The Madness Project (The Madness Method)

by Bralick, J. Leigh

  My head throbbed as though I’d drunk too much, but when a footman offered me a glass of fizz, I drank it without tasting it. Face after face bobbed past me, plastered with smiles that I knew they didn’t feel. I’d given up on smiling long since, except the rare moment when I felt my mother’s gaze fixed hawk-like on me from the head of the room.

  Finally I handed the footman my empty glass and slipped into the crowd. They parted around me as though I moved within a glass cage, never giving me more than a passing glance to see if I was looking at them. I was untouchable—they couldn’t approach me unless I gave them permission, which I rarely did if I could help it. It had given me a dreadful reputation for arrogance, but I rather didn’t mind. It was a convenient mask for my insecurity…and my indifference.

  I’d discovered long ago that, as long as I kept moving, no one really took notice of me. So nobody spotted me slipping away from the ballroom tonight, not even Griff or Samyr. Three of the Court Ministers’ sons flocked around Griff, talking flying or some such, while Samyr and two other girls listened in rapt and baffled silence around them.

  Somehow I was almost glad that they didn’t notice me. Tomorrow I would leave all this world of silk and champagne, and yet this last taste of it had turned strangely sour in my heart.

  After all, I couldn’t really pretend I belonged here. I’d pretended all my life, and the lie was killing me.

  I slipped down to the coatroom and wrapped myself up in a plain black coat, ruffled my hair out of its pristine plaster and shoved a newsboy cap over my head—the kind of hat I liked to buy because it was the sort of thing no member of the nobility would ever admit to owning, let alone be caught wearing. Then, when Pont was distracted by some late-arriving guest, I slipped out and headed back down to the plaza.

  The walk took a good twenty minutes, with the streets turning to slush in the cold and fresh-falling snow. The guards at the mouth of the plaza checked my pockets but not my face, and let me through without so much as a word. I bought a beer from a tavern tent, where they only checked the money in my hands, and for a while I sat on the low stone wall that circled the plaza, a holly bush’s spiny leaves pricking my back, the light from a streetlamp shining in my eyes.

  For a while I watched the Jixies who traded their talents for coin by the tents across the plaza, half curious, half afraid I would see one disappear before everyone’s eyes. A knot of guards kept a rigid watch on their stunts, restricting them mostly to simple tricks that needed no real magic.

  I’d nearly finished my beer when a commotion by a nearby tent caught my eye. I expected to see some slumdog nabbed trying to steal food from the vendors, but instead I saw the Jixy girl from the motorcar accident, locked in a verbal spar with two bigger boys. I pulled up my knees, wrapping my arms around them to watch.

  “I said bog off!” the girl shouted. She had her hands balled up, but her elbows hung close to her sides, protectively. “You want a scene?”

  “Hayli,” the bigger boy said, holding out his hands. The other kid smirked behind him. “C’mon, just this once?”

  She tried to get past him, planting a hand on his shoulder and shoving as hard as she could, but the big red-head didn’t even twitch. Then his hand flashed out and caught her arm.

  “You want the coppers? You want I should tell ‘em what you did, so?”

  I narrowed my eyes. No. That can’t be what he means…

  “Leave me alone.” She moved closer to him, saying something in his ear, and shoved him again.

  I swallowed the last of my beer and set the tankard on the wall. Half of me wanted to try changing my face, so I could charge in and find out what was going on. Half of me wanted to do the same thing, only as myself. Doing something stupid on my birthday was tradition, after all, and come tomorrow, Tarik Trabinis would be gone from Brinmark and all its scandal.

  The other boy was in the mix now, holding Hayli by both arms. He had to be a good six inches shorter than the red-head, but he moved with the lethal grace of a martial artist. The way his face shifted by degrees from threatening to suggestive to spiteful, I imagined he was trying to persuade her of something. Hayli put up a good fight, but I could see the anger and desperate frustration burning in her eyes.

  Stars, I thought, heaving a long sigh. I was just begging for something like this to happen, wasn’t I?

