking to a boy I didn’t know—a Mondarian boy I didn’t know—but I had already said too much. I tossed my last piece of stick into the fire. “I’m exhausted from the day. I’m heading to bed.”
“Oh, are you sure? I—”
“Goodnight, Ari.” I left the fire before hearing the rest of Ari’s words, only to be stopped at the door to the Lounge by the same group of magicians.
The pale one looked me up and down. “Hey New Lady, wanna watch something else disappear? It’s a two-person trick.”
“No,” I said, with no attempt to hide the disgust from my face. “Can you please step away from the door?”
The magician only smiled and took a step toward me. “But I think you’re the perfect candidate for the trick.”
I shuddered as he ran a finger under my jaw.
My sister and I each had a vial of pepper spray to deploy in emergency situations. All I had to do was hold my hand in front of the boy’s face and give Chip the command.
I opened my palm against my thigh and my body stiffened.
“She asked you to move, Felix,” Ari said behind me.
The pale boy’s face twisted. “Oh, don’t tell me you’re hanging around Novak.” His eyes narrowed on Ari. “Has your daddy gambled your mom away too? Because I wouldn’t mind putting a bid in for her.” The other boys laughed as new plumes of smoke rose from their mouths.
“Move, Felix,” Ari said, taking a step closer to me.
Felix blew smoke in Ari’s face before slowly stepping away from the door. Ari’s fingertips touched my back, gently guiding me back inside the Lounge.
“He’s the worst,” Ari said, when we stepped inside. The loud music stopped, so he didn’t have to shout. “He’s from my hometown and I have no idea how the maestro has tolerated him this long.”
Both our heads snapped to the sound of my name.
“Paris Marigold! There she is! Our last New Lady,” Darden McCray said from atop one of the low tables. “Go ahead and show us your heart.”
I looked at Ari first, then Darden. “My what?”
Genevieve’s head popped up in front of me. “Darden did a card trick where all of his hearts vanished. And it turns out all the New Ladies have a heart! Check your pocket!”
I shook my head. “I don’t have—” But when I reached my hands into my pockets, the fingers on my right hand grazed the edge of a card. I pulled out a two of hearts and held it above my head. The crowd in front of Darden burst into cheers.
“See, I told you all the New Ladies stole my heart,” he said, placing a hand over his chest.
“Do one more!” shouted a voice from the crowd.
Darden’s proud face nodded as he waved his hands in front of his face, then produced a notebook and a marker from the air. “Alright. But first I need a volunteer.”
Hands shot up all around us.
“Paris Marigold,” he said, meeting my eyes. “Since you were the last New Lady to steal my heart, how about you come up here?”
I tried to protest, but Genevieve tugged my arm, pushing me up to Darden’s makeshift stage. Darden placed the notebook in my hands. “Paris will serve as my lovely assistant for this trick which I call Capalon McCray.”
The crowd hissed, draining blood from my face.
“Death to Capalon!” shouted a voice from the crowd.
“Stinking stiffs!” shouted another.
I clutched Darden’s notebook with stiff fingers.
Did he know who I was? And was this an elaborate Mondarian-magician way to have me killed?
“In this trick, I will prove that I have the same genius as our enemy. I need any five-digit number,” Darden said, scanning the faces of his audience.
A number was shouted, and Darden wrote it down in thick black marker on the notebook in my hands. “Based on this number, I’ll make a prediction.”
Darden asked a girl in the front row to pick a card from a deck he pulled from his pocket. She showed it to the audience—the ace of clubs, then handed it back to Darden.
He rubbed his chin, wrote something on the card, folded it and placed it inside a small box on the fireplace mantle behind him.
“Okay,” he said, “Now I will blindfold myself and turn around. Miss Marigold, select two random people to write two more five-digit numbers below the first one.”
I picked two girls from the front row who followed Darden’s instructions.
“Got them?” he asked over his shoulder. “Good. Now, I’ll add two of my own random numbers.”
Still blindfolded, Darden asked for my guidance as he jotted down two more numbers, so that the page in the notebook looked like:
53898
67923
12602
32076
87397
Darden faced the audience. “I’d like somebody who thinks they are good at math to come up here and add this up. Not a drummer, of course.”
The crowd responded with a mix of boos and laughter.
A returning member, claiming to be a magician himself, added up the numbers, displaying a total of 253,896.
“Miss Marigold, my lovely assistant, will you please take out my prediction and read it out loud?” asked Darden, smiling under his blindfold.
