by E D Ebeling
When the dance broke up she was in a different part of the hall. The molding had been carved to look like a grotto. Candles poked out among plaster stalagmites.
“Fadril, darling,” said a swan man to his swan lady, “you’re already slowing. I’ll get you some perry.”
“No you shan’t, because I won’t drink it, and you will, and you’re wobbling enough to look almost a natural dancer––” He dragged her, both giggling madly, back into the crowd. Sarid attempted to follow them and tripped over someone’s hand. It was lying over the stones as if dead, and she followed its slack line back into the gloom. It belonged to a boy, sitting against the wall. He was wearing a mask––an otter, she thought, but she wasn’t sure. She looked around for the pile of vomit and couldn’t find it.
“Shall I get you some water?” she said.
“They are coming with their screws.” He was holding a pear in his hand.
“Are you all right?”
“Light save me. The wounds will never close.” He put the pear on a shelf in the rock and looked up at her. Sarid saw the large pupils through his eye-holes. Mad eyes. She wondered if he had walked into the hall by accident; he must have put on someone’s discarded mask and been quickly overwhelmed by the crush of bodies.
“Where are you staying?” she said. “I’ll take you back.”
“Help me,” echoed the boy, drawing his knees up and rocking.
“You needn’t fear me. I’m quite a bit smaller than you.”
“Small and smaller. There is no size in this place.” He still rocked. “I am a ghost, you are a ghost, and we could squeeze together into a tiny stone.”
“What place?” she said. “Where are you?” Something was wrong. More wrong than simple lunacy.
“Look about you.”
Sarid shook her head. “Only dancers.”
“Give me your hand and I’ll show you.”
She knew she shouldn’t. She could slip into a mind as easily as walk into the sea—it was some of the first magic her father had taught her—and an insane mind was worse, much worse, than the deepest, most pressure-pounding crack in the ocean floor.
She grabbed his hand.
His skin was cold and dry, and the air smelled of winter. The grotto was the same, the candles still glowing. But it seemed wrong somehow, as through it were all a misty simulation of some past event. As though if the mist were to clear there would be nothing; some worn stones and withered sedge.
“Do you see them?” The boy was standing now, and he pointed to where the dancers should have been. The hall was the same, but empty.
But as Sarid looked closer she saw that the garlands were dead and twisted up like ancient throats, the velvet curtains threadbare, faded to an ugly dun, the green walls covered with a film of smoke and dust centuries old. Her eyes followed to where the boy was pointing. The floor. Shapes moved beneath it like shadows behind gauze, angular and grotesque.
She heard faint cries, screams, and strangely affected by it she put her hands to her ears. “What are those?” she said. “Under the floor?”
“The slaves,” said the boy in the mask. “They put iron rods through us. We were puppets and so they made us. But it’s not fair.” He began to cry. Tears soaked through the cloth of his mask. “I didn’t know. I didn’t know anything. But they hunt for me and make the stones hot. Gods,” he cried, and a chunk of the floor gave way under him.
Sarid grabbed his arm and pulled him to the side of the hole. Light came from it, shifting and red like an ember; and it grew, following his feet, and Sarid tugged him away. The floor smoked; Sarid’s shoes blackened, heels threatening to turn under her. She gasped when the burn reached her feet.
She ran full out, pulling the boy after. He was so heavy, so much taller than her, and the stones groaned and crumbled always just where their feet had been.
Finally they reached the other side of the hall, and the crumbling slowed. The stones didn’t smoke and heave so. The result was that she turned her eyes toward the hole and saw inside it.
Humans, Elden, saebelen, and other, stranger, races danced below in an orange blaze.
They looked like twisted paintings of familiar subjects. Blurred, smeared, as though Sarid’s perception had been choked off right where they danced. Some had rifts in their faces, holes to a deep, black place. They carried flails of iron and ran between people hung up by their wrists, people in rich dress––ball gowns and dancing jackets––and Sarid recognized some of them. The boy in the otter mask was looking at a girl––the princess, whom Sarid knew from long ago. One of the blurred people, his mouth a windy, roaring hole, approached the princess with a long, iron screw. There was a pear affixed to the end. An iron pear that opened its petals and bloomed pain. Sarid closed her eyes and went down on her knees.
