Echo in Onyx

by Sharon Shinn

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Marguerite wore a pink-and-white dress to the luncheon and a crown of pink asters in her hair. I considered presenting her with one of the white roses even now gracing my room, which would have added a touch of elegance to her ensemble—but I didn’t. I was being greedy, but I wanted to keep all of them for myself.

  She was somewhat flustered when she returned to her room after the meal so she could nap for a couple of hours before the ball. “What’s wrong?” I asked as I helped her undress. The echoes followed us into the dressing room and proceeded to unbutton each other’s gowns.

  “That man. He’s so rude.” When my face showed inquiry, she explained, “Jamison. Cormac’s bastard half brother. Apparently he is a fixture at court and the king expects him to be welcomed everywhere, but he is familiar and offensive and very unpleasant! At least two of the other women at the luncheon made some excuse to leave the table rather than be near him—but, of course, they can’t complain about him for fear of offending Cormac! It is most infuriating.”

  I was mentally reviewing the companions I’d seen arriving with Prince Cormac yesterday. “Is he the one with the red-gold hair and the full beard? He was handsome, I thought.”

  She slipped her arms into the silken robe I was holding for her, then she tied the sash. “Yes, that’s him. Within five minutes I thought he was so ugly inside that he was no longer handsome on the outside. When did you see him?”

  I wrinkled my nose, embarrassed to be caught out, but couldn’t manufacture a quick lie. “I was watching from one of the balcony doors when they arrived,” I admitted.

  She laughed. “I suppose you weren’t the only one!”

  “No. We were all so curious!”

  “Well, pick a good place tonight,” she advised. “The ball will be held in the atrium, you know, and it’ll be an impressive sight. When I was a little girl, I used to sneak onto the balcony and watch whenever my mother and father hosted an event. There’s nothing like seeing echoes at a ball.”

  I had never given it any thought before. “Do they dance when you do?”

  Marguerite nodded. “In exactly the same motions at exactly the same time.”

  “What if one person has more echoes than another? Does one of the echoes sit on the sidelines?”

  “No! They dance alongside you like demented children, dipping and twirling in time with the music. But my mother and most of the other nobles always hire dance instructors who can fill in whenever there is a mismatch in the number of echoes. Some of the instructors are men, some are women. So anyone with echoes can be sure there will be enough partners available so that they actually enjoy the ball. Otherwise, it’s just too distracting.”

  “One of the maids said—well, I probably shouldn’t even ask—”

  Marguerite flicked her hands at her echoes and they headed out the door, toward their own room. She climbed onto her bed and I pulled the covers up to her chin. She was the same age I was, but when she lay there on the big bed, surrounded by pillows, she looked so young and small. “Ask me what?”

  “Well—once you’re married, and you and your husband—oh, never mind.”

  But her face showed a certain cynical comprehension. “Oh, yes, the marriage bed for a woman with echoes,” she said. “I want you to imagine me having that conversation with my mother when I was about twelve years old.”

  I did, and I had to swallow a giggle.

  Marguerite nodded. “But, yes. That’s one of the reasons it’s preferable for people with echoes to marry people with the same number of echoes. Because they all perform the same act at the same time.”

  “And if the numbers don’t match up? Do you find—dancing partners?”

  She made an inelegant sound. “I don’t know! I suppose some people do and some people don’t, depending on how much they care about the well-being of their echoes.”

  “And do they—I mean, if they’re having sex—do the echoes ever get pregnant? Or make someone pregnant?”

  Marguerite shook her head, tangling her blond hair on the pillow. “They’re sterile. They just mimic the motions.”

  I tried not to shudder. “The whole thing is a little unnerving to think about.”

  “I think it wouldn’t bother me at all if I liked the man I was married to,” Marguerite said. “But if I don’t like him, I think it will be horrid. Not only will I have to endure something unpleasant, but I will be forcing Patience and Prudence and Purpose to endure it as well.”

