Tear You Apart

by Sarah Cross

His hands found her like he was reliving a memory, and she wrapped her arms around him and gave in to the past.

  He couldn’t promise he wouldn’t kill her. She couldn’t promise she would stay with him. They shouldn’t be together; she knew that. But she didn’t care. Tomorrow she would care, in an hour she might care. But not now.

  CHAPTER TEN

  THE DAYS MELTED TOGETHER. The nights seethed with sticky heat, and Viv struggled to sleep a whole night through without nightmares. She kept her bedroom door locked, but left the balcony doors open for the animals, and half expected to find the old Huntsman standing there whenever she opened her eyes.

  Tonight, she woke not to nightmares, but to a loud animal snort. And the jingling of reins.

  A horse?

  Viv pushed the satin sleep mask off her eyes to find a brown mouse watching her. She raised a sleepy hand and lightly stroked its back.

  “Who’s out there?” she whispered. The mouse closed its eyes and gave a little wriggle of pleasure, but didn’t answer. They never did.

  Moving the mouse onto her pillow, and shooing away the other animals who’d been sleeping around her, Viv went to the balcony, squinting into the dark in search of a horse. None of her friends rode horses. Even the most delusional hero-types had cars.

  At first, all she saw was the garden, the fruit trees ringing the well. But then the darkness shifted. Moonlight slid along the glossy black body of a horse, traced the shape of a man holding the reins. Both horse and master were as black as the night they moved through.

  Viv shivered with excitement. She knew who the man was—she could recognize a horseman. She just didn’t know why he was here.

  Horsemen were magical beings, like fairies—except fairies were always female and horsemen were always male. And while fairies attended christenings, and bestowed curses, and otherwise played a role in cursed lives, horsemen were more standoffish. In Russian fairy tales, they served Baba Yaga. There were horsemen representing the red sun, the white day, the black night. This one was clearly Night.

  He’d spotted her on the balcony and was watching her, waiting.

  He didn’t call her name. He didn’t have to. It was rare to see a horseman, and there was no way she was letting him leave without finding out why he was here.

  Viv hurried downstairs. When she got to the yard Night was standing near the well. The horse was chewing huge mouthfuls of the garden. Flowers disappeared between its teeth and naked patches of earth showed where grass used to grow.

  Then Night was in front of her, holding out a black card printed with silver script. The words gleamed with light, so she could read them even in the dark.

  A twist of silver branches crawled up either side of the card.

  Silver branches meant the underworld. There was a nightclub there where the Twelve Dancing Princesses went to dance, night after night, until someone broke their curse. It was more exclusive than any club she knew. There was no velvet rope, no doorman to persuade—you couldn’t even find the underworld unless someone wanted you there.

  And now someone wanted her there.

  No one she knew had ever been invited.

  The underworld wasn’t a land of the dead, like in Greek mythology. It was simply a hidden place, a kingdom the fairies had carved out of stone and darkness so long ago that no one remembered who had done it. There, fairies and other inhuman beings could show themselves freely because there was no chance that a normal human would be present. The way there was a secret but most Cursed knew the underworld existed.

  More silver words appeared on the card as Viv watched.

  She glanced up at Night. His eyes were solid-black pools.

  “How do I get there?”

  “I’ll take you.” The horseman’s voice was deep, and once he’d spoken it seemed to drift away, like she’d imagined the sound.

  Viv ran a hand through her messy hair, conscious of her skimpy pajamas and the sweat that coated her skin. “Do I have time to change?”

  “We go now, or not at all.”

  Light glimmered across the words: Yes or No?

  “Yes,” she decided.

  At that the message faded. The invitation turned to dust and the branches that had adorned the card appeared on her arms: silver filigree stretching from elbows to wrists. The silver markings gleamed like the words had and were cool to the touch.

  “What are these marks?” she asked, holding out her arms so Night could see them.

  “This is your way in,” he said, taking her right arm. He grasped her left arm. “And this is your way out.”

