Julia Unbound

by Catherine Egan

  “That stupid doll is not the truth of who I am,” I say, annoyed.

  He laughs. “I mean that I remember you from infancy to now and you’ve always been just who you are, so stop winding yourself up about whether Ma put some other essence inside you. You’re Julia through and through and you always have been and I would know if there were something else in you.”

  It warms me to hear him say it, but he doesn’t know, not really. He doesn’t know how it feels to step out of my body, to disappear right out of the world, to become something else, somewhere else.

  “Then why can I vanish? Why can I go to Kahge?”

  “Who knows? Ma was a witch—maybe some kind of magic from something she did got rubbed off on you. Don’t you think that makes more sense than you being some long-dead monster? And don’t you think that Ma being a revolutionary witch makes more sense than her being Marike? Why on earth would Marike have decided to live as a washerwoman in the Twist? Anyway, if she were alive, she wouldn’t have stayed away from us all this time.”

  “Maybe she had no choice. Or maybe…well, the immortals, like the Xianren, I don’t think they love like regular people do.”

  “Stop it,” he growls. “She loved us, Julia. She was our mother and she loved us, and only death could have kept her from us. I remember her, I remember everything better than you do. You’re talking nonsense.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  To my shame, I find myself blinking back tears.

  “I just hate to see you twisting yourself into knots,” he says more gently. “And I want that thing out of your arm.”

  “We have a little time still,” I mutter.

  We cross the bridge into the Twist, where the night is still young.

  “I’ll walk you back to your hotel,” he says, slinging an arm around my shoulders.

  I manage a little grin. “No—I’ll walk you back.”

  “You just want to terrorize Torne’s fellows again.”

  “Not so!”

  But I won’t deny it might cheer me up a little.

  Graybeard is at a table with the ferret keeper and a stocky brick of a man I’ve not seen before. The stranger looks at us with a hostile expression, his blunt, ugly face ringed with silver curls, while the other two cower. I can’t help enjoying the terror I inspire.

  “The demon,” Graybeard spits.

  “Torne said to leave ’er be,” the ferret keeper reminds him.

  “Did ’e tell that demon to leave me be?” shrieks Graybeard, diving under the table.

  “I thought you were to be punished,” I say mockingly, squatting to glare at him under the table.

  “Come on,” says Dek, pulling me to the door behind the bar. We climb the stairs to the second floor and knock on Wyn’s door. A gorgeous redhead in a low-cut dress opens it.

  “Hullo, you,” she says, like Dek is familiar. Then she takes in my fine gown, and her eyes widen.

  “Dek!” says Wyn, appearing behind her and looking relieved. “Come in, both of you. Stars, Julia, you look…well, different from usual. Guess who’s downstairs!”

  “A bunch of rats who call themselves men?” I hazard, entering the room and ignoring the redhead.

  Dek chuckles, but Wyn is not to be put off. “Bleeding Emil Lorka, that’s who!” he practically shouts.

  “Really?” I ask, surprised. Lorka is a famous painter and Wyn’s hero. “What’s he doing mixing with these vermin?”

  “He wants to join the revolution!” splutters Wyn. “Look—Julia—you need to tell Torne which of those fellows tried to hurt you, and we’ll be rid of them. I’ll take care of them myself if Torne won’t. Most of them are real revolutionaries. They want the old Frayne back, the old ways, before Rainists got to decide how we all ought to live and worship. They’re open to witchcraft being legalized, even.”

  Wyn himself might not have been open to that a few months ago, but there is nothing like traveling with a pretty, charming witch to change one’s point of view. My chest feels hollow whenever I think about Bianka.

  “Was Lorka the short, ugly one down there?” I ask.

  “Gray hair,” Wyn says, startled by my rudeness about his hero, and I feel a bit bad.

  “I’ll talk to Torne another time,” I say. “I just wanted to see Dek home.”