  “Well, you never know,” I said. “The man you end up with may be courteous and kind, loving and generous. All of you might enjoy your time in the marriage bed.”

  She hesitated a moment, then asked in a small voice, “Is it something women generally enjoy? My mother didn’t make it sound as if that was very likely.”

  I obviously hadn’t been married to Robbie, but we hadn’t held off on that account. For one of the first times since he’d broken my heart, I allowed myself to remember how much pleasure we’d had in each other’s bodies. Really, there had been times I had found Robbie’s lack of ambition frustrating and his sense of humor annoying, but I’d loved every minute of intimacy we’d spent together. It had always been the best part of our relationship. “Well, I enjoyed it a great deal,” I said firmly, hoping she wasn’t shocked to learn I wasn’t a virgin. “But it’s probably a whole different story if you don’t like the man in your bed.”

  She closed her eyes. “Which is highly likely, I’m afraid. My mother hates my father, after all. I don’t think I know a single noblewoman who loves her husband.”

  “Some people think you might end up married to the prince,” I said casually, wondering how much she might tell me.

  She opened her eyes again. “Is that the gossip in the servants’ hall?”

  “I heard it said before I even met you. The king thinks if you marry Cormac, it might repair relations between Sammerly and Orenza. And the other western provinces.”

  “And make my father a very rich man into the bargain, because my father already has a list of concessions he’s drawn up for the king to consider,” Marguerite responded. “You can guess how much pressure I am under to make a good impression on the prince during this visit!”

  “Would you want to marry him?” I asked. “If he asked you?”

  “You mean, if our fathers worked out the arrangements.”

  “I suppose.”

  “I don’t know. I never thought about it until recently.” She closed her eyes and turned on her side to snuggle into the pillow. “I don’t want to think about it.” When she added something, her words were muffled by the pillow and spoken almost inaudibly. But I thought what she said was, “I don’t think I want to marry anybody.”

  It took more than an hour for Marguerite to dress for the ball. First she bathed in scented water and rubbed perfumed oils into her skin; then she sat quietly while I arranged her hair in complex coils, pinning blossoms into each tight curl. A few discreet cosmetics for her cheeks and eyes and lips, then it was time for her to step into her dress. It was a lovely layered confection of starchy taffeta and smooth silk, white with delicate accents of red ribbon and black lace. The whole ensemble had been created to accentuate the spectacular necklace I fastened around her throat, a collar of burnished onyx stones in white and black. The collar was six stones deep around her neck and fed into a wide V that narrowed to a point above her décolletage. A single bloodred stone hung at the very tip as if about to drip between her breasts.

  When she lifted her left hand to touch the lowest gem, I noticed her bracelet. Though it, too, was constructed of onyx in red, white, and black, it was done in a much simpler style, as it featured small, flat disks of stone connected by plain silver links.

  “That’s new,” I said.

  “You just haven’t seen it before,” she replied.

  I didn’t contradict her, but I knew she was lying. I was familiar with every piece of jewelry and clothing she possessed. “It’s pretty,” I said. �
��Maybe not as ornate as it should be for tonight, though.”

  She twisted her hand back and forth to watch the disks sway slightly as they hung from her wrist. “I’ve decided I should wear it every day,” she said. “As a perpetual statement that I am a daughter of the province of Orenza. Like you wear your ring every day.”

  We had talked about my ring before. “That’s not why I wear it. My mother gave it to me so that I would always remember that someone loves me.”

  Marguerite met my gaze in the mirror. “Well,” she said.

  After a moment’s silence, I said, “And now your shoes.”

  Finally she was completely ready, a delicate, perfect creation of beauty and artifice. I thought Prince Cormac would find her hard to resist.

