ARC: Shadowplay

by Laura Lam

  He rubbed the back of his neck with his false hand. “This is not going well.”

  “You’re being enigmatic. I don’t like enigmatic people. Why’d you hire a Shadow to spy on me?”

  “No nefarious reason, I assure you. I was merely curious to see how you have been doing. You were my charge, and I felt responsible. When I discovered you ran away, I wanted to find out why, and see how I could help.”

  I narrowed my eyes. Help? He had given me to strangers and never taken an interest in me. Why now?

  “Did you find out why I ran away from the Lauruses?” I asked.

  “No, I did not.”

  “They were going to operate on me.” I gestured to the general vicinity. “Make me more… marriageable.”

  His mouth dropped open. “They would not dare.”

  “I overheard them and left the day before they scheduled it.”

  “I would never have allowed that.”

  “Who are you to allow anything? You gave me to strangers and you threw dice with my life.” The words came out in a hiss.

  “I’d say the dice rolled in your favor, young Micah. You were raised in comfort and safety, until your parents acted against my express wishes. Would you rather I had left you with paupers?”

  The anger left me in a shaking rush. I sounded quite the spoiled brat. But I still wanted answers, and I still did not trust the man standing across from me.

  I heard the murmur of voices through the walls, coming closer.

  “We need to speak privately, and soon,” Doctor Pozzi said. “We have much to discuss.”

  My mouth tightened. “What’s so important?”

  “It’s about your health. I need to make sure you’re developing normally.”

  My breath caught in my throat. Developing… normally? The voices grew loud enough that Doctor Pozzi could hear them.

  “Come see me the night after Lady’s Long Night. I am staying on Ruby Street. Number 12G. It’s the top window to the left of the ivy trellis.”

  “Oh yes. I’m on the run from the policiers so I’ll just wander onto the street where the constabulary headquarters are. If this is an attempt at a trap, it’s pretty blatant.”

  “No trap. This I swear to you. Come now, you’ve shown you’re quite adept at not being seen when you wish.” He smiled.

  “Not good enough,” I muttered.

  The doctor grabbed my arm and drew me close to him. I could feel the coldness of his clockwork hand through his glove and my sleeve. He had dark eyes, his skin tanned from countless days in the sun. “I’ll leave the window by the trellis unlocked,” he whispered. “You have to come.”

  “Why?” I whispered.

  “It’s one reason I had to find you. Because you might be ill. You might be dying.”

  And Maske, Cyan, and Drystan walked back into the parlor to see me fainting into a boneless heap on the floor.

  I dipped in and out of consciousness as they took me back to the Kymri Theatre. Up in the loft, Drystan removed my coat and shoes. I was in his bed rather than my own. I stared at the ceiling, focusing on my body. Was I ill? I did not feel as though I was dying. Not so much as a cold had troubled me. I did not know what Doctor Pozzi meant, and I did not know if I could trust him. But I needed answers.

  And I had now fainted or nearly fainted three times, when before that, I’d never fainted in my life. A tiny corner of my mind wondered if he was right.

  Drystan came in, visibly relieved when he saw I was awake.

  “What happened?”

  “The Royal Physician.”

  He frowned. “What about him? What did he do?”

  “He’s Doctor Pozzi, the man who gave me to my parents. And he was the second client of Shadow Elwood.”

  “Styx.”

  “Yeah.”

  “What does he want?”

  I told him.

  “Are you going to go?”

  “Do I have any choice?” He didn’t threaten me, but if I didn’t go, he knew who I was, where I worked, where I lived.

  I rubbed my temples. I decided not to tell him what Doctor Pozzi had said about my health. I had no proof. And, truth be told, I could not say “I might be dying” aloud.

  “Do you want me to come with you?” he asked.

  I nodded. “Not into his house, but if you were nearby, it would be a comfort.”

  “Of course.” He settled into the bed, wrapping an arm around me.

  “Considering how often we’re sleeping in each other’s beds, maybe we should push them together.”

