by Dawn Metcalf
“Is that an excuse?” he barked.
“No,” she said. It was her line. “No excuses!”
“That’s right,” Stef said, wagging a finger at her. “You can do this.”
Joy dropped her dirty rag and toed off her flip-flops. Tossing her ponytail, she rolled her shoulders and bounced on her toes. The backyard was open and empty and as green as Abbott’s Field. She whispered words to no one.
“I know I can.”
Dipping her chin, Joy ran for the yard, bare feet clearing the parking barrier and touching wet grass. She felt it tingle up her spine, sending electric pops through her toes. Joy sprang in the dirt into a quick roundoff and slammed a series of back handsprings, fast and tight, in a snapping cycle that felt like flying. She landed in a corner. Everyone had stopped, stunned.
Joy was still moving. She pivoted left, right, and took off again, her mind’s eye imagining the triple twist, double back before it could happen, both knowing that the ground wasn’t a spring floor and that she could do it, anyway. She could feel it. Warmth pulsed up her legs like golden wine, warming her hip joints and filling her lungs, pouring liquid light out her palms.
She ran forward and dived, her fingers squelching in mud and wet grass, slippery and dangerous, but the rush was upon her—she wouldn’t stop, couldn’t stop!—and tucked herself through the spin, landing with an impossible stick. Present left, present right, a split leap and a long, stretched pose, reaching for the sky and straightening her knees, rolling the energy from her heels to her toes, pointing in crisp formation.
Final measure. She lifted her chin: finis!
There was a scatter of applause from other windows in the complex. A couple of whistles and a hooting shout. Joy blinked. She’d collected quite an audience. She stood up shyly as she lifted out of her performance trance, doing a little bow and a wave for the kids in the corner condo.
Monica and Gordon clapped wildly from their spot in the grass.
“WOO!” Monica hollered, spinning fists over her head.
“Wow!” said Gordon. “That was incredible.”
Stef ran over, eyes wide, mouth open, caught somewhere between awe and concern.
“What was that?” he said and patted her arms as if checking to be sure she was all still there. She breathed deeply, bright and beaming, and wiped at the grass sticking on her palms.
“That was awesome!” she said.
“That was insane,” Stef snapped. “Are you kidding me? You could have broken your neck! This is soft ground with loose grass and way too small...” He shook his head and helped wipe off green bits with a rag. “Seriously, Joy, what were you thinking?”
She picked bits of weeds off her tank top. “I wasn’t thinking,” she admitted.
“Yeah, got that.” Now that the shock was over, her brother sounded angry. “I thought you said you haven’t hit the mats in over a year,” he said, turning her around to wipe her back. “I’ve never seen you that crisp. Not in ten years—maybe ever. You looked Elite. I have no idea how you got that air...” He stopped as she shook out the end of her ponytail. She turned around curiously. His eyes had gone flat, his mouth a tight, thin line. She hadn’t realized she’d made him so upset.
“Sorry,” she said.
His eyes flicked up to her eyes. He held her shoulder hard, either steadying her or ready to shake some sense into her. “Are you okay, Joy?” he asked suddenly. “Do you feel okay?”
“Yeah,” Joy said, confused and suddenly every inch his little sister. “Just winded. Adrenaline crash imminent, but otherwise, I’m fine.”
Stef’s face was pale. The rag fell from his hand. He bent to pick it up and his voice was strained and strangely subdued. “You should go inside and eat something.”
At the mention of food, her whole body tingled. “Good idea,” she said and examined his face. “Are you okay?”
Stef looked alarmed by the question.
Monica slammed into her back, throwing her dark arms around Joy’s neck.
“You were amazing!” she gushed. “A one-woman show!”
“That was seriously awesome,” Gordon said. “I never knew you could trick.”
“Eleven years of gymnastics,” Joy murmured, still looking at Stef, who was busying himself with the wax. She felt like she was seven years old, the day after the talent show, ashamed and self-conscious for showing off at school. “I’m going inside to grab an apple,” she said. “Anyone want anything?”
