A Wicked Thing

by Rhiannon Thomas

  It swung open with a creak, and Aurora darted inside. When she closed the door behind her, the darkness became so thick that she could not tell where the walls ended and the air began. She bent down and groped in front of her until her hands brushed stone, then began to trace up and down, left and right with her fingertips. Somewhere, she had scratched a tiny star into the wall, marking the exact block she needed.

  There. She pried her fingernails into the gap between the stones and tugged. The scraping set her teeth on edge, but the stone came loose, then the one next to it, and the one after that, until a small crawl space appeared.

  It had been her escape route. She had spent years exploring every inch of her tower, hunting down secrets, but this one had been the hardest won, and by far the best. Every time the castle walls pressed too close around her, she would wrench the bricks free and crawl out into the forest, enchanted by the risk, the thrill of endless space. The tunnel had been built on purpose, she had told herself every time a voice insisted she should tell her father about its existence. He had included it in the tower himself, so that if anything terrible happened, she could slip out into the forest and escape. No one could see it from the outside. No one else could move the bricks. It was safe. So she told herself.

  Now she paused at the edge of the space. Was this how Celestine had entered her tower, all those years ago? Through the tunnel that Aurora had kept secret, convinced that the freedom it offered was worth the risk? She swayed for a moment, staring in the blackness, and then shoved the thought aside. It was too late for those kinds of questions and regrets.

  She wriggled inside. Dust clung to her clothes and her knees, but before she had crawled a few feet, the floor sloped downward, creating a narrow corridor she could stand in if she crouched. The tunnel was pitch black, apart from the occasional glint of light peeking in through the cracks in the stone. Cobwebs snatched at her hair, and there was a scuttling noise she did not want to think about, but her groping hands knew the way well, and soon fresh air fluttered at her face.

  The exit was still open, covered with little more than ivy and grass and a few loose stones. She scraped at them with her nails, fighting her way through, and then she was outside, crouched on a slope that led onto the street.

  She stepped onto the cobbled road, and her feet curled around the uneven stones. The streets wove in and out with no apparent logic, and Aurora followed them blindly, chasing the sound of activity and the distant movement of others. A century ago, she had always been too scared to visit the nearby town, certain that someone would recognize her. The same fear prickled the inside of her stomach now, the dreadful, thrilling feeling that she was doing something dangerous and forbidden, but she walked on, not entirely sure what she was looking for.

  The larger roads near the castle were lit by lanterns, hanging from the walls like eyes gleaming in the dark. Not magic, she knew, but something like it, some strange power that let the fire burn bright and bold. The same power, perhaps, that held together this cramped, sprawling, impossible city. The buildings climbed on top of one another, chasing up into the darkness, and ropes hung from window to window, clothes fluttering underneath. Even at this late hour, the city was alive with people, pausing at market stalls, leaning against walls to chat and laugh, hurrying about their business. The smell of food filled the air, escaping from windows, wafting from a few stalls she passed.

  One market holder caught her eye and began to yell. “Fabric!” he said. “Beautiful fabric, all the way from Eko.” He held up a length of red material, too stiff and too shiny to be of true quality. His stall was illuminated by a lamp overhead, and the fabric glimmered in the dim light. “Worth its weight in gold, but I can cut a deal for a pretty lady like yourself. Two silver coins for a ream. Can’t say fairer than that!”

  “Don’t listen to him,” shouted a woman from across the way. She held up another length of fabric, green and translucent. “He buys his fabric in Alyssinia, tries to scam everyone. But this stuff—this stuff is from Vanhelm. Inspired by the color of dragon eyes, it is.”

  “Sorry,” she blurted, and she hurried away, her eyes fixed on the ground. Small paving stones covered the street, gray with dust. A groove had been worn into the brick. Another ran parallel to it, a few feet away.

  “Move, girl!”

  Something clattered toward her, and she jerked aside. A horse cantered past, held to a carriage with steel bars and a gleaming harness. The carriage itself was almost square, black lined with bronze, with a single lamp swinging ahead of it, and another behind. A man sat on the roof, whipping the reins.

