Laughter echoed across the room in a light, airy current that filled Daron with the oddest dread.
“Spectaculore has been nothing short of wildly unpredictable, as you all know.” With a coy grin, the mayor continued, “As is typical in this business, but we aim to end on a high note. For tonight, we have a surprise in store for you.” He made an exaggerated display of peering over his guests. “Everyone has their roses, yes?”
Daron instinctively touched the rose that had been pinned at his lapel, as people began whispering curiously amongst themselves.
“Good, because every voter needs a token. And you’ll all have a chance to cast yours for the one magician who will emerge from the world below. For tonight, we finish the story…”
All at once, Daron stiffened.
“Satisfied as the gatekeepers were of the magician’s feat, they demanded one more spectacle. One last test.”
He reached for Kallia’s hand, and it was just as cold as his.
“Welcome, all.” Mayor Eilin had already begun clapping, exposing a teeth-baring grin. “To our final performance of the show.”
48
Be prepared to be surprised.
Jack had said as much, and yet shock slammed into her.
Amid the applause, a high-pitched shriek erupted from above. Mostly everyone had returned to the ball, barely paying mind to Janette as she dragged her father down the stairs to the bannister and away from the revelry. Kallia could still glimpse her pristine face, fury-red, in the shadows.
“Father!” she cried, as the other contestants and judges inched closer to their area. “What is the meaning of this?”
“Sorry for the quick change in plans, darling. Surely you understand.” The mayor absently gestured for the others to join, despite his daughter’s outburst. “We didn’t want to trouble you with more show talk. I know how tired you’ve grown of it.”
“Yes, because it’s all that’s ever talked about. And I’ll be damned if you let it ruin tonight.”
“Janette, please contain your—”
“I will not.” She crossed her arms, practically heaving. “You put me in charge of this event, and I will not see it derailed for yet another bloody performance.”
Her rage was palpable, especially in the face of naive party guests who tittered at the prospect of tonight’s events. The grandeur of the ballroom, forgotten in light of the upcoming entertainment. Kallia felt a trickle of sympathy for her. The night she’d spent ages planning, envisioning, executing—in a few words, was no longer hers, but her father’s.
“Did you know about this?”
Demarco stood at the outskirts with her, grim-faced as he watched the father and daughter bicker on while servants unveiled a row of three large, empty, crystal bowls glinting against the fireplace. Kallia couldn’t quite place his expression, but it wasn’t fury. An uneasiness had settled across his brow.
“No, I didn’t.” Not completely a lie. “But I’m assuming the others did.”
She glanced over to where the remaining contestants stood, donning top hats like their mentors. They shared smirks and whispers over the rims of their short glasses, as if this chaos was something they themselves had made from scratch.
“I’m so sorry.” Demarco exhaled, following her line of vision. “I-I should’ve known. Done … something.”
“Stop. It’s not your fault.” Kallia gently pressed her fingers into his wrist. “They’re the ones who should be scared.”
The challenge called to her. To the part of her that wanted to win, made her hungrier for it the more unpredictable the path.
The fools thought they could treat her like a flower—take away her sunlight and water so she would shrivel up and die. But she was more the stubborn plant, the kind that thrived anywhere if that’s what it took to live. Their first mistake was in thinking obstacles gave them an upper hand. Little did they know, she would always find a way to grow through cracks in the stone.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” he asked as she led them both to the gathering of contestants. She kept her chin raised while his jaw worked the whole way over. “This is unfair. We have no proper stage, no time to fully prepare for—”
“The world is our stage, Demarco. And we’ve practiced far more than any of them, and they know it.” She chuckled at the expression on his face. “Don’t panic. You know our act. All the tricks are on me, you’re simply there to look pretty.” She winked, squeezing his hand firmly. “Now, we win.”
The word felt good on her lips. She could taste the victory, so close. None of the other contestants reverberated with quite as much energy when they finally reached the group.
“Quite a night this has turned into,” one of the few remaining contestants said with a nasty leer. “Are you nervous?”
Kallia beamed. “For you.”
His face went ashen, but the bravado remained thick in the air in the small circle of magicians. The guests of the party looked on from a short distance, whispering restlessly amongst themselves as they waited for the performance to begin.
Erasmus entered the ring, his face alight with trickery.
“Apologies for the sudden turn of events,” he said. “Have to keep everyone on their toes as much as the participants, no matter what.”
“Oh yes, I’m sure all the participants were treated equally and knew nothing until this very moment.” Lottie appeared beside him, her viper stare aimed at every top hat in the circle. “Isn’t that right, Mister Mayor?”
“Miss de la Rosa, who said you could drop in on a private meeting?” Mayor Eilin sniffed. “And I don’t know what you’re getting at.”
“Sure you do. I heard it all in our last interview regarding the treatment of the contestants. You said, and I quote, ‘Boys will be boys, and we stick together.’” She grimaced. “Guess that applies to cheating as well.”
His face reddened even more, eyes turning murderous. Though not as murderous as Erasmus as he regarded the mayor. “You told everyone?”
“Not everyone,” Demarco chimed in pointedly.
