Silverblind (Ironskin)

by Tina Connolly

  * * *

  Dorie trudged back to her desk, despondent. The landlady’s deadline of noon had come and gone, and she had failed. Walking to Malcolm’s and back had taken more than a standard lunch hour. She had told the lab she was headed to the library for research after lunch, and nobody really checked up on you, but still, she should look like she cared about her new job. They had set aside a corner of an office for her and she should spread some papers around it or something. Not that any of it mattered. All she wanted from the Queen’s Lab was the chance to get back out in the field.

  Well, that and the rent.

  She was miserable enough that she thought telling Tam now couldn’t possibly make it any worse. She would return the incubator to him and tell him. But he wasn’t in his office—had gone off to do some research, she was told. She wondered if he’d gone to the Portrait Gallery to look at that basilisk.

  Somehow she made it through the afternoon. She waved off offers from scientists heading out to enjoy the weekend, and tramped back to their flat. How much longer would it be their flat?

  Dorie sighed as she trudged up the stairs to their room, the temperature rising as she climbed. The smell of linseed oil drifted into the hallway and she opened the door to find her roommate working on her latest canvas. The canvas only partially obscured the nude girl draped on the armchair in the middle of the room, asleep in the late afternoon sun.

  A laugh broke through Dorie’s gloomy day as she shut the door. “And I just got reamed out for my morals, Jack. Our landlady only tolerates me because of that ‘nice Miss Jacqueline.’” Woglet launched himself from her shoulder and glided down to the armchair.

  “I am a nice Miss Jacqueline,” Jack said calmly. “Don’t drop your foot, Stella.”

  “Are you almost done, Jack?” Stella said sleepily. “I’ve got to get to my evening tutoring.” A coo from Woglet made her suddenly sit up and notice Dorie, and her look of shock made Dorie realize she was still in boyshape. Stella blushed as she grabbed her clothes, but all she said was, “You might have knocked.”

  “I am so sorry,” Dorie said, embarrassed by her forgetfulness. She turned to face the door.

  Jack snorted as she set down her brush. “Yes, yes. You can go. Can I get one more session tomorrow sometime?”

  “Sunday I can,” Stella said. Dorie could hear her unhurried motions as she dressed. “Will you get the passes for me for next Friday, though? My mother’s in town and I swore in blood I’d take her to your aunt’s nightclub.”

  “That should be easy, since I’ll have to be there all week,” said Jack in a voice packed with meaning. “I’ll even comp you a drink.”

  Dorie wondered what exactly that meant. She didn’t like the sound of it.

  “That would be lovely,” said Stella, and then in a raised pitch to Dorie she drawled, “You’re safe now.”

  Dorie turned around to find the tiny girl fully clothed in shirt and skirt, patting Woglet on the head. Stella had regained her composure, and Dorie thought it likely that she was the red one now.

  “Toodles,” Stella said, and sauntered past Dorie and out the door, waving her fingers.

  “I think she likes you,” said Jack as the door closed.

  Dorie reddened further. “You know what Stella’s like.”

  “I do,” Jack said quietly, returning to her brushes.

  Dorie went to look at Jack’s canvas. It was another beautifully rendered figure study, like all of Jack’s work. From the angle you couldn’t quite tell if Stella was dwarvven or if it was just a big armchair. “That’s funny,” said Dorie. “Because scale is such a thing with Stella—I mean, the Pig has stools, but not all places think about the dwarvven, you know? Like the post office, or the desks at school. And then does she need help with a trolley seat, or if we’re not around, is she going to bat her eyes at some man, and so on. But you can’t tell what the scale is here.”

  “Hmm,” was all Jack said.

  Woglet hopped over to the cabinets, where he had been having good luck finding mice. Dorie plopped down in the vacated armchair, thinking about their finances.

  Finally Jack said, “My aunt stopped by this afternoon.”

  “Oh.”

  “Yeah. Miss Bates telephoned her about the rent. We’re through, Dorie.”

  Dorie slumped.

  “Aunt Alberta will cover our rent, but I have to start training under her.”

  “You can’t do that. You’re so talented.”