I retrieved the box and unfolded the ace of clubs. “Two hundred and fifty-three thousand eight hundred ninety-six.” I flipped the card around to share the evidence with the audience which erupted in cheers and applause for the magician.
; Darden tore off his blindfold and bowed to the audience.
Confident Darden was no longer trying to kill me, I leaned into him after his final bow. “It’s clever.”
“It’s magic,” he responded, half to me and half to the audience.
I laughed. “No, it’s simple math.”
Darden crossed his arms. “You think you know the secret to my genius?”
My mouth turned up into a half-smile. “The hearts—you must have placed them in our pockets during our dance training. And for the ‘magic’ number—it’s just adding the nines and then—” But before I could finish, a wall of green smoke billowed around me.
“Hey, no smoke bombs in the Lounge!” somebody shouted.
When the smoke cleared, Genevieve and Heather stood in front of me and Darden had vanished.
“So, were you in on the trick?” asked Heather.
I stepped off the table. “No, I didn’t know anything about it until—”
“Gen thinks you were in on it,” Heather said.
“It’s okay,” Genevieve said. “You don’t have to tell me, but that’s my guess.” Their heads turned at the sound of a guitar.
“Oh, that’s Reese Olsen,” Heather said. “The cute singer I was telling you about, Gen.”
Genevieve grabbed my wrist and pulled me forward to follow Heather.
A small group of girls had already formed around Reese as he sang a song about summer love. The relaxed melody encouraged the girls to sway and bob their heads in time with the music. When Reese finished, all the girls clapped. “Play another one!” shouted Staci Ringer.
Layla strode up beside me. “Come on, Paris. Let me rescue you from this crappy music.”
“Layla, don’t be rude,” Genevieve said. “Reese is an excellent musician.”
Layla turned her back to Genevieve. “Are you coming or staying?” she asked me.
Reese started another song, and I needed a good excuse to try another venture out of the Lounge to look for my mother. “I’m going to stay and listen.”
I received an eye roll from my roommate before she headed back to our room.
The other girls were too immersed in Reese’s music to notice me easing away and heading out the Lounge door. I followed the sound of a slamming door but took a step back when a uniformed guard turned the corner. The guard exited a small room with large, clear windows. Peering around the corner, I saw multiple viewing screens with varying angles of the Mansion, plus cabinets and a large board covered with dozens of keys hanging from hooks. The door to the room opened again as one guard exited and another entered. One of the keys on the board had to unlock the Records Room. But I wasn’t about to steal a key surrounded by a swarm of guards. I would have to find a way to track the schedules of the guards, learn their names and—
“Paris?”
I jumped with a shriek.
“What are you doing out here?” asked Reese, with a tilt of his head.
“Um…” What would a court lady be looking for? “Just looking for the rehearsal studios. I don’t remember which hallway to take.”
Reese smiled with his blue eyes. “That’s where I’m headed. And lucky for you, I remember where they are.”
I swallowed a lump of frustration down my throat. “I thought you were performing your songs for the Court Ladies.”
He shrugged. “I’m done and wanted to work on some new stuff before I turn in.”
I shot a final glance at the board of keys inside the guard’s station. “Okay. Let’s go to the rehearsal studios.”
We entered a carpeted hallway lined with a series of transparent doors. Reese opened one and said, “Ladies first,” waiting for me to take a step inside the tiny room.
I crossed the threshold, but kept my left palm available. “Can you keep the door open?” I asked. “I…don’t like confined spaces.”
“Okay.” He took a seat on a piano bench. “So, I have this song that would be great with your harmony. Want to hear it?”
I was in a tiny room alone with a boy. I had already been disgusted by Felix’s advance and was gaining an understanding of what the guard had meant by an ‘arrangement’ during our tour of the Hall of Memories. “Reese…just to clarify, is your only intention in this rehearsal studio to sing with me?”
He looked up from his guitar. “What else…wait, did you think I was going to—”
“I’m sorry, I don’t know why I said that.” I rubbed my forehead, wanting to disappear like Darden from embarrassment.
Reese opened his palms and shook his head. “No, it’s fine. I get it, there’s a bunch of guys you don’t know and getting into a confined space with one could seem, well you know—like I have a hidden agenda, which I don’t! I mean, not that there’s anything wrong with you—you’re a pretty girl, but I just want to sing with you—that’s all, I swear.”
Heat rushed to my face. I wasn’t sure if it was because it was the first time a boy called me a ‘pretty girl’ or because I assumed he might attack me. “I’m not sure how good I’ll be, but let’s give it a try.”
I found myself eventually relaxing, convinced that the only thing Reese Olsen wanted from me was my voice.