  Night stood there a moment, holding her arms at the wrists, his face betraying nothing. And yet, it was clear from the way he hesitated that something was wrong.

  “So … is there a door?” Viv asked, starting to get nervous.

  “There are many doors. This one is … inconvenient.”

  “How inconvenient?”

  “Hold your breath,” he said.

  And then he picked her up and threw her in the well.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  VIV DID NOT HOLD HER BREATH.

  She screamed. Her fingers clawed at the slick stone walls, but she couldn’t grab on to anything. Night slid in after her and sank like a stone. Disappeared into the dark water, so she couldn’t feel him at all.

  Until his hand closed around her ankle and he pulled her under.

  Her last scream was swallowed by the water that flooded her mouth. She was choking, her head full of darkness. And all she could think was:

  This was a plan of Regina’s.

  A trick.

  Regina knew witches—she could commission a magic invitation.

  And maybe—

  Hire a horseman.

  She should have known.

  This was—

  The stupidest—

  Way to die.

  Viv felt herself being tugged down, down, down—and then someone was dragging her out of the water, across a bed of wet pebbles. Not out of a well. Out of … a lake.

  She coughed, hacking up water. It all blurred at first—like lights seen through a raindrop-speckled window. Then the underworld came into focus. The silver trees with their knife-gleam branches. The faint, haunting music, like distant bells and snapping icicles. A sky that wasn’t sky but a dense mass of shadows.

  Night laid her down on the lakeshore. His jet-black face was smooth and expressionless. Not cold, but inhumanly composed.

  A man in a silver guard’s uniform came rushing over. His tinsel-colored jacket was like something a toy soldier would wear, but the sword he carried was real.

  “She has to go through the checkpoint,” the guard insisted, sounding nervous—like he was uneasy talking to a horseman.

  Viv turned onto her side to hack up more water and Night grabbed her right arm and showed it to the guard. “Check her here. I’m in a hurry.”

  The guard muttered another protest, but did as he was told. He ran his eyes over Viv’s right arm, then touched his ring to the silver swirls on her skin—and the mark disappeared.

  “All right,” the guard said. “But next time—”

  Night vanished before the guard could finish—just kind of disappeared like Batman—which Viv found almost as annoying as the fact that he’d dragged her down a well. He didn’t think he had to explain himself? Horsemen were as bad as fairies.

  “There won’t be a next time,” Viv said. Going to a nightclub was not worth almost drowning. She hugged herself and shivered. Her pajamas were sopping wet and it was cool in the underworld. Like an early spring night when the earth was just crawling out of winter.

  Silver branches stretched above them, all around the lake, glinting in the lantern light. There was no breeze, but the leaves made a tinkling sound like wind chimes. It was beautiful, still—and a little eerie. Like walking through a dream.

  There was a path that looped through the forest behind them where a line of guests in silver party garb waited to show their marked arms to the gua
rds at the checkpoint. They shimmered between the trees like figures made of mercury.

  Viv looked down at herself: at the water dribbling down her legs, the wet pajama shorts sagging from her hips.

  “I can’t go to the club like this,” she told the guard. “How do I get home?”

  “Traffic’s flowing one way right now. Into the underworld, not out. If you want to go to the club, you get in one of those boats.” He pointed to a row of gondolas at the shore. “Other than that, you’re on your own.”

  Viv stood and stared at him as he turned his back on her. “So I’m stuck here?”

  The guard didn’t bother to answer.

  Sighing, Viv wandered down to the boathouse. The boatmen wore silver double-breasted jackets like the guards, but they looked like they wore them under duress. They stood together, all slouching in a deliberate way, eyes half-lidded and bored. Half of them were smoking. God—they reminded her of Henley’s friends.

  One stepped out of the group and sauntered down to the shore like he was doing her a favor. He outpaced her, then stopped and turned back. “You’re really going to wear that?” The other boatmen laughed.

  “I’m not going to take it off,” she said acidly.