  The wheels ran through the ruts in the road, spitting dust in Aurora’s face. She stepped back, coughing, then turned aside and ducked into a side street, away from the crowds.

  There was no market here, only shuttered windows, hanging laundry, and the occasional person leaning against the walls. Not a trace remained of the forest that had stood here a hundred years ago, but some of the houses had boxes of flowers and plants hanging below their windows. Private patches of green amid the never-ending stone and dust.

  Aurora took one turn, and then another, always heading downhill, following the curve of the streets, until they were so narrow that she could reach out and touch the walls on either side with her fingertips. Voices bounced out of the windows, laughter and chatter and the occasional shout. When Aurora glanced over her shoulder, only the tips of the castle towers were in sight.

  A few people idled around a tatty building that jutted out of an alley. The Dancing Unicorn, the sign said. Aurora doubted that real unicorns were as fat and ungainly as the picture suggested. A woman’s voice floated on the breeze as Aurora paused. She was singing, haunting notes that rose and fell like a sigh. The sound seemed to slip into Aurora’s veins, as soft and delicate as silk. She had heard court singers and performers before, at the few celebrations she had attended as a child, and she played the harp herself in a clumsy, tentative sort of way, but she had never heard anything like this, nothing that sounded so raw and naked and sweet.

  The music lingered in the air, tugging on some unknown part of her, the hollowness that had filled her ever since she awoke. She peered through the entrance and saw a large crowd of people, all moving, talking, laughing, dancing together. The rush of chatter made her pause, glance around warily, but there were so many people here that she truly was invisible. She could slip in, have a taste of that music, and no one would know.

  She raised her chin and walked tentatively through the door.

  The room inside was low and cramped, the air spiced with smoke. Lanterns hung from the rafters, swaying back and forth in time with the steps of the crowd, throwing scattered patches of the room into shadow. Mismatched furniture filled most of the floor—torn armchairs and stools of different colors and tables that rocked, seemingly without provocation—except for the space near the stage where people danced. And the people . . . they filled every inch, talking, playing games, dancing, arguing in more languages than Aurora could imagine. Several people around Aurora’s age stood behind a roughly cut bar, and more were scurrying around, laughing and joking and ferrying drinks.

  On the stage at the far end of the room, a tall girl played an alien instrument of wood and strings. She had a willowy look about her, with long black hair hanging over small, sharp eyes and pale brown skin. Half of her face was in shadow, the lines of her cheekbones sharpened by the distant lanterns. She swayed as she sang, her eyes closed against the hot buzz of the room. The music ached with a desire that Aurora could not name, a longing that loosened the knots in her stomach. She took a few steps toward the girl, weaving between the tables, letting the atmosphere of the place, the notes on the air, soak into her skin.

  “Aurora—” Her name stuck out of the chatter as clearly as a shout. The speaker was an older woman, talking to a man who might have been her husband. She had a loud voice and animated hands, acting out every word with gestures and nods. “It’s a miracle, is what it is,” she said. �
��An absolute miracle. I told Maureen, I told her, I will never forget this day. I won’t, and neither will she, I bet. I never thought, in my lifetime—” The woman stopped and looked up at Aurora. Her smile was almost toothless, welcoming. “Can I help you, dear?”

  “Oh.” Aurora’s heart fluttered and warmth rushed into her cheeks. “No. I’m sorry.”

  “No need to be sorry, dear. Pull up a chair if you like. We were just talking about the ceremony.”

  “The—ceremony?”

  “With the princess,” the woman added, as though Aurora was rather slow. “Sleeping Beauty. Surely you saw it.”

  Aurora’s stomach twisted. “I missed it,” she said.

  “Missed it?”

  Aurora jerked her chin in an awkward imitation of a nod. She wanted to ask the woman to tell her about it, to spill every detail, share what she thought of the princess. But the words would not move off her tongue.

