Julia Defiant

by Catherine Egan

  I don’t dare tell him what I saw, what I remembered. Not until I understand it a little better myself.

  “Nameless only knows what she was doing. I hope you found something worth almost dying for in that place.”

  He gives a shaky laugh and says, “I think when all this is over, I’m going to get a nice, quiet job at some obscure, second-rate university somewhere.”

  “You won’t,” I say. “You’ll keep on doing horrifically dangerous and difficult things for Mrs. Och.”

  He laughs properly this time. “You’re probably right,” he says. And then, more gently: “What about you? What will you do when this is over?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I reckon that depends.”

  “On what?”

  “On how things turn out.”

  There is a heavy pause, full of all the terrible ways this might turn out. But even if we succeed, the truth is that the future terrifies me. Say we find Ko Dan. Say he fixes all this, and Theo is safe. Can I go back to Spira City? And if I can, then what? Back to a life of crime in the Twist? Or turn my back on that old life and become a barmaid, fending off desperate old coots night after night? I can’t imagine a future for myself, a grown-up life I’d be glad to inhabit.

  And beyond all that, it depends…it depends on what it means that I can disappear, that the world’s edges are porous, but only to me.

  “Why did you insist on coming with me in the library?” he asks.

  I tell him the truth: “I overheard Mrs. Och asking you to research me. I want to know the answers too.”

  He is quiet for a bit. At last he says, “It is unusual for her to encounter something she cannot explain. I think it worries her.”

  “It worries me too,” I say. “I thought it was all a great lark, a piece of brilliant luck, my vanishing trick, until I stumbled into Kahge. If that’s what it is.”

  “Well, perhaps you can tell me…how it feels, what you see?” He’s been dying to ask, I can tell—held back only by Mrs. Och wanting to keep me away from my own secrets.

  I do trust Frederick, but it is hard to find words for how it feels. I tell him what I can—the steps of vanishing, the way it feels to lose contact with my body, how I am different in Kahge, Spira City aflame. And haltingly, I tell him about the creatures at the side of the river, screeching the name Lidari. Lidari, one of the Gethin, Marike’s prize general thousands of years ago.

  “I know that witch in the library said that the creatures in Kahge don’t have bodies, but they did,” I say. “They didn’t look like the Gethin, though. What happened to Lidari, anyway?”

  “He served Marike for centuries,” replies Frederick. “Mrs. Och would be better able to tell you about her. Marike was the first real threat to the authority of the Xianren. Before that, every human empire had at least made a pretense of obedience to them. The Eshriki Empire was the beginning of the end of Xianren rule. Indeed, at one point, at the height of her power, she even imprisoned them and tried to reassemble The Book of Disruption herself.”

  “I remember reading about that in Professor Baranyi’s study,” I say. I hadn’t understood what I was reading at the time. “She couldn’t read the Book, though, could she?”

  “No. Only the Xianren could read it and reassemble it. They outlived her empire, of course. The story is that Casimir hunted down Lidari, executed him, and sent his head to Marike. However, these legends are rarely the whole truth of the matter.”

  “So why would those…creatures in Kahge be shouting Lidari’s name?”

  “I’ve no idea,” says Frederick, sounding ridiculously cheerful. He loves having baffling questions to dig into. “I hope that the transcriptions I made will be revealing once I translate them all.”

  I think again of the little pot my mother was holding in the vision I saw—like the little pot Marike held in the painting on the library wall. I don’t dare ask about that—not yet.

  “And you’ll tell me what you find,” I say. “No matter what Mrs. Och says.”

  A long pause, and then he says, “I’ll tell you.”

  The cool forest passes by us, Tama-shan receding as the city walls approach. I try to take comfort in being myself, in my own body, safe among friends—more or less safe, more or less friends. But my skin is still crawling with residual fear as I think of what I saw in the cave, that other self, not me, whispering with my mother, plotting and longing…for what?