  What I don’t want is to spend any more time in this room with this stunning redhead in her revealing dress, hanging on Wyn’s arm now and staring at me. Perhaps it’s her presence that makes me want to show off a little. In Tianshi, I learned to cross the city by vanishing, and I’ve been thinking how useful it would be to hone that skill. I embrace Dek quickly, give Wyn a slug on the arm that isn’t wrapped around his redhead’s tiny waist, and go to the window.

  “We’re on the second floor,” Wyn reminds me as I pull it open. I don’t need it open—I can vanish to anyplace that I can see—but I’m going for dramatic effect here.

  “I know.” I step onto the ledge—no easy task in my heavy dress and stupid shoes.

  “Julia,” says Dek.

  The Edge squats below us—this broken crust of the city between the Twist and Limory Cemetery.

  “Is she mad?” squeaks Wyn’s redhead. “What is she doing?”

  I’m afraid of all the unknowns of what I am and what I can do. I’m afraid of how far I can go. But there is this too: it’s fun. If I can put aside all the whys and hows, I have always loved being able to vanish. My heart speeds up, but I push away the familiar fear that I won’t be able to pull it off this time. I step off the windowsill. The redhead’s screams drown out whatever Wyn and Dek are yelling.

  I can do it in under a second. One step back: the world blurs and I am unseen by ordinary eyes as I plunge through the air. Two steps: sight and sound receding farther. Three steps back: a buzzing in my limbs as I lose contact with myself. Four steps: Whoosh. The city spreads out underneath me and I am everywhere, nowhere, bodiless. I find West Spira, careful not to focus too closely on anything so I don’t go crashing into a building, just casting my perspective over it all until I find the West Spira Grand Hotel and its tenth-floor balcony. Focus. I am on the balcony, back inside my own body, heart thundering. Not bad. A single leap from Wyn’s window to my own. What can’t I do? I hang laughing with delight and relief over the balcony railing for a moment, then pick the lock on the door with shaking fingers and push my way into the room.

  “I wondered when you’d be back,” says Pia from the darkness.

  She’s in an armchair in the corner, a shadow in the dark room. I wouldn’t have seen her at all if she hadn’t spoken.

  “Hounds, you’re creepy, lurking in the dark like that,” I tell her. I drop onto the bed and kick off my pinching shoes. It feels like far too much work to get out of this bleeding dress with all its ties and bindings, the petticoats and the corset, but I don’t want to sleep in a corset either. I give a dramatic moan.

  “Are you injured?” asks Pia. She actually sounds worried.

  “No. I just hate this dress.”

  I make myself sit up and start fumbling with the ties.

  “Lady Laroche is in the city,” she says. “Have you seen her?”

  I snort at the absurdity of her asking me that, and a seam rips as I struggle too violently out of the top part of my dress. The purse with the sleeping-serum darts tumbles out of my dress and onto the bed. I tug the corset loose and gasp with relief. My bottom ribs feel bruised.

  “Here is my report for Casimir,” I say, ignoring her question about Lady Laroche. “Sir Victor introduced me to Duke Everard at the opera. The duke is handsome and charming and writes poetry and fancies himself a bit of a freethinking rebel. He’s devoted to his mother. Dafne is utterly beautiful, and I’m sure she doesn’t need me looking unbeautiful next to her to win him over. Then rats came marauding all over the place, and we didn’t se
e the opera after all.”

  I toss my dress, corset, and purse on the floor and crawl under the bedcovers in my petticoat, adding, “I hope there aren’t any rats in here.”

  “There were a number in the lobby,” says Pia. “But I don’t think rats know how to use an elevator. We ought to be safe up here.”

  “Safe.” I repeat the word and laugh.

  “Sir Victor wants to see you in a couple of hours.”

  “Then I’ll sleep for a couple of hours.”

  “Shall I wake you?”

  “Fine. Now go away. I don’t like the idea of you watching me sleep.”

  She doesn’t move.

