Tella sat down on the bed beside her sister. “Do you really believe Julian could be Legend?”
“I don’t know,” Scarlett mumbled. “I think Legend has power over his performers; I don’t believe he controls their every action, but I get the impression he can prevent them from revealing certain secrets. So if Julian really were Legend, I doubt he’d have allowed Armando to tell me the truth about the role he’d played in the last Caraval.”
“I hate Armando,” Tella said.
“He was only doing his job. But I can’t say I like him very much either.” Scarlett punched the pillow she’d been sniffling in, a bit of her fight returning.
“Do you think he could be Legend?” Tella asked.
“I think anyone could be Legend.” Scarlett sucked back the last of her tears. When she looked at Tella, her face was determined. “I think the only way to find out for certain who Legend is, is if we keep using Julian to win the game.”
“You want to use him?” Tella nearly toppled off the bed. This was not like her sister at all. “Where did this come from? I thought you didn’t even want me to play.”
“I don’t. But if you win and meet Legend, then we can find out the truth about Julian.” Scarlett pulled out a slip of paper as if it were a dagger she’d hidden up her sleeve.
This was definitely a new side of Scarlett.
Tella liked it.
“Julian gave me this,” Scarlett said. “It’s the next clue. He said he wanted to help you, but I think he was trying to bribe me with it.”
Tella took the page, recognizing the script from the first clue card she’d received at the party.
* * *
THE GOAL OF THIS GAME IS NOT WHAT YOU THINK,
TO FIND THE TRUTH SEEK THE WOMAN
OF PARCHMENT AND INK.
SHE ALONE HOLDS THE NEXT CLUE,
WHICH WAS LEFT ONLY FOR YOU.
* * *
“This sounds like a woman I met at a Wanted shop the other day in the Spice Quarter.”
It also sounded as if it truly were meant for Tella alone. She doubted everyone playing the game had paused at the same shop. Elantine’s Most Wanted. Tella had hoped to return there, but it seemed like a rather great coincidence that Legend was leading her back to the very place that had first put her in touch with Jacks.
The game was starting to seem too real again.
Tella reminded herself of all the trickery she’d just witnessed from Legend’s performers in the Temple District. She would have been intentionally naive to believe that Caraval was more than just a game. Caraval was just one giant deception, but Tella could feel it trying to pull her in.
She held out the clue card Scarlett had just given her. “Come with me tomorrow night to look into this.”
Scarlett bit down on her lip.
“What, do you have other plans?”
“Who would I have plans with?” Scarlett asked. But the question came out oddly shrill, and Tella swore her nightgown flinched, quickly flickering from pink to black.
Tella didn’t know what her sister was hiding, but again she had the feeling that Scarlett was concealing something.
“I’d just prefer not to go out at night,” Scarlett added. “I can’t risk getting caught up in the game again.”
“I understand,” Tella said. She just wasn’t certain if she believed her.
NIGHT THREE
OF CARAVAL
22
Tella would have traded a year of her life for another hour of sleep. She didn’t even care that she possibly had less than one year to live. She never wanted to leave the blissful blue comfort of her bed with all its soft blankets and downy pillows. Yesterday had been brutally long. But she’d already slept much more than she should have—and if she never got up she would definitely have less than one year to live.
Beat … beat.
Nothing.
Nothing.
Beat … beat.
Nothing.
Beat … beat …
Nothing.
Nothing.
Her heart was even slower than it had been the night before. But it was still beating. And Tella would make sure it didn’t stop. It did slow her down a bit, but after drinking a pot of strong tea and eating several toffee tarts and berry puffs, she felt a little more like herself.
She managed to finish dressing just before twilight. For that evening she’d chosen to wear a slender-skirted, corset-less dress the dark blue color of tears cried from storm clouds. It was perhaps too thin of a gown to wear at night, but it was easy to move about in. Although Tella was still a little breathless by the time she reached the sapphire wing, where Scarlett was staying.
Only Scarlett wasn’t in her room.
Tella knocked for a full minute, nearly bruising her knuckles on the heavy wood door.
Given how adamant Scarlett had been about not leaving the palace at night and becoming accidentally caught up in the game, Tella expected her sister to be safely in her suite. But either Scarlett had lost track of time—which was doubtful—or she really was hiding something from Tella.
Tella hated doubting her sister again, but as wary as Scarlett was, it made no sense for her to be out. Especially on an evening like this, when it seemed all of Valenda was Legend’s game board.
Unlike the previous two nights, where Legend’s constellations had been specific in their location, on this night they covered every district in shimmering bursts of celestial blue.
Tella found herself unusually grateful to Armando for pressuring her into earning the second clue. Without it, Tella would have had no idea where to begin her search.
As she left the palace in a sky carriage, she saw stars forming all the traditional symbols of Caraval: a dazzling blue top hat; a bouquet of blue roses; a blue hourglass. Though those weren’t the only shapes in the sky. Constellations reminiscent of the Fates hovered over Valenda’s hills and districts as well. Tella spotted a jeweled eye patch, a dagger crown, a skeleton key, a cage of pearls, lips sewn shut, and a pair of shimmering dark blue wings. The wings were probably meant to represent the Fallen Star, but they were so achingly similar to the wings tattooed on Dante’s back that Tella’s dying heart managed to speed up at the sight of them, filling her veins with a warm rush of blood.
