A dark-haired boy leans close to me. His hair is tousled like Will’s. I wish, fleetingly, I could go back to the time when I was merely a patron of the Debauchery Club, waiting breathlessly for Will to flirt with me. That April could be beside me, laughing at my awkwardness whenever he appeared.
“I have what you want,” the boy says, trying to entice me. But it’s not Will’s voice, and it’s easy to say no.
Among the pipes and the vials on the table is a small brush with a painted handle. It’s beside a small jar of sparkly silver eye shadow. April’s eye shadow. She used it just hours ago. I grab both and drop them into the bag, pulling the drawstring tight.
I leave behind these people, lost in oblivion, as the gong sounds once more.
Six objects. The game is nearly over. And then I’ll have to choose. Not between Will’s safety and my mother’s. I won’t accept that. I’ll have to choose how to kill the prince. Unless my father gets to him first.
The room that I’ve stepped into is completely white.
The music is sedate, but after the silence of the last room, it seems loud. Musicians play sitars and violins. I imagine that the girl from the Debauchery Club might be here, singing about suicide. The dances in this room are informal, people swaying to the music, too close for propriety. Mother would not approve.
Will—the real Will—is standing across the room. My heart stops. And when it starts up again, it hurts. It beats wildly. He’s wearing a formal jacket, velvet with brocade trim, but underneath, it’s the same sort of thing he wore when he was examining us at the club—a fitted shirt, dark pants. No vest or other fashionable additions. He’s scanning the room, the dancers. He’s looking for me.
He sees me before I reach him, and I stop a few paces away, too overcome with relief. Too confused to speak. He’s wearing the same dark mask as all the other men, but on him it is entrancing.
I look at his mouth, exposed as it is. And then it’s impossible to focus on anything else.
We’ve only stood here for a moment, but it feels so long that I’ve begun to believe that he is never going to touch me again. Finally he puts his hands on my shoulders and draws me in. His thumb caresses the base of my throat, carefully avoiding the rope burns.
Our masks bump together, and one of the peacock feathers drifts slowly to the floor.
But the moment is interrupted as the horrible clock toll pulses through the room, shaking the walls and the floor with a peal that is louder and longer than any before.
The crowd surges, pushing us back toward the bare white walls.
“It’s the prince,” someone says. “A madman is chasing him.”
I have to stand on tiptoes to see anything, but indeed, the prince is running through the room. His mask is askew, and his eyes dart this way and that.
A figure in dark robes and a mask that covers his face follows. He carries a scythe in his hand. He moves like he’s stalking prey, slowly, methodically.
The revelers are crying, falling to the floor, scrambling over one another to get away from Father and his blood-streaked mask.
“Who let him in?” I hear a man scream.
“The Red Death,” a woman moans.
“Don’t let them out of your sight,” I tell Will.
Pushing myself away from the wall, I force my way through the hysteria, pulling Will along. We hold hands even while pursuing death. My hand fits so perfectly in his.
Before we reach Father, guards pour in from every direction. Everyone freezes, from the half-dressed revelers to the contortionists in their unnatural positions.
The guards surround the prince. But Father has disappeared. I eye the soldiers. Before Will and I can proceed, Elliott enters the room.
He halts just inside the doorway, but his jaw clenches below the line of his mask, and I know he sees me. With Will.
“Take the prince,” he says to his men, without taking his eyes from me.
“Araby, Prospero is up to something.” At Will’s warning, I look to the prince, who raises his arms and then drops them dramatically. Debris begins to rain from the ceiling. At first it’s simply confetti, but then orange marbles pour down. The sound is like raindrops, and when the marbles hit, they sting. Courtiers trip as they run for the door, trying to shield their faces. Some scream as sharp glass slivers begin to fall.
“I want him alive,” Elliott calls, lunging into the crowd. His fair hair shines in the candlelight.
I put my hand on Will’s arm, allowing Elliott to pass us. The doorway he’s headed for is one that I explored earlier. And Prospero is long gone.