She looked up and called to the boy, “How do we get out?”
“Out?” the boy said.
“There’s always a way out. How did you get in here?”
“There isn’t a way out.”
She closed her eyes again, and filling her mind was the iron pear with the petals.
She remembered the other pear. “Back to the grotto.”
“I will die,” said the boy. “I will jump and die.”
Sarid took him by the arm. “Come on, the grotto.” As soon as she stepped forward with him the floor began to crumble again. She ran, pulling him with a strength sprung from conviction. Her feet burned, but she gave them no thought––she knew it wasn’t real. None of this was real. They fled around the side of the hall, keeping to the wall. They reached the grotto and Sarid saw the pear in its niche.
She grabbed it. The floor beneath them groaned and shifted, and she thrust the pear at the boy. “Dig your hands into it. Smell it.” He took it from her and bruised it with his big fingers.
Sarid smelled it: sweet and woody. The smoky air grew fragrant. She looked past her shoulder––the hall was bright and green, stuffed full of fresh garlands, moving with dancers.
“Seven hells,” she said.
The boy in the otter mask dropped the pear. He licked the juice off his palms. He took Sarid’s chin in his hand, lifted her mask slightly, and kissed her on the mouth. He laughed––a sound as joyous as fifty Yule bells clanging all at once––and he twirled around and was lost in the throng.
Sarid wiped her mouth, astonished.
Rischa found her there, twenty minutes later, still standing in the same spot.
“Bones,” he said. “I’ve gone to hell and back looking for you.” His sweet face was showing, his mask dangling around his neck. “You promised me a dance.”
And though she’d done nothing of the sort, she accepted his hand and they danced.
The steps weren’t difficult and Rischa led her through them. Her cheeks grew hot and she shrugged off her own mask. His hand on her waist made her skin tingle, and she thought of the pear. She began to cry. “Am I that bad?” he said. His mouth looked so familiar.
“Can I kiss you?” she said.
He stopped moving and stared at her. She did it, quickly, impersonally, and it was just like the other kiss. She was lightheaded and tight in strange places. She needed to get away.
“I’m going to bed,” she said.
He looked surprised. “I’ll take you back.”
“No. Stay here.”
She moved too quickly for him to follow, and she came alone to her room.
Gryka scrambled up from her bedding, gave a long-boned stretch, and walked over, tail wagging sleepily. But the tail began rolling in earnest, and the dog stuck her nose in Sarid’s skirts. Sarid’s tightness had become a cramp. She pushed the dog away and saw the blood. She took off the soiled dress and crouched over a copper bowl, confused and shivering. She had never suspected she was human enough.
Three
Her lips were full and dry in the morning. She got up from her bed and bent over, thinking of butter-churns and waterwheels. She turned when she heard a noise from the fire
place.
Rischa entered, batting dust from his knees. How she hated his shadow.
“What are you doing here?”
The dog leapt up and accosted him with her tongue. “At least Gryka appreciates company,” he said.
“I’d appreciate a door so you would knock first.”
He lifted his head. “I never thought––” He made a face. “I’m sorry, I’m being a gigantic arse.” He pushed the dog away. “I’ll affix a little bell outside the fireplace. Would you like that?”
She threw a robe over herself. “What do you want?”
“My brother’s looking for a girl in a leopard mask.”
So he’d found out. She was vexed by how quickly. “Torment me more, would he?”
“He’s saying the strangest things,” he said, looking sideways at her. “He was in a bad way last night. Wasn’t supposed to have gone at all.”
She nodded, and walked across the floor to her fire-fountain. “Acted like he had seventeen bludi knocking about in his head.”
