by A. G. Howard
Even if Thorn tried to argue, Father Erik would convince him all was perfect and proper with a hypnotic purr of those celestial and hedonistic vocal cords.
Over the years, Thorn had become acutely aware of his guardian’s manipulations. When he was that eight-year-old boy, Thorn had delivered the ortolan back to the forest that afternoon after being “healed” by Erik. Then he watched as the bird tried to fly but instead floundered on the ground, gasping for breath. Erik had convinced the songbird she was healed . . . but her ribs still pricked through her lungs, and she died just the same.
Nothing could live forever. At least, nothing of the natural world.
Thorn often wondered if he had the strength to refuse his father’s will, now that he knew. But this had evolved to something beyond Erik’s web of persuasion. Thorn owed him his life and purpose, and would do most anything to hear pride and praise on the strains of Erik’s beautiful voice—no matter how maniacal or horrific the request. He wanted to be the son Erik needed.
The man behind the masks was his father in all the ways that counted. And family counted above all else.
So, of course Thorn would take him to Rune, as soon as Erik had digested her song’s energy and could make the trip. They would be silent in their observance; she’d never know they were there. A slight detour from their relaxed Sunday routine of resting in their rooms wouldn’t hurt.
Thorn told himself this, in hopes to stifle the truth: that he himself wanted to see her again, and that later, when he and Father returned home, he would pick up his violin. After two years of sleep, his muse had reawakened.
Tonight, he would serenade Rune in her dreams once more.
It’s his eyes that call to me first—coppery and glimmering. I squint, unsure if they’re real.
Then I hear the music, and there’s no denying the reality, or that I’m meant to be in this place. Meant to see, hear, and feel everything. It’s the only way I’ll be complete and comfortable in my own skin.
I stumble into the pitch-black tunnel without hesitation, following the heart-rending chords of the violin. Literally following the notes. Each pitch dances along the stony wall—a different color—like a laser-light show. My hand traces them, drawn to the tactile delicacies they offer: blistering reds, temperate greens, sun-warmed yellows, and blues as cool and variable as the ocean depths, where cerulean and navy glisten like sapphires on the tails of monstrously fanged fish.
In the distance, I see him: my maestro, draped in shadows. His eyes flash again—two pennies at the bottom of a wishing well. Can he make my wishes come true? Can he help me sing without pain?
A heavy mist seeps down from above and separates us.
A dripping sound echoes, and my feet splash through cold, rising water. I’m momentarily brave, but my courage wanes when the liquid turns black and swallows me up to my neck.
I shiver in the icy waves. My throat constricts. I panic . . . struggle to keep my head exposed. It’s not a tunnel; it’s a box. A box filling with water that reeks of rotting fish and stagnant mud.
I’m drowning.
My skin freezes, my lungs burn; my mind grows dizzy, numb. I kick against the wooden walls, but I’m too weak, too small, too scared to break through.
Unconsciousness ebbs.
The violin revives me. It becomes more than music. It becomes a voice.
My maestro speaks through it, coaxing me to fight my way to freedom. I grit my teeth and kick again. Everything I do is in slow motion, until finally, my left knee bursts through, leaving a gaping gash in my skin. It will be a scar one day.
But all that matters right now is I’m free.
The box bursts open and I swim to the surface. Overhead the night sky greets me, blanketed in stars. The musical laser-light show becomes planets in chaotic disarray. I drift upward until I’ve joined them, in the middle, at the epicenter of the Milky Way, where it’s warm and comforting like a velvet throw.
My own song breaks free to join the violin, a duet both celestial and powerful. The spaces resonate in my head, lining up behind my mouth and nose and transitioning to my upper register. My voice lifts—a high C so pristine it forms a golden glow—a bubble made of glittering energy. It matches my maestro’s sparkling eyes.
The planets and stars in the galaxy float around us, aligning, riding upon the melody the violinist and I now carry as one.
Two halves united.
With the heavens aligned, all is right with the world. Music and love and happiness. Also, peace.