Like the first two rooms of the ball, the shadows behind the stage hold a less obvious door. We have to fight the crowd running the other way, but eventually I drag Will into a black corridor. Only steps from us, two guards are pushing Father, in his deathly black robes, against the wall.
“Dr. Phineas Worth, you are under arrest.”
“No!” I hurl myself at them.
One of the guards shakes his head. “We have our orders. Step away, Miss Worth. Your father is a murderer.” But neither one touches me. They probably still think that Elliott and I . . .
Will tries to break in, but the guard blocks him. While they are distracted, I throw my arms around Father.
He strips off the dark robes and mask and presses them to me. “Do what has to be done.”
The guards pull us apart, but they don’t take the robes away.
Cradling the bundle, I feel something in the pocket. My heart constricts.
I look to Father as the soldiers shove him toward the violet room. He nods. When they are gone, I reach into the pocket and pull out a glass vial. Holding it to the light, it looks empty, but I know something horrible lurks inside. Not only is there a cork stopper, but it has been sealed with wax. Will draws a sharp breath.
“Are you going to try to stop me?” I ask him. Because I know he has strong opinions about murder and death. About right and wrong.
“No,” he says. “But I’m going with you.”
I couldn’t ask for anything more than that.
I drop the robes and the mask of the Red Death. Clenching the vial in my fist, I lead Will through another door. And now we have reached the center of Prospero’s labyrinth.
The walls, the floors, the ceiling, all black. Everything except the windows—those are a horrible bloody crimson.
This room is smaller than the others, and already crowded with courtiers fleeing my father and Elliott’s guards. We move through the press, pushing when we have to. Like the outer room, everything in this room is black, from the wood floor to the wall panels. Manacles line the walls. Instruments of torture. And the clock looms over everything, ebony, tall, menacing.
Prospero cowers in the shadow of the great clock. No one recognizes him, because these people have never seen him cower. They don’t expect the pathetic, trembling man with tears streaming down his face to be their cruel, sardonic prince.
Elliott warned me how difficult it would be to kill someone. Even this man who deserves it more than anyone. Prospero and I stare at each other.
“Elliott is coming.” Will puts his hand on my wrist. The movement reminds me of the black velvet bag that is hanging there. Of Prospero’s mockery of decency and love. His destruction of my own family, and so many others. I consider dumping the contents over the prince’s head, but these items are too precious to me.
“Tell everyone to get out,” I say to Will. “Clear the room.”
Will doesn’t hesitate. “Move!” he shouts. “Out of the room, get out, or face certain death.”
Most flee, but some wait, expecting some sort of show. They’ve been at Prospero’s court too long.
Taking the final steps across the room, I break the wax seal with my fingernail. I stop when the toe of my shoe touches Prospero’s silk jacket. He pulls his arm away, still hunched in the shadow of the clock.
I scrape at the cork to coax it out of the vial, but it breaks off, too far down in the v
ial to get at.
“What is going on?” Elliott is behind me now. I look back for a moment, and our eyes meet across the black room. He won’t forgive me for taking his revenge from him.
I throw the vial to the floor. It shatters at the prince’s feet.
The clock begins its thunderous peals, and Prospero’s mask hits the floor with a crack.
He climbs to his feet and stretches out to me, but I just shake my head. A single red tear rolls down his face.
Elliott’s men flood the room even as he collapses. Prince Prospero is dead.
The sun rises, blazing through the red windows. The glass shards sparkling against the wood floor are far more beautiful than the diamonds Prospero fastened at my mother’s throat.
And then someone knocks my feet out from under me, and I hear the word “Murderer!” leveled at me as I hit the floor.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
ELLIOTT’S SHADOW FALLS OVER ME, AND I LOOK up at him over his uncle’s body. He’s looking at Prospero, his face stricken.
Two guards take my arms, but even as I find my footing, one of the guards begins to convulse. Red tears streak his face.
“I told everyone to clear the room,” Will says from somewhere behind me.
“She killed the prince,” the other guard insists. “Elliott ordered that he be taken alive.”
