“It’s unacceptable to me, too. I’m sorry you had to take a slave to the theater.” Velsa couldn’t resist mirroring Parsons’ haughty tone. “What a horrible life you must lead, how ashamed you must be of having to keep your precious, perfect soul in a Fanarlem body. Maybe all Fanarlem souls are tainted, but I do wonder how souls get tainted to begin with.”
Parsons’ mouth snapped open, and Velsa thought, I went too far with that one.
But really? She could have gone farther.
“Parsons—” Irik stood up too. “Please stop. I know you’re upset, but all Velsa did was to try and lead a quiet, unmolested life. Weren’t you the one who gave her a new skeleton and took her to the theater?”
“Shut up, Irik.”
“No one will take you seriously if you make a huge fuss about this,” Irik said.
Parsons threw the drink at the laughing Halnari girl and stormed out of the room. Irik gathered up her skirt and went after her, giving Velsa only the briefest unreadable expression. Velsa realized some of the other women in the room had stopped their own games to watch the fight. The last thing she wanted to do tonight was call attention to herself.
“So I can have this custard?” the Halnari girl asked no one in particular, as Velsa ducked out of the room.
“There you are!” Pin was in the hall, pulling back from another door she had just peered in. “I was worried when I didn’t see you for a while.”
“I’m fine. Calban made me apologize to Parsons.”
“I saw her storm by…didn’t go very well, did it?”
“She said he only did it to humiliate her. I don’t quite understand.”
“Parsons is a spoiled brat. Calban likes putting her in her in place, I think. He likes putting everyone in their place, really.”
“I’ve noticed.”
“There is a funny sort of fairness to Calban, though. I wouldn’t be surprised if Parsons is right, and he did ask you to apologize to her just to get her spine bent out of shape. That’s kind of satisfying, isn’t it? Wasn’t it her fault that you’re here?”
“Yes, but…I could do without all this guesswork about whose side he’s on.”
“I’m not sure Calban has a side.”
“That sounds just as bad.”
Pin gave her a gentle expression, and it was a little eerie to think how much her soulful, long-lashed golden eyes and faint smile must resemble the same concerned expressions Velsa gave Grau when she was trying to comfort him. “You’re young,” Pin said. “I can’t blame you for being ambitious.”
They were back in the banquet hall, and still no sign of Sorla. Velsa was definitely getting concerned, especially since she kept seeing Flynn’s assistant, but not her. She went back to the staging room to get a new tray of drinks, and brought one to the assistant.
“Have you seen Sorla?” she whispered.
He shook his head. “She didn’t show up on time, so I had to come without her. Sorry.”
“But—I need her!”
“I’m sorry, I have a family to feed, what do you want me to do?”
Velsa kept walking, but now she really must have looked like an animated doll, as stiff and absent-minded as she felt. She was barely aware of the people surrounding her, the swirling music, the dancers. The party was in full swing now, and Parsons’ friend wasn’t the only Halnari starting to laugh a little too loud and stagger around. It was the perfect time for Velsa to escape, and she had no ally.
The boat was going to leave without her.
If I could get the band off myself…
Maybe she could. If she could sever her own head and break the line of contact between the golden band and her eyes, her powers would be set free. She might be able to use telekinesis to reattach her head to her body.
Crazy…but no more crazy than the rest of the plan. She only had to hold onto her telekinesis long enough to put one piece of her spine back together. She had never done anything like it before, but how hard could it be? She tried to remember exactly what her spine looked like, from Parsons’ skeleton swap and the books she had read. It was just four little screws to open up a joint in her spine. And she really only had to get one screw back in place to link her head to her body. Her telepathic powers had accomplished far more than that in the past.
She kept circling the room until that batch of drinks was gone, and then she snuck off to the workroom in the basement. Music filtered through the walls from several directions, along with the echoing shouts from the swimming pool.
Velsa shut the workroom door behind her, muffling it all to a dull din.
She could only do this if she didn’t think too much about it. Just follow the plan.
Well, not the entire plan. She couldn’t remove the jewels. The guests might notice if she emerged without them, so she would have to walk out the door with them on. That was unfortunate, because once she left, she wouldn’t have a great way of hiding them from thieves. Her outfit was quite unforgiving without any place to hide things.
All that really mattered was escaping.
She took off the necklace, then picked up the seam ripper. She held it to her throat.
She was paralyzed. If this didn’t work…
If only I had a mirror…
She felt around a moment, pushing her fingers under the band, in the hollow of her throat. She found one of the stitches and kept it marked with a finger.
She fumbled with the seam ripper, poking her skin once before she felt it catch the thread there. With one hard pull, she broke the threads.
After she had snipped a couple, she was able to pull her skin apart at the neck. Her jaw was trembling badly. It was one thing for someone else to deconstruct her, but doing it to herself took a great act of will. Her hands resisted. Her mind resisted. But the whole time, her fingers were battling with the golden band, the unyielding cold metal that settled around her power like icy fog. Even if she couldn’t escape today, if she could just get the band off, and hide its absence behind the heavy necklace…
She pulled stuffing away from her bones, feeling out what was under there. Between each joint of her spine was a little ball made of rubber, that allowed her spine to move in every direction. Four thin cables held the spine joints together around the ball. Eight small screws attached the cables, four to attach to the top piece, and four to attach to the bottom.