“So it was you.” He walked up next to her. “What did you do? He was going on about the floor crumbling––”
“I wasn’t the one who made it crumble.”
“You stopped it,” he said shortly, accusingly. “No one ever stops it. All we can do is wait. What did you do? Leap into his head?”
“Yes.” She poked at the banked coals in the fountain, and blew them into life. “Don’t ask after the details.”
“Gods.” His eyes were big. “I was joking. In his head? Could you do it again?”
She stood up, wiping soot off her arms. “Imagine the most horrifying nightmare you’ve ever had had come true.”
He was silent for a moment. Then he said, “Is that why you were crying?”
She filled the kettle with water from a pitcher and hung it on its hook. “I don’t want anything more to do with your brother’s head.”
“But if it happens again––” Rischa blurted. He said more carefully, “You must understand. He’s got worse. There’s no cure anyone can find, and then all the sudden there was you––”
“Leave me alone.”
“I won’t.” He was deadly serious. “I could make things difficult for you. I will become Ravyir if my brother isn’t fit for it.”
She almost laughed, but her stomach turned. She wasn’t sure it was a cramp. “You would use extortion?” she said.
He opened his mouth and looked at his boots. “No,” he said scornfully. It changed her mind, for some reason.
***
Rischa arranged for the first meeting between them to be held at sunset.
Sarid kept herself busy that afternoon, picking cobwebs and burs from Gryka’s fur, brewing fennel tea for her stomach, ginger tea for her head, and valerian tea for her nerves; and the sun went down much too early for her taste.
After looking in a window at her raggedy dress, she dug through a pile of clothes in the corner. She put on her least-stained jacket and met Rischa outside her fireplace; and they walked the long corridors toward his family’s rooms, which were in a wide tower on the south side of the hall.
“I’ve told him who you are,” Rischa said. Sarid wondered if she should have taken more valerian. “I’ve also told him to pack in his sarcasm. Perhaps he’ll behave. I don’t know.” They had come to a round common room upholstered in grey velvet, and without bothering to knock Rischa pushed open a door.
A cloud of red dust burst out, and Sarid sneezed.
“Great gods, Yoffin,” Rischa said. “Must you shower in paprika?”
A little man, the one with whom Sarid had danced at the first ball, opened the door further. “We was having eggs, Master Rischa.” Yoffin pulled Rischa into the room and ushered Sarid after.
“Let him be,” said Rischa’s brother. “He smells better that way.” Sarid could scarcely see him through the red.
“Charming.” Rischa opened a window and tried to wave some of the stuff outside. Yoffin took two eggs off a platter, put them both in his mouth, and tucked them in his cheeks. He swallowed them whole, one after the other.
“Gurd,” he said, “I’m flattered you’ve dropped by but I can’t have no trouble––I’m already in trouble.”
“Take this back before it starts stinking,” said Rischa’s brother, and he thrust the platter, one egg rolling round it, towards his manservant.
“Off I go, off I go,” chanted the man, backing out the door, “before my ears become a liability.”
The door slammed shut. “The kitchen girl,” said Rischa’s brother. The air had cleared and Sarid could see him better. He was more gaunt than his brother, his hair darker, his eyes a lighter gold. His shadow was as black as his brother’s.
“You’ve promised not to be difficult,” said Rischa. “Bones,” he said, “this is Savvel. Savvel, this is––” He scratched his ear. “I can’t remember your proper name.”
“Sarid Hyeda.” Savvel dropped himself into a chair and stretched his legs under a little table, making it wobble. “I’ve been asking round. Don’t look so frightened,” he said to her. “It wasn’t a threat. Though I’ll allow I don’t think my little brother knows much about you.” He smiled. “Why are you here? To depose the Pashes? You have my blessing.”
Rischa’s eyes rolled upward, and he yelled, “If you want help you shouldn’t beat it around the head.”