Elliott silences him. “Araby Worth has always worked for me. She killed the prince at my command.” He pulls me up and leans in to my ear. “I still need my execution,” he whispers. “But don’t worry, I have a prisoner who will do.”
Father. The shock hits me like a blow. I see the truth written on his face, which is so close to mine that we could be about to kiss.
Elliott lets me go. Will catches me, giving me a moment to find my strength.
“We should get out of this room,” I say, taking Will’s hand so he knows I can stand now. “We don’t know . . . how well protected we are.” Will just emptied his vial this afternoon, and I’m unsure how long it takes for the antidote to enter his system.
“The party is over,” Elliott calls. “Everyone should return to the city.”
Our camaraderie, whatever held our small band together over the past weeks, is gone.
“You should find your mother,” Elliott says.
I don’t look back at him or at Prospero’s corpse as I guide Will out of the room.
“It’s over,” he says.
I don’t feel any triumph. April is dead. Elliott hates me. My father is a prisoner. I just killed Prince Prospero, and all I want to do is collapse to the floor and weep.
“What do we do now?” I ask.
“Pick up the pieces,” Will says. “Right now we find your mother. Tomorrow we hire some sort of lawyer to defend your father.”
“Are there any lawyers left?”
We step out into the corridor and come face-to-face with a group of revelers.
“The party is over,” Wills tells them, echoing Elliott.
They stare at us, stunned, as we brush by.
“At least we got fancy new clothes from the experience.” Will adjusts the lapel of his jacket. But, as usual, my dress is in tatters. I stop to rip off a bit of blue fabric that drags the floor.
Will leans close. “It looks good on you that way.”
I look up at him. When he kisses me, every nerve in my body tingles. My toes curl up, and my heart pounds. Prospero is dead, and we are alive.
We find my mother sitting alone in the white room, staring at the wall. When I call to her, she stands.
“So it’s over,” she says. “And you killed him.”
“Yes.” I don’t know what else to say.
Will puts his arm around me. “We need to get to the roof. If Elliott is here, then Kent must have brought him.”
“Do you know the way?” I ask Mother. She leads us silently. We pass through two mostly empty rooms, up a flight of stairs.
As we go, she takes in Will’s tattoos, our linked hands. But she says nothing, and her face remains expressionless. I think maybe she’s in shock.
On the roof, the wind whips my hair back and forth. It’s midmorning now, and the sun burns my eyes. Kent smiles when he sees us, but it fades when he notes that April isn’t with us.
The ship is beautiful. The great balloon floats above the roof, and the wooden deck gleams under the feet of the two children who spill out of the cabin as soon as we appear, leaping onto Will, hugging him, hugging me.
“Who is this?” my mother asks. It’s the first time she’s spoken since we left the party. Henry turns to her and solemnly holds out his hand. My mother leans down and shakes it.
“I’m Henry,” he says. “And that’s Elise.”
“Why are you wearing those masks?” Elise asks. “Are you in disguise?”
“Does it look silly?” I ask her.
I put my hand to my velvet mask. One last peacock feather remains. I pull the mask from my face, and she takes it from my hand and peers through the eyes, holding it over her white protective mask.
“No, you looked magical,” Elise says.
“Where is April?” Kent comes across the deck of the ship. The girl Mina is behind him, her face filled with concern.
“She’s dead,” I say, because April would be annoyed if I dragged it out. She wouldn’t want me to be coy. She would want shock and drama and weeping. “I had a plan to get her out, but the contagion . . .” When I reach out, Will is there to support me.
Kent’s face goes completely colorless. Mina sniffles. We stand together, unable to say anything. At least I know they understand.
“Where is she?” Kent asks. “We should bring her . . . body . . . but we shouldn’t have her on board with the children, and Elliott wanted me to find the pumping station as soon as possible.”
“It’s in the swamp,” I say. Everyone turns to me. “In the old manor house. That’s what all those locked doors were hiding. Prospero almost gave the keys to the machine to Malcontent, but I hid them in the cathedral.”
