Illusions of Fate

by Kiersten White

  The nightmare man turns around, twisted smile falling into puzzled frown, and I swing the sugar bowl up, knocking it into the hand cupping his shadow-burning crystals. They fly free, landing on the unprotected skin of his face with sizzling hisses.

  He screams and shoves me to the ground. The impact jars my destroyed hand and it is too much. I lean over and vomit onto the rug.

  A stream of words I do not understand but instinctively recognize as foul and evil stream from his mouth, but then, to my surprise and disappointment, he laughs.

  I wipe the corners of my lips and sit up against the edge of the couch, barely able to see him through the red haze of pain.

  His face has angry holes eaten into it, opening onto dark patches. He takes out a pristine handkerchief and wipes one side and then the other. But rather than wiping the burns off, it’s as though he has wiped his old face back on. No evidence of my momentary victory remains.

  He sniffs genteelly, tucking the handkerchief back into his suit pocket. “I like you. You have all the spirit and passion they’ve been careful to breed out of Alben women. To thank you for finally giving Lord Ackerly a weakness I could exploit, I will keep you for my own.”

  My head lolls back on the couch, and I close my eyes, letting out a sharp breath in place of a laugh. “I would sooner die.”

  “Never worry about that. You’ll want me. You’ll be perfectly at home. And only I can keep you safe from the coming war.” A finger touches my cheek, and I shudder. I concentrate on the pain in my hand since it is preferable to the sensation of his skin on mine. “You shouldn’t have gone to the gala, Jessa. Men like Lord Ackerly will bring you nothing but suffering. I’m so disappointed in you. Still, you’ve learned your lesson, and we will move on as soon as this is settled. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve a guest to prepare for.”

  The door closes, and I open my eyes to find the room once again without an exit. I angle my neck so I can see the wall. Though the light has dimmed, I can still see my two shadows. They’re slumped in defeat, but tiny dots of light have eaten through the extra shadow’s silhouette.

  Could it really be Finn’s shadow, as the nightmare man seemed to believe?

  This is not the same world I woke up in yesterday. I know none of the rules, and I have none of the power. All the things I’ve learned, all the ways I’ve tried to make a place for myself where I am not at the mercy of others, none of it matters in this new, bizarre reality.

  A harsh caw draws up my head. Three of the horrid black birds are staring at me from the armchair. One of them hops forward, darting close and pecking my leg with its bone-hard beak, then flapping back with a chorus of croaking laughter.

  Another moves to do the same, and I cringe, shielding my ruined hand and ducking my face into my shoulder.

  There is a clatter of wings and a chorus of angry caws, but nothing touches me. I raise my head to see one of the birds—missing a single claw—bobbing in front of me, flapping its wings and viciously attacking the other two when they get too close. It draws blood and rips a pinion out of the wing of one of my would-be assailants. They flap away, cawing reproachfully, and disappear into the bookshelf.

  I wipe my eyes and look at the remaining bird. “Well,” I say, “spirits’ mercies. I am sorry I didn’t leave better food for you outside my window.”

  The bird turns so one yellow eye is fixed on mine.

  I sniffle, swallowing back another wave of nausea. “I should have known you weren’t evil. You’re far handsomer than those other wretched birds.”

  It ducks its head and tucks some stray feathers back into place along its wing. “Are you a boy?” I ask, and it bobs its head. “Sir Bird it is, officially. Now, Sir Bird, is there a door to this room?”

  He hesitates, and then weaves his head back and forth in what I assume is an approximation of shaking it no.

  I squeeze my eyes shut against a welling of tears. “I’m afraid that if I do not escape right now, I shall never leave this place.” I don’t know what the nightmare man has in store for me, but any kindness he thinks of is one I want no part of. My hand pains me to distraction, though, and I haven’t any hope of fighting my way free.

  There’s a frantic scratching, and I open my eyes to see Sir Bird hopping the length of the table, twisting and twitching as though fighting some internal war. Finally, he shakes himself from beak to tail, caws, and flies to the iron grate over the fire.