  He made an affirmative noise against my hair. “Tomorrow. Can’t be bothered tonight.”

  “Agreed.”

  The strong, steady beating of his heart lulled me to sleep.

  24

  LADY’S LONG NIGHT

  “Once there was a prince who was very cruel. The king and queen lived in fear of him. Though nearly grown, he was prone to tantrums and violence. One day he went hunting in the woods and came upon a lovely nymph. He ordered her to be his lover, but she declined. He was enraged and took up his bow, meaning to shoot her.

  She laughed instead, and the wooden bow grew leaves and branches and twined around his arms, pinning them to his sides. The nymph showed him his own cruelty in visions, until he wept and begged to be let go. But still she kept him pinned to the forest for a day and a night before making him promise that if he were ever cruel again, any scrap of wood around him would pin him and not let him go.

  The prince came back to his land and ordered all wood to be burned and only stone and metal used. This proved to be difficult, but everyone did as he bade. He married a timid princess from a faraway land and was very cruel to her. One day she went into the woods to cry. The nymph found her, and gave her a wooden staff to bring back with her to the castle, asking her to leave it underneath the bed that night. She did, smuggling it into the city under her cloak, and the next morning, she awoke to find the prince pinned to the stone bed, no longer able to hurt anyone.”

  “The Cruel Prince and the Wooden Staff,” Hestia’s Fables.

  The low gong of the doorbell tolled.

  “I’ll get it!” I cried, bounding down the stairs from the loft and dashing to the door. I dampened my enthusiasm long enough to check through the peephole that it was the guest I was expecting.

  Earlier that afternoon, I had waited for Cyril at the spot I mentioned in my note, breaking into a smile when I saw him walking up the path of the park toward the fountain where I stood. We hadn’t spoken properly since he’d come to the circus and tried to convince me to go home. He knew I was wanted by the law, but I hadn’t been able to properly explain. So over a cup of coffee I’d told him about what really happened the night R.H. Ragona’s Circus of Magic fell. Grief and guilt still hit me in the stomach. I would never forgive myself for the mistakes I had made. I would never forgive myself for Aenea, and for the clowns I hurt.

  He’d understood, as I’d hoped he would, though I could tell he hurt for me, and realized that I was, in many ways, a completely different person from the sister he had climbed trees with. He in turn told me about what happened at home – that mother drank more than ever and might be coming to Imachara for the “ladies’ spa”, the polite phrase for the Fir Tree Hospital for Women, which had two wings: an asylum and a treatment center.

  “Is this my fault?” I gasped.

  Cyril hesitated. “You may have been the catalyst, but it’s not your fault. They knew what they planned to do to you, and they’re the ones who chose to lie. Mother and Father haven’t been getting along for some time now. It’s her idea to go – to make sure she’s better before she grows any worse.”

  He didn’t try to convince me to come home with him again – he knew that home was broken. I decided to invite him around to the Kymri Theatre for Lady’s Long Night, for levity and to put him at ease about my new life. Hopefully. I knew I could trust him with it – if there was anyone I trusted, it was Cyril, the brother who’d always been there fo
r me.

  Now, I threw open the door, dragged Cyril into the hallway and embraced him. He hugged me back. The others came into the foyer to greet us, and then gaped at me.

  I wore a dress of cheap muslin. It felt strange to have skirts swishing around my ankles again. I bought it on the sly a few weeks ago, and decided that having my brother come to visit on Lady’s Long Night was as good an excuse as any to dress up. I had even attempted a hair style with my shorn locks, though it ended up looking more like Lily Verre’s, with bits escaping the pins and falling into my face.

  “It’s my sister!” Cyril exclaimed. “She’s all grown up.”

  “I could still beat you in a fight and you know it.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “You know it. I’ve more muscles now.” I strove for composure. “Cyril, these are the friends I live and work with. Well, you’ve already met them after a fashion. Jasper Maske is the head magician and our teacher. Cyan led the séance and is a magician, and Drystan is also a magician and, um, my good friend.” I trailed off, blushing. Drystan’s eyebrows rose, but he smiled. I fought the urge to shuffle my feet like a shy child.