  We make it back to Tianshi just before the city gates close for the night. Fan Ming exchanges polite farewells with the professor and Frederick. Gregor has all but given up pretending to be Lord Heriday, since Fan Ming pays him no attention anyway. Then Fan Ming turns to me and says, “I am relieved you were not badly harmed, Miss Heriday. I am so sorry I could not prevent what must have been a very frightening experience.”

  Could not, would not, did not. I meet his eyes and thank him in my best polite Yongwen, but I’m thinking that if I’m ever alone in a dark tunnel with him again, things will go very differently. He promises us that he will report the “incident” to Si Tan, though I suspect that Si Tan orchestrated the whole thing.

  We part ways with Gregor and Esme when we reach the second tier road, as we are going in different directions.

  “Come see me in the morning,” says Esme to me as we say our goodbyes, and I nod, wondering what on earth I will tell her to explain why I’m so interested in Frederick’s research. Having people like Mrs. Och or Frederick know the awful depths of what I can do is one thing, but I’m afraid of how differently the people I love might look at me.

  The moon is high and bright when the professor, Frederick, and I arrive at the house in Nanmu. Mrs. Och and Bianka are waiting up, and as soon as they see us, Bianka cries, “What happened to your face?”

  I lift a hand to the scabby imprint of the witch’s teeth on my cheek. “Somebody bit me,” I say flatly, and then add: “A witch.”

  Mrs. Och raises her eyebrows.

  “Julia was assaulted by a most powerful and unusual witch,” says the professor. “Fan Ming seemed very shaken by it, but it is possible he was involved.”

  “Fan Ming took me to that cave and left me there,” I say. “He knew.”

  “Come, sit by the fire,” says Mrs. Och. “Describe to me what happened.”

  I feel very uncomfortable with all of them staring at me, but I tell them what the witch looked like, the way she sniffed and licked and bit me, the way she tumbled my memories about like she could pull them from me and examine them. I don’t mention that last memory of my mother, the one that wasn’t mine.

  “Perhaps that is why we were granted access,” says Mrs. Och when I am done. “Si Tan wanted to know who was prying around his library and for what. Now he will know not only what we are here for, but who you are and what you can do.”

  Who am I? What can I do?

  “Julia wanted to assist me in my own, separate investigation,” says Frederick cautiously, and Mrs. Och turns her most terrible gaze on him. He does not quite meet her eyes, but he carries on, stumbling only a little. Oh, Frederick—stalwart and true, you are. “We spoke of what she sees and experiences when she crosses over to Kahge. She saw some beings…creatures with physical form. They were calling out the name Lidari.”

  “Ah,” says Mrs. Och. And that is all.

  “Will you describe the creatures you saw, Julia?” says Professor Baranyi.

  I do my best, though it makes me shudder to think of the misshapen beasts emerging from the mist, that antlered thing pointing at me with its human hand. I watch Mrs. Och as I talk, and I do not like the look on her face. The look of locking me out. Whatever she thinks about all this, she is not telling me.

  “I’m sorry you’ve had a fright, Julia, but what about Ko Dan?” Bianka breaks in impatiently. “I thought this trip to the library was to find out where he’s gone.”

  A look I can’t interpret passes between the professor and Mrs. Och. Then he clears his throat and replies, “The Shou-shu records do ind
eed show Ko Dan taking a trip to Sirillia a year and a half ago, for the purpose of meeting with Zor Gen of the Xianren.”

  “We already know that from Gennady,” snaps Bianka. Her nerves are clearly frayed. “They stuffed this magical book inside my son while I was sleeping.”

  “Indeed,” says the professor. “Upon his return, Ko Dan was reprimanded—officially, for the misuse of a magical object. He was exiled to Tama-shan for meditative penance, the plan being that he would return to the monastery when he and Gangzi agreed he was ready. Now, I did find a new note in another record book suggesting that Ko Dan sent Gangzi an appeal requesting permission to return. There is no record of Gangzi’s answer, but the appeal was registered only a few weeks ago. Of course, we have no way of knowing how accurate these records are. They might have cut his head off and put something rather prettier on the books. Given Si Tan’s suspicion of us, we must also consider the possibility that the records were altered for our benefit and are intended to mislead us.”