  I close my eyes again. Perhaps if I can sleep I can wake up somewhere safe, my hand intact, this nightmare over.

  Sir Bird caws again, louder than ever, and I look at him, irritated. “What is it?”

  He pecks at the iron grate, hops down behind it, and then flaps directly into the fire.

  “No!” I gasp, standing and rushing forward. But Sir Bird hops back out of the fire, tapping impatiently on the grate with his beak. I gasp my surprise, and he hops through the fire and back once more.

  “I—through there? But the fire!”

  As if to prove a point, Sir Bird hops directly into the center of it and stares at me, his eyes reflecting the flames that do not touch him.

  Well. It makes as much sense as anything else that has happened since last night. Grasping the heavy iron grate with my good hand, I drag it away. It makes a horrid screech against the floor, and Sir Bird caws a warning a moment too late. Books explode off the shelves, turning into birds in midair, the room a whirling mass of cries.

  I duck my head, screaming, but Sir Bird flies out past me and into the melee, scratching and pecking and, in a process my eyes cannot comprehend, swallowing other birds. They converge on him, attacking, and though he fights more fiercely than any, he will be overwhelmed. There is an iron poker next to the fireplace and I grab it, flinging it wildly and batting the demon birds into the walls. They turn back into books on impact, falling to the floor with dusty thuds.

  Sir Bird goes down in a tangled mass of feathers. I can only tell which one he is because so many other birds are trying to kill him. I grab his foot and yank him free of the pile, cradling him to my chest and diving into the fire.

  I pull the grate shut behind us, not a moment too soon. Black bodies slam against it, beaks straining through the gaps in the pattern. I tug it tight, leaving no space at the top like the one Sir Bird used to get in.

  I do not know how badly Sir Bird is hurt, but my fingers are slick with his blood. I tuck him into the crook of my elbow where I hold my ruined hand against my chest. The pain is so all-consuming that it’s a relief to focus on something else: figuring out what I am supposed to do now that I am crouched in a roaring fire.

  Sir Bird croaks and jabs his head toward the back of the fireplace. It’s solid bricks, stained with years of soot.

  I look up—the chimney narrows into two pipes. There’s no way I will fit in either of them. Not even Sir Bird could, were he able to fly. I suppose he meant for me to hide here, but it won’t take the nightmare man long to find me. If his bird knew I could sit in the fire unharmed, surely he will know as well. I take a deep, smoke-free breath, and collapse to rest against the bricks until I am discovered.

  Thus it is I am greatly shocked to fall straight through the wall into a small, dark passage.

  Ten

  SIR BIRD CROAKS REPROACHFULLY, AND I VOW to never again question his directions. Half laughing, half sobbing, I crawl using my knees and my one good arm. Every bump and jolt sends a scream of pain through my hand. The ground is cold stone slick with layers of grime and—judging by the overwhelming smell—bird droppings.

  After what feels like an eternity, I see tiny cracks of light ahead and crawl faster, desperate to take a full breath and to be out of this cramped, dark place. I push my shoulder against rough wooden slats and a trapdoor flips down on spring hinges. Taking Sir Bird in my good hand, I gently lift him through and then wriggle my way out of the opening, grateful, for once, for my corset.

  I’m free. I’m free! I stand, every muscle quivering, and again tuck Sir Bird again
st my chest, trusting him not to touch my hand. I finally force myself to look at it. My fingers are a blue-and-purple mess, knuckles bent at wrong angles. Three are split open and bleeding, and I see slivers of white I can only assume are bone. Even after I get them properly set, they will never be the same.

  My stomach threatens to give out on me again, but I refuse. Finish escaping now. There will be plenty of time to mourn my writing hand later. I follow the small space between the gray bricks of a house and the hedge, and arrive at an opening large enough to squeeze out of. Valuing speed over caution, I shove myself through, hair catching on twigs and dress ripping as I burst into the cloud-dimmed light of an Aveburian afternoon.