  “Pleased to make your acquaintance, Lord Laurus,” Maske said, shaking hands.

  “Please, call me Cyril.”

  Cyan gave my brother an approving look from the top of his head to his toes.

  Hey! I thought at her. You have your sailor.

  Sure I do. Doesn’t mean I don’t have eyes. I noticed him at the séance. You never told me you had such a handsome brother.

  He’s my brother!

  She sent me a smirk, but kept her face pleasant as she held out her hand to Cyril. “Lovely to meet you. Again.”

  “You’re not as frightening today.”

  She laughed. “I’m glad.”

  I shot a look at Drystan, who also gave me a smirk.

  “Come in,” I said, playing the host. “Are you going to spend Lady’s Long Night with us?”

  “If you’ll have me. I told Mother and Father that I was going to the cathedral with Oswin.”

  “Wonderful! How is Oswin, by the way?” I asked as I led him to the kitchen while Maske made a pot of coffee.

  “He’s good. Engaged to Tara Cypress. They’ll marry when he finishes university.”

  Engaged. So strange. Once, there had been talk of Oswin and I… but that would never happen now.

  “Hah, he got into university?” I tried to make light of it. “Can’t believe he passed his exams.”

  “It was a near thing.”

  We lapsed into silence as Maske poured the coffee into our cracked cups. I stirred my customary sugar and milk into it, but Cyril kept his black. My brother looked about with unabashed curiosity at my new surroundings.

  Drystan kept sneaking glances at me.

  “What?” I asked, resisting the urge to pat my hair.

  “You look different.”

  “You’ve seen me in a dress before.” I smoothed my hands down my skirts. “What, do I look silly?”

  “Not at all,” he said with a smile that warmed me straight through.

  Normally, people exchanged presents right before they went to sleep on Lady’s Long Night, but we opened ours before going to the cathedral, since Cyril would make his way home straight from there. We passed our wrapped parcels around. Cyril brought little presents of sweets for Maske, Cyan, and Drystan as well as me. He also gave me a stash of coins, which I protested but was secretly grateful for, and he brought some of the possessions I had left home without – some of my old Ephram Finnes novels and a new one to go with them, a blank leather-bound diary, my half-filled sketchpad, and my music sheets for the piano. I ran my fingers along my old possessions, half smiling. They were familiar, yet they did not feel as though they belonged to me at all.

  Cyan gave me a preserved dragonfly cocoon from Temri, painted a bright blue and lined with gilt paint. I thanked her with a nod. I gave Cyan a pot of gold eye paint I had seen her linger over at a marketplace, and to Maske I gave – well, a mask. It reminded me of him, the Maske of Magic, made of black velvet embroidered with six-pointed stars, the thin crescent of a moon curling over an eye. He said that if we won the duel, he’d wear it for his first performance.

  Drystan and I exchanged gifts last. He had been the most difficult person to find a present for. In the end, I gave him a small flute that sounded a bit like an owl’s call, for he used to sometimes borrow Sayid’s instruments and play at the fireside at the circus. I bought him the nicest I could afford, with little vines carved into the wood and colored with green enamel. His face lit up when he opened the case and I flushed with pleasure that he liked it.

  When I opened his present, I felt as though I had offered him a lowly trinket. He gave me a necklace that was somehow neither masculine nor feminine, but just right for me. It was long enough that I could hide it underneath my clothing and was made of thin metal rectangles strung together. Each had an Alder word engraved on them, like “luck” and “faith” and “goodness” and… “love”.

  I blinked so that the others would not see the tears that marred my vision. Drystan seemed to understand. He put the necklace on me and it settled under my clothes. We finished our drinks and the cold metal of the necklace warmed against my skin.