She should probably get on the floor so she wouldn’t collapse when she broke the joint.
First, she gathered all the tools. She put a towel under her head to catch the rubber ball before it could roll away. Then she lay down with the tools in her line of sight. The hard basement floor was cold and clammy against her bare arms and legs. She battled a feeling of deep vulnerability, like something awful was about to happen to her body.
It is…
No, it’s going to be okay. You can do this if you stay calm. You know you can.
She found one of the screws, using both her fingers and her mind. Her telekinetic senses were starting to get a feel for the shapes. See, not so hard. She twisted the screwdriver. The screw was tight at first, but once she got it going, it came out easily enough.
She did the second screw without problems, but when she did the third screw, the ball popped out and rolled off, despite the towel, and her body shifted around it, her spine now severed except for one small cable. At the same time, all the strength drained out of her limbs. She could still feel them, but she could no longer hold up the screwdriver, and her arm flopped to the ground with a clunk.
She bit her lip. This wasn’t as bad as having her skeleton swapped. She still had a head.
But…the golden band was still around her neck. One tiny cable of her neck, and that was enough. The magic of her animation and the magic of the band seemed to work the same—just one point of contact was all they needed. No, in fact, the band was worse, she realized. It wasn’t touching her right now. It just needed to encircle her neck.
Damnit. Damnit!
But maybe, even
with the band, she could snap the cable. She just needed one strong burst of power. One surge of fear and fury and strength. She imagined it straining, the glorious freedom of releasing her telepathy. Come on—come on—!
The cord snapped, breaking her head from her body entirely. Now she had no feeling there. But nothing held the golden band on either. It shot across the room as her mind violently repelled it.
Her cheeks felt hot with exertion, as if she could sweat—or maybe more like she couldn’t sweat, but desperately needed to.
This was really starting to feel like a terrible idea. What now?
She just had to get her head reattached. She needed to sense out one of the screws, get it back in place, and mend the chain of magic.
Her telepathy was free, but more exhausted than she had expected from the effort of releasing the band. She strained her eyes unnaturally sideways and down, looking for the screws. She spotted one and reached for it, but her mind was so clumsy—it was worse than trying to do something with her left hand. She lifted it a few inches, only to lose hold—it was so tiny.
There was no way she was going to be able to replace the screw. Simply no way. Not all the heroic resolve in the world would get her there.
She wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry.
She would just have to stay here until someone found her, or—curses—call for help. She stared at the ceiling, trying to figure which was worse, and imagined Calban lifting her head up by the hair and giving her that infuriating, amused expression.
The door suddenly opened, and Irik peered in.
“Velsa? Who did this to you?” Irik swept down beside her, but she didn’t seem to know what to make of a beheaded Fanarlem.
“I did it—to myself. I’m fine. Well—not exactly fine, but…I had to get the golden band off, to free my telepathy. I can’t bear it.”
Pin slipped in behind Irik. “Were you trying to escape? Oh, Velsa!”
Velsa was getting cross now. “Anyone else out there in the hall who would like to come in and see how well this plan went?”
Irik gathered up the tiny screws. “How do we put her back together?”
“Give them to me,” Pin said. “I’ll do it.” She picked up the screwdriver. “You know you never would have made it out of here, even without the golden band.”
“I might have. I know the place is crawling with telepaths, but they won’t notice me trying to escape unless they’re looking for it. Telepathy isn’t some all-knowing force.”
Pin didn’t look convinced. “Why won’t you listen to me? Escaping won’t be this easy.”
“I had to try,” Velsa said.
“I’ve heard you crying in your sleep,” Pin said gently.
Velsa’s cheeks pricked with embarrassment. Irik looked a little embarrassed herself, but Velsa was grateful she had come. Better Irik than Calban.
“I know how you could escape,” Pin said, as she fixed the first screw in place. Some feeling returned to Velsa’s body.
“How?”
“We trade. I’m allowed to leave the grounds. And I can pretend to be you. I bet it will take a few days for anyone to notice Pin is gone, and accordingly, that Velsa is actually Pin. That will buy you time, which you will certainly need, because Calban might not bother tracking you alone, but if he thinks you’ll lead him to his other escapees, that’s another matter.”
“We trade? Bodies?”
“Faces,” Pin said.
“But then I would be stuck with your face.”
“And I would be stuck with yours. ‘Wow, Pin, that is a very generous offer. Won’t you get in terrible trouble?’”
“I’m sorry,” Velsa said. “That is a generous offer. But…I can’t lose my face. I know we look similar, but we don’t look the same. I’m very attached to my face. It’s my face.” She considered that Sorla had swapped her face, in order to help Velsa escape. Although, where is she?
By this time, Pin almost had her back together. She just needed a replacement for the cable Velsa had broken, and rummaged in a small chest of drawers. “I certainly don’t mind if you don’t take me up on the offer, but it is by far the safest plan of escape. And I’m willing to do it, because I’m sure Calban won’t punish me too terribly, but I’m starting to wonder what could happen to you if you stay. Either due to your own stubbornness, or because Parsons has it out for you now.”