  The echoes filed into the room and arranged themselves behind her. Their gowns were very similar, but sewn from blush-colored fabrics; their necklaces were simple strands of multicolored onyx beads, and their coiffures didn’t incorporate quite so many flowers. Still, as they stood silently behind her, they looked like reflections of Marguerite captured on a tarnished silver surface—fainter, more ethereal, much more likely to melt away.

  “I hope you have a wonderful time at the ball,” I said.

  She stifled a sigh as she lifted her chin and headed for the door, the echoes trailing in her wake. “I hope so, too,” she said.

  I headed to the kitchen to see if I could grab a quick meal but found the place so chaotic that I just started helping any way I could, carrying plates and washing out pans. Once the meal was served in the grand dining hall and cleared away again, the pace dramatically slowed down. I was able to swallow a few bites and then sneak out, lured by the muffled strains of music. I realized the dancing must already be under way.

  I made my way to the east wing of the third floor—where Lord Garvin and Lady Dorothea had their studies, and where no one was likely to be present at this time of night. I slipped through the doorway that led onto the balcony. I had carefully dressed in neutral colors that would blend with the wallpaper and the wood, and I stretched out full length on the floor, my head propped on my fists and my face a few inches from the railing. Someone in the atrium would have to look very carefully to spot me staring down at the scene below.

  And what a sight it was. The musicians were set up under the overhang of the balconies, as were the chairs and the tables of food brought in for the comfort of the guests. So there was nothing to be seen in the atrium except the dancers themselves. For a moment, my eyes could hardly take in the riot of colors. All the women wore ball gowns of lime and strawberry and tangerine and wine; all the men sported dark trousers and bright jackets. Everywhere were flashes of gold and sparks of silver, and the whole gorgeous mix was in endless motion, driven by the lively music. But eventually I began making sense of the patterns and was able to pick out the individual dancers. And then I was even more impressed.

  Marguerite had been right—there was nothing to compare to the sight of echoes dancing together on the ballroom floor. Marguerite and the black-haired prince turned and spun in the very center of a stately pattern of color, and around them, in perfect orbit, wheeled three identical pairs of dancers. Smaller clusters of paired dancers spilled out around them in a bright, twirling constellation. Each set moved with flawless precision; it was as if the partners glided between invisible mirrors, danced with their own reflections. A woman pivoted so quickly her lavender skirt flared behind her, and two more skirts billowed in exactly the same way. A man threw back his head and laughed. Two other men laughed in concert. It was dizzying. It was extraordinary. It was magical.

  The spell was briefly broken when the music stopped and it was less obvious that certain groups were acting in concord. The dancers fanned themselves, murmured a few words to each other, or took the opportunity to change partners. I noticed that the prince still kept a light hold on Marguerite, and his echoes remained similarly close to Prudence, Patience, and Purpose. But the governor bowed to his wife and sought out a large, dour-faced matron wearing a violent shade of fuchsia. I could only see one other figure who might have been her echo—and then I noticed a slim, simply dressed woman step out from under the balcony and sidle up to one of the governor’s echoes. When the music started again, she did her best to emulate the large woman’s steps and gestures. No doubt she was mostly following the lead of her shadow partner. If I squinted through the slats in the railing, I could hardly tell that she was not exactly synchronized. On the dance floor, her mistakes would probably go completely unnoticed.

  It was the most surreal and most mesmerizing scene I had ever witnessed.

  I had probably been lying there for a half hour, staring at the dance floor, when I heard the door behind me quietly open. Assuming it was one of the other servants, I didn’t even turn around to see who had arrived. So I was caught completely off guard when a solid shape dropped to the floor on my right side and I glanced over to find Nico Burken sitting there. My “Oh!” of surprise was so loud it would have been heard below except that the musicians were playing a particularly rousing passage.

  “I thought that was you,” he said. “Do you often find vantage points like this where you can come ogle your betters?”

  “No!” I said, breaking into a laugh and motioning for him to lie flat. “You’re not dressed right! Your clothes are too dark and someone is likely to see you.”

