by Kara Silver
By the time Berkeley called back with a yes, early that afternoon, Kennedy, packed, goodbyes said and bridges burned, was already on the coach to Oxford, feeling between two worlds, with half a foot, perhaps, in each, and no secure foothold in either. And no map and no compass and… You have Aeth, she told herself. Aeth who called you back. Called you from…temptation? Her hungover brain couldn’t make sense of it.
It wasn’t that late or dark when she arrived in Oxford, but she treated herself to a cab to college, feeling defiant, although about what she had no clue. Perspiration made her take her coat off and undo a couple of shirt buttons, despite the chill, and she was shoving her wheeled case through the gate by the Porter’s Lodge when she heard the music. What was it? Old-fashioned instruments, was as close as she got. Pipes and drums and…fairground music? Ice dripped down the back of her neck and she forced herself to turn, to see what was coming along the long street that led to University Parks.
“Procession!” A man in porter’s overalls sprang out and clapped his hands, making her bite back a scream. She didn’t know this guy and guessed he was a holiday temp. Whoever he was, he seemed pleased about…what was happening. He nudged her. “Drumming up trade. Literally—hear it?”
The rhythmic thudding pulsed low and long in the winter air, as insistent as a heartbeat and throbbing like a bruise, forcing her to thrum in unison, to take on the colour, the tempo. It shattered the evening into shards and remade it, to its liking. Kennedy…didn’t like it.
“Barking. That’s the verb. Not dogs though!” the man continued.
Barking. Kennedy knew what it meant, in this context, that of a troupe of people, whooping, singing, exhorting their way up a street. Attracting a possible public to a carnival or circus or…funfair. She thrust her shaking hand into her pocket and drew out the flyer she’d crumpled and shoved in there. She hadn’t realised she still had it. Or that it would be shiny and pristine, not creased and tattered. It matched the poster she now saw on the notice board beside the lodge, the one showing old-fashioned-looking rides and booths and a big theatre tent for the painted and costumed company of actors.
“No! Don’t touch—” Kennedy hadn’t realised she’d been drawn out into the street but now fought the urge to move forward. She shrank back against the gate, shaking her head at the players surrounding her. The commedia dell’arte troupe, gaudy-costumed, white-faced, rouged-cheeked, red-lipped and masked seemed to have stepped from the paper and come to life, blowing and playing instruments and declaiming lines of dialogue.
They didn’t touch her, any more than the crowd following them or the people emerging from Heylel to join the throng did, but they—or the play, or the music—snagged her, caught her, swept her up. Like being zipped up, she thought, her head whirling, fighting the lure of the music and declamations and dancing. Like two sides of a zip joining, coming together.
No. She’d fought stronger. She vaguely knew some of the characters of the traditional theatre, the Harlequin and the Pierrot, for instance, their costumes unmistakeable. There was a pair of Lovers, weren’t there? Yes, that tall male figure with dark curly hair, bowing and kissing the hand of a slim girl was one. Why…had he stopped? He straightened and grabbed at the arm of an older-seeming man, one dressed in a long black cape and dark-red trousers, and pointed where Kennedy stood.
Kennedy didn’t like it. The freezing drips down her nape of earlier were now a whole block of ice encasing her that she had to smash through to move. She tried, but couldn’t get her body to flee. All she could do was turn around and press herself against the iron bars of the gate now in front of her, bars she clung to keep her still. Keep her from moving into the melee. Her shirt caught on an ornamental metal rose decorating the bar and she jerked, wrenching another button from its hole, yanking her shirt off one shoulder. The shoulder that bore her demon mark.
An exclamation sounded from behind her, but she didn’t stay to see who or it was. Gathering all her strength, physical and mental, she pushed herself through the gate and into the lodge, where she grabbed her room keys from her pigeon hole, ignoring the porter’s shout about her case. She couldn’t stop and see to it. Not now, when everything in her screamed a warning to her, yelling at her to get away and not look back.