“I can’t. I just can’t…”
“I’m sure your husband will get used to it pretty quickly,” Pin said.
“It’s not about him.”
Velsa didn’t think she really was all that stubborn usually, but she didn’t want to give in on this. This was one of her great fears.
But for Grau, and Sorla…
They don’t love you for the exact shape of your nose.
“You should go,” Irik said. “The pain of transformation can be overcome. Don’t you think so?”
Velsa said goodbye to her own face, after a short night’s sleep where she wouldn’t be surprised if she had cried out again. Pin felt she should wait until morning, when it made sense for Pin to go out on errands.
Velsa was so nervous, putting on Pin’s cloak and walking out the gates, but no one looked twice.
Pin was right. No one ever guessed they would switch faces. It was a good plan, even if she hated Pin just a little bit for suggesting it. A part of her would have still rather taken her chances with her own skin intact.
She had a long walk ahead, to get to the caverns, and her chest was heavy with the jewels. The weight of them tucked against her rib cage felt like a physical manifestation of the heavy fear inside. But all she really had to do was keep walking, down the hill, through the palace complex, outside the gates…into the wilds.
She walked, and no one stopped her. The air was warm and smelled deliciously of sun and grass. She dared to hope that she might really make it to Kessily and Dennis, and then to Grau, and then to Laionesse.
But why had Sorla never come?
Please let her be with Kessily and Dennis…
She sent out her thoughts to Grau, wondering if she might be able to reach him.
Grau? Grau, I’m free…
She felt that he was all right, but she wasn’t sure if it was only her own wishful thinking. His voice never answered her back. If he was hundreds of miles away, he was beyond her grasp.
She finally reached the caverns in the late afternoon.
“It’s Velsa,” she called at the entrance, just in case Dennis thought she was Pin and got any more ideas to attack. She walked in the narrow entrance.
It was so dark here. An easy place to ambush someone.
Inside the catacombs, a lantern with a single lantern burned, barely illuminating the vast space. “Hello?”
Kessily walked out of the sarcophagus chamber, clad in a hooded black cloak. “Velsa?”
“Yes, it’s me. I had to change my face a little bit to escape…”
“Oh,” Kessily said, and it was obvious she hadn’t even noticed. “Is Sorla with you?”
“No…”
“She went to look for you. Last night, some soldiers were prowling around outside. None of us dared to leave the cave.”
“Where’s Dennis?”
“Hunting. He needs some blood before we depart. It’s a long trip.”
“How have you been?” Velsa asked.
“Oh, it’s been so fun,” she said dryly. “I’ve got to figure out how to shift back. I hope Grau really can help.”
It sounded like Kessily had taken Velsa’s comment about Grau knowing something about magic to heart. She prayed that Grau didn’t take one look at Kessily and throw up his hands. “Should I look for Sorla?”
“Stay here. She’ll come back. You didn’t see or hear any sign of soldiers out there anymore, did you?”
“No…”
“Good.”
They didn’t have anything to do except watch the candle burn down and talk, so Velsa told her about Calban’s. Turning the whole th
ing into a story, it didn’t seem as bad. In fact, some of it was downright funny in the retelling.
“My only story is the one hundred hunting stories Dennis has told me,” Kessily said. “I think he has some lonely man’s reflex to impress me because we’re alone in this cave like the last two people on earth, an experience which really cannot end soon enough.”
“One hundred different hunting stories?”
“Good question. Maybe the same one retold a hundred different ways.”
Their laughter died quickly. Dennis rushed in, telling them to hush.
“The guards are still out there,” he said. “They’re distant, but I heard them. They’re patrolling around. Did Sorla come back?”
“No…” Velsa was getting very worried. “What if she’s been caught?”
“We have to leave tonight,” Kessily said. “I guess it’s your choice whether you’re coming or not.”
Velsa couldn’t leave Sorla. They were family. She had rescued Sorla, embraced her, earned her trust that Velsa and Grau would take care of her. But if she didn’t leave tonight, she didn’t know how to reach Grau, and he could die up there in the north. Sorla wasn’t likely to die if abandoned, but there were worse things…and she was just a child. Grau was more likely to be able to handle a difficult situation himself.
“We need to head to the rocks at nightfall,” Dennis said.
The main rooms of the cave had no view of the outdoors, so periodically Dennis peered out to check the skies.
He had just stepped out when they heard the distant gunshot.
“Dennis, you okay?” Kessily hissed.
“I’m fine, but—”
“What?” Velsa rushed up behind him.
“Sorla. I think she’s in the woods.”
“Which way?”
He pointed. Velsa immediately reached out with her mind, trying to find the familiar imprint of Sorla’s energy. Sorla? Sorla, please!
Sorla’s mind caught hers, like two linking hands. But physically, they were still far apart.
Another shot rang out, echoing hard against the mountain.
What do I do? Sorla cried out to Velsa. They’re shooting at me and they can’t hurt me but I don’t know how to lose them!
The Sorcerer’s Wife Page 21