“How do you think that sounds?” he asked when we were finished.
“Nice. It’s quite a talent to be able to compose songs in your head like that.”
He nodded and puffed his cheeks. “Just takes more than talent to get noticed. And I haven’t figured out what that is yet. But maybe harmonies are what I’ve been missing.”
“Maybe.”
Reese yawned. “Ready to head back?”
“No, I’m going to work on some scales,” I lied. “In case I’m the focus of Maestro’s sectional again tomorrow.”
After Reese left, I headed back in the direction of the guard’s station, when I saw the outline of the captain’s silhouette turn my way. I exited the hallway through the first door I could find, leading me out into a dark courtyard. I hid behind a square-shaped bush when the sound of another door opened at the opposite end of the courtyard, followed by murmuring.
I poked my head around the bush to see Maestro Leto holding a woman, or perhaps a girl, in his arms. Their faces pressed together in a passionate kiss—the maestro’s body and lack of light in the courtyard hiding any revealing clue to the identity of the maestro’s partner. Then as quickly as they stepped into the courtyard, they turned to step back inside, flashing me the smallest hint of physical attributes of the girl.
And I could only think of one person who matched—Layla Tanvi.
The next morning, one hundred court members filled the dining hall with their bodies and conversations. I followed behind Layla through the buffet line and stared at the back of her head between piling my plate with, according to their name plates, eggs, bacon and hash brown. I was thankful to have seen her in bed when I left the courtyard the night before, but she could have beat me back to the room through some unknown shortcut of the Mansion.
“Thanks again for last night, Paris,” Reese said as he passed behind us. Then his eyes bounced to Layla’s shocked expression. “What? She sang with me.”
Layla turned her head over her shoulder to cast me a suspicious glance. “Sure, you did.” She slammed a spoonful of gravy against her plate. “So, you’ve purchased a ticket to Reese Town. I thought you were one of the cool ones, Paris.”
“I haven’t purchased anything.” I picked up a pastry which I had learned from the salon to be a donut. “Is Reese named after a city?”
Layla chuckled. “Nice try at a cute diversion, but you don’t have to hide your infatuation for him.”
Infatuation? Layla thought I had romantic feelings for Reese?
“Layla, my involvement with Reese Olsen last night only involved singing.”
She nodded with a grin. “But that’s how it always starts, right? First, it’s singing, then it’s talking and before you know it, you’re writing Mrs. Reese Olsen on your sheet music.”
I waited for Layla
to pick a table but she tilted her head to the door. “I’m off to the rehearsal studios. I saw that they have a brand-new piano in there that’s just begging me to play it.”
I had plans to interrogate Layla over breakfast about her activities following the party in the Lounge. “I can eat while you play. I would love to listen.”
“Sorry, princess. I don’t play for other people. I only play for me. See you at rehearsal.”
Unsure of where to sit, I picked an empty seat next to Staci Ringer and across from Darden McCray. “Hello, Darden. Where did you—” But he picked his tray up and left the table.
I had just taken a bite of a long cream-filled donut when Ari Novak took Darden’s empty seat. “Good morning,” he said, before digging into his eggs.
“Goo-muhr,” I started, but took my time to swallow before speaking again. “Good morning.”
“How are those?” His head tilted toward my donut in-hand.
“The white cream ones are better,” I said, showing him the yellow custard innards of my pastry.
He nodded. “Good to know.” He shoveled a heaping forkful of eggs into his mouth.
His silence made my shoulders tense, so I looked to Staci, who was caught up in a heated conversation about a Junior Court competition with Genevieve. Left to talk with Ari Novak on my own, I scanned my brain for questions appropriate for a drummer:
When did you decide you enjoyed hitting things with sticks?
Are you concerned about future hearing loss?
Do you buy everyone you meet hot chocolate or just me?
But to my relief, Ari was the first to ask a question. “Are you getting along with your roommate?”
I nodded. “She’s very…strong-willed but has been a decent person for temporary cohabitation.”
And is possibly our maestro’s secret lover.
Ari smiled. “Cohabitation?”
“Oh, I mean—”
“No, I like it. I like you and your funny words.”
Heat rushed to my face, so I stabbed my eggs.
Ari sipped on something from a white foam cup. “I thought Darden and I hit it off right away but he refused to talk to me last night. I’m not sure what I did to make him so upset.”
Recalling my dissection of Darden’s tricks and his deployment of a smoke bomb, I had a feeling Ari wasn’t the cause of Darden’s foul mood. “He’s probably just…thinking of a new trick to perform.”