The universe belongs to us. Together, we own it.
Together, we won.
“Rune.”
The whisper warms my ear. I curl up and pull the covers over my head, reluctant to leave the private haven of REM sleep.
“Come on, hon. They’re serving breakfast in the atrium. You need to eat so you can get to class on time. How are you feeling today?”
The concern in Mom’s voice shatters my utopia, but I already know the details of that dream by heart. It’s the same one I started having shortly after Dad died. The dream that pulled me through the darkest and most terrifying event of my life, when my grandma tried to drown me. When I was falling unconscious, his music roused me and gave me the power to save myself.
Even after that, my maestro continued to keep my subconscious company for a long time during nightmares of the event, until I suddenly stopped dreaming of him two years ago. I’ve missed our duets in my sleep. It felt so good to finally be in that place of comfort again.
All this time, I’d always assumed Dad’s spirit was the one playing the violin . . . my deliverer of music. And that his eyes shifted from hazel to flashing coppery-gold to serve as my beacons in the darkness.
But yesterday, I saw those eyes shining inside the gardener’s hood. And now I’m having my dreams again.
What does that mean?
I shiver, only partly because Mom drags off my covers to expose my skin to the chilly room. I squint at her. She’s holding the bed curtains open, and soft lavender light filters into my comfortable cave from the lava lamp. It still looks like midnight in my tiny room. Her stance is blocking my digital clock.
“What time is it?” I ask.
“Seven thirty a.m.”
The answer shocks me enough to sit up, so fast I almost bump the top of my head on the antechamber’s low, arched ceiling. “You’re supposed to be at the airport by eight! Why didn’t you wake me up earlier? I wanted time to say good-bye.” I feel like a little girl again, needing that red thread around my wrist so I can let her go.
Mom pats my hand. “It’s okay. I called and got my flight changed. I’m going to stay till the end of the week, to catch up with Lottie and to do a little sightseeing on my own. I can buy a few outfits to wear while I’m here. Maybe I’ll even find the perfect wedding dress, yeah?”
“Mom . . . you should be back home with Ned, planning the wedding.” Newly engaged, and he’s all alone at our house instead of spending quality time with his fiancée.
She shakes her head. “You’re my priority, Rune. I just don’t feel good about leaving yet. Your spell was . . . different this time.”
Her unspoken I’m worried you might be going completely bat-monkeys like Grandma Lil echoes in the silence. The lava lamp makes a soft burbling sound and the fluorescent light casts everything in eerie shadows. Mom looks like half of her face is gone.
I cringe and roll my shoulders to alleviate the sense of dread and confusion rising around me like the freezing water in my dream, adding to the guilt I’m already wrestling with over so many things—including making Mom stay longer, all because I faked fainting yesterday.
Not only did she have to call the airport, she had to notify her boss at the house-cleaning service, too. Now she’s using up vacation days that should be saved for her honeymoon. She must be really upset to disrupt her life like that.
And to think, she doesn’t even realize how screwed up I am.
“Let’s get a move on.” She nudges
my left knee with her palm, almost touching the scar that’s exposed by my lace-trimmed shorty pajamas. “The seniors have last breakfast while the juniors start their classes. It’s the perfect time to meet the kids you’ll be graduating with.”
I cringe. After the “fainting” incident yesterday, I stayed in my room the rest of the evening and was able to avoid meeting any of the students other than Sunny. However, most of the teachers breezed through for introductions.
Professor Diamond Tomlin—the youngest of the staff at age twenty-five, and instructor of all things theatric and scientific—came in, having just returned from a weekend gig in Paris with his alternative punk band. Other than his tweed jacket and pleated pants, he looked the part of a drummer, with his dark beard and wiry build. But his hair sticking up in thick, brown waves all over his head and the sharpness of his inquisitive blue eyes gave him more of a young, rebellious Einstein vibe, which fit with what Sunny had told me: that he likes to perform science experiments in his dorm after lights-out, resulting in strange orange flashes beneath his door.
