“You know you’re Princess Renya’s surrogate?”
I nod. My hands are cold again, so I start rubbing them together.
“Well, you two are as thick as thieves. You’re like twins from different mamas. I don’t know how that’s possible, to be up-front about it. We’ve all seen you bleeding right through your clothes, all for a girl who’s too selfish to behave. Yet you treat her like a sister.” He throws me a sideways glance, and there’s a touch of judgment in his eyes that infuriates me.
“I told you I knew I was her surrogate. What else do you know?”
“Do you know that your brother Jayden is suspected to be the leader of the OLA?”
That glance shoots my way again, so I stare out the window. We’re on a high stretch of ground between bridges, and looking out, the Isles are all a mix of green and blue. There’s a pond off to the right, fed by a fast-moving creek. Everywhere else I look I see moss and grass and more moss again.
“I know that about Jayden, yes,” I say.
“Well, do you know about your connection to the OLA?”
“My connection . . . ?” I curse myself for making my shock so obvious, yet again. But I can’t worry about that right now, because my mind is racing.
If we were anywhere else, I’d whirl on him and pummel him with a million questions. I’d fire them so fast his head would spin, just to get a feel for how trustworthy this accusation really is. I’d study his face; I’d try to read his intentions.
That’s what I would do, if we were anywhere else. But we’re here, cresting the bridge that descends to the Ninth Isle, and through the dust and dead bugs on the windshield I get a clear view of the next checkpoint—the Ephemeral City—for the first time. And no matter how I want to scream at him, nothing’s going to tear me away from this view.
“That’s the Tenth Isle, right there,” he says, and there’s a little awe in his voice, too. “I’ll never get used to how it hits you when it first appears.”
The Tenth Isle is not a separate island off in the sea. It’s an island in a clear blue lake that covers most of the Ninth Isle, so it’s an island within an island. It’s home to the first trees I’ve seen since we reached the Isles, trees that are gloriously tall and still mostly green, dappled here and there with flashes of red and gold foliage, and growing up out of the forest is a towering skyline of huge tents, like a circus as big as a village. Under the bright sun, the canvases glow in every color—sea-foam green, sunset red, sky blue—and they dot the horizon, fluttering in the sea breeze, held up by poles rising higher than I thought tent poles could rise. In the center of it all, an enormous white tent stands, its pointed roof held aloft by at least a dozen poles like a castle with a dozen spires, and atop each point, a pennant of a different color flaps wildly in the wind—orange, violet, teal, and black, some solid, some striped, and some starred.
Behind the palatial white tent rises a giant wheel, turning like a clock, carrying gilded gondolas in a wide arc, at least a hundred feet above the treetops. Atop each gondola, rings of flames like wreaths of flowers ripple and dance and spill down to the ground like flowing garlands of sparks.
“That’s the Wheel of Fire,” my driver says, and I see he’s caught me staring out at it.
“It doesn’t seem real,” I say. “How is it that the whole city isn’t set on fire?”
“Haven’t you ever seen fire flowers before?”
I say, “I can’t remember.” But what I’m thinking is How could I forget something so strange?
He says, “Fire flowers aren’t flowers at all, and I should stop teasing you—you’ve probably never seen them before. They’re only burned at the festival, where chips of the fire trees we’re hauling are lit. Each fragment flares into a bloom, but only their resin burns, and their resin doesn’t drip, so the flame stays contained. It’s a selfish kind of fire. Like the rest of the magic of Lanoria, wouldn’t you say?”
I don’t answer him. Instead I ask, “What did you mean when you asked me if I knew about my own connections to the OLA?”
He makes a turn off the road into a vast gravel lot and pulls into a long line of similar trucks. At the front of the line, I can see Outsiders waving flags at drivers, motioning them through a gate in a tall fence. “This is the line to the receiving area. You should get down,” he says, tugging a folded blanket from the backseat. “Get down on the floor and I’ll cover you.”
I do as he says, and I go from a view of the Ephemeral City lit by bright sunshine to complete darkness. It’s hot and hard to breathe, but before I can say anything, he keeps talking like nothing’s changed.