“Surprise, surprise.” The proprietor threw up his hands. “Those who rig the game are the weakest players of them all, you know.”
“This is not solely your game, Rayne. You may have bound us all here in that contract of yours, but you don’t make all the rules. What does it matter, whether things were fair or not? That’s life,” the mayor declared, snapping a triumphant finger. “No, that’s show business. And if any contestant is too rattled to perform, well, I’m afraid they’re not cut out for it.”
“You should be afraid,” Kallia interjected, hands on her hips. “Because I’m ready.”
You’re not ready.
Jack’s words from long ago kicked back in her mind, the ones she hadn’t wanted to hear. The ones she hated.
She inhaled deeply.
You’re wrong.
She was ready, and she always had been.
The mayor stammered in irritation before spinning back to the crowd. The faces of contestants and judges throughout the circle turned frustrated, while others grinned. Demarco, surprisingly, not one of them. Kallia didn’t know what to make of that, but the flutter of unease dissolved as the guests quieted, save for the servants clearing away stragglers from the center of the floor.
“Rather than move everyone into the main theater,” the mayor resumed his announcement, all tight smiles for the party, “we thought the ballroom would make a worthy arena for our final performance. The Court of Mirrors, after all, used to be quite a showroom itself, back in the day. With a stage already beneath our feet.” He raised a gloved hand, crooking two fingers upward. “Gentlemen?”
Kallia jerked at the harsh, rusty groans, one after the other. Across the floor, where she and Demarco had danced, the surface shifted. Servants in elegant black suits pulled floor panels up from the ground, raising them to their full height and forming a wide ring within the dance floor. The six raised panels encircled the center like petals unfurl
ing, surrounding a spacious expanse right beneath the largest chandelier of the ballroom. The guests clapped in awe at the beautiful display it formed, the way the lights hit the reflection with an otherworldly glow. A stage like a bright cage for all to peer into.
Made entirely of mirrors.
Kallia blanched. The surfaces gleamed dangerously like well-sharpened knives raised over a chopping board. Before she could grab Demarco’s hand—to pull him aside or make a run for it altogether, she didn’t know—the mayor gestured invitingly to her.
“And since our lovely Kallia is dying for her time onstage,” he said, a little too gleeful, “it’s only fair to give her the privilege of going first!”
* * *
Daron wanted to break something.
This couldn’t possibly go on. And yet he moved closer to the newly raised stage with Kallia, who seemed just as dazed when, only moments ago, she was determined to tear this show to the ground.
“I-I need a quick word, with Aaros about the music. I’ll be right…” Kallia didn’t even finish, rushing to meet her assistant at the edge of the mirrors. Even in the frenzy, her expression was shrewd, focus pushing through. Never one to let a twist knife at her, unlike him.
As soon as those mirrors were raised, it took everything to tamp down the urge to run.
“You really think this is a good idea, Daron?” Lottie sidled beside him. The last person he needed to see, when he needed to remain calm.
“What do you mean?”
“I think you know.”
Eva.
“It’s a very different act,” he bit out. “This isn’t the same.”
It wouldn’t be. They wouldn’t even be going near the mirrors. The proximity to them would set him on edge, so he would focus on Kallia. Just Kallia.
And she would win. There was never any doubt in his mind about that.
“That’s not what I meant.”
A new, quiet panic entered him as Lottie pulled at him, her expression blazing as he’d never before: desperate, haunted. “Don’t perform, Daron. Nothing good will come of tonight.”
His breath hitched at the cold certainty in her voice. With how little he had to do in the act, he honestly couldn’t see how. Until all at once, he remembered those moments when power had burst through him without warning, out of pure reaction. Instinct.
There was no way she could’ve known that. “What are you talking about?”
Lottie was never speechless. It was the first thing he’d noticed about her when Eva had first invited her to join them for a post-show dinner, like bringing a wily stray cat home who had refused to be ignored. Daron never thought it a wise friendship, but Eva never cared. She preferred the company of those who were clever with their words, magician or not, and Lottie had an endless supply. Arguing, persuading, criticizing—each play of words, her specialty.
But now she didn’t know what to say. And as much as he wanted to wait for it, Aaros frantically waved him over to the stage area.
“I need to go.” Daron shook out of Lottie’s grip, his heart thundering.
“Dare.” A low growl of warning. “If you do this, I’ll—”
“Write a thousand stories about me for all I care, Lottie,” he said, backing away. “I’m not leaving her alone in this. I’m not going to do that to her.”
She did not try to stop him this time, instead grabbing the nearest flute of alcohol and drowning it in one swallow. A bolstering vote of confidence. Whatever it was, he couldn’t let her panic bleed into his.
He concentrated entirely on Kallia as she conversed with the musicians arranging themselves around the stage of mirrors. Aaros lingered behind, beckoning Daron to the side.
“How does she seem?”
Aaros looked troubled. “Fine.”
That wasn’t a good sign.
“Take care, judge,” he continued, digging into his coat pocket before passing off an item. “If anything has shaken her even a little, something bad must be in the air tonight.”
Daron didn’t want to think that way. Ominous thoughts only led to ominous things. The assistant departed, leaving him with Kallia. Once the musicians took their places, her arms crossed, fingers running over a small scrap of cloth, a hint of bloody petals along its edge.