“How about another towel?” Gordon suggested as he sprayed Monica’s toes. With a squeal and a shout, they were at it again. Stef shook his head.
Feeling oddly chastened, Joy nodded and left.
She rubbed her hands together as she took the stairs, the tight tingling in her fingers and a slight woozy sensation telling her she’d burned too much too fast and needed to refuel. Of course, she should have expected the glucose drop after her wild little stunt in the yard—no warm-up, no practice and on inadequate turf—Stef was right, she’d been stupid. And her and Monica’s motto was No Stupid. She could have easily slid into the pavement or hit the fence or landed on her head. She still nursed the injury of two broken toes from that time she’d blown an aerial, and that was back when she was in top form, with her coach in the gym and all the safeties in place. Today, she had just been...reckless. Maybe she could blame it on summer? Ever since she’d been barefoot outside, she’d been itching to really move. She’d barely enjoyed any sun since she’d started working at Antoine’s. The long days had become all about earning money, which sucked, but now there was a promise of obtaining a glamour: the carrot at the end of a very long stick.
She hopped onto the landing and let herself into the condo, entering the security code and thinking maybe she’d invite Monica and Gordon to go out dancing and blow off some steam. Neil had said that there was some party going on at the beach. She hadn’t considered going because she didn’t want him to think that he was asking her out.
That was the trouble with having an invisible boyfriend; it was hard to appear to be a couple when the guy in question never appeared.
Joy grabbed one of the oranges out of the bowl on the counter, but it was gushy to the touch. She put it back, opting for a couple of bananas and a stack of whole wheat crackers. She checked the fridge for some cheese, making a mental note to add sharp cheddar to Stef’s growing grocery list. As she shut the fridge, Joy caught a glimmer on the very edge of her Sight.
It wasn’t the flash of splintered light that she’d experienced when Ink first cut her eye, but it brought the same chilly wariness that she could feel in her lungs, edgy and tight.
She kept her hand on the fridge, replaying her footsteps in her head: Had she accidentally stepped over a ward? Dialed a combination? Triggered a key? She swore at herself for being lazy; she couldn’t forget how easy it was to become someone else’s plaything, someone else’s prey. In the Twixt, Folk were cats and humans were mice.
But she was no mouse.
Joy cautiously let go of the handle and tried to locate the source of the spark. It had the same sort of shimmer that she associated with the Twixt. If she could catch sight of it again, she’d probably know for certain—she, like Ink and Inq, could see signaturae, unlike the rest of humans and Folk—but there shouldn’t be anything here inside Ink’s wards. He’d checked them so carefully. No one could be inside the house!
She retraced her steps, drifting past the counter, opening the fridge, carefully peeking around the corner while keeping her eye on the kitchen window to catch any reflections. Joy wondered how she’d ever felt safe with her head stuck in the fridge. She closed the door and saw it again.
It was reflected in the stainless steel, milky and indistinct.
Joy looked behind her—nothing. Even with the Sight, there was only her ordinary kitchen with her ordinary snacks o
n the ordinary countertop. She edged closer to the refrigerator; the sunlight from the kitchen window was bright on her shoulder, warming her skin through the air and glass. Maybe that was it? A flash of sunlight on skin?
Not likely.
As she turned, she saw it again: a flash reflection. Her whole body tingled. It was something on her.
Joy remembered when she’d been first marked by Ink, when he’d attempted to obey the law of the Twixt and blind a human with the Sight, but he had missed, accidentally scratching her cornea instead. The wink of light that had speared her eye hadn’t been the wound; it had been his signatura drawn directly on her eye. She remembered the sort of Flash! Flash! she’d had when seeing things in the Twixt for the first time: horrible monsters and fabulous creatures and the glowing shapes of signaturae on skin. This was the same sort of flickery brightness, the same sort of echo of light.
Her stomach dropped with an odd twist of shame and nervous dread. She ran to the bathroom and switched on the light. Removing her shirt, she sat on the sink with her back to the mirror and, twisting awkwardly, tried to see what it was.
