Divided

by Rae Brooks

  Once they were within the people, Calis could hear the gossip and the music. The music! The music was nothing like he’d ever heard. It was a twanging, stringy sound that he wasn’t entirely sure he enjoyed. He didn’t hate the sound—but it was a far cry from the soft melodies played back at the castle. Then again, that had been what he wanted away from.

  Tankards littered the tables with mead in them that smelt bitter. There were no fanciful dresses, and Calis realized that he and Lee were dressed just as well. Most of the people were in their work clothes, and even some of the girls weren’t in dresses. Others of them were a little more dressed up, in dull colors, and no one seemed to be wearing shoes. Even some of the men had removed their boots. A few people waved hello to them, which was odd since Calis knew that none of them knew who either Calis or Lee were.

  But this was not about rules or regulations, and there were no standards associated with waving to someone. These people were simply being friendly, without any sort of attachment to it. Calis smiled. He was glad he’d come here. They neared the center building, and Lee ducked underneath a curtain that seemed to be doubling as a door.

  Calis followed and immediately his ears were assaulted with that music. It was much louder than it should have been, by royal standards, and Calis found that he had to shout to speak to Lee. “This is different,” he said.

  Lee glanced at him for a moment, as if trying to understand what Calis said, and then he nodded his head when he finally deciphered it. They both glanced into the building. Everyone was moving about in the strangest manner. Nothing made any sense. Girls were twirling and men were just moving—with no rhyme or reason—and it took Calis a moment to realize that they were dancing.

  Try as he may to find a pattern in the way the bodies moved, he could not. The people were just moving with their own rhythm, and everyone seemed to have their own set of steps. At the back of the building, there was a raised area where even more people were performing the foreign movements.

  Not only were the movements chaotic, but the entire scenario was. The loud music seemed secondary to the way people used any surface to dance on, and there was no need for pairs. Women and men danced alone, women danced with other women, and men danced with other men. Calis could see a few male-female pairings, but they were not separated in any way from the others.

  “Fascinating,” Lee said. Calis was surprised that he could even hear his advisor over the events in the room. Everything seemed so hectic that part of him wanted to run, and the other part was so entirely fascinated that he didn’t think he’d ever leave. People were drinking, drinking while they were dancing!

  A voice from beside Calis startled him out of his amazement. “Goodsir, would you care to dance?” Calis blinked and glanced towards the girl who had just spoken. She had black hair, braided behind her, in a much more sensible way than the noblewomen wore theirs. Yet, she still looked pretty in her dark, blue dress.

  Calis flushed. He certainly wasn’t ready to join in this obviously intricate design of dancing and whatever else was going on. “I-I… I don’t know the steps…” he admitted warily. Was that alright here?

  The girl laughed as though he had told some joke. Only, she wasn’t laughing for his benefit like Lady Avyon, she was laughing at him. “Oh, come on…” She grabbed him by the wrist and whisked him out into the center of the moving bodies.

  When he glanced across at Lee for help, he found that his advisor found himself in a similar position. The two girls had apparently plotted their attack and had both enacted at the same time so that the men had no chance of saving themselves. How devious. Calis had no idea what to do with his body. Certainly none of the steps he’d learned back at the castle would do him any good here, but the girl just moved—not really needing him. “Just move!” she instructed.

  Once again, Calis’s cheeks were getting very hot. He tried to move his body, but the entire ordeal just seemed completely awkward. This woman wasn’t going to go away, despite his weak protests. When Calis glanced to find Lee again, the search was in vain. This woman was dancing in a way that made no sense, and everywhere he looked—people were doing that very same thing.

  What was this? He was sure that he had never been more humiliated in his life. The girl seemed amused, but he was not. In one last desperate attempt before he was going to run from the girl like a child, he found a singular person that stood out to him.