  I turn to my right and am unsurprised to see Finn, standing on the step of a fine townhouse, cane poised in the air midway to knocking on the door. It was his shadow, after all. His angular shoulders droop, and even his hair appears dimmer than usual. But his dark eyes are fixed on mine, and his mouth is frozen open in the pleasing round shape of an O.

  “For spirits’ sake, do not knock on that door.” And then I collapse onto the ground.

  “Jessamin!” He kneels beside me, hands hovering as though he isn’t sure what to do with them. “You must want me to explain everything.”

  “No.” I watch in horror as a massive plume of smoke shoots out of the chimney and transforms into a cloud of black birds so thick it obscures the sun. “I want to run away from here as fast as possible.”

  He follows my eyes and curses, then slides his hands beneath my legs and back.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Picking you up so we can run!”

  “Don’t be daft, my hand is broken, not my feet!”

  “Right, that was stupid. Stupid.” He helps me up by my elbow. “This way!”

  We run across the lane and down the street. We’re surrounded by solid row homes, finer than any I’ve ever been in, with attached walls and no alleys or side streets to offer us escape. The cloud of birds circles overhead, a swirling mass of terror.

  There are a few people out, but judging from their dress they are all servants. They glue their eyes on the ground and hurry in the opposite direction of us. Is this so normal an occasion for them that it does not merit so much as a shout of fear?

  I do not realize I am cursing in Melenese until Finn—one hand on my elbow and the other waving his cane in mad circles overhead—gasps, “What are you saying?”

  “I am saying that my hand hurts so much I want to die and will you kindly shut up and let me focus on running?”

  “If you will kindly shut up and let me focus on a spell to save our lives!”

  He glares at me but then stops dead, nearly jerking me from my feet. “One of the familiars is with you!” He raises his cane, eyes blazing with murder toward Sir Bird.

  “Don’t you dare!” I hunch my shoulders around Sir Bird, angling him away from Finn.

  “We haven’t time for this!”

  “So keep running!” I shrug away from him and continue my mad flight.

  He catches up to me quickly, falling into pace though I do not doubt he could outrun me in my current state. “That bird belongs to him.”

  “This bird saved my life.”

  “I am saving your life!”

  “You were ready to give in! I saved my own life. You are simply keeping me company on this leg of my escape.” Sir Bird caws brokenly in support of my statements.

  One of the birds dives at us and smashes against an unseen barrier, exploding in a poof of feathers that turns into ash. “And how,” Finn says, huffing with anger or exertion, his cane still tracing patterns into the air, “do you intend to evade the flock of familiars even now conveying our every move?”

  “I can’t do all the work! Surely if you are so important as to merit the smashing of my every finger, you can figure this out.”

  “Stop!” he says. I fear he is going to leave me, but he nods. “Here, this should work.” He traces a rectangle onto the blank space of a head-high wall, then knocks the tip of his cane on it three times in rapid succession. The wall melts away and, instead of a view into the small front lot of the house, it opens into blackness.

  He ducks to go through, then looks back and sees my hesitation. “Trust me?”

  “Of course I don’t.” I grit my teeth and swish sideways past him, but I miscalculate the width of the door and brush my ruined hand against the brick. I cry out, the pain intensified to a blinding wave.

  This time when his arms come around me, lifting and cradling, I do not object. He hurries down a flight of stairs in the pitch black. The wall seals behind us, cutting off the harsh screams of the birds. At the bottom, Finn taps his cane against the wall and a line of sconces burst into flame, illuminating a stone tunnel with periodic holes in the ceiling. It drips with the slick collection of water from the cobbled stones of the street above us. Finn’s fine shoes splosh through the accumulated slush and stone-strained filth.

  “Not far now,” he says.

  “I can walk.” I do not want to, of course, but most of the dizziness has passed and the pain has dulled to merely overwhelming.

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I need you close for this next part anyhow. And will you please get rid of the bird.”

  I cradle Sir Bird closer to my chest. “You will have to get rid of me first.” Sir Bird squawks loudly.

  “Accursed stubborn creature.”

  “He is not accursed!”

  “I was speaking of you.”

