by Cecilia Tan
As it turned out, Caitlyn herself didn’t have the patience to teach the steps. She’d delegated that to others. Remy took Kyle’s group and began to explain, while the students who had done it before were walked through the paces by Caitlyn and Masterson.
They weren’t evenly split girls and boys among the freshmen and others who had never danced this way before, so Kyle found himself face to face with a ruddy-cheeked guy with dirty blond hair down to his shoulders. He’d seen him a thousand times around the house of course, but couldn’t remember his name. Hopefully he’d remember it before he had cause to use it.
The pavane wasn’t that hard. Soon they were mixed in with the students who knew how it went, and another student whose name Kyle couldn’t remember played a small frame drum to keep them in time.
They moved on to other dances, then, and with more intricate changes of partner. Kyle wondered if it was going to be even more confusing when everyone was wearing masks. He was just wondering this as Caitlyn herself stepped into place beside him and they turned to press their palms together.
She pulled her hand back suddenly, “Circe’s tit!” She shook it like she had been shocked by a massive jolt of static electricity, but Kyle hadn’t felt anything. “Wadsworth, what...?”
Kyle’s eyes were wide. Did Caitlyn have siren blood? If so, she might not want everyone in the room to know about it. “Er, sorry,” he said. “Shuffling my feet on the carpet.” He shook his own hand, too, belatedly.
“Well, pick them up a bit more, and quit wearing those polyester pants,” she shot back, but he could see she was just playing along. They mimed their way through the dance without actually touching.
When the dance practice was over, she cornered him in private near the back door to the kitchen. “So what the fuck was that? I’ve never got a jolt like that off you before.”
“Um, you don’t by any chance have any mantic blood?” Kyle asked.
“What do you mean, mantic blood? My mother’s a seer, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Er, mantic, I mean like Sphinxes and sirens,” Kyle amended.
Caitlyn scowled at him. “You know mantic is a synonym for prophetic, right?”
“It is? I, um, I learned it from a book. I’d been assuming it was related to the manticore...” He broke off when she made a derisive sound.
“Get to the point, Wadsworth. Why did you shock me?”
“I didn’t mean to. I asked about mantic creature ancestry because of this.” He pulled the amulet out of his shirt. “It’s supposed to give me the power to make Sphinxes tell the truth.”
“Sphinxes are...”
“Extinct, I know. But it should work on other ‘mantic creatures,’ or so I read.” He put it back under the cloth and the amulet felt chilly against his skin, just from that. “Sirens included. I was trying to find the one in the library.”
Caitlyn folded her arms. “Well, there have been a lot of seers in my family. It’s possible we’ve got a siren somewhere back in the family tree. But that’s probably true of everyone here—well, not sirens specifically, but various magical beings. I know not everyone believes that, but...well. You need to be more careful.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to...”
“It’s all right, Wadsworth, I’m sure I’m not hurt. But if you’ve got a thing with that kind of power, you just have to be really careful with it.” She took a half step back. “If it’s something that controls mantic power, that’s some powerful stuff. Sphinxes weren’t exactly pushovers, you know.”
“Yeah, I know.” He sighed.
But he didn’t quit wearing the amulet. He was afraid it would get lost or stolen if he put it in his desk drawer or hid it somewhere, and he just tried to be careful about not touching people. That night he and Jess had a normal date, but of course that meant Monica was off at her lab and he had no chance to test it on her. He stopped by just to socialize a few times over the next few days but never saw her, but with classes having started that Monday, he was already beginning to feel pressed for time. And there were only two weeks until the date of the Masque, with dancing practice, and mask-making, and homework.
Meanwhile Kyle’s love poem for Jess remained unwritten. She came to Tea with the Master again, though, at which Kyle recited a poem that was not specifically about her, but which seemed to go over well, and the only annoying thing about the positive response he got was that Frost was not there to see it. “I wonder where the little kiss-ass is,” he murmured to Jess at one point during dessert. “He usually never misses a chance like this.”
But after folks had dispersed and Kyle was standing in front of the house with Jess, saying goodbye to her, the front door burst open and the guy with the apple cheeks whose name Kyle still had not remembered since dance practice came running out.
“Oh good, you’re still here.” He looked back and forth between Kyle and Jess.
Jess blinked. “Um, have we met?”
He swallowed, catching his breath, and then nodding his head. “Persephon Cavendish. Most people call me Persy. I was there Halloween night. I, um, you have to help my roommate. He won’t...” He swallowed again, and Kyle realized his shortness of breath was probably because he was panicking and not because of running after them. “He won’t wake up.”
“Circe’s tit,” Jess said, and shooed him back into the house, hurrying behind him.
Kyle went with them, back through the common room, where a few heads turned as they went through, but no one seemed to know anything was amiss. It wasn’t until Persy pushed open the door to his room that Kyle felt the urgency of the situation himself.
Persy’s roommate was none other than Timothy Frost, who was lying on his bed atop the covers, his hands folded on his stomach and his eyes wide open, looking for all the world like a corpse.
Jess put a hand on his head. “Frost?”
He was unresponsive. Limp. She sat on the edge of the low bed, her palm on his forehead and her eyes closed for a few moments.
