Books by Jessica S. Olson
available from Inkyard Press
Sing Me Forgotten
Sing Me Forgotten
Jessica S. Olson
For Jon.
You wrangle kids, you keep the peanut butter stocked, and you don’t bat an eye when I ask you how best to stab a person with a shard of glass.
You’re the real dream, and this book wouldn’t exist without you.
Jessica S. Olson claims New Hampshire as her home but has somehow found herself in Texas, where she spends most of her time singing praises to the inventor of the air conditioner. When she’s not hiding from the heat, she’s corralling her three wild—but adorable—children, dreaming up stories about kissing and murder and magic, and eating peanut butter by the spoonful straight from the jar. She earned a bachelor’s in English with minors in editing and French, which essentially means she spent all of her university time reading and eating French pastries. Sing Me Forgotten is her debut novel.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Acknowledgments
Chapter One
I am a shadow. A shimmer of black satin. A wraith in the dark.
Music soars above the audience to where I hide behind a marble cherub near the Channe Opera House’s domed ceiling. The lead soprano’s vibrato trembles in the air, and my eyes fall shut as her music sends her memories rippling across the inside of my eyelids in shades of gray. The images are fuzzy and the emotions distant, but if I surrender myself to them, I can almost forget what I am for a moment.
Every night when the curtains rise and lights engulf the stage, when the seats fill with whispering patrons and the air shivers with the strum of strings, I glimpse the world outside—a world I’ve never seen with my eyes but know better than the beat of my heart because I’ve experienced it through a thousand different pasts.
The lead soprano’s memories pull me in, and for a moment I am her, dashing out onto a stage bathed in golden light and sending my voice to fill the theater. The audience watches me dance, and though I cannot see their expressions from the soprano’s vantage point, I imagine their eyes glassy with tears as my song plunges into their souls and strums along their heartstrings with slow, practiced grace. Their faces shine, their gazes riveted on my beauty. I raise my hand to my own cheek where I can all but feel the warmth of the spotlight.
But instead of smooth skin, my fingertips slip against my mask. I jolt my hand away, hissing, and relinquish my hold on her past.
My attention flicks to the premium box where Cyril Bardin meets my gaze. You’re too visible, Isda, his eyes say.
I shrink into the shadows as applause smatters like raindrops below, not nearly enthusiastic enough to ensure adequate ticket sales. It seems the soprano, though nearly flawless in her performance, was not enough to make up for the rest of the abysmal cast.
Luckily, I’m very good at my job.
The clapping peters out as Cyril strides onto the stage. The performers line up behind him, tugging at their costumes and adjusting their wigs as discreetly as they can. Where their smiles pull across lips tight with too much makeup and wrinkle in tired, powdery lines around their eyes, Cyril’s is charming, as always, accentuated by a regal, high forehead, paper-white hair, and a clean-shaven jaw. He gestures to the crowd with twinkling eyes. “Merci, my illustrious guests.” His voice booms out to bounce back from the far walls. “It has been truly a pleasure to entertain you tonight.”
Without thinking, I reach for the pendant at my throat and twist its chain around my fingers as anticipation bubbles like champagne in my stomach.
“Now before I bid you au revoir, it is time once again for the Channe Opera House’s age-old tradition of having the audience join our performers in a special rendition of the Vaureillean classic, ‘La Chanson des Rêves.’” Cyril turns to the orchestra at his feet and nods. “Maestro.”
The conductor cues up the strings, then climbs onto the stage at Cyril’s side and raises his baton. As one, the audience launches into the familiar tune.
The skin on my left ankle bone prickles—the place where I once carved the Manipulation Mark that enables me to harness my magic. The scar has since faded and been scraped away by clumsy tumbles down the stairs, but the ability that carving it gave me is still just as strong any time voices fill the air with music. My power purrs to life in my chest, reaching out toward each voice, yearning for the memories that live in them. I scan the faces quickly, letting images and emotions trickle through me one after the other, a burbling current of sights and sounds and smells.
When people sing, I see their memories, starting with the newest. If I want to, I can comb backward through time, sifting through the liquid swirl of moments in their minds as though rippling my fingers through water in a creek.
It is only in these moments that I truly feel alive. Where the world has forced me to hide, hated me for my power, tried to kill me for what I am, I have found my purpose in surrounding myself with its music and holding the memories of its people in my hands. They don’t know I’m there, churning through their minds among their secrets and darkest moments, but I know. And no matter how many nights I’ve spent up here tucked away in the shadows, the thrill of finally having some measure of power over them sends tingles straight through every nerve of my body.
This is my performance, the only one I am allowed. I may not be able to stand on a stage and hypnotize them with my voice, but in this small way, I am just as much a part of the production as the dancers and singers.