  He stops and I brace myself to be dropped, but he shifts me with the gentlest of movements to free his cane for wider access. I turn to see a circle, inscribed with patterns, burned into the wall. Beneath us, a wider circle glows faintly under the streaming water Finn stands in.

  “Running water helps,” he says as if that is any explanation at all. “But I cannot have any part of you outside of the circle. If you would stand on my feet and”—he pauses and looks down as though unwilling to meet my gaze—“wrap your arms around me in as tight an embrace you can manage without pain, that should be enough.”

  “Must we?”

  I do not know why this sounds more intimate than being carried in his arms, but my cheeks burn. He nods and removes his arm from beneath the bend of my knees, easing me down until my toes meet the water and the tops of his shoes. Keeping Sir Bird between us and angling my hand so that it touches nothing, I wrap my free arm around Finn, trying not to note the smooth muscles of his back beneath his long, black overcoat.

  “If you could—that is, would you mind terribly—tucking your head in as well?”

  I close my eyes and lean in. My head fits right at the hollow of his neck, and the image of his collarbone springs unbidden into my mind. My breath must catch because he murmurs about having hurt me again. I shake my head, pressing it closer into his neck. “It’s fine,” I whisper, not trusting my voice.

  “This won’t be painful, but you will be disoriented. Try not to let go when it’s finished. I fear you would fall.”

  I nod into his neck, his pulse beneath my cheek.

  He whispers a series of foreign words, and we are swept away, twirling and tumbling in a rush of water that is neither cold nor wet. It takes me several seconds to realize I am still upright, clinging to Finn, and even longer to process that we are not in any river, nor are we in the sewer system, but rather in a bright room where every square foot is covered in books—crammed on shelves, piled on tables and chairs and couches, strewn haphazardly in teetering stacks on the floor.

  “You’re trembling.” Finn’s voice is a low song beside my ear, and I know I should let him go, but the commands refuse to transfer from my brain to my arm.

  “Here is the back of the couch. Use it to steady yourself. I’m going to clear a spot for you to lie down.” He’s careful and gentle, as though addressing a spooked animal.

  I nod and pull my head away from his neck, keeping my eyes down. I cannot look him in the face, not so soon. I shift to lean against t
he couch, and he slowly releases me. I sway but manage to stay upright, and he darts out of view. The sound of books being flung to the floor punctuates an otherwise silent room.

  “How are you?” I whisper to Sir Bird.

  He is breathing, I can feel it, but I have no knowledge of normal bird breathing, much less magical bird breathing, to determine whether it is too fast or too slow. It is easier, though, to focus on the bird rather than let my mind dwell on my own pain.

  “Here,” Finn says. His arm is around my shoulders again, and he guides me around the couch to where I can sit. I don’t want to lie down. It feels too vulnerable, too personal, and brings to mind the other strange couch I woke up on today.

  The coffee table.

  The hammer.

  “Are you going to be sick?” He sounds alarmed.

  I lie down and squeeze my eyes shut. I feel fingers reaching to take Sir Bird and flex my arm instinctively.

  “I promise not to harm your beastly little friend. But I need your hand. Will you trust me?”

  This time I nod, and his hands are soft as he lifts Sir Bird away. “I have my eye on you,” he says in a low, menacing tone, and I am relieved to hear Sir Bird caw ill-naturedly in return.

  Something warm and comfortingly heavy is placed over my waist and legs. I am shivering, shaking all over. Now that I no longer need to run, my body is shutting down.

  “Your hand.” Finn’s voice is cold. I’ve done something to anger him, and I open my eyes, confused. He’s kneeling next to me, fingers outstretched, just barely above my injuries. They shake until he draws them into a fist. “I will kill him.”

  “Wait your turn,” I try to say, but my voice breaks and I seal my lips shut.

  “Will you let me fix them?”

  “Are you a doctor?”

  “I would not let a doctor within twenty feet of your fingers. I can make them right again.”

  “Will it hurt?” I hate that tears pool in my eyes, but I cannot help it.