“He was just like this when you found him?” Kyle asked.
“Yes,” Persy said in a weak voice. “There are no marks or anything, doesn’t look like he fell and hit his head...”
Jess opened her eyes. “He needs someone with more Healing Arts than me. Get Master Brandish.”
Persy stood paralyzed.
“I’ll go,” Kyle said. Persy made a kind of whimper of protest, but didn’t actually do anything to stop him.
Kyle took the stairs two at a time and found the Master chatting with two students outside the door of her apartment. It took only moments before she was rushing back up to Frost and Cavendish’s room, and only a few moments more for everyone in the house, it seemed, to know what was going on. Brandish emerged from the room, carrying Frost in her arms, and ordered everyone to their own rooms immediately. “I don’t think it’s an attack,” she stressed, “but for safety, please, everyone to your rooms. Remy, a headcount by the time I return.”
So Kyle watched from his own window to see her carrying him across the campus, Frost looking small and wan in her arms, his eyes still staring, unseeing.
“Kyle.”
He nearly jumped out of his skin at the sound of his name right there in the room with him, but he recognized the voice.
He whirled around and there was Alex, looking somewhat frail and wrung out, but alive and awake.
“Holy crap, Alex, what the hell are you doing here?”
Alex’s smile was somewhat crooked. “You came to visit me every day. I figured it was about time I returned the favor.” Under his jacket, he was still wearing the loose hospital pajamas and had square marks on his arms where tubes and things had been taped down. He was barefoot and there was no sign of his shoes. “I’ve been waiting for you to get back from tea.”
“Alex...” Kyle was overjoyed to see him, but at the same time, confused. “What’s going on?”
Alex sat on the edge of the bed and Kyle sat next to him. “I’m afraid to go back
to my room,” Alex said simply.
“Why?”
“Because Monica might be there.”
“I knew it!” Kyle leaped to his feet. “I’ve been suspecting her since the night you were attacked.”
Alex’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “You have?”
But Kyle waved at him to keep talking. “Tell me what happened.”
Alex took a deep breath. “Well, you probably know a lot of this. But...I went to the library and got myself locked in on purpose. I was getting desperate and, you know, may as well see if the siren rumor was true, right? If it wasn’t, well, at least I spent the night studying and all that.
“I was walking through the stacks. It wasn’t that late yet. All of a sudden I turned around and she was there.” Alex looked behind him as if she might appear in Kyle’s room, too. “I was like, ‘oh wow, Monica, you’re the siren? Well, I’m sorry I didn’t take you up on your offer sooner, then, would have saved me a lot of trouble.’
“Maybe that was the wrong thing to say. She launched herself at me, her hands turning into like giant bird talons or something.” He rubbed at his collarbone where Kyle knew there was a scar. “That’s the last thing I remember, really.” Then he rubbed his forehead. “She tore into my mind, too, not just my skin. I gather I’ve been out for more than two months?”
“It’s February. Term just started a few days ago,” Kyle said. “Don’t you think you should go to Dean Bell with this? He’s been unable to figure out who did it or to catch them.”
Alex shook his head. “You know they’ll come up with some way for it to be my fault.”He heaved a heavy sigh. “I bet they’ll blame Frost on me, too.”
“Frost? How?”
“I mysteriously wake up from a coma at the same time he falls into one? I guarantee I’ll get blamed.” Alex shook his head, then looked back at Kyle. “I’m starved.”
Kyle needed to think. He needed to sit down and sort out all the new information, but there were more urgent things to take care of. “Do you have your room key? I’ll go to your place and get you some clothes and stuff. I’ll bring back food, too.”
Alex felt in his coat pockets, then broke out into a smile. “Here they are.” He pulled his keys from his pocket.
“You’ll be safe here until I get back, won’t you?”
Alex took a look around. “The place is pretty defensible, yeah.”
“No, I mean, if she comes after you. You don’t think Monica’s actually responsible for Frost, do you?”
Alex blanched. “Maybe it is my fault. Maybe she was coming after me and ran into him...”
Kyle shook his head. “Here, this will keep you safe from Monica.” He took the amulet off and put it over Alex’s head. “It’s an amulet that will make Sphinxes and sirens tell you the truth. And presumably not bite your head off in one gulp, either. Sphinxes were no pushovers.”
Alex ran his fingers over the amulet. “Um, okay. Why were you wearing it?”
“Because I’ve been trying to catch the siren. I haven’t seen Monica since I made it, though.”
“Maybe she knows what it is and she’s been hiding from you because of it?” Alex lay back on Kyle’s bed, holding the amulet up in his hand so he could look at it.
“Dunno. Be back as quick as I can.”
Kyle hurried across the quad to Camella House. Lindy and Yoshi were watching TV when he came into the suite. He just waved and went to Alex’s room, packed up some things in a bag, then exited, locking the door behind him.
“Monica around?” he asked, as he came back into the suite.
“I think she’s taking a nap,” Lindy said. “You off to visit Alex or something?”
“Yeah,” Kyle said. “Just bringing him some things. You never know what might help someone wake up.”