  “But if it is true, then Ko Dan was there in Tama-shan?” cries Bianka.

  My heart plunges into my stomach. To think we might have been so close to him and let the chance slip by! No wonder the professor didn’t want to leave. I don’t see how we’ll get back inside the library. Si Tan isn’t going to issue permission again, and while I am generally confident of my breaking-and-entering skills, a mountain aflame with protective spells is not something I want to take on.

  “I tried to get us more time,” says the professor helplessly.

  “We need to confirm this version of events,” says Mrs. Och. “Dek and Wyn should press their contacts, find out what the rumors in the city are.”

  I hold back a snort, since their contacts seem to consist of a few barkeeps and two pretty girls.

  “If we can be sure that Ko Dan is in the library, I will go there myself,” says Mrs. Och to Bianka. “But we must be sure. Once I reveal myself, we will have only a short time to act. Now it’s late. We will decide on a course of action in the morning.”

  And so we are dismissed. Frederick and Professor Baranyi go to make up a bed for the professor in the servants’ quarters, as it’s too late for him to go back to the house in Xihuo, and Mrs. Och retreats to her room, closing the door. Bianka looks at me and sighs.

  “She didn’t tell me the truth about Gennady or Theo until she had to,” she says. “She likes to keep things to herself.”

  “I know,” I say.

  I stay awake for hours. Only when I’m sure there will be no secret whispered council about the True Nature of Julia—or anything else, for that matter—do I let myself sleep.

  I feel as if I’ve barely put my head down on the pillow when I’m woken by Theo’s crying. He has pulled off his diaper and wet the bed, and Bianka is cursing a blue streak.

  “Dipe umma noooo!” screams Theo when Bianka tries to pin a new diaper on him. He wriggles free of her. She sticks herself with one of the pins and begins cursing again. I leave them to it, wearily stripping the sheets off their mat and tossing them in a corner. I lay a spare blanket down to act as a sheet.

  “We can wash those in the morning,” I say. “No point trying to do it in the dark.”

  “We?” says Bianka. “Me, more likely. You’ll be off doing whatever you do all day, intrigue and whatnot, and I’ll be stuck here like always.”

  She is trying to hold Theo down, but he slams his head into her mouth and wriggles skillfully out of her grasp, fleeing across the room. She gasps with pain, raising a hand to her lip.

  “Little rotter,” she says, fighting back a sob. “Come here and put your diaper on.”

  “Dipe umma NO!” roars Theo. No doubt he’s woken the whole household by now—not that Mrs. Och or Frederick is going to come to our aid.

  “Look, how about I tell you a story while your mama fixes you up,” I say.

  Theo is standing in the corner of the room now, starkers, but he regards me warily, considering this.

  “Yes,” says Bianka with desperate enthusiasm. “Won’t that be nice? You love Lala’s stories, don’t you, darling?”

  “Stoy,” he says, like it’s his idea.

  “I’ve got a good one you’ve never heard before,” I say.

  He comes plodding over, suspicious, still ready for a fight. I half want to laugh at how the powers of a witch and a vanishing spy combined are barely enough to get a tot into a diaper. But then, like always when I offer him a story, one comes up from the depths, all its details intact, every word that my own ma whispered to me all those years ago when we lay abed together in the dark nights.

  I tell them about a princess so beautiful and so rich that noblemen the world over sought her hand in marriage. Her parents urged her toward various useful alliances, but she declared that she would only marry the man who brought her the Cup of Life, a magical cup said to grant its keeper immortality. Her parents were very angry, thinking this was a ploy of hers to never have to marry anyone. When they accused her of this, she admitted it freely, saying she preferred to stay unmarried and rule her own kingdom after they were gone. But one day something came to the palace—a creature half man, half dog, with a cloak made of darkness and ice—and he claimed to have in his possession the Cup of Life.