  He shrugged and steadied the gondola while she boarded. “You must be new. Otherwise you’d have heard about the dress code.”

  “Silver?” She really wished he would stop talking.

  “Silver for us every night. But yeah, silver’s tonight’s theme for the guests. They like themes. Helps to identify the outsiders.”

  He grinned at her as he started to row, and Viv turned her face away so he wouldn’t see the burn in her cheeks.

  Outsider—she’d never been an outsider. Not in any way that mattered. And she didn’t like being made to feel like one now.

  The silver forest bordered the lake on three sides. Globe-shaped lanterns hung from the trees and cast a golden glow on the water’s slowly rippling surface.

  The underworld was all shining and dark, bright metal and heavy shadow. On the far shore, hills of black rock repeated into the distance. There was no horizon, just a point at which everything turned to darkness, like the world around them had been rubbed out.

  The palace stood on a rocky crag overlooking the lake. Below it, nearer to the lake, was the nightclub. There were no windows and, like the best nightclubs, no sign telling you what it was—but Viv’s heart beat faster when she saw it. The gleaming black walls reflected the lake and the forest like mirrors made of obsidian.

  When the boat bumped to a stop, the boatman held it steady so Viv could climb out. Her bare feet met rough stone and she winced, taking slow, careful steps as she made her way up the hill to the club. There had to be a smoother path—a ways off, other guests were approaching the club with far less difficulty—but the boatman had let her off here and she figured it would be just as much work to cut across the rocky hill as to go up it. So she went up.

  When she rounded the top of the hill, she saw an old beggar woman standing outside the club, picking her teeth with a sliver of bone. Her face was withered but her eyes were sharp and bright.

  A fairy, Viv thought. Waiting to test me.

  Well, she wasn’t going to walk into that trap.

  “Took you long enough.” The old woman flung her toothpick to the ground. “All this time and that’s how you’re dressed? I was told you’d need help, but I’m not a miracle worker.”

  Viv forced a tight smile. “It was kind of you to wait so long.” Being rude to a fairy was one of the biggest mistakes you could make. They loved baiting people—then dealing out “just” punishments when you told them off.

  “Damn right it was. Can’t imagine why someone would want you all dressed up. You’ve got no figure to speak of—your ass is as flat as a squashed cockroach.”

  That was a new one. “Sorry. I don’t know, either. Someone hired you?”

  “You think I’d bother with you for free?” The old woman fished a thin gold wand out of her sleeve, and Viv stiffened as the fairy aimed it at her.

  It wasn’t like she’d never had magic used on her, but she’d been an infant then. It was different when you were old enough to know what was happening.

  A flare of heat started at Viv’s hips and moved up her chest. When she glanced down and saw that her pajamas were burning away, she let out a startled cry—but the fire didn’t burn her. Her pajamas blackened, then crumbled to ash. And then the ashes swirled in the air like they’d been caught in a cyclone, and re-formed as a black velvet dress studded with pinpoints of light: blue-white diamonds whose glow faded and blazed, twinkled and winked out, like stars. It was as if someone had made a dress out of the night sky.

  The stones she’d been walking on rolled up around her feet, coated her heels and her toes; then with a burst of heat, they transformed into high heels made of black glass.

  The old woman came closer, scowling. “You couldn’t be bothered to dry your hair?”

  “I almost drowned.”

  The fairy touched her wand to Viv’s forehead. Heat flared again, and Viv’s wet hair unplastered itself from her head and neck and settled onto her shoulders in silky black waves. Cold metal teeth sank into her scalp. She glanced at the reflective black walls of the nightclub and saw that her now-dry hair was crowned with a tiara made of stars.

  “That’ll have to do,” the fairy said. “Try not to embarrass yourself in there.”

  “Thank you,” Viv said, managing an awkward curtsy on the stones.

  The old woman groaned like that had not reassured her, then started down the hill toward the shore. Thank god, Viv thought. She’d made it through the trial unscathed.