  I got up and made my way through the widening crowd. For once the ubiquitous guards had disappeared, which struck me as odd. Usually they were onto tramps like flies on dung, especially unruly tramps.

  None of the three kids even glanced at me as I got near. I couldn’t tell what they were arguing about any more—it had long since left the semi-rational place it began.

  I grabbed the shorter boy by the arm.

  He spun and swung so fast I barely ducked before his hand caught my throat. Somehow I’d thought he would be the easy one, but I should have known better. I’d seen how he moved. For a moment we stepped around each other, watching, studying, waiting. He had speed on his side, but I knew I had an advantage in strength. The next time his hand flew at me, I caught it and grabbed, hard. His eyes widened, his muscles tensed.

  Alarm blazed in my mind.

  I released his hand just before he tried to throw me, and in the split second he took to realize he was off-balance, I aimed a wicked right punch straight at his face. Pain exploded through my hand, showering all the way up my arm, but I had the brief satisfaction of watching him spin, stumble, and hit the ground. Then the other kid was on me, swinging at my head.

  I ducked, aiming a blow at his stomach, but he struck my arm aside and lunged to grab me in a bear-hold. The calculated fight vanished; instinct took over. My knee slammed into him but the same moment I stumbled, ears ringing and blood pounding across my vision from the kid’s fist on my jaw. Vaguely I realized I’d lost my hat, but the world spun too madly for me to even see it.

  “Anuk!” Hayli shouted.

  Then another voice, deeper, “Break it up! What’s the matter with you?”

  Light flashed off the steel shaft of a baton, waving frighteningly close to my head, then a pair of policemen dove between us, dragging us apart. The red-head Anuk struggled for just a second, then suddenly he stopped and looked at me long enough for that moment of recognition. He swore, and before the policeman could do a thing about it, he jerked free and pelted into the crowd, hauling Jig along behind him.

  “Bloody hell,” the police sergeant said, poised to chase them down, but then he spotted Hayli and turned toward her instead.

  “She’s just a bystander,” I said, probing my tender jaw. “Let her be.”

  “Don’t tell me—” His voice died as he saw me, and some mixture of surprise and frustration flashed across his face. But he just saluted and said, “Your Highness.”

  Heads turned at that, but both policemen moved together as if to shield me from the view of the gossip-mongerers.

  “Really, Sergeant,” I said. I glanced at Hayli, and for some reason I gave her a crooked smile and watched the blood drain from her cheeks. “This is hardly the worst thing you’ve caught me doing.”

  “You’ll have to come with us,” the other policeman said, fidgety and wide-eyed.

  “I’d rather not.”

  “I can’t just…” The sergeant stared at me, his hands tightening reflexively on his baton. “You know I can’t just walk away.”

  “No? Forget you saw anything,” I said. “It is my birthday, after all.”

  His lips twitched under his red mustache. I knew I’d put him in a sore spot—technically he couldn’t touch me, but now the whole crowd had seen the fight and most of them hadn’t recognized me yet. To them I’d be just another trouble-maker who deserved to be marched off by the police, so the constables couldn’t simply let me walk.

  Though, by the hushed muttering that circled around me, I figured my anonymity would prove short-lived. I bent and rescued my hat from the slush, then lifted my hands in a shrug.

  “Well
, lead on, Sergeant. Where do you want to take me?”

  “Please, Your Highness. Just…follow us a moment.”

  They turned and strode off with me between them, through the gaping and murmuring crowd, toward the security pavilion I’d passed on my way in. Several other policemen gathered inside, crowding around a coal brazier for a few moments’ warmth before heading back to their patrol in the plaza. My two guards marched me toward a long table scattered with reports and a few chairs—not near enough to the fire to get any warmth from it. Some of the other officers watched us curiously, but when the sergeant snapped his fingers they turned purposefully away.

  “If you would please sit, Your Highness,” the constable said, and the sergeant gestured me to a chair.