  The boy was relatively little, though taller than the woman with whom he danced. He was dancing as effortlessly as the others, but there was a familiarity in the way he moved his body. He spun the girl, brought her to his body, spun her outwards, and then let himself move freely. Calis took a breath and decided to use what knowledge he did have of dancing to lead this girl to some extent.

  He twisted his body and then pulled the girl into a twirl. For a moment, she seemed surprised and then her smile went from amused to flirtatious. He laughed and pushed her from his body only to bring her back. As the rhythm of the music eased its way into his body, he was able to move without worrying too much about the lack of steps.

  Once his body was moving on its own, Calis cast a glance back to the boy who’d more or less saved him. The boy was with another partner, now. Calis was in shock—changing partners midsong? This seemed so freeing. The boy wore a soft, white cotton shirt and brown trousers. To Calis’s eyes, he was the only one who was truly dancing.

  The woman he was with had short, black hair, and the biggest smile Calis had ever seen on someone’s face as her body fell against the boy’s chest. The boy had short black hair, as well. It was flawlessly black. There was a slight spike to it that made it appear even messier, but fortunately, it was so short that the mess wasn’t too unbecoming. He also had very tanned skin. Calis was positively fascinated with his movements, and did everything in his own power to mimic them.

  “You must be new,” his partner said when they finally found a rhythm so that they weren’t stopping every few moments.

  Calis offered a weak smile. “That obvious?”

  “Well, yes,” she answered nicely. Her brown eyes were amused as she regarded him. Calis wasn’t sure how he felt about being regarded like this. She was being flirty, but for no real reason—there was no fakeness, only a genuine interest. Calis liked it, and so he found himself smiling at her. “I’m Taiya!”

  A name. That wasn’t anything Calis had been asked for in his visits to Dark District. For all of his bravado in coming here, he had very rarely interacted with people. When he did, they had been short lived and no name had been required. “Pretty name,” he said.

  She seemed a little confused that he hadn’t given his, but she seemed to forget it after a moment in their movements. “You catch on pretty quickly!” she encouraged. Well, that was nice to hear. He felt more comfortable, but that didn’t mean that he didn’t look like a fool to everyone else. “Where are you from?”

  “Just a traveler,” Calis answered easily.

  “Oh, how exciting! I’ve lived in this boring place my whole life. I’m sure you have tons of stories to tell!” she squealed. Her behavior wasn’t that different from noblewomen’s, but something about it was endearing whereas nobles were not.

  Calis did have many stories, and any of them would have amused her and could have been edited to ensure that she didn’t know who he was. But he didn’t feel like getting into any of them. He wanted to forget life for now. “I do, but for now, I don’t want to think about any of them,” he told her honestly.

  “Now that I can understand,” she said as he twirled her again. “Well, welcome to Telandus,” she said. “Are you staying long?”

  “With events like this?” Calis asked, “I might stay a little longer. When I showed up, I certainly didn’t expect anything like this. I only arrived this sun.” He tried to mix as much truth into his words as he could so that he had less to explain later.

  The girl seemed amused enough without being too interested in what he was saying. If she’d thought l
ong enough about it, she might have recognized that he had a distinctive resemblance to Calis Tsrali, but she was enjoying the moon like he was—and she didn’t care who he was. “We don’t do this often. So when we do, we like to go all out!” she exclaimed.

  Calis thought that much was rather obvious, but he didn’t bother to say as much. Inevitably, Calis caught a glimpse of Lee who seemed to have mastered the art of dancing just as he had. Though, he had to wonder if Lee had done so in the same way that Calis had. Probably not. Lee probably knew a little more of what to expect with these dances. “So is that friend your only traveling companion?” the girl asked a few moments later.

  “Ah, yes,” Calis answered, not bothering to go into too much detail. Surely, it wasn’t that rare for two men to be traveling together.

  The girl accepted this, and they continued dancing. The songs changed, but the steps really didn’t. They just kept up with the rhythm of the song, and moved in very similar patterns. A few times the girl allowed him to dance with others who were just dancing around them, and he found that they were no different from the girl.