Principal Norrington came in behind the professor and shook my hand, saying he looked forward to having me in his financial-literacy and career-planning classes second semester. With his accent and weathered good looks, I was convinced there was a British spy hidden behind his stuffy sweaters and wire-rimmed glasses. Confirmation came when he unintentionally bumped into Madame Harris—school librarian, classical lit teacher, and counselor in a curvy, blond-haired, gray-eyed package—on the way out of my room. As he helped her pick up the papers she’d dropped, their eyes locked, and a 007/Miss Moneypenny vibe passed between them.
Their romantic moment shattered when Madame Bouchard—instructor of historical musicology, vocal pedagogy, and all around scariest staff member at the academy—appeared. Bouchard fit perfectly inside this gloomy, haunting place with her stiff-as-iron poise, thin-lipped, heavily painted face, and straight white hair bleeding to a hot-pink dye job before falling to her waist. She was something fresh out of Bride of Frankenstein. Yet from what Sunny told me, Bouchard is more mad scientist than monster. Her favorite pastime is taxidermy. She’s even transformed one of the empty dressing rooms on the second floor into her workshop and personal exhibition hall.
Her gruesome reputation precedes her, judging by how the other three teachers scattered as Bouchard started to grill me about my training: who my instructor was in the States, how many times I’ve performed in public, and how long I’ve “been such a little songbird because you must have practiced Renata’s aria from The Fiery Angel for months on end to master it so well.” Aunt Charlotte adjusted her glasses and insisted I’d had a stressful enough day and wasn’t to be interviewed.
The two ladies began arguing. My mom and I sat, dumbfounded, until Headmaster Fabre arrived and told Bouchard to save her questions for another time. He had a kind, handsome face and a French accent; but his thick white hair and burly beard were more reminiscent of a distinguished seafaring captain than a Frenchman. Bouchard didn’t dare back talk to the man who hired and fired the staff. She glared at Aunt Charlotte, then left in a fluster of stutters and snarls. After rescuing me like he did, the headmaster would’ve been my choice for teacher of the year, if not for his subjects being world geography and social studies, my least favorites. He complimented my singing at the audition, then apologized that his wife, the costume designer and health teacher, was away in Paris at a fashion show.
She is the teacher I’ve most wanted to meet, and I’ve already decided to look for her today. I’m hoping to offer assistance with costumes. If I’m going to be stuck here, sewing and designing are the best shots I have at staying sane.
“Where are those uniforms we borrowed?” Mom interrupts my thoughts, digging through my closet where we shoved my things last night before we settled in to sleep—me in my comfortable curtained-in cave and she on the chaise lounge. I’ll offer her the bed tonight. It’s unfair for her to have to curl up on a couch that’s four inches too short just because of my dishonesty. Besides, I’m curious to know whether she’ll hear the same things I heard coming from the vent above my bed . . . rustling and breathing. Maybe those are the kinds of sounds a hundred-year-old building makes. But I’ll feel better knowing it wasn’t all in my head, like everything else seems to be.
Mom drags some clothes from the closet. The pink bag that held my uniforms went missing yesterday between my unplanned operatic performance and our attempt to unpack and pretend everything was normal. Aunt Charlotte had to sift through old uniforms donated by last year’s seniors to give me temporary substitutes.
I wrinkle my nose, remembering how awkward and big they looked last night when I tried them on. “Why can’t I just wear street clothes until they show up? These are extenuating circumstances, right?”
Mom chews her lip. “Rules are rules. Lottie’s already bent enough for you. She has to draw the line at academics. It affects your grade if you go to class out of uniform. These will have to do until we find the ones we bought. I’m sure they’ll turn up by the end of the day.”
I nod, not mentioning how violating it feels, having your clothes stolen, wondering why anyone would take something so personal in the first place.
Unless it was for revenge because I interrupted the tryouts . . .