  I pause. Like all my mother’s stories, it is relentlessly grim. But Theo is quiet and diapered now, nestled against Bianka while she strokes his curls, so I carry on: “The princess quaked when she saw the thing that had come to see her. His dark boots seemed hardly to touch the ground, his cloak brought a terrible cold into the warm hall, and his face was that of a beast. He held in his clawed hands a simple cup of red clay, and she knew that to accept it and to accept him would indeed mean that she would live forever.”

  Theo’s eyes are drooping closed, his breathing slowing down. I keep my voice to a soft monotone.

  “Her parents pressed her to refuse and tried to cast the thing out, but their guards were frozen in time, unable to move. ‘If you accept this,’ said the beast, ‘you will belong to me and you will never die. If you refuse, you will belong only to yourself, but soon your flesh will rot and your bones will turn to dust in the earth.’ The princess shuddered to think of this fate. Better to live forever, whatever the cost. ‘I accept,’ she said, and she reached for the cup. The instant her fingertips touched the cup, it swallowed her up and she disappeared inside it. The beast tucked it back into his cloak and left the palace. Neither the princess nor the beast with the Cup of Life was ever seen again.”

  Oh, Ma, what were you thinking, telling us such tales? I lie there waiting for sleep to come, but then Bianka’s voice comes instead, not sleepy in the slightest: “Such horrible stories you tell.”

  “They’re the only ones I know.”

  I think again of the look on my mother’s face in the vision or memory I had of her holding that double-spouted pot: I have it. Was it something so powerful she feared it might swallow her up? But she didn’t seem afraid. She was never afraid. Even standing on the barge before the roaring crowd that day, her eyes roving over the people but never falling on me, held tight by Dek as I screamed and screamed, my world splintering around me. She must have been afraid, but she did not look afraid.

  “My gran, who raised me, was not much one for stories,” says Bianka. “Perhaps because all the good ones stink a little of folklore. She was a royalist, very taken with King Zey and his philosophy. She was too practical a woman to be telling me tales.”

  “What about your parents?” I ask.

  “It’s not a pretty story.”

  “That’s all right. I mean, I don’t mind. You needn’t tell if it’s…if you don’t want to.”

  “No, it’s not that,” she says. “I never knew them, and so, while I think it sad, it is just another sad story about other people. My gran and granddad came to Frayne from North Arrekem. They bought a dairy farm and my ma was a proper little milkmaid, but then a hired hand forced himself on her. He ran off afterward and left town. Nameless knows what
became of him. My poor ma tried to get rid of me in the womb, but I held on, very stubborn. After I was born, she fell into a great sadness. She was unmarriageable now, and far too young to be caring for a babe, and some women, well, after having a baby, they can get awfully blue. That’s how it was with her. She hung herself when I was a few weeks old. My gran and granddad raised me, and I loved them, but I never felt right in that little town that was all a-whisper about my ugly beginnings. My gran died of a fever when I was fourteen, and it was just impossible, me and my granddad alone and him such a quiet man. I still feel awful about it, but I left for Nim a year later, made my way as a dancer and cabaret singer. I never had the courage to go back and tell him I was sorry. I don’t even know if he’s still alive.”

  “When did you know that you were a witch?” I ask her.

  A little laugh in the dark.

  “Oh, first time I held a pen, I knew,” she says. “Perhaps even before then. When I saw my granddad making notes in his ledger, keeping his accounts, I thought I must know how to do it. I told him I could keep the ledgers if he taught me to read and write a little, and so he did. And then I knew. I could feel it whenever the pen touched the page—how the paper became everything and the ink was my will and the world might bend to what I wrote. I didn’t dare write anything to make it so, not until a calf I was fond of fell ill. Then I wrote on a scrap of paper Missy don’t die. The whole house smelled of the magic, and I was terrified. I ate the paper I’d written on, and my gran and granddad never suspected, though they fussed and worried about the smell for a day.”

  “And Missy?” I ask.

  “She got well again, but I was so feverish I couldn’t get out of bed for a week. So I learned I could do it, and I learned what it cost me. It was too big a spell to start with—the saving of a life. I learned to hide it—how I couldn’t burn, how strong I was—and I swore off writing anything. Too dangerous, too painful. I wanted to be a dancer, not a witch.”