The old tale followed its predictable course. Malik tried to dance with Mercia and won pain and rejection for his efforts. The angel excoriated him for his nature and drove the imp to his knees with the lash of her tongue. She danced to the edge of the stage, prepared to depart—and took that long fateful glance back at the contrite Malik, still kneeling, but yearning towards her with one hand outstretched. For a long instant they locked gazes, then the angel fled.
The hook is set, Ymera chuckled inwardly. But who is caught by whom?
Malik sought help from other Imps and finally approached the Temptress for the ensorcelled gem that would weaken the angel’s resolve. Trickery, scheming, it all unfolded in beautiful choreography and understated stage effects that brilliantly enhanced the old story.
But it’s the young halfbreed and the girl who carry this production, Ymera decided. They’re both magnificent, the rest are merely very good. And the spare elegance of it! No spectacular sets or splashy illusions, only subtlety. Those simple tricks they do with white kerchiefs and fake shadows are excellent. But she’s tiring, there’s a strain there that’s barely showing now, but getting worse. I wonder?
She called up a subtle spell to adjust her vision and saw it. She’s pregnant. From the exquisite care he’s taking with her, he knows it, too, and he’s straining to cover for her eroding agility. I wonder if he’s the father? What a piquancy that lends to their performances! The lust of the imp shading over into the tenderness of the husband. Brilliant!
The moment of transformation came. Malik the imp, now hopelessly in love with the angel Mercia, broke faith with his Master and freed her from the very trap he’d set before Salim arrived to claim her. The Tormentor’s terrible rage ended in cruel vengeance upon Malik. The despondent imp, limbs broken, was chained into Hell’s depths under the savagery of his fellows, never to know movement or freedom again. The audience groaned in pity.
Then a general indrawn breath as Mercia dared what no other angel would chance; the journey into Hell to rescue Malik.
They have captured us, Ymera knew in the back of her mind. Not a human soul in this audience could look away now. She glanced aside at the Acting Royal Wizard’s profile and smiled to herself. And Chisaad’s gaze tells me he’d like to get to know that youth very, very well. Mercia, you have competition!
Clever use of ropes and beams portrayed the long journey downward, Mercia dodging other imps and demons and all manner of nightmarish denizens as she dared the depths. Until at last she found the chained, broken Imp. And even in his misery, Malik bid her flee and save herself, for how could an imp who could no longer walk hope to escape Hell?
Yes, I can see why Chisaad is fascinated by that young man, Ymera thought, and admitted uneasily, as am I. That disconcerted her enough to break her entranced state. Why? Is it his maleness? I’ve seen thousands of handsome young stud-humans before and bedded more than a few. Yes, he’s intriguing, but at the end of the night there’s nothing new there. She brushed the distracting thought aside and concentrated on the play.
* * *
It’s not a stage trick. Chisaad decided. He really does command an actual Shadow. Ten other Mages and Priestesses are watching, and Ymera too, yet none of them see it!
For a moment he marveled, then smiled. We are so accustomed to seeing what we expect, and every Silbari knows that stage performers practice illusion. If anyone were so rude as to send a detection spell at the Shadow, they would receive nothing, and so assume they dealt with an illusion and look no deeper. What complacent fools we are!
He put the feeling aside to examine later. Right now, he had a shining opportunity, if he could find a means to bring this unique youth under his control.
Ymera has noticed my attention. Now I must walk my own tightrope between being too subtle and not subtle enough.
* * *
Maia’s Mercia freed him from his bonds. Kirin collapsed to the stage while miming broken limbs. Then Mercia put forth her power to Heal the broken imp, raised him to his feet, and they sang the Love Duet.
Kirin sensed her strain, trying to keep up her part of the Duet. The even more demanding Escape scene loomed. How can I help her through it?
They began the difficult Escape, climbing tilting pieces of stage and angled ladders. Once Maia nearly missed a step and Kirin managed to stabilize her without being too obvious. He caught and carried her across the Bridge of Fire, set her down on the far side and felt the brief gratitude in her touch. So far, so good. We can do this.