There was a ghostly smear stuck to her skin.
Joy reached her hand over her shoulder and tried to touch it, but it was too far down her spine. She tried reaching behind her back, but it was too high, out of reach, like an impossible itch. She pulled the skin at her shoulder and saw it move. There was definitely something there. Joy squinted, but it was cloudy and vague, unlike the clear designs of True Names. It wasn’t the black of Ink’s marks or the pale watermarks of Inq’s reverse-henna tattoos, but Joy recognized what it was just the same.
A chilly sort of horror crept up her arms. She knew.
She’d been marked with someone’s signatura.
* * *
Joy sank to the floor, her legs weak with fear. She’d been marked—not by Ink or Inq or anyone that she knew. The knowledge squirmed inside her, setting off sparks in her brain. How was that possible? She hadn’t seen anyone! She hadn’t seen it happen, and for some crazy reason Joy thought, after everything she’d been through, she ought to have felt something happen, at least.
She crumpled against the wall. After all Ink’s efforts to keep her safe, to keep her unclaimed and free, she’d been marked, tied to some stranger in the Twixt. Her mind spun with the implications: Who? How? When? Why? With someone already out to kill her, the mark on her flesh felt like a beacon. Joy felt inexplicably violated, exposed. I can’t believe this! What happened? What could she do? What would she tell Ink?
Oh my God. Ink!
Joy remembered his rage when Briarhook had branded her. He’d been livid, a sharp, deadly quiet, and when he’d returned to Graus Claude’s, his arms had been soaked to the elbows in blood. She’d thought for certain he’d killed the gruesome hedgehog and his sneering accomplice, Hasp. She’d been horrified at his violence and herself for feeling avenged, but she had felt it all through a woozy thickness that had been her healing trance that night. Whatever Kurt had given her had left her memories both foggy and bright, but she could still see the vivid streaks of blood against the sink’s porcelain knobs and what it was like to see Ink’s signatura for the first time: an ouroboros, a living tattoo winding over his back.
Yet Briarhook lived because Ink valued life, instead cursing him to earn back his heart, now kept in an iron box. Ink said that he had never killed another living being...until now. What would he do if he found out that she’d been claimed by some stranger? Would he hunt down whoever was responsible, only to later be crushed with self-loathing and remorse? She pictured him hugging his arms over his head in misery. Joy never wanted to see him like that again.
Grabbing her purse from the hallway, she took out the scalpel. She returned to the bathroom, turned her back toward the mirror and tried catching the edge of the blade under the newfound mark. The blade head slipped, snagging nothing. She tried again. Either she couldn’t get the right angle or she was doing something wrong. Maybe it wasn’t a real signatura? Maybe it was too fresh? Maybe it was something else? Joy wasn’t completely clear how signatura worked, and since she didn’t know whose it was or where it had come from, perhaps that made it impossible for her to erase? She’d only ever removed four signaturae from her skin: Ink’s, Inq’s, Briarhook’s and Aniseed’s. Of course, that was four more than anyone else had ever managed, and the reason that the Council was interested in her still. She felt stupid for having assumed that removing anyone’s signatura would be just as easy and then furious to be proven wrong now.
Why NOW?
She kicked the linen door in frustration and stretched her arm farther, straining her shoulder and wrist. She felt the blade skip against her skin and realized that she’d probably cut herself before she’d do any good. She tried to remember what it felt like to slice Briarhook’s brand off her arm, erase Aniseed’s mark in the air or slowly fuse Inq’s belly closed—that oily, slick, reverse-spark of undoing.
Whatever it had been like, this wasn’t it.
She dropped her arms and examined the shape: it was a roughly circular blob, runny and blurred. She blinked and tried another angle. Squinted. No use. She couldn’t make it out and she couldn’t risk asking Ink. Joy knew she had to get rid of it before he found out and did something...horrible. She didn’t want to be responsible for hurting him again.