When her carriage touched down in the Spice Quarter, Tella found herself looking around for Dante, but he didn’t appear to be following her that night.
She glanced back up at the star-bright sky, wondering which constellation he was beneath, and if he was there with someone else. She pictured his wide, tattooed hands on another girl’s neck, brushing her pulse as he charmed her with the same low words he’d said to Tella the night before. Even if I wasn’t Legend I would want you to win.
Tella’s stomach clenched painfully at the thought. Not that she wanted Dante there with her. She didn’t need to be distracted by his cryptic teasing or the low sound of his voice. The narrow streets of the Quarter were enough of a diversion.
Every lane and alley was packed, much fuller than the last time she’d visited. The colorful inhabitants of the Spice Quarter mingled with the holiday merchants, who appeared to be preparing the city for Elantine’s Eve by selling overpriced bits of costumes. The merchants stood in front of almost every shop, all of them shouting.
“Five coppers for the Murdered King’s crown!”
“Three coppers for the pearly cage worn by the Maiden Death!”
“Four coppers for a Prince of Hearts mask!”
“Two coppers for Chaos’s gauntlets!”
“One copper for the Unwed Bride’s veil of tears!”
Tella didn’t notice any of Legend’s performers, at least that she knew of, among them, but she thought she spied other people playing the game. More than once she’d heard someone knock on a brick wall and say, Legend sent me, as if it were a code to open some hidden door that would lead to the next clue. She envied their energy and their careless effervescence. Whatever courses these people were on, t
hey seemed very different from hers.
Either Legend was personally toying with Tella, or they weren’t all playing the same game.
The second clue she’d received told Tella to seek the woman of parchment and ink, which clearly indicated the older lady who worked at Elantine’s Most Wanted. But when Tella arrived, no one was there.
The scent of tall tales, charcoal pencils, and parchment tickled Tella’s nose as she stepped farther in. In one corner of the shop, a slim square of the space was set aside for a disorganized yet well-appointed art studio. Everything else was covered in paper—even the ceiling was plastered with yellowing posters that appeared to be older than the shop’s absent proprietor.
Tella tried to take in every image as she waited for the old woman to return. These posters were not scraps of paper with hastily drawn faces. These were works of art, with detailed renderings of criminals that Tella had only heard rumors of. There were many she’d not heard of as well. Every square of parchment and canvas seemed to tell a tale as marvelous as it was macabre.
Augustus the Impaler’s name apparently said it all.
There was also the Duchess of Dao. Wanted for inland piracy, selling poisons, and seduction.
“I didn’t know seduction was a crime,” Tella murmured.
“Depends on who you’re trying to seduce.”
Tella spun around. But instead of finding the ink-stained crone, Tella came face-to-face with a girl in a luminous parchment-white gown, sewn together with thick black stitches that made her look as if she could have been one of the inked portraits escaped from the wall. Aiko, another one of Legend’s performers.
She was always difficult for Tella to read. Aiko generally kept to herself, since her job was to observe. She worked as a histographer, immortalizing the history of Caraval by drawing significant events in a magical notebook, which was currently tucked under her arm.
Her appearance clearly meant that Tella was on the correct path. But Tella couldn’t honestly say she was happy to see the girl.
Tella liked Aiko well enough outside of the game. But she’d preferred to have avoided her inside the game. Aiko was known for making unforgiving bargains. During the last Caraval she had made a deal with Scarlett that had cost her sister two days of her life; Scarlett’s temporary death had not been like Tella’s, but it was still not something Tella would ever willingly experience again.
“You’re welcome to look as long as you wish,” Aiko said, “but choose wisely before asking a question. I’ll only answer one for free, and after that each will cost you something irreplaceable.”
“Can I just ask for the next clue?”
“You can, but I won’t give it to you. The most I can do is guide you toward it, if you manage to ask a better question next time.”
Blast it. Tella hadn’t meant that to come out like a question.
She kept her mouth shut as her eyes wandered over several more posters, searching for an actual figure from the Deck of Destiny, hoping it might possibly lead to the next clue.
She didn’t spy any Fates, but she did see crimes ranging from blood-drinking and cannibalism to necromancy, selling bad spells—
Tella halted. All thoughts of crimes and clues and Fates fled from her thoughts as she reached a poster in the center of the back wall.
She forgot how to exhale. How to speak. How to blink. How to move.
Trimmed in a starry border, this portrait was prettier than the others, though maybe that was also because of the beautiful face beneath the word Wanted—a face that bore an uncanny resemblance to Tella and Scarlett’s missing mother, Paloma.
23
Paradise the Lost.
Wanted for thievery, kidnapping, and murder.
Tella couldn’t pry her eyes from the picture. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to believe it.
After so many years of wondering about her mother, finally Tella might’ve found an answer to one of her unanswerable questions. But it was not the answer she’d hoped for. Her mother was a thief. A kidnapper. A murderer. A criminal.