I slip into each audience member’s recollection of the performance like a ballerina into her spotlight, skipping from one mind to the next, easing away any negative emotions I find there and replacing them with positivity. Once the tone is right, I move on to erasing the moment where the lead tenor’s voice cracked on that high G and eliminating the instant when one of the backup dancers tripped as she twirled across center stage.
I whisper-sing along with “La Chanson des Rêves” as I work, the words so familiar they fall off my tongue as easily as breathing. The chorus is my favorite part.
Who was the monster, the man or Les Trois,
In Time’s unstoppable tread?
Was it the terrible queens, the world’s guillotines,
Who bathed Vaureille in red?
Or was it the man with love in his heart,
Innocent and brave tho
ugh he seemed,
Who unsheathed a blade, their hearts he betrayed
As he ended their lives while they dreamed?
I work quickly. With nearly two thousand seats in the theater, it is impossible for me to modify every person’s recollection of tonight’s performance, but I don’t need to tamper with them all. If I can do the majority before the song ends and my connection breaks, it should be enough to encourage positive reviews, repeat ticket sales, and season pass popularity.
The orchestra strums out the final refrain, the audience falls silent, and the images vanish from my mind.
I twirl my pendant’s chain around my pinky as a grin spreads across my lips.
The air fills with the rustle of patrons making their way to the exits, and I survey their expressions as they tug on gloves and babble enthusiastically to one another, dressed in silks and tuxedos, adorned with pearls and top hats. Their cheeks glow with the flush of excitement. Their arms wave emphatically as they speak. Their hands dig into their purses for the glimmering coins that will buy them tickets to return.
Cyril catches my eye from the stage. He does not smile—that would be too obvious—but the creases in his cheeks deepen in approval.
I nod, chest heaving slightly from the expense of power, and settle back to wait for the opera house to empty.
* * *
Only once the workers have cleaned away the litter from the seats, extinguished the lanterns, and packed off for home, do I emerge from behind the stone cherub on the ceiling. I drop silently through the trapdoor that only Cyril and I know about and land like a cat in the upper hallways of the opera house.
The grand, palatial building cradles me in its dark depths as I make my way to the main floor, across the shimmering tile of the lobby, and toward Cyril’s office in the east wing. The faint scent of smoke curls lazily in the air as the newly extinguished candelabras stretch their arms toward the high ceilings in the shadows.
My skirts shush-shush-shush across the floor, the only sound to break the silence. I breathe easily. Now that the lights are out and the people are gone, there is no risk of being seen, no risk of having someone catch sight of my mask and wonder at what it hides, no risk of being discovered and sent to my death.
Stars glitter in the windows as I pass, and I pause for a moment to lean on a windowsill, undo the latch, and push the pane wide. Crisp, autumn air brushes against my neck and ruffles the raven feathers attached to my mask. I drink in the taste of approaching autumn, the crumbly musk of orange-red leaves, the slight chill on the edge of the breeze.
The grayish glow of gaslights carves shadows along the maze of cobbled streets outside. A horse nickers nearby, and the scrape of carriage wheels chafes at the wind.
What would it be like to walk along those streets? What would my footsteps sound like if I were to stride over those cobblestones? What would the air feel like on my bare face?
I know the city of Channe better than anyone. I’ve seen every inch of it, from the lavish homes up on the hill to the sooty district of the factory workers to the west. I’ve explored it through the eyes of bakers and councilmen and cabbies alike—anyone with enough money in their pockets to afford a night at the opera.
But to actually see it myself? Not in flimsy, black-and-white memories where the sensations have been dulled and the emotions siphoned away by the passage of time, but there in the middle of it all? To really experience it? I lean against the window frame as constellations sparkle like jewels in a sky of black velvet.
Laughter draws my gaze to the street corner. The soprano whose memories I viewed earlier climbs into the dark recesses of a cab, followed by one of the lead dancers.
My jaw stiffens.
As much as I love their music and the memories I see in it, I cannot help but resent every last one of them. The performers, the dancers, even the patrons. They, all of them, play a role in making simply existing dangerous for me. It is they who would shriek at the sight of my face, they who sneer at the mention of gravoirs, they who have carefully constructed a society in which I am not welcome.
It is because of them that the world will never hear my voice.
I pull the window shut and, instead of heading upstairs to Cyril’s office like I’m supposed to, I turn and reenter the empty theater.
It is silent as a tomb, the watchful dark a cold caress as I make my way to the stage, mount the stairs, and stride to its center. I turn and face the gilded, plush seats.