  “Please,” I groan into the satin pillowcase. The metal of her goggles glints in the moonlight that comes through the curtains.

  “How is your brother?” she asks.

  “Alive.”

  “I know you better than Casimir does. You won’t let him take you. He hopes you will, but I know you won’t. But you won’t give up on your brother either. So what will you do?”

  I say nothing.

  “Julia, I know you have met with Lady Laroche. I am not passing this information along to Casimir because it is irrelevant. He is not concerned about the revolution. He has every confidence that Agoston Horthy will take care of it—and if Casimir is not concerned, then neither am I. But I am worried that you will do something rash to try to help your brother. I know Lady Laroche. She is clever, but she is not careful, and she has too much faith in her own abilities. Do not let a witch try to help you get the poison out of him. The mechanic made very sure it could only be done by him.”

  For a moment, I can’t even make words. Then I splutter, “You’re worried? Go away, by the Nameless. Leave me alone.”

  She rises but does not leave. I pull the covers over my head so her voice is muffled.

  “The nuyi, even once it reaches the brain, does not control your thoughts,” she says. “It is like an outside force exerting pressure. The farther it expands through the brain, the more complete its control of your actions. It will become impossible to resist the compulsion of the nuyi, impossible to act against it. Still—while the nuyi will eventually control your ability to act or not act, it will not control what you think or feel.”

  “Can we talk about this tomorrow?”

  “The Xianren destroyed most of the nuyi long ago. They tried many methods, but poison was the most effective. The herb hermia is lethal to the nuyi. Injecting it into the queen resulted in the death of the entire nest. Individual nuyi could also be killed merely by being trapped in a jar with the herb. Hermia is also lethal to humans, but poison dosages can be dealt carefully. Poison can be measured out so that it will merely weaken and not kill.”

  I pull the covers off me and sit up. She leans forward and makes an odd sound in her throat.

  “What the bleeding stars is the matter with you?” I ask, staring at her shadowy face.

  “Injecting it right into your arm would be too dangerous,” she says in a rush. “Too much in the bloodstream…and if the nuyi dies, Casimir will know. But a very little bit, ingested…a small dose would not kill you. It would not kill the nuyi either. But it would sicken it. Slow its growth. Slow it down.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “There would be side effects.”

  “Slow it down…as in…so, it might take longer than ten days or two weeks to reach the brain? Longer before it controlled me?”

  She steadies herself and says: “Yes, precisely. Casimir will not want to lose you by letting your brother die. If the poison sac is close to disintegrating, he will order the mechanic to operate. He might not know…I don’t know if he can feel it when the nuyi has attached to the brain. It might work. You might keep the nuyi from your brain long enough to save your brother, if you are consistent in serving Casimir, if you are useful. Once your brother was safe, you could remove it, if it had not reached the brain.”

  “What’s going on here?”

  She is shaking, and I can’t figure out why she’s telling me this. If it is some trick of Casimir’s.

  “I am not ordered to keep quiet on this matter in particular,” she says. “But his will is woven all through me and it is hard…sometimes, it is hard even to speak. To think about a thing too closely…if it is not aligned with his will.”

  I ask in disbelief: “Are you trying to help me?”

  “I cannot help you, Julia.” Half-collapsed against the doorframe, she manages a ghost of a grin. “But let’s say that, in spite of the odds, I am betting on you.”

  Telegram to Lord Casimir, Nago Island: DUKE EVERARD MALLEABLE STOP DEVOTED TO MOTHER STOP DAFNE PROMISING STOP LAROCHE ORCHESTRATES RAT INVASION OF WEST SPIRA STOP JULIA COOPERATIVE STOP

  “Witches flock to trouble,” he says. “And that’s what’s coming. It’s a good time to get out of Spira City.”

  I think I won’t be able to sleep at all, but I suppose I do, because Pia is waking me up again. It is still black night outside.

  “A hackney is waiting,” she says.