Dropping the scalpel back into its pocket, Joy picked up her brand new phone—replaced thankfully under warranty—and prayed that all her data was retrievable from the cloud once her transfer was confirmed, but she couldn’t access her contacts list until then. She ran to her room and opened her desk drawer, rifling through old papers, library cards, business cards, magnets and Post-it notes, excavating the one she’d hoped to find: a crisp piece of card stock with exquisite penmanship. Graus Claude’s voice mailbox was a convenient 800 number.
She dialed quickly, waiting for the automatic voice stating its standard instruction that she could please record her message after the beep.
“Hi, this is Joy,” she said, feeling foolish. “I have something I have to show you.” She added, “Alone. My cell phone’s reestablishing voice mail, so please call or email. I’ll check for messages until I hear from you. It’s kind of urgent. Thanks.” She recited her phone number and spelled out her email address and hung up, wondering if she was making things worse.
Ink trusted the noble toad absolutely, but Inq was suspicious. The Bailiwick already suspects something, Inq had said when they’d been passing off Joy as Ink’s chosen, his lehman. But that was before Joy had proven herself, undoing Aniseed’s pandemic curse, potentially saving both worlds, and falling in love with Ink. Graus Claude knew that she was on their side, didn’t he? He counted her as a friend. A niggling voice chased that thought through her mind. Well, he didn’t actually SAY that he considered her a loyal friend—he’d implied it—but the Folk twist the meanings to suit their own ends. The Bailiwick is no different.
Joy trembled with more than apprehension; she still hadn’t eaten.
Hurrying back to the kitchen, she peeled a banana, took a huge bite, pulled on her shirt and scooped the random assortment of crinkling snack bags into her arms. She took the stairs in twos, finishing the banana before she hit the courtyard, and managing to open a lemon water as she rounded the corner into the back lot.
Her car’s windshield gleamed in the sun. Matte-white smears of wax had dried in semicircular patterns. Stef was gone, Gordon was gone and Monica sat on the parking stop, picking at the sponge in her hand.
“Hey,” Joy said, looking around. “Where did everybody go?”
Monica looked up as if she hadn’t realized she was alone. The wet splashes across her shirt and shorts spoke of an earlier giddiness that was now notably absent. Monica’s voice was low and subdued. “I didn’t see where Stef went, but Gordon went home.”
“Figures that the guys leave us t
o do the last bit of dirty work,” Joy said and handed a bottle to Monica. Her friend didn’t touch it, didn’t even lift her hand to take it. Joy frowned. “Are you okay?”
“No,” Monica said to the asphalt. “Definitely not okay.”
“Okay. Not okay,” Joy repeated as she sat down on the concrete riser, plucking at her friend’s wet clothes. “Did Gordon push things one step too far?”
“You could say that,” Monica said and stretched out her legs. Soapy water sludged past, the bubbles only the tiniest froth, the edge of the puddle evaporating in a long, gray smear. “Gordon asked if he could meet my folks, get our families together for a picnic.” She threaded her fingers and stretched her arms in front of her, turning her palms inside-over, light versus dark. “I said I didn’t think it was a good idea,” she said and cracked her neck to one side, then the other. “Then he asked if I had a good reason why not.”
Joy took a swig of her lemon water. “Is there a good reason why not?”
“Yes and no,” Monica said. “Mostly no.” She leaned back on her palms, keeping her eyes on the water. “First of all, I figured that would officially make him my boyfriend and I wasn’t really looking for a boyfriend right now, you know? We hooked up. We had fun. I never expected to fall for him.” She shrugged without conviction. “He’s the first guy who’s stuck around long enough for me to wonder ‘what if?’ And, okay, yeah, I shouldn’t be surprised that he wants to meet my parents—I should be flattered, right?—but honestly, it freaks me out.” She tapped her flip-flops in the puddle, sending tiny splashes across the asphalt. “I’ve never brought a boy home before, and that sounds pretty serious,” she huffed. “It feels pretty serious, so I guess I just freaked.” She glanced over her shoulder at Joy. “I’m happier having things stay the same.”