  A few times, Calis caught Lee’s eye. And eventually, he realized that Lee had been allowed a break, while Calis had not. At last, Taiya, his dance partner, seemed to require a drink, and so she wandered away from him. This left him free to return to a place less populated with bodies. Sweat made his hair and shirt cling to him. He panted—being out of breath after dancing—what a concept. “That was… not what I expected,” he breathed.

  “I know, this is… actually…” Lee seemed at a loss for a moment. “Enjoyable.”

  “You wouldn’t think it possible with the way the castle handles its festivals, but I agree… this is brilliant.” Calis looked around the room, where people were still drinking and dancing in such a carefree manner that it stunned him.

  Lee let out a breath. “The people are far less annoying, at any rate. Though, I can’t say I’m a fan of that band.” Calis had located the source of the stringy music long ago, and he glanced towards the three men up on stage dancing and playing their fiddles.

  “At least it isn’t boring,” Calis offered helpfully. He glanced to a keg nearby and thought idly of grabbing some mead, but he was sure that it would be disgusting and would not quench his thirst.

  The dance floor was so alive that Calis had a hard time separating the bodies from their environment. The band managed to be loud enough so that all three connected buildings could hear them. “It certainly isn’t that,” Lee answered.

  A few moments later, Taiya returned with a smile on her face. She held two tankards and set one in front of Calis before handing the other to Lee. Well, this certainly ruined Calis’s idea of staying away from the mead. He glanced down at the brown, gold liquid and let out a breath. He needed some liquid, anyway. “Thank you,” he said after a moment.

  “I don’t know if it will be what you’re used to, but you looked parched on the dance floor.” The other girl, the one that had originally grabbed Lee, appeared a few moments later, and the two exchanged a brief greeting.

  Apparently, their dealing with these girls wasn’t over yet. Calis wasn’t entirely disappointed that their company had not given up on them. As they drank, they learned that the girls were sisters—twins, in fact, though not the type that looked alike. Lee’s girl had much lighter hair than the other, and the one Calis danced with was taller.

  They spoke without thought, talking about their troubles and how they both worked as servers at the local inn—which their father owned. That meant that, for Dark District, they were well enough off. “So what’s the town gossip, anyway?” Calis asked when there was a lull in the conversation.

  Both girls came alive with the chance to talk about gossip. The word seemed to do wonders for any woman, noble or not. “Well, this sun, one of the princes who has been away returned from a five year stead in Dokak,” the brown-haired girl said.

  Taiya, though, seemed to know that this was not the sort of information they were looking for. “Well, that is true—but here in Dark District we don’t know much about that. Though, that is what this dance is to celebrate,” she said, confirming what Lee had already told him, “but aside from that, we don’t know much about it.”

  “So what do you know about?” Lee asked, encouraging any extra information, as he always did. Lavus’s philosophy on information gathering was nothing like Lee’s, who preferred to get all rumors and figure out the truth in them. Calis much preferred Lee’s way of doing things, and Lee didn’t even execute the people who gave him false information.

  The girls smiled mischievously and exchanged glances. “Well, there is the fact that the younger Tsrali brother comes down to Dark District sometimes and is known to kidnap young girls!” the brown haired girl said conspiratorially.

  Calis frowned. Had Tareth really stooped to that level? How pitiful. “That sounds bad,” he said flatly.

  The girls nodded their agreement. “And then there’s the mysterious Phantom Blade, as everyone has taken to calling him—nobody knows who he is, but lately he is always there when Tareth or any other noble shows up to cause trouble for our Dark Districters,” Taiya said softly. She glanced around, as if she thought the guy would be there now.

  Calis and Lee glanced at one another. Calis didn’t know why, as no one had any new information on this person—but hearing about this vigilante amused him endlessly. “…Phantom Blade?” Calis asked, as if he found the story a little childish.