“Like I said, I know about your brother Jayden, and his connection to the OLA. I probably know more than most about them, because they tried to solicit me in the past. Few people can bring goods into the palace without being searched.” He’s quiet for a moment, and my nerves spike as I imagine that someone is standing beside the truck window. But then a moment later he continues. “I’m not the only one at the palace who knows about Jayden, and I know there are people at the palace who suspect you might be with the OLA, too. I’ve always assumed it was true, to be honest. And then I saw you in the King’s City, just one day before the bombs went off at the Apple Carnival.”
“Bombs?”
“Yes indeed. The OLA hit the carnival this year, and the day before, you were talking with someone I’m certain is a member of the OLA, because he was the very same person who tried to solicit me to join.”
He keeps talking, but I can no longer make out what he’s saying. My ears are ringing, and I’m bathed in sweat, and I can hear someone calling my name from far away.
His words have thrown me into a memory.
It doesn’t come on with memory sickness, at least not yet. Instead it feels more like a blow, like I’ve been hit hard in the back of my head.
I’m in the King’s City, and someone is calling to me from across Queen Rosamond Square. It’s a boy, someone I associate with my brother Jayden. Then he’s right in front of me, and he’s adamant about something, and I hear my own voice repeating, I will. I will. I strain to see him, but the memory is already receding. I’m peering through the dark, but I can’t see his face.
The truck lurches forward and I’m jolted awake, only I don’t think I was ever really asleep.
A voice comes from right beside the driver’s window. It’s a woman, asking to see a bill of lading for the truck. The driver says something he thinks is funny—there’s a laugh in his voice—and a piece of paper rustles as it’s pulled from a pocket and unfolded. She asks him if he’s got an extra clove cigarette, says she can smell it in the cab.
I hold my breath, and my heart beats as fast as a rabbit’s. The back of his hand smacks against my leg as he picks up the cigarette case from the floor right beside me.
She thanks him, and her voice is too loud. I feel like I’m suffocating. My head is swimming. Then the truck rolls forward and I know we’re clear. But I still feel like I could be sick all over this blanket.
Not out of fear of being discovered. The truck is still rolling and he’s whispering, “We’re in. Stay down until I tell you.”
I hear him, but my thoughts are still far away. I’m remembering Queen Rosamond Square, and there’s a frenzy of activity around me.
It’s the day before the Apple Carnival. The day before bombs will go off in a crowd, and I was just speaking to a member of the OLA.
What did I agree to do?
Twenty-Eight
I don’t know what time it is, but I know it’s late enough that I should be starving, and would be, if I didn’t still feel sick enough to vomit. I climb out of the truck cab, my dress sticking to my sweat-soaked back under my coat. My driver seems blissfully unaware of the memory I just had. He hands me my bag, jumps down in front of me, but then scowls.
“You all right?” he asks. I’m crouching down in an effort to stay out of sight, his embed blinking right in front of my eyes. “You look kind of shook-up.” He c
hecks over both shoulders and then lowers his voice. “She didn’t see you,” he whispers.
“I know, I know. It’s not that.” I stare at the ground. That’s all he’s going to get from me on that subject. The truth is I don’t want to talk about that memory, or anything else that might stir up that same kind of queasiness in me. I can’t afford to slow down now.
I shuffle my feet. I guess I’m not good with goodbyes. “Thanks for the ride. . . .” Now I can’t help but look up at him, embarrassed. “Did you tell me your name?”
“It’s Hollis,” he says. “My friends call me Holly. You can call me that, when you make it back to the palace.” He reaches into the backseat of the truck and pulls out a cap, and with one quick motion, he pulls it onto my head. “That’s what you need, a plain gray cap.” He straightens the brim that sits low on my forehead and shades my eyes. “A brilliant disguise,” he says, and winks.
I tuck the ends of my hair up under the sides and back. “Thanks,” I whisper.
Holly grabs my hand and pulls me into a hug. “I don’t know if you are OLA or not,” he says into my ear. “Just stay safe. This place will be crawling with Authority guards, so keep your head down and your eyes open.”