  We made our way down to the Celestial Cathedral as dusk fell. It was the night of the Penmoon, and so all of the Penglass glowed blue, tingeing the snow around us. I steeled myself against its wordless call. I tried to recall the glyph I had seen in the vision of Anisa and Matla, but though I could recall the general shape, the rest eluded me. Did Cyan remember? There were so many more secrets inside of them, I was sure of it, but perhaps it was for the best I didn’t remember. I had enough mysteries.

  On the long promenade that led down to the Snakewood Palace, floats draped with white fabric fluttered in the winter wind. Snowflakes danced from the clouds. We bustled through the crowds until we found a good view of the parade. Men and women dressed as Chimaera – angels, dragonkind, mermaids, and others – waved as the floats moved down the boulevard. They wore all white, as though frosted, the blue light of Penglass settling on them like a shawl.

  Music drifted through the streets. Imachara was fragmented lately, with the rising Forester protests, but at that moment, any animosity faded away as the citizens listened to the flute music rising and falling with the whistle of the wind, mesmerized by the slow waving of the false Chimaera.

  After the parade had made its way back to the Snakewood Palace, we went to the Celestial Cathedral, our feet sliding on the frosty pavement. It was the largest cathedral in the city; its spires of white and dark marble some of the tallest in the city.

  I did not consider myself particularly religious, but there was something about sitting on a pew under such a high manmade ceiling, and seeing the monumental religious figures in the stained glass that made me feel so small. I liked the near silence, but for the low murmurs of a few prayers, or the shuffle of feet. Like holding one’s breath.

  The High Priest trundled onto the stage, awkward in his heavy white and gold vestments. He led the people in prayer, and I mumbled the verses along with the countless others around me. I lifted my eyes to the windows, wondering if the Lord and Lady heard our prayers.

  The priest finished his sermon, and relinquished the stage to the choir. Two dozen men and women in dark blue robes embroidered with stars lifted their faces toward heaven and sang, their sweet voices reverberating throughout the cathedral. Drystan’s hand found its way into mine. They sang of love of the night and the day, and how the darkness made the stars and moon shine that much brighter.

  When the last note faded, the silence was absolute.

  And then it shattered.

  A keening wail echoed about the chambers, so loud that I clapped my hands to my ears. All the gas lights outside on the street and inside the cathedral extinguished, leaving only the glass globe chandelier bathing everyone in an unearthly glow. Outside, a loud voice asked all to gathe
r around.

  My hand still clasping Drystan’s, I filed out with the others. Faces were tight with worry. Curiosity drove us forth.

  Timur, the leader of the Foresters, stood on a makeshift podium in the square outside the Celestial Cathedral opposite the Royal Palace – the same square where Foresters had protested in the autumn. He waited, arms open, for us to gather below.

  “Friends, welcome. I thank you for joining us on this most special occasion. The Long Night of the Lady.” He gestured at the moon. “I apologize for interrupting your festivities. But the Long Night of the Lady marks a new beginning. The night grows shorter. The light wins against the battle of darkness, snow melting into the life of spring.”

  He gestured to his fellow Foresters fanned out behind him. Many of them had the look of bodyguards, their massive arms crossed over their chests.

  “For years, I was one of you. Working in a job that poisoned my very soul. Paper after piece of paper crossed my desk. Eventually, I realized what the papers said. They said that the nobility and the royals had everything. The large holdings of land. The vast wealth. The hordes of Vestige. I’d leave my office and see people with soot or grease on their faces, their clothes shiny with use and their faces pinched with hunger. Where is the justice in that? That those who live in comfort are blind to the reality and the pain that many of their citizens live each and every day?

  “I left and founded the Forester Party. And there was an enormous response. The people of Ellada yearn for justice, and I aim to bring it to them. First, I hoped to work with the system, and I brought forth petitions and worked within the confines of the law. The petitions had thousands of names but nobody within that building” – he waved behind him at the Snakewood Palace – “was listening. They hoped that if they ignored us we would go away. As you might have noticed, we haven’t.”

  Snow swirled around us. People’s faces were serious, their noses pink with cold. Some murmured amongst themselves, but most were quiet. It was not a mob like last time. People were listening.