“You never do,” Lindy agreed. “Good luck. I haven’t gone to see him since I got back from break.”
“Sure. Later.” Kyle hurried down the stairs, then into the Square where he spent his last five dollars on a sandwich he hoped someone who had been eating nothing but pumped-in liquids for two months could digest.
Alex wolfed down the tuna sandwich like a man who hadn’t eaten since Thanksgiving. “You have to keep it a secret that I’m here,” Alex said, between bites. “You can’t even tell Jess. Sirens can read minds, you know? She’d find out.”
“Lindy said she was there, but taking a nap,” Kyle said. “Could she be tired out from attacking Frost?”
Alex licked his fingers thoughtfully. “Hmm. Usually a siren gets energy from the people she has sex with. But maybe it has to be ‘digested’ like food? Could be. Speaking of which...”
He was asleep before Kyle could even say anything. Kyle nudged him over onto his back and pulled the blanket over him. If sirens could read minds, then Kyle really had to make sure he didn’t go near Monica unless he was wearing the amulet. In fact, it was probably best if he didn’t confront her until he could be sure that he could get her to confess in front of a Judge like Dean Bell.
He lay down next to Alex on the narrow bed, trying to imagine the circumstances where Bell and Monica would be in the same place. “Well,” he said to Alex’s sleeping form, “looks like my dance card at the Masque is going to be full.”
February
A week into February, Kyle thought maybe his head was going to explode. He wasn’t used to keeping a secret, for one thing, and Alex living in his room was a pretty huge one. It meant sneaking food to him constantly, and worrying about what would happen if they were caught. The morning after Alex had appeared, there had been quite a ruckus over his disappearance from the Healing Arts building, especially since Frost was now in essentially the same situation Alex had been in. Kyle didn’t think Alex would have been blamed for anything relating to Frost if he’d just gone to the PTBs right away, but after mysteriously disappearing into the night?
On top of that, there were all the preparations for the Masque, continued failed attempts at writing a love poem for Jess, actually skipping a date with her with worry over running into Monica and accidentally revealing Alex’s existence.Then there was the fact that his Magical Biology class made no sense. He sat at his desk trying to write a paper on the parallels of mundane taxonomy to magical, only to find himself basically arguing that magical taxonomy made no sense.
“Something wrong, Ace?“ Alex asked from the bed, where he was reading a comic book.
“What makes you ask?” Kyle said without looking up from his notes.
“Oh, the fact that you just about bit that pencil in half.”
“Oh.” Kyle set it down and sighed. “It’s just that Magical Biology isn’t biology at all. It’s not science. If it was, then...well, then creatures like the Sphinx couldn’t exist.”
“But the Sphinx did exist.”
“I know,” Kyle said miserably. “But I can’t make it make sense in my head.”
Alex sat up. “What doesn’t make sense?”
“Well, things like the classification system.” Kyle angled his desk chair so that he faced the bed. “It’s a lot like how mundane science used to try to group things together, but once we looked at their DNA, we knew that, for example, some species of plant that look a lot like other plants aren’t actually related at all, while others that look different were actually more closely related.”
Alex crossed his legs and leaned his elbows on his knees. “What you’re saying is that science gets at some underlying truth. But is it more useful?”
“What do you mean, useful? Of course science is useful.”
“But you’re talking about a classification system. Is it useful to know this plant that has three leaves is related to this plant that doesn’t, and this other plant with three leaves is something else? Or is there something about three-leafed-ness that is actually good to know? In the case of plants with three leaves, okay, maybe that’s too broad an example. But say you’re talking about jaguars and leopards, for example. Both are spotted cats that evolved separately
, the jaguar in South America and the leopard in Africa and Asia. If you grew up fearing the leopard, and you went to South America and saw a jaguar and reacted as if it were a leopard? You’d have done the right thing. Regardless of the fact they aren’t the same animal at all, scientifically speaking.”
Kyle thought about that for a moment. “You’re saying the inherent truth is...?”
“That predators can eat you. And maybe the existence of two independently evolving spotted cats that can both eat you expresses some inner truth about the aesthetic of the universe. Science may prefer to classify based on ancestry and the past. Perhaps magic prefers to classify by the results, by the future.”
“That makes a kind of emotional sense, but no actual sense.”
“Why isn’t emotional sense actual sense?” Alex sat up straighter. “In magic, emotional sense is possibly more important than actual sense. Common sense says I can’t make objects levitate either.” Alex made some paper clips on Kyle’s desk fly across the room slowly like a tiny flock of geese and land on the bed. “We’re talking about the ability to transform reality, Kyle. Science is about measuring and understanding reality. That’s admirable. But magic is exactly the realm that picks up where science has to leave off. The chimera and the Sphinx and the manticore and the gryphon didn’t evolve from a common ancestor. But don’t you think, just looking at them, that they belong in the same category? What’s the usefulness of a classification system anyway? Does it help you know what to do if you run into one on the street?”
“Well, no, since they’re all extinct.” Kyle sighed. “Why are all these creatures extinct, anyway?”
“They’re not all extinct,” Alex said. “A lot of them did die off around a thousand years ago. I’m sure your class will get into the theories on why, though no one exactly knows.”