  “Young people these days,” the woman said to the man who might be her husband. “I’ve been waiting all my life for this, and these young things miss it. Tristan!” A boy, cleaning off a table a few paces away, looked up. “I’ve found you a friend.”

  The boy had scruffy brown hair and a lazy smile, like he was enjoying a joke that he hadn’t yet shared. He walked over to them, balancing a tray of mugs in his hand. “A friend, Dolores?”

  “Someone to get rid of that sullen look you’ve been wearing all night.”

  “It’s not sullen! It’s deep.”

  “Deep nonsense if you ask me. It’s not like you.” The woman shook her head. “How anyone can be miserable at a time like this, I really don’t know. But don’t you worry. I’ve found the only other person in Petrichor, if not all of Alyssinia, who missed the show. You can commiserate with each other, or complain, or whatever you young folk like to do.”

  He looked at Aurora, and there was a little hitch in his smile, as though something were tugging down at the corner of his lips. Aurora forced herself to look him in the eye, her heart pounding. Then his smile grew again, and he gave her a casual nod. “Glad to have you in the club.”

  “You’ll regret it, you know,” Dolores said with a knowing wave of her finger. “When you’re old and gray like me, and your grandkids ask you where you were when Sleeping Beauty woke up. Tell them you missed it, and see what they say!”

  “Don’t worry, Dolores. I won’t have grandkids. Are you finished with these?” He gestured toward the mugs on the table.

  “Oh, yes, take them then, if you won’t entertain an old lady’s hopes.”

  “Sorry, Dolores,” he said as he scooped them onto his tray. “I’m a hopeless cause.” With a nod to each of them, he headed back to the bar.

  “That boy,” Dolores said, after he had gone. “If I ever see him care about anything, I’ll be so shocked, it’ll be the end of me.” Aurora gave another awkward nod, and Dolores turned to her husband again.

  With the conversation apparently over, Aurora drifted away, wandering closer to the stage. She leaned against a wall and closed her eyes, allowing the singer’s voice to surround her. The sound was new and wistful and right, and as Aurora listened, it filled her empty stomach and soothed her throbbing head. One song melted into the next, and the next, until Aurora began to feel that she could breathe again.

  “Good, isn’t she?”

  She opened her eyes. The boy she’d met earlier leaned against the wall beside her.

  “Yes,” she said. The music still filled her, leaving her oddly confident, almost bold. “I’ve never heard anything like her before.”

  “Yeah, Nettle’s pretty new. Arrived in Petrichor maybe three weeks ago? One of those traveling performing types.”

  “Nettle?”

  He shrugged. “Stage name. Don’t ask me why. She’s bristly enough for one, but the girl knows how to sing, so no more questions asked.” He had a casual, comfortable air about him, like the whole world was his friend, and he was waiting for them to realize it. “Sorry about Dolores,” he added. “She always thinks a ‘nice young man’ like me needs a friend. Seems to think I’m some kind of charity case, and ropes any pretty new girl into the cause.”

  “Oh.” For some reason, the casual compliment seemed more genuine than all the voices that had ever called her beautiful. “That’s okay.”

  “I lied, you know,” he said. “To Dolores. I did make it to the ceremony. But her annoyance at the idea that I didn’t was just too good to miss.”

  “Oh,” she said again. She could feel him watching her out of the corner of his eye.

  “How about you? What did you see?”

  “Nothing,” she said. “Only the crowds.” It wasn’t entirely a lie. “What was it like?”

  “How about I tell you over a drink? My treat.”

  “Oh.” It seemed to be the only thing she was capable of saying. “No, thank you.”

  “You can’t come to an inn and not get a drink.” He pushed himself up from the wall with one hand. “Don’t worry. I won’t actually be buying it. Bartender’s privilege.” When she did not move, he grabbed her hand. “Come on. We’ll get you sorted out.”

  He set off toward the bar, and Aurora found herself following, suddenly conscious of her unbrushed hair and dusty knees. The boy didn’t seem to notice. He gestured at a wobbly stool, and she pulled herself onto it without question.