  Jack threw her brushes into the cup. “So what? I can’t get a break. Even the nudie mag won’t pay what we owe. I’ve been scrounging food off of friends, I’m out of Alizarin crimson and lampblack and white; how can you do anything without white now and then? I tried to go paint by the harbor but with the heat wave everyone who can afford to buy art fled the city for the shore, and I can’t afford fare to go to the shore. Forget trying to have a breakthrough. I can’t paint, period. We’re through.”

  “I’m sorry,” Dorie said helplessly, over and over. She had had Jack’s salvation in her hands and she threw it away for her own pride. She might have broken down in tears, even, except Dorie Rochart did not cry. She gouged her temples with her fingers until the pressure behind her eyes subsided. She looked up to find Jack looking at her with reluctant sympathy.

  “Well,” said Jack. “Water under the bridge. I can still paint in the afternoons when The Supper Club’s closed. And my aunt’s going to teach me to drive her ancient car—maybe we can borrow it and get out of this hot city for a day off.” She put a hand on Dorie’s shoulder. “I know you’ve been trying. You’re exhausted, too. And it’s got to be hard staying a boy all the time—isn’t it?”

  Dorie nodded.

  “Look. My aunt’s breaking me in easy,” Jack said. “She could have started me off today with maraschino cherry negotiations, but instead she wants me to go listen to a musician for the club. I mean, it’s not all altruism—she keeps promising Uncle Léon she’ll go on a date with him occasionally instead of putting out fires at the club and she never does. Point is, you’re coming with me. We’ll go get something to eat.”

  “All right,” Dorie said with relief. She had not realized till that second how tense the strain had been. She let go, sagging, and her muscles and joints and bones melted, reshaped, softened back up into little blond Dorie. She had never been so happy to see her porcelain doll face, and at the same time, there was an overlay of regret as Dorian’s wry charm with its broken nose and banged-up leg melted away.

  Perhaps, when all of this was over, and she was ready to be simply Dorie again, she could be not simply Dorie, but a changed Dorie. She could meld the best of both worlds: be a girl again but with the stamp of her heritage on her face, with the marks of her life visible.

  “There,” she said to Jack, and Jack laughed.

  “I know you’ve gotten used to Dorian’s clothes—and heaven knows I don’t care if you go in drag, but at least go in drag suitable for a club.”

  “Ah,” said Dorie. “Right.” Jack herself was busy pulling a flared red dress out of the tiny shared closet, so it looked like dresses were the order of the day. Dorie grabbed the first dress she touched on her side of the closet and put it on. Another of Aunt Helen’s discards that hadn’t sold, but they all were. In the first place she didn’t care about fashion—even if she had had money she wouldn’t have spent it on clothes—and in the second, thanks to her fey mother, it didn’t matter whether she cared or not. Dresses reshaped themselves to her—or more accurately, her body reshaped itself to them. Minor adjustments, but enough to make anything remotely her size look tailored to her.

  This dress seemed much better than the lacy rosebud one. It was chartreuse silk, with a fitted bodice and short flared skirt. Jack watched with amusement as Dorie’s cleavage recontoured itself to fit. “That’s a terrible shade for a blonde,” Jack said. “Or it should be. Except your skin even changes—did you know that? Picks up slightly different undertones.”

  “Oh
?” said Dorie indifferently.

  “Only an artist would notice, I suppose,” said Jack. She tossed her paint-spattered trousers on her bed. “Every time I paint you I have to adjust the colors I use for the underpainting. You’re like the perfect model for someone to never get bored with—if you liked sitting still, that is.”

  “Stella’s the perfect model,” countered Dorie. “After your eighteenth job of the day all you want to do is sleep in an armchair. Although I could really go for that, too.”

  “Yes, where were you last night?” said Jack. She had taken all her bracelets off for painting, and now she loaded them back on.

  “With Tam,” said Dorie reluctantly.

  Jack wheeled around to look at her. “As Dorie? Or as Dorian?”

  “Dorian,” she said. “Except then I was also at Helen’s house as Dorie, and he saw me. As me.”

  Jack was shaking her head. “And you didn’t tell him, did you?”

  “No.”

  “Ugh. Dorie. This kind of thing never ends well.”