Before Malik could step off the tightrope that did duty for the Bridge, Sevan burst onto the stage as the demon Fear, right on cue. He and Kirin mock fought back and forth on the tightrope as Kirin made his Shadow flicker around them both.
Meanwhile Mercia drew back the oversized bolts on the Door Out, with much pantomiming of strain.
She’s not faking that. Her cramps have come back.
But he had shifted his attention away from his own moves for a moment too long. His foot came down on empty air. He flailed his arms like a windmill as he toppled.
* * *
Ymera saw the youth lose his footing and fall. A drop that awkward, from that height, could break bones. This couldn’t be part of the script. A collective gasp came from the audience as the more quick-witted shared her realization. With the practice of centuries of instant decision-making, she hurled a feather spell to cushion his impact.
Her spell hit the youth an instant before he landed—and it vanished.
* * *
Kirin barely knew the spell had hit him. His Shadow swallowed it completely. He caught an angled ladder with one hand, managed to push off it enough to not land on it ribs-first. That saved him from broken bones but converted his fall into a roll, one so fast that he rolled right off the stage. He landed on something soft and magical that tangled his limbs.
His Shadow, its appetite whetted, gulped down that spell too.
A cloud of silver puffed into the air. Nearly blinded, Kirin gaped up from the floor. A naked woman clutched at fistfuls of silky thread in a vain effort to cover herself.
Next to her sat a Purist Priestess wearing six stars.
* * *
For an instant the whole audience held their breaths as Keldra’s dress flew apart. She leaped to her feet and shrieked loudly enough to rivet all attention on her. Someone sniggered, someone else chuckled, and the crowd dissolved in choked barks of laughter.
Chisaad ignored the junior priestess’ humiliation and her grandmother’s outraged scream. He kept his gaze on the halfbreed. The youth scrambled back onto the stage with silver threads scattering in his wake. His face bore a terrified expression as he fled back to the girl and the young man playing Fear, who had both come down to the stage. The two of them seized him protectively and hurried him away. All three gave backward glances at the crowd.
They know! Chisaad thought triumphantly. They’ve been concealing him in plain sight.
Chisaad turned his gaze to Ymera. Thanks to his preset scrying spells he had seen her attempt to cushion the halfbreed’s fall. Did she see what happened to her feather spell? Does she understand what he must be?
By the puzzled look on her face, the answer was mixed. She knows her spell didn’t work correctly but doesn’t realize why. I must lead her to the answer that best serves me.
Dona Hellas had been sputtering, now she found her voice. “You did this!” The senior priestess of the Purist sect shouted. She leveled an accusing finger at the ruler of the Red Street.
Ymera drew herself up haughtily. “I did not. You think I’d stoop so low as to humiliate your granddaughter merely to bait you? Arrogant conceit!”
“I saw you throw a spell!”
“In an effort to save the actor from a misstep, that the show not be interrupted. You are simply not that important to me, Dona Hellas. Consider instead those to whom Keldra’s shame could actually matter.”
Ap Marn had his surcoat half off, obviously intending to offer it to Dona Keldra.
When the harridan spoke, he hesitated. The possibilities in Ymera’s words visibly flashed across his face, and those of a hundred other attendees. There were any number of people in this audience who might wish to see the leading family of the Purist sect humiliated. But to do so in a neutral place like the home of the wealthiest merchant in the city, implied a willingness to upset the social order guaranteed to offend Aretzo’s leaders. It would take a foolhardy man to dare that, unless he wasn’t planning to be around much longer anyway. Ap Marn’s jaw set in angry reaction.
Wailor Junior eeled past Ymera, Chisaad, and Ap Marn to drape his own surcoat around Keldra’s shaking shoulders. She clutched it close and gave the blond Gwythlo youth a look both wary and grateful.