With that he lets me go, gives my bad shoulder a firm pat that almost buckles my knees, and turns around to climb back into the cab. “I’ll see you,” he says.
I nod, and the truck starts up, and I turn my back. I hurry around a tent where they’re selling burning fire flowers in cheap tin lanterns, and I melt into the crowd. I’m not ten yards away before I’m wishing Holly had never left. He might be a stranger, but he was a stranger who was trying to keep me safe, and that’s way better than being alone.
People press in on me from everywhere, and by people I mean Enchanteds, with a few Outsiders here and there, doing the jobs no Enchanted would ever do. A small group hurries toward me, bent under a load of sandbags that are used to brace the tent poles. A few more are carrying fat purple logs to a chipper and feeding them through. On the other end, two Enchanted women in tie-dyed dresses are taking the fragments and setting them on stands, lining them up by height on a table at the front of their tent, and lighting them all on fire, so that they give the appearance of a burning garden. A third woman inside the tent is calling out from behind a table to the festivalgoers streaming by. “Get your fire flower today, and enjoy its flame for all three nights!”
And everywhere I look, there are images of King Marchant. His face ripples on the wind on flags that hang overhead, and he peers out of tents on stacks of souvenir plates and china cups. Along the pathways that wind through the Ephemeral City, lampposts are decorated with large banners displaying his life-size image, so that it feels as if the king himself were staring down at the crowds.
I try to keep my eyes on the ground. I can’t risk falling into memory sickness. I know I lived in the palace with the princess and her family, so I must have known the king. If just hearing Holly talk about seeing me with a member of the OLA brought on the return of a painful memory, what might happen if I see a familiar face?
Of course, I know a familiar face isn’t always a trigger. The memory of Darius walking me to the whipping post, taking the whip from Lars’s hand—that horrible memory proves many things to me, not the least of which is that I can look at a familiar face for days without a hint of memory returning.
But then, I met Darius right after I’d begun the race. That initial dose of Oblivion must be wearing off. I should probably expect more and more memories to return.
I’m startled from my thoughts by someone saying Prince Lars’s name right behind my shoulder. I spin around to find two Enchanted Authority guards, both men, standing in the shade of that palatial white tent in the center of the city, beside an open doorway. Their eyes are on the legs of Enchanted women, dressed in brightly colored sundresses, as they pass through the open door carrying large trays of wood chips. “He’s not here,” one of the guards says. “I heard the prince won’t make an appearance at this year’s festival at all.”
“He’ll be on the throne soon enough,” says the other. “Next year’s festival, it will be his face staring down at us from every pole.”
As I pass in front of the open doorway, I keep my head down but I raise my eyes, unable to resist peeking inside. In the center of the floor stands a circular stage, surrounded by rows and rows of empty bleachers. Two smaller stages have been erected in the far corners of the tent, and on each one, a Hearts and Hands bout is under way. A family of Enchanteds passes close by on the path, so close they almost bump into me. Like me, they are not watching where they are going. Instead, they are all looking down at a printed program they share between them. “Qualifying matches all day,” says the mother, flipping the program over to the back. “With the championship match to start at midnight.”
“Midnight!” squeals one of the children, a girl of about thirteen. “That’s when the princess will be lighting the torch. Can we go? Can we go? Can we go? Please, please, please, please!”
The mother says something in response, but I can’t understand, because a loud brass band is heading toward me from the other side of the white tent. They are marching, with a flag twirler in the front spinning two flags—one with King Marchant’s image and the other with Prince Lars’s—and I flush with heat when my eyes fall on Prince Lars’s face. But then the flag twirler passes me by, and I’m surrounded by baton twirlers tossing flaming sticks into the air, and I duck my head and walk quickly until the sound of the music is far behind me.