Tella wanted to believe the poster was wrong. The mother she knew was not any of those things and yet as Jacks had said, The reason you couldn’t find her before is because Paloma was not her real name.
Her mother’s real name was Paradise, and Paradise’s resemblance to Paloma was unmistakable. It wasn’t just that she had the same oval-shaped face or thick dark hair. It was the way her lips were curved into that enchanting, enigmatic smile that Tella had grown up mimicking. Her large eyes were just the right amount of narrow at the corners, the perfect balance of clever and thoughtful. With a stab of jealousy, Tella realized she looked almost exactly like Scarlett. In the poster she even appeared to be around Scarlett’s age.
Did Scarlett know about this? Was this why her sister refused to ever speak of their mother?
“What can you tell me about Paradise the Lost?” Tella asked.
“She was special.” Aiko glided toward the portrait and ran an unadorned finger down Paradise’s cheek. “I never noticed until now, but she looks quite a bit like your Scarlett. Although Paradise was much bolder than your sister.”
“What else can you tell me about her?”
“Your sister or Paradise?”
“I know my sister better than she knows herself. I want to know about Paradise.”
Aiko’s dark eyes sparked with a familiar gleam. With her enchanted histographer’s notebook, the girl was almost magical and tricky enough to be a Fate. Or maybe Aiko was Legend—it would be brilliant if the Great Master Legend turned out to be a girl. “I’ll tell you all I know, but I’ll need your payment first.”
“You can’t have a day of my life,” Tella said.
“You’re not really in an ideal position to bargain if you want to know the truth about Paradise. She vanished nearly eighteen years ago so most people don’t remember her. But I come from a long line of storytellers.”
Tella shrugged, as if unimpressed. On the inside all she could think was, Eighteen years, eighteen years, eighteen years …
Her parents married nearly eighteen years ago. Tella knew because after her mother had first disappeared she’d searched for information about where her mother had lived before she’d married her father, but Tella had found nothing. Because Tella had been searching for a women named Paloma, but before she came to Trisda, Paloma had been the criminal Paradise the Lost. Jacks had been telling the truth about her mother’s name.
Tella had always felt bitter, as if she’d been robbed, because she’d only known her mother for half of her life. But now she felt as if she’d never really known her mother at all.
“That’s all I’ll part with for free,” Aiko said. “For the rest of her story, I’ll need something in return. And don’t worry, I won’t steal any days of your life.”
“What do you want?”
Aiko angled her head, long black hair falling to one side as she appeared to think. “Caraval is a world built of make-believe, and sometimes it’s difficult for those of us who always live inside it to feel as if anything is real. Most of us won’t admit it, but we all crave the real.” She paused as if she were about to add something else, but then she seemed to think better of it. “All I want from you today is something real. A memory.”
“You need to be more specific. I’m curious about my mother, but I’m not going to let you take something like the memory of my name.”
“I hadn’t even considered that.” Aiko’s dark eyes gleamed. “Excellent idea. But I’ll save it for another time. Tonight I’d like the last memory you have of your mother.”
Tella recoiled, instinctively taking a sharp step back. “No. I won’t give you any memories of her.”
“Then I cannot give you any information about Paradise the Lost.”
“Can’t you pick another memory?”
“You called Paradise your mother. I want to see why.”
“I never called her that,” Tella argued.
“Yes you did. Y
ou said you were curious about her. And since history is my expertise, I can tell you everything you want to know. So, either you can find another expert, or you give me the last memory of your mother. I will allow you one minute to think about it.”
Tella could not give up any memories of her mother. There were too few and they were too precious. But, if the game really was about sacrifice as Armando had said, sacrificing a memory would possibly allow Tella to make future memories with her mother.
And perhaps Tella was better off without that final memory. Ever since finding those cards in her mother’s room Tella had been haunted by them, unable to stop wondering what would have happened if she’d never flipped over the card with the Prince of Hearts or the Maiden Death. Would her mother still have left if the Maiden Death had not predicted her departure? Would she have already fallen in love with someone if she’d never turned over the Prince of Hearts?
“All right,” Tella said. “You can take the last memory I have of my mother.”
“Splendid.” Aiko glided toward the work desk in the back of the shop, appearing a little too eager, which only intensified Tella’s unease as Aiko opened her enchanted notebook to an untouched page of pristine parchment.
“All you must do is place your palm atop the page. Some people actually enjoy the process. Our memories weigh us down more than we realize.”
“Don’t try to convince me you’re doing me a favor.” Tella pressed her hand to the dry paper. It heated against her skin, similar to the sensation she experienced whenever she touched the Aracle, except this warmth went beyond her hand. It crawled up her arm to her neck, coating her like melting butter and turning her head comfortably fuzzy.
“The book needs to access the memory before it can collect it,” Aiko said. But now her voice sounded distant, like someone calling from the other end of a very long corridor.
Tella’s eyes fluttered shut and when they opened again, she was back in her mother’s enchanting suite on Trisda. Her mother was sitting on the floor across from her, clearer than she’d ever been in Tella’s memories.
Legendary--A Caraval Novel Page 17