5
Mesopotamia, was Kennedy’s thought on waking from a night of demon-filled dreams. Mesopotamia? What did that even mean? Her first stupid thought was that it was the brand of vodka she’d drunk last night after locking herself in her room. She’d needed to calm down, stop her demon bone aching, and the half bottle of Polish clear spirit had done that for her, even if leaving her dehydrated and shaky, her head fragile. Maybe that was what Jim had intended, in giving her hard booze as goodbye present when she’d called in to tell him she wasn’t taking the job. Nah. He wasn’t known for being passive-aggressive. He bypassed that and went straight to rude.
But waking up feeling so rough was yucky. Like the day before. Or was that yesterday? Time had telescoped. Funny that, when almost everything else seemed to kaleidoscope. Images and sounds from yesterday beat at her, coalescing. She groaned, thinking of all the stuff she had to do. Send a long, grovelling text to Chandy, who’d wanted, or needed, to talk to her about why she hadn’t gone or hadn’t been able to go, to the reunion. That was going to be a talk about Karl, Kennedy could see it. She inhaled a long, hopefully calming breath.
Then, Kennedy would have to grovel to the porters for having left her case at the lodge. Oh, and she also had to see Dr Berkley and possibly the principal. Great. Oh, and let’s not forget Aeth. He’d done some sort of long-distance Wyebury-to-Oxford stone guardianing, if that was a word. It’d probably taken it out of him. Which meant Kennedy was in for more grovelling. Pity she didn’t play a contact sport. She’d have had a pair of kneepads ready to don for when she had to get down on her hands and knees later.
As it was, she practically crawled to the tiny kitchen on her floor and helped herself to a teabag, her stomach revolting at the thought of coffee. The staircase was weird during the holidays—things in place but no people. She wondered if anyone else was staying up, and why she was. Duties, remember? Demon mage, and all that? Maybe she’d never ever be able to leave the place, like Aeth. Being here like this was a bit like the feeling she’d had on the coach, of being between worlds. Her brain stirred to life like a sleeping cat when the fire died down. Between w…
Kennedy rushed back to her room as quickly as her fragile state allowed. The paper, the flyer advertising the fair—where was it? She needn’t have worried. It was in the middle of her floor, looking as brand-new and box-fresh as it had yesterday. Mesopotamia! Meaning, between the rivers. In this case, not the Tigris and Euphrates but the Cherwell and Thames, both of which ran through Oxford. And more specifically, the small island between those waters. She’d passed it, training in the parks with Aeth. Might even have walked along its path. And now it was the location of the travelling fair.
Suppressing a shudder and not thinking how the sight of the poster on the park fence and the actual presence of the players had affected her, Kennedy sat to ponder. Okay, she was doing this. She studied the handbill. It looked old-fashioned, the colours sort of muted, Hipster-like, she supposed, fitting for something so traditional. Well, you don’t get much more traditional that the sixteenth century. The players, the fair owners, seemed to come regularly to the same spot. She couldn’t gather a lot of information from the leaflet, it being a simple piece of paper.
Research from secondary sources was all very well, but very limited compared to what she could learn from the source itself. “You’re doing this,” she ordered her reflection in the mirror above her sink. “You’re not a coward.” Well… “Too bad. You’re still doing this.” She pointed at herself, her face set to stern, and nodded.
She had clothes there, still hanging in the wardrobe, hadn’t taken much back with her for the break, so was able to change. Something made her slip on the long leather duster coat she’d, wel
l, won, she supposed, last term battling— Huh. She’d never caught his name. “Tattoo Guy. Shadow Demon Dude,” she said out loud, leaving her room. And that been her first foray. She could only get better. And stronger. Even if that did sound like an ad for washing detergent. And it wasn’t beginner’s luck, she argued with herself, when Kennedy tried to tell herself it probably had been. Wow. Demons get imposter syndrome too. Who knew. She should be keeping a journal. It could go with the other old sets of field notes kept in the building she now stood before.
“Remember this coat, Aeth?” she called up quietly, cupping her hands around her mouth and angling her head up to the museum roof. “Remember its previous owner? We came out on top then, and that’s all over now, right? And this? It’s just a nothing-thing.” She spun around, not wanting Drew Lytton to be hovering and catch her being weird again. But there was nobody there. “I’ll come up afterwards for you to nag me,” she promised. Time to go.