My unruly hair cascades around my shoulders, several strands sticking to my suddenly overwarm cheeks. I use the brush Mom hands me to rake the waves from my face until they pop with static. Snuggling a knitted headband into place, I swing my feet over the bed’s edge and yawn.
As I’m pouring my sleepy limbs into the gray jacket, long skirt, and white ruffled shirt that make up the riding habit wannabe, the scent of bacon and something cinnamon blends with rich notes of coffee and wafts under my door. My stomach rumbles. Last night, after I showered to clean the sticky soup from my skin, I refused to eat anything else. I said I wasn’t hungry; but the truth was, I was too freaked out.
How is it possible that I saw a guy in Victorian clothing who no one else knows about, who can vanish and drain the life from roses with just a touch? Whose eyes have been in my dreams for years, alongside violin music I thought belonged to my father?
I force the unsettling thoughts deep down inside. I have enough to worry about today in the real world. Cinching the borrowed skirt’s waist with a belt only causes the excess fabric to pleat and bulge in weird places. At least the red necktie fits. After applying light strokes of blush and peach-tinted lip balm without risking a peek in the cheval mirror, I follow Mom toward the door, resigned to my fate.
I won’t be able to get out of this until I prove myself capable of performing without breaking down. Yesterday’s fiasco brought this truth to light, and it’s been confirmed by Mom’s determination to stay at my side until she feels I’m strong enough to be here without her. For years, Mom has put her life on hold to deal with my lack of one.
It’s time to figure out why this overpowering ability to sing—that once brought me so much satisfaction—is gnawing away at me like a sickness. I need to know why I’m broken, so I can fix myself. One way or another. Maybe this place can help me do that, and then I can finally look forward to my future. Because I’m starting to realize there’s something worse than stepping up and facing your fears—and that’s living as if you’re already dead.
6
PERFORMANCE ART
“Thinking will not overcome fear, but action will.”
W. Clement Stone
Abandoning my claustrophobic dorm room for the vast opulence of the grand foyer, Mom and I squint against the sudden brightness. Morning filters through tall, cut-glass windows, casting dappled imprints of diamonds, squares, and stars along marble floors, bronze statues, and the mirrored wall.
I focus on my reflection, and that eerie sense of being watched shivers through me. In Leroux’s lore, the phantom often observed his prey through mirrors, even used them as doorways to lure Christine into his underground world.
An i
cy gust whisks over me and teases my hair. Startled, I glance upward at the vents, breathing a sigh of relief to find the air conditioner kicking on.
I start to relax, basking in the dissonance of the warm sun dancing with the chilled air. There’s always been something about being in natural light that invigorates me, and makes me feel capable and strong. It’s almost as if I absorb its power somehow. Dad would’ve said I was basking in its aura. And Mom would’ve laughed at him. But it doesn’t matter whether she believes or not. I know what I feel.
I step directly into a ray of sun and my blood responds, sparks of stamina bursting through my limbs and muscles. The energizing sensation feeds my courage. As Mom and I take the winding stairs, following the scents of food to find the atrium, I convince myself I can do this. This is a school founded on theatrics. I can act confident. I can face the other students, apologize for interrupting the auditions, and win them all over.
My optimism wavers as we arrive at the atrium on the third floor, partly due to the quiet chatter seeping out through the dark, arched entrance, but even more because of the song being piped in softly through speakers. I recognize the rich nuances of the language—marked with aggressive and hard consonants—as Russian. It’s from the opera the students were auditioning for yesterday; although this piece belongs to one of the male performers, which explains why the orchestral rainbow blooming in my mind isn’t consuming me. Only female arias seem to have that effect.
I hesitate at the threshold, hoping that if another of Renata’s songs comes on today, it won’t speak to me . . . or if it does, that the low volume will subdue my itch to purge. I’d like a day or two to recoup before facing another bout of humiliation.
Mom crosses the threshold and gives me a nod of encouragement. Nibbling the ends of my hair to taste the sweet orange and vanilla of my shampoo, I follow behind her, and step into character.