  “Ugh, I know!” Dorie had two nice-ish pairs of shoes and she dug them out of the closet. “Navy heels or copper flats?”

  “Flats,” said Jack. “How is he? I haven’t seen him since he left for University.”

  Dorie shrugged. “He’s written a book. He works at the Queen’s Lab.” We’re kind of doing something we’re not supposed to do, and I don’t want to drag you into it if I don’t have to. “Are we ready?”

  “Yes,” said Jack. “Since you don’t need to do any hair or makeup. Seriously, how do you do that?”

  Dorie groaned as she popped Woglet in the leather handbag and pushed out the door. “Oh, honestly, Jack, after however many years you know it’s not on purpose. I don’t even want to talk about hair and makeup. It’s a relief being Dorian, you know that?”

  “As long as you can stay in his shape.”

  “It’s getting easier. Your sketch helps.”

  “Good!”

  A couple of boys whistled as they went past and Dorie remembered that as a girl she dampened her aura, shrank back, fell away. Of course, when you were walking next to a tall girl with a fiery red dress and mile-long, satiny-dark legs, you might not be able to fall away. Boys were going to whistle no matter what.

  “I think…,” Dorie said slowly. “I think after this is all over, and I can just be a girl again, I want to be a different girl. Even if it’s more work to stay in a different girl shape.”

  “Go on.”

  “It’s like … who I am on the inside has never matched with my outside, you know? I don’t recognize myself when I look in the mirror. Changing to Dorian was the first time I ever started to like what I saw.”

  “Do you mean you want to stay a boy?” Jack said neutrally.

  “No,” said Dorie after consideration. “No, I’m a girl inside. Just a different girl.” She turned to her friend. “I wondered if you would help me make a sketch.” The heat was ebbing as the sun sank behind the buildings. The sky was the perfect fading blue of a late summer twilight. “I’m not artistic like you. I cobbled Dorian’s face together out of memories and your life-drawing sketches. I want you to help me create a Dorie I would like being. One who looks a little like my parents. One who’s got her choices written on her face, for good and bad.”

  “I’d be honored,” Jack said seriously. “But when you say your parents, do you mean—”

  “I mean my dad and my stepmum. Yes. Not genetically accurate but … yes.”

  “It’s a plan,” said Jack. She shook Dorie’s hand as they arrived at the club. “I’ll use that photo on your desk and come up with some ideas for you.”

  Dorie undampened her aura as they walked up to the front of the line. “We’re here on behalf of The Supper Club,” started Jack, but the sturdy bouncer waved them through before she could finish. In short order they were installed at a tiny table near the kitchen, with a decent view of the performing space. Dorie didn’t realize how starving she was until Jack told her to order whatever she wanted.

  “I think staying a different shape takes it out of me,” said Dorie. “I eat like a horse as Dorian. Or I would, if I could find enough dandelions.”

  “What have we been doing to ourselves?” said Jack. “The artistic life—maybe it’s just not worth it. Look at you, having to make choices between selling off wyverns and paying the rent. Me selling dirty pictures. How is that artistic integrity?”

  “We’ll make new plans,” said Dorie. “Refuse to compromise. Never surrender.”

  “Oh, I dunno,” said Jack. “Life is full of compromises. Maybe art is, too. Maybe this whole thing is foolish.”

  “No,” said Dorie firmly. “The bright side here is working for your aunt—”

  “The man—”

  “will free you from having to compromise your art. This is a temporary setback. You will work for your aunt for a bit and whatever business skills you learn will be useful if you want to open your own gallery.”

  Jack perked up a bit. “There’s that.”

  “You’ll have your artistic breakthrough on the weekends, that’s all.”

  “Weekdays,” Jack pointed out. “Club hours.”

  “And I get paid in two weeks. A lot can happen in two weeks.”

  Jack took a deep breath. “I won’t jump off a bridge tonight, then.”

  “Or marry some doughy millionaire.”

  Jack laughed ruefully. “I don’t think that’s ever an option for me. The millionaire would be followed shortly by the bridge.” She pulled her sketchpad from her satchel and set it on the table. Her pencil touched down as the first player, a thin cellist with long hair and beard, entered. “All right, Mr. Cello,” she said. “Do your worst.”