When I stop, I see that I’m right in front of the Wheel of Fire. To my left, a long line of Enchanteds with a few Outsiders mixed in are shifting their weight from foot to foot as they await their turn on the ride. I suppose even Outsiders can ride if they have the mackels for a ticket. There’s a rich sweet smell in the air, and it makes my stomach growl. Opposite the entrance to the ride stands a wide food counter, where vendors are frying up doughnuts and funnel cakes, and my queasiness has receded enough for my hunger to gnaw at me.
But then the unmistakable sound of someone groaning in pain draws my attention to a large crowd of people gathered to my right.
Between the onlookers, I catch a glimpse of a huge gear, like an outsize component of a clock. It’s turned by Outsiders chained to long wooden arms that extend from the center of the gear. As they trudge in well-worn circles, the gear turns the giant wheel overhead.
The chained Outsiders are many, strapped in by rows, dirty and bent, and their taskmaster stands above them at the hub of the gear, watching, his hands raised, rubbing his fingers against his thumbs.
While I watch, one of the younger men stumbles, and the taskmaster calls to him to get up. When he stays slumped, the other Outsiders on the wheel keep going, so that his feet drag across the ground. I can see this has happened to others—the caked blood on the tops of their bare feet gives them away. The wheel doesn’t slow, but the taskmaster hits the slumping man with Projectura anyway. His body shudders. He doesn’t raise his head, but vomit spills from his mouth onto the ground. Then the gear moves, and his bloody feet drag through it.
A group of gathered Enchanteds, who seem to be here for no reason except to enjoy the taskmaster’s show, laugh until they are red in the face, falling together and spilling their drinks from their cups. They keep cackling, even as the Outsider gets his feet back under him again.
I notice that I am rubbing my own fingers against my own thumbs, my eyes moving from the taskmaster to the laughing Enchanteds and back again. Someone bumps me from behind, and I turn just enough to see the red stripe running down the pant leg of a King’s Knight, so I duck into a rectangular blue tent full of burning incense and portraits of King Marchant made of flower petals.
An anxious Enchanted vendor scurries over to me to show her wares, but then she looks me up and down and turns away. As soon as the King’s Knights have passed, I merge back into the crowd, heading the other direction.
I’m trying to move
quickly, tamping down my anger and my hunger as I pass more and more tents giving off the scents of cooking food, when a woman with her hair and face hidden by a scarf comes up alongside me and grabs me by the arm. I jump back, but the woman tells me not to be afraid.
“I know who you are and I want to help you,” she whispers, never slowing. She slides something into my hand. When I look down, I see that it’s a ripe orange. “Take this, and a word of warning,” she says. “The prince is planning to wait for you at the final checkpoint of the race, in case you slip through the hands of all the Authority guards and King’s Knights who are searching for you here.”
I can’t stop myself from lifting the orange to my nose and drinking in its sweet fragrance. “Thank you,” I say, and I let my gaze brush across her face for just a moment. Her eyes meet mine, and though the rest of her face is covered, her eyes are eerily familiar. I try to read her, but the crowd is so big and it’s churning. I can’t trust my Cientia here.
She wraps a scarf like the one on her own head around mine, covering me from cap to shoulders. “Stay hidden,” she says. “I can’t tell you what the next clue is—I don’t know it, and no one will tell me—but I know there’s a fleet of trucks parked just beyond the west gate, and I know that at least one has the keys inside.” She turns her face when she notices a group of Authority guards heading toward us. “Good luck and stay safe.”
She wraps her arms around me and pulls me into a brief hug. I smell jasmine on her. And then she’s gone.
I tug the scarf across my face and hurry away, but come to a sudden stop when, like an object floating to the surface of a dark lake, a memory rises up out of the depths of my mind. I think it was the jasmine that gave her away, but I know all at once that the woman with the scarf was Princess Renya. I turn in a circle, looking for the back of her head, but she’s gone.
With this scarf covering my face, I’m able to finally lift my head and properly search for the clue. One part of me wants to keep hoping that Marlon is alive and keep looking for him, but I’m not speaking with that part of me right now. I can’t. Instead I keep my eyes moving, searching for a plaque or a sign or a banner—anything that might contain a riddle that would point me to the next checkpoint.
Crown of Oblivion Page 23