Hellas glared at the young Gwythlo, more implike in his pale skin and pointed ears than the Governor or even the actor. Her hostile gaze shifted from Ymera to the two Gwythlos and back as if she couldn’t decide which she despised most.
Chisaad had remained seated. Now he rose, faced the crowd, and spoke.
“My Lords and Ladies, Mages and Priestesses, good Gentles all, I saw what happened. Lady Ymera did indeed save the young performer from his misstep, a generous act on her part that likely averted a serious injury for him and prevented the premature end of the performance. Unluckily, her spell arrived a fraction of a moment too late and it interacted badly with the troupe’s own illusions. Those of you who deal in magic know how unpredictable it can be when two spells collide. Three is even less predictable, particularly when one of them is new and comparatively untried.” He made a small gesture at the threads still floating in the air. “Good Dona Keldra has suffered the effects of an unfortunate mischance, not an act of malice.”
The crowd muttered like a convocation of doves, many cooing their satisfaction at this explanation. Hellas visibly sensed the tide of public opinion pressuring her to accept this facesaving solution. She struggled against it for a moment before surrendering without grace.
“I suppose it must be as you say—Acting Royal Wizard.”
Ap Marn’s clenched jaw relaxed. He favored Chisaad with an approving look, and young Wailor with a resentful one.
At that moment a servant came running with what had to be one of Arriga Millago’s own dressing gowns. The hostess led Keldra away to a private place to change, Wailor Junior trailed after, and the herald bid everyone to return to their sets and prepare for the resumption of the performance.
Chisaad called up a spell to privately project his voice to Ymera’s ears and whispered, “We must talk.”
She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye and gave him an infinitesimal nod.
* * *
“God Above, boy, could you have bungled that scene worse?” Grandfather thundered.
Kirin hung his head, still shaken. The nightmare of the bursting dress came back and he trembled. “Yes Magister, I mean no, I mean—” My fault, my fault!
“And you two, rushing him offstage like that!” Grandfather rounded on Sevan and Maia. “What were you thinking?”
“Grandfather, that’s a Purist priestess out there!” Sevan blurted out.
The old man snorted. “And two Orthodox and a Dissenter, and most of a dozen mages! So what, my fool grandson?”
“She’s wearing six stars! She could burn Kirin!”
Grandfather opened his mouth to say something, but visibly changed his mind as Maia glared at him. Carmella winced and rubbed her forehead, smearing the Temptress’ makeup.
Pieter interrupted. “No, here in Aretzo she would have to get the Hierarchy’s permission first. Which is unlikely to be granted since the Hierarch and her Circle are Orthodox. You panicked, all three of you, and made a bad situation worse.”
“Yes, Father, I did,” Kirin admitted humbly, flooded with shame. “I’m sorry.” The eyes of the family cut like flensing knives. I failed them all.
“The show has to go on,” Grandfather growled. “All three of you get yourselves ready to pick up where you left off. Stage the fight on the boards if you’re not calm enough to do it on the wire. Maia, you look like cracked glass. Can you finish the scene?”
“Yes, grandfather,” she said, raising her head high.
“And the play?”
“I have to, don’t I?” She stared back at him, but everyone saw the frailty behind the brave words.
“You do.” His glare included all three of them in that you. “To your places, everybody. We resume on my word.”
* * *
Chisaad watched carefully as the play continued. The cast members were plainly shaken, struggling to renew the intensity of their earlier scenes. The woman had abandoned her levitation tricks and the halfbreed barely showed any of his Shadow, and that only in ambiguous hints.
This audience is distracted, Chisaad thought. No longer emotionally invested. The actors feel it. Millago looks unhappy, even angry. The Purists will blame him for this. He knows this mess will damage his reputation and his business and I can guess who will suffer for it. That might give me the opening I need.
The play limped to its conclusion. The audience offered halfhearted applause that soon ceased. The acrobats vanished behind their curtain and were not seen again. The wealthy and powerful resumed their dance of influence while servitors set out an elaborate dinner. Chisaad found a moment to speak to Ymera alone. He activated his private speaking spell, but she cast a circle of privacy about them both and spoke first.