She got in a mini-grovel as she left, pleading late-onset travel sickness that’d had her rushing away yesterday. Yes, she was aware unauthorised objects in the lodge accrued fines—well, now she was—so she’d collect her case and pay later. Promise. I’m just going to Parks, she told herself as she walked along to the end of the road and the entrance to the massive green space. I’m just enjoying some freezing winter weather. La-la-la.
And, yeah, why have an outdoor fair in December? Oxford had dozens of al fresco concerts and plays and exhibitions—in the summer. Surely people wouldn’t be into wandering around kiosks and booths and playing games and whatever in the winter? And yet, when she crossed the bridge to the small ait of land, the island perched in the middle of two rivers, the atmosphere felt warmer, somehow.
The fair took up most of the land, as she’d supposed, and was fenced off. She could vault the wooden fenceposts, she guessed, or…just push the gate open. Yep, easier. No one seemed to be about, yet all the tents and kiosks stood there. Well, they’d hardly take them down every day. Kennedy looked back over her shoulder, wanting the normality of the park, with its ducks and punts on the river, its dogs woofing on the grass, its adults scowling at students. But the angle and the trees prevented her seeing behind her. And when she turned back, several figures stood in a row in front of her, costumed, but not masked.
“Ah. Yes. Hello?” She waved. “I, erm, wondered if the champagne booth was open?” It was the first thing she saw. She pointed at it.
“Do you want a drink?” asked a middle-aged man in a long scholarly-looking cloak. “Would you like a drink?” His accent was singsong, lulling. Or that could have been the calm of the place. It felt muffled, somehow. Removed, was as close as she could put it.
“Yes?” She shrugged. “Who doesn’t like champagne? Oh!” She laughed as the Harlequin and Pierrot did a bit of business, getting in each other’s way as they rushed inside the booth and opened its wooden shutters, knocking into each other in opening a bottle of sparkling wine. The cork shot out with a pop—to be caught by someone behind her. Kennedy whirled around to see the young guy from yesterday, his curls wild and his dark-eyed stare intense.
“You came,” he said, his tone, if not accent, a little similar to the older man’s. He looked a bit like him too.
“Yes. You wanted me to.” Kennedy didn’t know how she knew that, or why she felt so okay about it. “I wanted to. I don’t know why.”
Another man stepped forward. “To meet us. Meet me.”
Kennedy stared. Even if he hadn’t been wearing the red-trouser-costume of the Pantalone character, she’d have known him again. And he looked more familiar than ever. She assessed his red-brown hair, his green-brown eyes, his pale face… Older than Curly Guy, younger than Scholar Man, this man was perhaps late thirties. Old enough to be her—
“Kin,” the man said, approaching. “We’re kindred.”
Kennedy took a step back. “No, you’re not. I don’t have any.”
“You do.”
God. He’s a nutter. “What makes you say that?”
“Come. Look.”
“No… I—” But she let him lead her around the sticking-out flap of a tent, into relative privacy, or at least where it was secluded enough for him to slip his shirt from his shoulder and turn. For her to see, as she’d dreamed, she now realised, that he bore a mark similar to hers, the same raised scarification and in the identical place as she did.
She couldn’t stop herself from crying out at the similarity. Was it identical? The others she’d seen, in the museum displays, in old journals, hadn’t been exactly the same as hers. And as for the marks she’d seen on flesh, the marks born by the demons’ victims hadn’t been quite like hers. For the first time, she wondered of the shadow demon she’d defeated had carried a mark. She should have looked but doubted she’d have been strong enough to. To know she was connected to that evil. But this? This was—
“Kindred,” she echoed. “Who are you?”
“Giacobbe. Your kin.” He laughed and took her hand to lead her back.
She realised with a twist of disappointment, that she’d hoped he would say, father. But this, this was…
“Papa, is this a cousin?”