  I complied, trying not to smile. It always amused me to see how nervous they got when they had to talk to me. They could never simply tell me what to do, even when I knew I deserved to be treated like any other delinquent.

  “What was this about, now?” the sergeant asked. “Did those fellows attack you?”

  “No,” I said blandly. “I attacked them.”

  The sergeant’s mustache twitched. I leaned back, crossing my ankles and keeping a steady gaze on his face.

  “They were bothering someone,” I added. “No one else was around, so I thought I ought to defend her. Suppose that was a mistake.”

  “You defended someone who was in danger?” the constable asked.

  “I suppose we can’t fault you for that,” the sergeant said, “even if it was rather indiscreet. You really ought to have called on one of us to help. If anything had happened—”

  “I’m sorry. I don’t suppose I saw you at the time.” I leaned forward and said, “It’s been a long day.”

  The constable choked on a cough.

  “Terribly long,” the sergeant said, his face shifting to realization. “I’m so sorry about what happened this morning, Your Highness. Terribly sorry. Can we do anything to help?”

  I smiled faintly. “You could let me go back to my party.”

  The sergeant exchanged a glance with the constable, then jerked his head. The constable nodded and puffed up his chest, sending me his smartest salute before strutting off to the other side of the tent. I’d never seen him before, not like the sergeant, so I imagined he’d be feeling a bit proud that he’d gotten to help the sergeant deal with the unruly prince.

  The sergeant sat down in the other chair, leaning onto his knees to get a good look at me.

  “Your Highness, I know I don’t have the right to say anything to you…”

  “Please,” I said. “Say what you will.”

  He cleared his throat and sat back. “This is the third time this month I’ve had to apprehend you for something.”

  I waited, but he didn’t say anything else; he obviously couldn’t think of how to proceed without accusing me or patronizing me.

  “You’re asking what’s wrong with me?” I asked. “Wondering why any proper prince would want to go sticking his nose into trouble?”

  “Now, I was a boy once too, not terribly long ago,” the sergeant said, eyes glinting with a hidden smile. “Boys are boys. Doesn’t change if there’s a crown on your head. Not really. I know all you noble kids can stand straight and bow and say yes-sir when you have to, but that doesn’t entirely change the blood, does it?”

  I smiled; I couldn’t help it. “Not at all.”

  “As I see it, who you are—I mean, the prince—doesn’t change what you are—a boy. Just means you’ve got to fight harder than most to make sure the world doesn’t notice when you fall. If you’ll pardon me saying it, Your Highness, it’s not about you. It’s about them. Your family, the people of this city. With the news and photographs we have these days…the whole world is watching you. Just remember that.”

  I propped my elbow on the top of the chair and glanced away, pressing the backs of my fingers against my mouth. Yes, the whole world was watching me. And the world never let me forget it, either. Though the flatterers insisted that the people loved me, I knew they were always holding me up to some standard I’d never be able to meet.

  “Are we done here, Sergeant?” I asked, looking away.

  He gave a rather disappointed little sigh. “Yes, Your Highness. You’re free to go. Just try not to get into any more trouble tonight, all right?”

  I got up without a word and pushed my way out of the tent. The crowd from the fight had dispersed, but I spotted Hayli still lingering where I’d left her. She stood with her arms wrapped tight around her, watching me wide-eyed as I made my way back toward her.

  “If people keep staring at me, I’m going to start breaking things,” I said when I reached her. “Preferably noses. Or eye sockets.”

  “You!” she said finally. “What…”

  I measured her a moment, thinking about what Anuk had said. Then I decided it was absurd, and with my head pounding worse than ever, I realized that all I really wanted was to be home, alone, in peace and quiet.

  I must be getting old, I thought, and turned to walk away.

  “Oh, wait!” Hayli cried. I glanced at her over my shoulder, but she just said, “Thanks.”

  I nodded.

  “The coppers let you gan?” she asked.

  “They can’t arrest me. Not really.” I backed another step, then stopped at a half-mad idea. “Do you want something to eat?”