“Your explanation placated the harridan and put me in your debt.” Her words whispered into his ears. “You’ll want something for that.” Her gaze had gone very cold now, a thin mask of human womanhood that barely concealed the monster behind it.
“A small thing,” he assured her, allowing a little of his very real nervousness to show. He arguably ranked as the most powerful mage in the city, but knew himself not even close to her equal.
“That I avoid the bitch and her grandpup?” An ugly hiss lurked behind the words.
“I think you’ll choose to do that on your own,” he answered. “I want . . . something else.” He swallowed as if the words were hard to speak and found that they were. So much at risk.
Ymera eyed him for a long moment, probably scrying him in half a dozen ways. “What?”
“The halfbreed.” He let his gaze drop, brought it back to her face and stared defiantly. “I want him.”
“Why not seek him out yourself?” The question purred between those rouge-tinted lips. “Insufficient courting experience?”
Chisaad could feel his face heating. “True, and I don’t know the Old City. Searching, finding, c-c-courting,” He gulped. “In that place. I don’t know how to do any of those. You do.”
“Do you know that girl is pregnant, probably by him?”
“What?” For a moment the question left Chisaad whipsawed. “What—oh.”
She nodded. “He may spurn your advances, especially if made clumsily.”
“I—I will, ah—” He swallowed hard and looked down at his feet. So much at stake. “I will have to risk that, won’t I?”
He looked back up in time to see a smile bloom on her face like a painted rose on a porcelain plate.
“So be it. I will let you know what I discover, and help you meet him. Persuading him is your problem.”
He could only whisper, “Thank you, Lady Ymera.”
She dispelled her circle and moved away into the crowd.
Chisaad heaved a sigh. Silver chimes called the attendees to dinner. He made very sure he had his customary bland expression back in place before he answered.
* * *
The gates of the Millago mansion shut behind the DiUmbra troupe. The cold clang stuck a dagger in Kirin’s heart.
His family plodded home through the clean streets of Cliffside, across the Processional and the Bazaar to the stinking cobbles of Sulfur Street. Nobody said anything until they had carried everything back into the Attic and Uncle Ger had returned the horses and wagon.
“How bad is it?” Pie
ter finally asked his father when the family crowded around their dining table. They had gathered to eat a scrounged-together meal in place of the one they had not been fed by Millago. Kirin huddled with Maia and Sevan at the far end. The bits of dried fish, withered olives, and stale flatbread tasted like wood on his tongue.
Grandfather brought out the little pouch Millago’s mayordomo had thrust at them before they left. He upended it on the plank table. Five one-dohba coins clattered on the wood. They lay there, dull gray depleted silver stripped of its power before being minted. Everybody stared at the pitiful pile.
“We spent three on the wagon rental and four more on makeup and supplies,” Grandfather said dully. “A net loss of two. The damage to our reputation? I can’t even guess.”
One of the candles lighting the room guttered and went out. Twilight faded into night outside the windows. Maia clutched Kirin’s hand.
I’m under Salim’s curse, he thought. My Shadow has ruined my family.
* * *
Shimoor’s gaunt face stirred on the pillow. Terrell held one withered hand in his own, feeling the birdlike bones under crepe skin and listening to the Wizard’s shallow breathing.
“Old teacher,” Terrell whispered, remembering. Lessons in perception, learning to use his magesight to see the flow of power in the world. Lessons in politics, seeing and understanding the dance of influence every being exerted upon every other. Engineering, numbers, so many truths revealed, so much understanding gained.
Shimoor stirred, opened his eyes. “Terrell,” his breath gusted in a bare whisper.
“I’m here.”
“Chisaad.” A sad sigh carried the name.
Terrell nodded. “He served you and Mother faithfully all these years. I won’t forget him.”
“. . . beware . . .”
“Beware?” Terrell repeated, startled and confused. “Of what?”
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