  “Made a new friend, Tristan?” The girl behind the bar had a mass of brown hair and a sternly cut mouth. Her expression was somewhere between an eye roll and a sigh.

  Tristan laughed. “I’m always making new friends, Trudy.”

  “Don’t I know it.”

  “Dolores says this one skipped the ceremony yesterday. Wanted to introduce me to the only other sensible person in this city.”

  Trudy glanced at the other customers and then across to the far wall. She frowned. “Don’t let Nell hear you talking like that. You know how she gets.”

  “It won’t hurt anyone,” he said, but he stopped talking all the same.

  “So what drew you in here?” Trudy said. “No offense, but you don’t look like our usual clientele.”

  “I came in for Nettle,” Aurora said. Her tongue tripped over the name. “I could hear her from outside. She’s . . . she’s really good.”

  Trudy smiled, revealing crooked teeth. “Got good taste then. I was beginning to wonder, seeing you come over here with this one.” She tilted her head at Tristan, who promptly elbowed her in the side.

  Aurora glanced back at Nettle, standing on the stage alone, now singing to an upbeat rhythm that made Aurora’s toes twitch.

  “There we go,” Tristan said, pressing a large mug into her hands. “One mug of mead.” She raised it slowly to her lips and took a sip. She was surprised to find it sweet and rich like honey. It warmed her throat, and she took a bigger gulp.

  “Like it?” Tristan asked, and she nodded.

  Another customer appeared at the end of the bar. “Evening, you two,” he said. “Two pints of ale, please. And one for yourselves, in celebration of the princess’s return.”

  “I’ll take this one,” Trudy said, and she bustled off, leaving Aurora alone with Tristan again. He swung himself over the bar and settled on the stool beside her.

  “So,” he said, “that was my dear, demented cousin, Prudence Middleton. But don’t tell her I called her that.”

  “Demented?”

  “Prudence. She thinks it sounds like the name of a shriveled-up old shrew. I think it suits her.” Aurora tilted her head, unsure if he was joking, and he laughed. “And I’m Tristan Attwater.” He stuck out a hand, and Aurora took it with tentative fingers. “So,” he said again. “You got a name, or am I going to have to make one up for you?”

  Aurora looked him in the eye. Her fingertips tingled. “What would you choose?”

  “Let’s see.” He brushed her hair back from her face and looked at her with exaggerated care. “I dub thee . . . Mouse.”

  “Mouse?”

  “
Were you expecting something more regal?”

  She shook her head and took another sip of mead. The sweet burn down her throat made her daring. “Why Mouse?”

  “You look like you’re hiding away.”

  He still offered her that lazy smile, but there was intensity in his eyes that hadn’t been there before, a fleck of something that seemed to cut to the core of her. She stared down at the mug in her hands, but she could still feel his eyes on her. “I’m not hiding from anyone.”

  “Never said it was a person.”

  She gulped the mead to avoid a reply. Her heart pounded, but it was a different sort of fear than the one she had felt in her tower. Thrilling. Nettle was still singing, and her music brushed against Aurora’s skin like the heat from a flame. Here were people, treating her like she was normal, like she had no fate and no duty and no trauma around her. Someone to talk to, not protect or manipulate. It was, she thought, a first in her life. She wanted to dwell in it longer, in this freedom, where she could breathe and talk and listen and not hide everything behind expectations.

  Yet Tristan was watching her closely, and his eyes seemed to see through it all, the myths and pretenses, to whatever lay curled beneath. The part of her that even Aurora could not see.

  “You were going to tell me about the ceremony,” she said. “What it was like.”

  “So you can paint a mental picture for your future grandkids?”

  “I just want to know what I was missing.”

  Tristan glanced over his shoulder, as though checking for lurking spies. “Not much,” he said in a low voice. “It was all speech, smile, curtsy, cheer, speech again. The princess didn’t say anything.”

  Aurora took another sip. “It must be pretty overwhelming for her,” she said.

  “Facing the crowd like that?”