The chandelier and theater lights have long been extinguished, and the room is full of shadows. I pretend each one is a patron like those in the soprano’s memory. They watch me with rapture, their brows raised in awe. They sit forward in their seats, holding their breath, waiting for my next song.
I tip my head back and close my eyes, imagining the gentle hum of a bow sliding along the strings of a violin, ushering in the opening notes of my aria.
But as I inhale and open my mouth to sing, a soft ballad strokes along the shell of my ear.
I stop. Hold my breath. Turn my head toward the sound.
The quiver of a faraway voice slides through a melody I don’t recognize. A man’s voice. A rich tenor that glides from note to note with the smoothness of melting butter.
I should ignore it, exit the theater, and mount the stairs to Cyril’s office. I should stay far away from whoever is singing in the dark.
But my body shifts toward the music, drinking it in, letting it shiver into my ears and roll down my spine as I make my way back up the aisle and into the hall. My pace is slow at first, but it quickens as I get nearer. What kinds of memories might I see in his refrain? What new parts of the world might I discover?
His voice is snow the day after a frigid night, its surface smooth as glass and sparkling like diamonds. It is the bright fire of autumn transforming the world into a kaleidoscope of burning reds and golds. It is the soft caress of darkness, welcoming and accepting and constant.
Everything in me stills. The thrum of excitement in my pulse eases; my lungs cease their in-and-out movement; even my heartbeat slows. His vibrato sweeps from note to note, pulling me with it.
When I reach the end of the hallway, his memories crash into me all at once with the force of a thousand tons of stone. I stumble backward against the wall and grasp the foliage carved there so tightly pain stabs into the pads of my fingers.
Where every other memory I’ve seen has been a faraway wisp of grays and muted glows, his are achingly vibrant, full of color and vivid sunlight.
They swirl through me, a rainbow of emotions and hues sweeping me along like the tide of a monstrous river. Instead of dropping into his most recent memory, I plunge backward in his mind, spinning past echoes of laughter and flashes of music, too enthralled by the deluge of feelings to settle on any one memory and instead letting them all wash through me, a sparkling cascade of life.
My body tingles, sparking like lightning as though I’ve come alive for the first time in my seventeen years. As I hurtle through the images, one face jumps out, and I stop. Stare.
She’s a small girl—maybe six years old—crowned in dark hair that looks so real I swear I could reach out and let its silkiness trail across my palm. With a bright blue ribbon tied at the crown of her head and a lacy periwinkle nightgown clinging to her petite frame, she could be any other child in the world.
But my body goes rigid when I see her. The blood drains to my feet, and I sway where I stand. My hands dart for my pendant, clutching it so hard its ridges cut through the flesh of my palm.
This girl could be any other child in the world but for her face.
Her face is like mine.
My knees buckle, and I crash into a nearby candelabra. It topples, clanging like a gong against the tile.
The tenor’s voice breaks off, and the memory vanishes. I scramble upright, heart thundering, sweat making my hair stick to the
nape of my neck.
“Hello?” the tenor calls.
I back up several paces, staring horrified at the candelabra at my feet.
And then I run.
Visions of the night of my birth when I was dropped into a well and left to drown engulf me as I lift my skirts and bolt around another corner. As a gravoir, a supposed memory-twisting monster, it is impossible for me to forget a single moment of my existence. But the memory of the cold water, the burn in my chest, and the grip of Cyril’s hands as he dragged me back out and whisked me to safety has never felt more real or immediate to me than it does now as I flee for my life.
For if that tenor catches me, if he removes my mask and sees what I am, the death that has stalked me since that frigid, wet night will finally claim me.
Chapter Two
The tenor’s footfalls trail me, echoing against the ceiling and statues until it seems as though he is everywhere at once. I slam one foot in front of the other and pray to the God of Memory to hide me away where this man will never find me.
I careen around a staircase and skid to a halt in front of Cyril. His hair glows like a white halo in the starlight, and his lips pull tight into a line as his eyes flick from my face to the hallway behind me. With a grimace, he grips my elbow and steers me into a deep alcove in the wall before sweeping forward to meet the tenor.
“Monsieur Rodin,” Cyril says, his voice quiet and tense as the tenor comes around the corner. “What on earth are you running for?”
“I’m sorry.” The tenor slows to a stop but dodges a look past Cyril’s shoulder to the hallway where I am hidden. I press my back against the wall, praying my black dress stays obscured in the shadows and the crystals I’ve sewn into my mask don’t glitter.
The mysterious tenor is a boy around my age. He wears threadbare clothing and a cap atop a mop of dark hair that hangs across his eyes and tangles in his eyelashes. “I saw someone,” he says as his chest heaves in and out from our chase. “It could have been a thief.”
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