“Help,” said Savvel. “I keep forgetting I need it.” He rapped his knuckles on the table. “I’ll be nice, Rischa, if it contributes to your peace of mind. Now, I suppose we must talk,” he said to Sarid, “about my little nightmares. But I’d rather my brother didn’t hear, caring as I do for his peace of mind.” (Rischa blew air from his cheeks.) “So I wonder, could you bear it if he left for a while? And do sit down.” He pushed out the other chair with his feet. “So I stop feeling like a boor.”
Sarid sat down, tongue-tied and sweating. “Go on,” she said to Rischa. “There are––things––” Fear seized her and she was incapable of more.
“You heard her,” said Savvel. “I won’t throw her out the window. Not before we’ve got used to each other.”
“Not sure I should,” muttered Rischa.
“Go.” Sarid pushed her jerking hands between her legs, and Rischa let himself out.
“I’m checking back in just a bit.” He looked at her significantly—she couldn’t tell what for—and shut the door.
Savvel sat back and tilted his head. “You’re frightened of me,” he said. “Why?”
“What do you want?”
“I want you to help me.”
She folded her skirts and then smoothed them. “How could I possibly help you?”
“You’re saebeline.”
“You’re a lunatic.”
“And that’s the curious thing, isn’t it?”
She found a hole in her skirts and set to making it wider.“No one believes a lunatic.”
“Except his brother.”
Sarid could feel the blood rushing up her neck, over her face.
“The terror pumps from the heart,” said Savvel. He leaned his chair against the wall. “Sarid is in love with Rischa. Sarid and Rischa.” His smile was infuriating. “What your grandmother did is inconsequential to me, Sarid. A rumor. The same, vengeful blood may run in your veins, but love runs hotter.”
The veins stood out in Sarid’s hands. Her hair lifted in a cold wind. She turned to see where it came from, but there was nothing, no window open. He was still smiling, as though he could see something she couldn’t, and she said angrily, “What is it, anyway? What’s wrong with you?”
“You and everyone else”––he rolled his knuckles over the table––“and the stones and the birds and the trees do an excellent job pretending. But there’s really nothing here but a hole.”
“If that’s what you’ve decided, then I can’t help you.”
“I haven’t decided anything. It wasn’t my choice.”
“Why do you think I can cure you? Mayb
e it’s just who you are.”
He leaned in, suddenly serious. “I certainly hope not. For your sake. It was a big mistake you made at that ball. Once my father finds out, you’re stuck with me whether you want it, whether I want it, or not. And if ever I were to become Ravyir, they’ll bundle you straight off to Anturvy and make you a royal medic, so you’d best get used to me.”
Rischa reappeared in the doorway then, and Savvel put the smile back on his face, and let her go. The sun had gone completely. The oil lamps flickered and made watery reflections in the windows, and Sarid could have run down the hall so great was her relief.
Rischa was silent on the subject of his brother. He seemed more interested in her. “Why do you dress like that?” he said. “Don’t you get cold in those shreds?”
“They’re not shreds.” She played with the frayed lace on a sleeve. “Ladies wear them once and throw them away. Why’re you asking? Were you planning on making me a royal medic?”
Rischa laughed. “Did he threaten you with that? No, I don’t think so.” Then, “Who are you, anyway? One of the gentry? Someone’s secret by-blow?” He said it lightly, as though he didn’t much care.
Sarid looked into a window. His brother’s comment about his ignorance must have stung. She shrugged. “Gentry, I suppose. Or used to be. My family did a terrible thing forty years ago.”
Rischa didn't say anything. But he was sure to hear the details at some point, from someone less than sympathetic towards her, so she decided to get it over with.
“My grandmother was seduced by a saebel.” She spoke as though she were reciting a lesson. “She got pregnant and was run out of Charevost. She bore my father, and he grew up and was lonely and abducted a human girl, so my sister and I are a quarter saebeline.”
Rischa shook paprika out of his shirt collar. “You've a sister?”
“Yes. She lives with my father in the mountains.”
“If they’re there, what are you doing here?”