  “Worst,” unfortunately, turned out to be predictive. One cellist, two “musicians,” and four drinks later, Jack had a sheaf of mocking cartoons but nobody to hire for her aunt. Additionally, the screeching of the cello had started Woglet yodeling in harmony, and Dorie had had to step outside until that act was over. Now he was curled on her lap on a napkin, deigning to eat bits of chicken from her plate.

  “Well, that was a waste,” said Jack.

  “Hardly,” said Dorie. “Your aunt gave you money for dinner and musicians have been comping our drinks all night.”

  “Cheers,” agreed Jack, clinking her empty glass against Dorie’s.

  As if alerted by the motion, the waitress appeared behind them and deposited two more drinks at their table. “From the cellist,” she said with a knowing grin.

  “It’s amazing how fast the word gets around about who we work for, isn’t it?” said Jack. Under her breath: “Too bad the cellist was so lousy.”

  The waitress rolled her eyes. “And you don’t have to listen to him every time there’s an open night.”

  “Tell me,” said Jack. “Is it worth sticking around for anybody else? Between the cellist, the drummer, and that girl who was singing and accompanying herself on harmonica…”

  “It has been dismal, hasn’t it?” agreed the waitress. “It’s usually much better. It’s the summer curse—beautiful nights make people busk on street corners or chuck it all and go to romance. But the next guy is good, I promise. He doesn’t come often—has a real career I gather, unlike most everyone here who wants to ‘make it.’ Stay for him and you won’t be sorry.”

  “Sure thing,” said Jack, lifting her full glass. “Have to, don’t we?”

  “She was cute,” said Dorie, as the waitress left.

  “Not my type,” said Jack.

  “Not Steeeella,” said Dorie, who was feeling tipsy.

  “Hush, the pianist is coming on.”

  “If he’s anything like the cellist a little noise would improve—” Dorie started to say, but then she saw the pianist and stopped, mouth open.

  Tam.

  “Wait, isn’t that—?” said Jack. Dorie flapped her hand at her to hush.

  He was in the same sort of clothes he wore every day—canvas
trousers, boots, that battered leather jacket. He had, thankfully, taken off his explorer hat, and his sun-streaked hair was wild.

  The cellist had worn a suit. The harmonicaist had worn an evening gown. Yet no one laughed. Quite the opposite—quiet settled over the noisy club.

  In the silence one finger fell, striking the ivory keys precisely, and the note rounded and shaped itself through the silent air. Another, another, and then both hands were pulling an unfamiliar melody from the keys. Unfamiliar—and yet not; as it stretched and pulled like taffy into the air the crisscrossing melody pulled familiar memories into her mind—the forest, the wyverns, the eggs. Standing in the clearing with Tam and watching the wyverns swoop down to the nest. And then the melody took another turn and it began creeping along, guilty and ashamed. Stealing and thieving, and next to her Jack shifted uncomfortably in her chair.

  Dorie was feeling pretty uncomfortable, too. This was how Tam felt, she could tell. This was how she felt. Eggs for research—a step up from Malcolm. Stealing them for the ironskin. A step up again, perhaps. And still you felt guilty.

  Well. Tomorrow would tell them if they could return the new wyvern chicks back to their families. That would make up for a lot.

  She sat in silence—the whole nightclub did, even Woglet—until he was finished, and then there was a sea of applause. He was last—how could anything top that?—and the waitress said, he’s too good for us, you know, and Dorie agreed, while Jack just sat and stared past her sketchpad with no sketch of Tam.

  Jack was silent as they left, tramping home through the darkness. Finally she said, “It felt like he just reached into your head and pulled something new out of it.”

  “Sure,” said Dorie, who did not really understand the artistic process, but understood that Jack liked to think about it. “I had no idea he liked to play the piano. I don’t remember him doing that.”

  “Play and compose,” pointed out Jack.

  “And write contraband books, and do field work better than anyone except me. Makes you wonder what else he’s hiding.”

  “We’re all hiding something,” Jack said. “You don’t talk about being half-fey.”