The young girl from yesterday came forward. Her hair was more auburn than Kennedy’s and her eyes a vibrant bottle green. She hadn’t been masked, Kennedy recalled, nor had the woman with her, her mother. Then it was a flurry of introductions and handshakes and hugs. Such long, tight hugs, as if everyone was kinfolk. Wait. Perhaps they were. But what then did that make them? Kennedy felt too afraid to know, and didn’t want to, not in the midst of the warmth and acceptance surrounding her.
“Giacobbe, or Pantalone. Isabella. Emilia, or, la Signora,” Kennedy brushed tears from her eyes and tried to get everyone straight.
“I’m Tristano. Tris. My grandfather, il Dottore.” The curly-haired man indicated the scholar. Ah, doctor as in Oxford-uni type of doctor. Those were the types she was more familiar with, here.
“You and Isabella, you’re The Lovers, gli Innamorati? In the play, I mean. I wasn’t… Wait. I have a cousin?” She hugged the pretty redheaded Isabella again as it sank in once more, and everyone laughed again and more champagne was poured. “I shouldn’t. I’ve got a pounding headache as it is. Well, I had. Seems better now.”
“The power of family,” observed her uncle, taking her hand.
Kennedy knew there were a million questions she should be asking, a million and one things she should be thinking, rather than standing hand-in-hand with her uncle and aunt, her cousin hugging her from the front, her arms around Kennedy’s shoulders, and Tristan standing close to Giacobbe. She couldn’t remember all they told her, who owned which amusement or kiosk or booth or ride, along with what they did in the play, or even who the other members of the commedia alla maschera were. Instead she rode the waves of acceptance and here and we that buffeted her from every side.
Someone called out something to Giacobbe and he answered in rapid-fire Italian, then turned to Tristan and said something. Tristan nodded without speaking and shot off, evidently to do whatever it was needed doing or attending to. And that, that degree of understanding, of complicity, of trust, hit Kennedy hard. Tristano wasn’t even related to her uncle and the bond between them was tangible. Whereas she, Kennedy Smith, had no bonds with anyone. Not with her friends back h—in the town she’d grown up in, or here. Well, maybe one…
“I have to go.” She pulled away. “I have to…” She pointed over her shoulder, left it vague. “I’ll come back,” she assured them all or herself; she didn’t know—speaking over their exclamations and exhortations to stay for a meal, to stay for the evening. She hurried away, rubbing her forehead when the headache returned as she left the fairground and dashed over the bridge. Hungover, in pain, her heart hurting, she ran all the way to Heylel and practically walked up the wall of the museum, to scramble onto the roof.
Aeth was there. Human, and as tall, broad-shouldered, dark-grey-eyed and dark-blond-haired as ever. Perhap
s more so, because he was waiting. Pacing. “Kennedy!” he exclaimed. “What is it? What’s happened?” He stopped himself crossing the roof to her, and firmed his face. “Apart from your behaviour in Wyeford.”
Kennedy stopped too. “Behaviour? Like, enjoying myself in my break?”
“Like running away from your duties here.”
“Look, Rocky, I couldn’t talk to you at the end of term. Well, I could talk, but you couldn’t answer. Actually, not sure I don’t prefer that…” She grinned.
Aeth didn’t grin back, and she sighed.
“I sort of needed a rest, okay? To recharge? Recoup. But I’m back now.”
“And now? Where have you been now? You’ve not just got back to college.”
“No. Yesterday. I… I’ve just been to the fairground. The travelling—”
“Fair,” he finished for her, his face like thunder. “You need to stay away from that place.”
“What?” Incensed, Kennedy closed the gap between them, getting ready to poke him in the chest. “I thought we’d gone through all that, all the ‘you don’t tell me what to do’ stuff.”
“I’m your guardian—”
“Yeah. That’s a great basis for a relationship, isn’t it?”
“You’re being irrational.”
“And you’re being a stone drag.” She wasn’t quite sure what the slang meant, but remembered the previous owner of her coat saying it to Aeth. It seemed apt.
“Explain.” Aeth did his stern voice, but she detected a wary light in his eyes. And she couldn’t explain, not the wholeness that had enveloped her in the fairground, not the way her heart had lightened with each hug and embrace from her kin, her…family.
“That place…” Aeth started.
She’d been lost in her thoughts and his voice almost made her jump.