Kent pushes his glasses up on top of his head and runs his hand through his hair.
“Kent, we’ll come back for April’s body, if Elliott doesn’t bring her,” I say. “But we should go now.”
He nods and moves to the wheel. The ship begins to rise. The wind is brisk, and we move quickly.
“What’s the plan?” Will asks.
“The keys,” I say. “Then the swamp.”
“Exactly,” Kent says. He’s tapping his foot against the deck, as if he can make the ship move faster just with the force of his nervous energy. “We need to set up a hero, someone the people can look up to besides Elliott, so his power won’t be absolute,” he says. “You already saved those little girls. You killed Prospero. Now you’re going to find a way to bring fresh water to the city. To cleanse the swamp. And Will and I will be there to help you. And it’s . . . probably best that Will isn’t within stabbing distance when Elliott returns to the city.”
Will pushes back his hair, his expression somewhere between guilty and embarrassed.
“What did you do?” I ask.
He pulls a pamphlet from his pocket and hands it to me.
In an effort to right the wrongs of my forebears, I plan to hold an official election in two weeks’ time. All occupants of the city are invited to vote. Anyone who would like to claim office may run for it. I shall be running for the office of mayor of the city.
“It doesn’t even sound like him,” I say. But we all know that it will do exactly what Will intended. Elliott can’t renege on this election without looking like he plans to be the newest tyrant. And maybe it will keep him from executing my father without a proper trial.
Elliott is not going to take this lightly.
“I knew the risk I was taking,” Will says. “And I’ll accept the consequences.”
“Not alone,” I say.
I watch Kent steer for a few moments, wondering if I should say anything more about April, but then Will pulls
me away. We stand at the rail at the back of the ship, but instead of the breathtaking scenery below, we look at each other.
“I don’t deserve—” he begins, but I put my hand up to stop him. It’s too close to what I thought after Finn died. That I didn’t deserve happiness.
Neither of us should be thinking that way any longer. Not when he was the one who convinced me that living is worth it.
“Don’t apologize again,” I tell him. “It’s over. We’ve both done terrible things. And we’d do them again if we had to.”
He starts to say something, but I stop him with a quick, mostly innocent kiss. The wind ruffles his hair. He stares out over the landscape, and then he looks back to me, a hint of a smile on his lips.
“Let’s go into the cabin,” he says. And with that, the contrite Will is gone. He’s the Will I first met, whose movements are smooth, and whose eyes promise excitement. He shuts the door behind us, and then, as if we have all the time in the world, he runs his thumb over my cheek, lifts my chin. My eyelids flutter closed. But he doesn’t kiss me. His hands caress the line of my throat before sliding to my shoulders. Every movement sends sparks through me. And though I can’t help appreciate the skillfulness of his touch, I don’t let myself melt. Not yet.
“Be still,” I say, grabbing his hands, and placing them at my waist. Even there, resting lightly at my sides, his fingertips makes me shiver.
Starting at his collar, I trace his tattoos, ever so slowly, up, up, up. My hands are in his hair, delighting in the feel of it slipping through my fingers, silky and coarse at the same time. I follow the tattoos back down. I could keep touching him forever, but his slow smile indicates that he’s not going to just stand there while I do it.
He leans in, and his lips capture mine.
It’s nothing like the times before. Not gentle, not questioning. Just passionate. I’m pinned against the door, and he’s devouring me.
At some point, my knees give out—it’s been a very long day and night—and he guides me to the cot. We don’t stop kissing, even when the springs protest loudly. I can’t get enough of him.
“Araby!” my mother calls. We hear the door creaking open and we break apart, but it’s not enough to hide what we’ve been doing. She stands on the threshold, scandalized, her hand covering her mouth. She steps back, as if she might faint, and though she’s had a terrible night, I can’t help smiling—even knowing that I should be embarrassed, because she has to see that though I’m still wearing what’s left of my dress, I’ve halfway unbuttoned his shirt.
Dance of the Red Death (Masque of the Red Death) Page 22