  I stagger into the main room and pull the plainest dress I can find out of the wardrobe—Csilla hung a selection from the trunks of clothing Casimir had sent over. I don’t look at the nuyi. I don’t need to. I can feel it halfway along my upper arm. Squinting at the mirror, I shove the hair extensions back into place with a ribbon.

  “No corset?” says Pia.

  “Not for visiting Sir Victor before dawn,” I mutter.

  Pia lights a lamp and says, “You ought to cover that scar, at least.”

  I blink in the lamplight. The purple scar stands out starkly on my cheek, running from my temple to my top lip. I cover my face with powder, but lacking Csilla’s skills, I end up looking as if I’ve been baking and got a faceful of flour. I wipe some of it off with a handkerchief and stare at my reflection despairingly. I will just have to hope I’m not required to be visible for anybody other than Sir Victor today.

  Pia hands me a purse that clinks. It is stuffed with paper money as well as silver coins.

  “Use this for bribes or for anything else you need,” she says. “Tell me when you need more.”

  I take it, remembering with a queasy chill the last time Pia handed me a purse full of money. I push the memory aside and tie the purse around my waist. Just in case, I put the sleeping serum darts Dek gave me into this purse as well.

  An electric hackney is waiting for me in front of the hotel. As we drive through West Spira, I see a good many soldiers out, carrying lanterns and pistols. Rat-catching. Every now and then a sharp shot rings out.

  A woman in a maid’s uniform is waiting for me outside the parliament gates. She is cream-puff pale, and her almost lashless eyes make her look like a frightened rabbit.

  “Are you Ella?” she asks.

  “I suppose I am.”

  She blinks and hesitates, and then says, “Well, are you?”

  I sigh and say, “Yes.”

  She looks me over uncertainly, but she takes me inside.

  Sir Victor’s offices are quite as beautiful as the hotel, with high ceilings, thick carpets, and windows overlooking the river Syne. Sir Victor himself looks gaunt and exhausted as he wishes me good morning.

  “This is Karla,” he says, introducing the maid. “She is one of ours. She will be serving Agoston Horthy breakfast in his office within the hour, and you will go with her, invisible. You will learn the way, where he sleeps and eats. Karla, tell Ella whatever you can.”

  I look at Karla, who blinks rapidly at me. I wonder what she makes of invisible.

  “Well, miss, he rises very early. He has no preferences as far as food and drink. In fact, I’d venture to say he cannot taste anything. He’s at his desk and in meetings for most of the day. He works very hard. Sometimes his boots are covered in mud in the morning, but I
don’t know where he goes at night.”

  “What do you mean, he can’t taste anything?” I ask.

  “Well, I don’t know, miss, only it seems to me that he must not taste very well. The girls made a pudding once and by mistake they put salt in it instead of sugar! I didn’t know, I took it to him, but when I got back to the kitchen they was all in hysterics because they’d tasted it and it was so awful, truly inedible. I ran back there to take it from him, but he’d eaten every bite! When I asked him if it was all right, he told me it was fine, and so I took the plate away. But I tried a crumb myself, miss, and I could barely choke it down, it were so terrible!”

  I look at Sir Victor.

  “I am not interested in his taste buds. I want to know why he has mud on his boots in the mornings. Where does he go, whom does he meet?” He hands me a sheaf of papers. “Memorize these when you have the chance. They are maps of the palace and the parliament buildings. You have a room attached to mine in the guest suites at the palace—I’ve marked it on the map. There are some clothes and things to make it look as if a girl lives there.”

  I fold the maps and tuck them into the purse with the sleeping serum and the money from Pia.

  “Have you been to bed yet?” I ask him.

  He shakes his head. “The city is in an uproar.”

  “The rats?” I ask, and he nods. Karla looks back and forth between us, wide-eyed.

  “It is being considered a direct attack on the Crown by witches,” he says. “There will be Cleansings aplenty in the weeks to come. For now, go with Karla, get the lay of the land.”