  There was no one guarding the entrance so Viv slipped into the shadowy alcove that led to the door. She wondered who had arranged for her to have the dress.

  Wondering made her clumsy. She stumbled on her way in, one of her ankles almost twisting in the black glass heels, and she had to grab hold of a man’s arm to keep from falling. He glared at her, dark gray brows furrowing—and she apologized and clunked away, every wobbly step making her nervous, every glance around the room making her feel less like she belonged.

  Everyone else was wearing silver—it was the dress code, just like the boatman had said. And they all seemed to know one another. The dancers pressed close together, spun in unison, and traded partners like what happened tonight happened every night.

  The floor was made of glossy black tiles and the walls were black mirrors. Silver disco balls spun light onto the dance floor, turning the room into a dizzying swirl of reflected light—like scattered moonbeams, or sped-up raindrops.

  Plush black velvet benches lined the walls but Viv didn’t want to sit down. She needed to find the person who’d invited her so she could find out what this was all about. The problem was she didn’t know who she was looking for.

  Viv grabbed a drink from a waiter and sipped it while she circled the room.

  She recognized a few Cursed, but no one she knew very well. A blonde princess stood with her arm raised like a falconer’s, a long-tailed blue bird perched on her wrist—the two of them seemed to be carrying on a conversation. A ballerina was trying to coax a one-legged soldier off a bench. She would do a graceful leap, her feet propelling her as if she weighed no more than a paper doll—and then she’d hurry back to him, take his hands in hers, and urge him to join her.

  At the center of the dance floor, eleven beautiful girls danced with eleven underworld princes. The girls wore slinky, silver dresses slit to midthigh or full skirts that puffed around their hips like storm clouds. The princes wore suits the color of cold steel, and silver sashes that signified their rank, in case their royal bearing wasn’t enough.

  At the edge of the eleven couples, a twelfth girl danced on her own, cutting a tango without a partner, her teeth biting her lip instead of a rose. She looked desperate—but all the girls looked desperate. Like they didn’t want to dance, but something inside compelled them.

/>   The girls wavered between laughter and sobs; they clung to their partners and then held them at arm’s length. And their moods changed at different times, like the stars on Viv’s dress—this one flaring brightly, this one winking out.… One would burst into tears just as another shouted a song request to the DJ. It made Viv feel sick. She didn’t want to play audience to their torment. She wanted to get away from them.

  Hurrying across the room, she downed her drink. The sweet liquid left a parched feeling in her throat.

  So those were the Twelve Dancing Princesses. She’d seen them a few times, at a diner in the morning: their eyeliner smeared, their shoes broken, and their stockings torn. And she’d always thought they were lazy, trashy party girls. They went dancing, they spent all night every night dancing, and they bought a lot of shoes. What a hard life. What a stupid curse.

  She was rethinking it now.

  Facing the wall, she could see the stars sparkling on her dress, the dancers shifting like shadows in the background. The fantasy of the underworld. But when she looked at herself, she saw an outsider—and she wondered what she was doing here. At home, she went through the motions. Every day was a twisted variation of the one before. She fought with Henley, or she clung to him. She hid from her stepmother. She went to the beach, a party, a club, a café. And every day she waited for her fate to be decided, while other people’s lives changed.

  Tonight was different—but she didn’t know what to do with it. She was staring at her reflection, trying to decide, when she noticed a young man behind her, close and getting closer.

  She whirled to face him and almost went skidding out on the glass shoes. He caught her before she fell, and one of the stars went floating off her dress like a snowflake.

  “Careful,” he said. “This floor isn’t made for glass slippers.”

  He was her age, maybe a little older. Black hair, underworld-pale skin, dark gray eyes.

  He held her like he was used to having a girl in his arms. He danced here often, maybe every night—she was sure. He had an ease about him, like he was a regular, but he was ignoring the dress code. He wore a black tuxedo, not silver like the rest of them.