“Everything is going to be all right,” he promised, reaching for her. “Those fools wouldn’t dare mess with the act in front of all these people. It will go just as we rehearsed.”
Kallia nodded slowly, tucking the cloth back into a hidden fold of her dress. Her fingers tensed at the absence. “And if it doesn’t?”
“Then no one would fault you for having a bumbling oaf of a mentor.”
That drew a snort from her. When she looked up at him, truly looked at him, his whole world narrowed.
“You’ll be here, at the end of all this, right?”
Doubt. It was strange to hear it in her voice, and he wanted it gone. “I’m not going anywhere.” He ran his hands up and down her arms, warming her. “We’re doing this together, remember?”
Kallia nodded, less shakily. “Yes.”
She looked at his mouth right as Daron looked to hers, his eyes grazing to her neck where he could almost feel her straining pulse beating beyond its limits. He laced their fingers together, not caring what others would think. What rumors would spread, what stories would be written. Before he lost his nerve, he led her through the open space between two mirrors so they could take their place on stage.
As the welcoming applause washed over them, Daron avoided looking at his reflection. Just like Kallia they focused on each other instead. And for a small, quiet moment in the din of the cheers, it was as though it were only them. Like a practice, at the Ranza Estate.
At her wink, the weight lifted off him. He made quick work of his jacket before throwing it to the ground, pulling out the scrap of fabric Aaros had passed to him once the room hushed.
“Tonight, we have prepared a very interesting dance for you,” Kallia declared to the audience. Bold, without a trace of worry in her voice. He both feared and admired the masks she could so easily don. “One that could turn deadly, if we take even one wrong step.”
With that, she thrust her hand out, letting her fingers beckon toward the ground at their feet. A flame sprouted like a flower, before it grew and spread around the mirrors as if oil drenched the floors. The fire built into a blaze, surrounding the floor inch by inch, teasing nearer and nearer to them until there was no way out without burning.
Given Glorian’s aversion to fire, the gasps and shrieks in the crowd were unsurprising.
“To those who’ve danced over flames before,” she added, lifting the black fabric over her head for all to see. “Have you tried it, wearing a blindfold?”
Kallia made sure to run her fingers over the fabric to confirm there were no slits cut, that it was not sheer enough to peek through. Confirmation and credibility.
After Daron tied the fabric over her eyes, he guided her into position only breaths away from him. The fire licked near their legs. Sweat began to drip from his temple. There were only a few times during their practices when Daron had nearly gotten burned, but Kallia never allowed it. Even blindfolded, she could anticipate her mistakes before they happened, and would pull him back before the fire could so much as graze him.
One more dance among the flames.
The lights of the ballroom dimmed, before blacking out entirely, the sea of fire the only illumination over the floor.
And all of a sudden, Daron became like the dark, transported by shadow at the first low swell of a song rising in the air.
49
Kallia was grateful for the blindfold. She could sink more easily into the music, into the movements that came more from muscle memory than sight.
Blacking out the rest of the lights around the ballroom was an effective touch, bringing in a reel of gasps from the guests. There was nowhere else to look but them, and though she wished to rip off her mask for the chance to see, it was a relie
f that she couldn’t.
Behind the blindfold, there were no mirrors.
Only Demarco. Only fire.
Each step they took was the only area untouched by flames, but they had to keep moving. Fire may part, but it was never content to stay back.
The low, sultry rise of strings reached into the air, tightening every touch. She hooked her arms around Demarco’s neck, leverage for when he lowered her in an agonizingly slow split. The usual burn ran up her thighs as he lifted her back to facing position, when she summoned a handful of flames from the floor and unleashed them into the air. Their heat teased around her—around them both—while he spun her out of harm’s way. One sharp turn after the other, to avoid this added obstacle.
Like her audition, she thought, wishing she could see the judges now. Their audience. Each time a swirling orb of fire grazed around her a little too quickly, startled gasps of both fear and delight sounded. Whenever a lean or a lift led them out of the fire’s path, relieved breaths and clapping trickled in over the heady beat.
Demarco was letting her lead more tonight, his movements less sure. She would never hold his nerves against him, when there was so little warning. If anyone had more reason to fear when it came to mirrors, it was him. The fact that he chose to stay by her, in spite of it all, meant everything.
So she gladly seized the lead. Relieved to be in control, when all else felt out of her grasp.
Her chest heaved slightly as they reached the next phase of the act. She squeezed Demarco’s shoulders to signal the lift. He took her by the waist, holding her up as she raised her arms high above, the music dropping with the boom of a drum.
She sliced her arms downward, feeling the orbs of fire falling back to the floor in bursts around them.
The audience roared. Triumph shot through her veins, on top of exhaustion. Her legs trembled from the effort as he lowered her, but his grip was looser. Familiar, from all the practice.
He had initially hesitated over a fiery dance floor. One drop, and she could fall into the blaze, despite her confidence in her quick reflexes. Still, each time they reached this point in the dance, he’d grip her tighter. A reminder. I’ve got you. I will never let you fall.
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