  She squinted at me, a sudden look on her face like vinegar. “I can take care of myself, like,” she said, hot.

  I laughed. “I don’t doubt that.”

  Her brow puckered.

  “I was asking you nicely,” I said. “Don’t think I can’t make it so you have to sit and talk to me.”

  “What?” she gasped. “Why d’you want to talk to me?”

  “What did that other kid mean, about telling the police what you did?”

  She frowned. “I dan’ get what you want.”

  So I moved closer to her, putting on the sternest air I could and feeling just a little guilty when she wilted away from me.

  “I know you’re a Jixy.”

  “I am not!” she cried, balling her hands into fists, her cheeks red. “Why would you say that?”

  I regarded her with some surprise; it had never occurred to me that she might deny it.

  “You appeared out of nowhere yesterday, didn’t you?” I asked, folding my arms. “With the motorcar?”

  She flinched and turned, as if she had half a mind to just walk away.

  “Even if I was, what would it matter?” she asked.

  “Today my father got shot by a Jixy who could appear and disappear at will. So. Talk to me.”

  She looked like I had slapped her. “I was there!” she cried.

  I raised one eyebrow, and it must have been my father’s eyebrow, the way she turned so pale.

  “I mean, I saw it all happen. I was across the street by the big tree. I saw the shooter up on the balcony. It wasn’t me, honest.”

  I believed her. The shooter had definitely been larger than her, most likely a man. But even though I knew the kid was clear, I didn’t want to let her go just yet. Maybe because I wanted an excuse to keep talking to her…though why, I had no idea.

  “So you say,” I said.

  She closed her eyes. “I’m no Ghost. I dan’ even know any Ghosts.”

  “You wouldn’t know where to look for him?”

  For a moment she didn’t reply, but stared around the plaza as though she were looking for someone—or maybe afraid of finding someone. But we stood alone, a little island in a swirling sea of revelers, and no one even seemed to see us.

  “No,” she said. “I actually dan’ na a lot of…Jixies.”

  “Hm,” I said. I nodded at the slight bulge of her waistcoat under her left arm. “You can eat that if you want. I’ll just get something for myself.”

  Her hand flew to her side, the color draining and then rushing back to her cheeks. I turned and walked away.

  At the tave
rn tent, I ordered some sort of bizarre fried dough which I’d always rather wanted to try, out of morbid fascination, maybe. I’d just settled back onto my spot on the wall when Hayli inched her way over to me. For a moment she hovered there, watching me under the fringe of her lashes.

  “Can I sit?”

  I moved my leg aside, as if that’s what she’d meant. When she just stared at me I said, “Look. See this?” I gestured at my hat. “My grand attempt at a disguise. So please pretend it’s working.”

  She smiled faintly and pulled herself onto the wall, as far from me as she could get while still being close enough to talk. I hid a sigh by biting into the dough. For a few seconds I chewed thoughtfully, hyperaware of Hayli studying me as though I’d suddenly grown another head.

  “You ever had this stuff before?” I asked, waving it at her.

  She shook her head, so I pulled off a chunk and held it out to her.

  “Tell me I’m not the only person who thinks it’s disgusting.”

  That made her grin. She reached out, slowly, then snatched it all at once, a little wary bird grabbing a crumb. She sniffed it suspiciously, all the while eyeing me over the top of it. I couldn’t tell if she thought me terrifying or repulsive. Maybe both.

  Then she ate the whole thing in one bite, cramming it all into her mouth as if I might steal it back from her. I smiled when she hid her mouth behind her hands, cheeks bulging like a chipmunk’s.

  She swallowed and started to lick the sweetness from her fingers, but thought better of it and wiped them on her trousers.

  “Eee, that was gross,” she said.

  “You ate it.”

  “Can’t complain.”

  I held out the rest to her. Gad, if anyone in the Court knew I was sharing food I’d already eaten from, they would probably faint.

  Hayli scowled like a devil, then she swiped the dough from my hand and choked it down.

  “Why’d you help?” she asked when she’d finished. “With the lads?”