  He stretched out beside me, just a few inches away, but he didn’t look too worried. “None of them will bother to look up,” he said. “They’re too full of their own consequence to think anything of importance could be happening somewhere else in the house.”

  This tallied with my experience, but I still didn’t want to attract attention. “And keep your voice down.”

  “If you’re always this bossy, I don’t wonder that none of the other servants wants to join you to watch the entertainment.”

  I choked back a laugh. “Most of the ones who would like to see the ball are still cleaning up the kitchen,” I retorted. “But they’ll be at one balcony door or another before the night is through.”

  “So are you enjoying the evening?”

  I nodded. “I can’t take my eyes off the dancers. I’ve never seen anything like them.”

  “And this is a small gathering, compared to some of the events the king has hosted,” Nico answered. “Imagine, if you will, a room in which everyone has at least one echo, and all the sets of dancers spin around each other like stars in some kind of celestial pattern. From above, it is an absolutely amazing sight to behold.”

  For a moment I felt an intense desire to witness such an impossible sight. Then I said, “So you’re in the habit of spying on people even when you’re not touring the kingdom?”

  He grinned. “I make it a habit to watch everyone every chance I get.”

  “Thank you for the roses,” I said. “They’re so beautiful.”

  “I wanted to buy something less expensive, you understand,” he said, “but by the time I made it back to the market, there was nothing else left.”

  “I was astonished that you bothered buying me anything at all.”

  “Were you? Then you must not be paying attention.”

  I wasn’t sure how to reply to that. Fortunately a clatter below caused both of us to quickly look down. On the edge of the dance floor, right under an archway, there was a small disruption in the ripple of color and movement. It looked as if someone had stumbled, then bumped into another couple, then tried to get out of the way. Most of the dancers hadn’t even noticed, and they continued spinning around the floor as if nothing had occurred.

  Nico was frowning, so I peered harder through the slats. A young woman was hastily exiting the dance floor, clutching folds of her dress in her fists so she didn’t trip over the fabric. A man stared after her, his back to us. “What happened?” I asked.

  “Looks like Lord Jamison is up to his old tricks,” Nico replied.

  I looked again. Yes, that was the man with the red-gold
hair that I had spied yesterday afternoon. His navy jacket hugged broad shoulders that indicated a certain physical power. I wondered if he had been holding his erstwhile partner a little too tightly. “Such as?”

  “Somewhat forcefully displaying his interest in winning a young woman’s attention.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Is this how he always behaves at social events?”

  “Let’s just say, it’s not unusual. You can find women across the Seven Jewels who despise him.”

  “Why does Cormac tolerate him, then? Why does the king?”

  “You’ve got it backward,” Nico said. “Jamison feels free to behave as he does because his father and his half brother put no checks on him. Harold, I suppose, feels some guilt about the fact that Jamison is illegitimate. He can’t give his son the crown, but he allows him every other indulgence. Cormac—who knows? Perhaps he chafes at the restrictions put on him by virtue of being the heir, and he likes to see how Jamison flouts such restrictions in his own life. At any rate, Jamison is free to do his worst—and he frequently does.”

  I gave an exaggerated sigh. “I would like to think nobles and royals were better than the rest of us, not worse.”

  Nico laughed and gestured toward the scene below. “They’re certainly not better, but they’re more interesting to watch.”

  I trained my gaze back on the dance floor, and a companionable silence fell between us. Nico seemed content to watch everything that was happening below—not just the patterns of the dancers, but the conversations going on along the sidelines, the discreet entrances of the servants carrying in more platters of food. I had the feeling that, if I asked him, he would be able to tell me how many people were in the room, who had danced most often with whom, and how many glasses of wine each one had tossed back. I thought it must be an exhausting way to live.

  “So do you dance?” he asked presently.

  “I do,” I said. “I like it, too.”

  “Reels and line dances, or fancy ones?”

  “You do think I’m provincial.”