  “Oh, I know the name sounds silly. But he is very real. He wears a mask, dresses in black, and he is very handy with a sword. He shows up and helps citizens of Dark District with the nobles and then just vanishes. It’s the oddest thing. But he is so handsome!”

  “I’m jealous,” Calis said teasingly. The girls giggled at his flirting and while the brown-haired girl waved him off, Taiya bit her lip.

  “You have no reason to be,” she said.

  Lee was obviously thinking on what had just been said. There didn’t appear to be any new information in what the girls had said, but Lee didn’t like to leave any word alone without inspecting it voraciously. “Do you think he lives in Dark District?” Lee finally asked.

  Taiya shrugged. “We have no idea. I doubt that a noble would help us, so we assume that he does. For a while, we thought it might just be a kind traveler passing through, but it has been years now. So if it was a traveler, he obviously doesn’t plan on leaving.” The girls glanced at each other once again.

  A traveler or a boy coming of age. Those two options seemed the only available ones, as Calis doubted that anyone would just decide one sun to risk his own life for the life of others. That wasn’t a simple decision to make. No, this person had to be a bit of a daredevil, to say the least. “Has anyone ever spoken to this phantom?” Calis asked.

  The brown-haired girl, Claire, answered this time. “Not really. I mean, there has been the occasional time when he’d ask if someone was alright after a particularly nasty fight, but other than that, no. He doesn’t socialize.”

  Oh, he socializes, Calis thought, just not in his mask and cape. In fact, I would wager that he is somewhere at this dance right now. Calis only wished that there weren’t so many tan-skinned people. In fact, dark skin seemed more common than pale among Dark District residents.

  “People have tried to follow him after a fight, but somehow he manages to lose everyone. Even the nobles can never catch him, and they have horses and guards!” Taiya said. She leaned forward as if she had to be in his face to convey this information properly. She very desperately wanted him to know that this Phantom Blade was wonderful. He sounded as much, anyway.

  The music died down as the band decided to take a quick break. Calis realized how few they’d taken when the quietness of the room almost startled him. People still laughed and talked, but the lack of music was stifling. People had stopped dancing and most were getting drinks with the lull in the activities.

  Finally, Calis took a drink of the mea
d and found that he had been exactly correct about its flavor. What he had not been correct about was his own thirst, and the way the mead quenched it without being at all appealing. He cringed a little as the thick liquid slid down his throat, but was grateful once it did. “So where did you two meet?” Claire asked.

  Lee glanced idly at Calis, as if this was entirely his story to tell. Calis supposed that was fair since he was the one that suggested they come here. “We’re from the same town originally—we were friends before we left and decided to leave together. Nothing fanciful, I’m afraid.” His words came more easily than they should and sometimes he worried about how good he was at lying.

  “And here we were hoping you’d met fighting a dragon!” Taiya said. They would think that. City folk always thought that travelers saw dragons on a daily basis when in fact a real dragon hadn’t been seen in half a century.

  Lee laughed at the idea, but then shrugged his shoulders. “Sorry to disappoint,” he said. Claire offered him a sweet smile, obviously trying to reassure him that she didn’t mind. Calis was a little wary of how easy it would have been to cart these girls off and have their way with them. No wonder Tareth thought to kidnap women from Dark District. These girls’ inhibitions were entirely gone—and Calis knew it couldn’t be entirely due to this dance.

  When the band picked up again, the two girls let out the strangest, most synchronized squeal that Calis had ever heard. “The Soul Finder dance!” Claire said cheerfully. “I was beginning to think they weren’t going to play it.”

  “Soul Finder dance?” Calis asked. That sounded ominous, and was not anything that he had ever heard of. When he looked at Lee, he could see his own curiosity mirrored in the green eyes.

  Taiya waved her arm, as if her sister had told a joke wrong. “Oh, it’s nothing, really. Just a fun little dance—or game—that we play. Two dance partners stand together, close their eyes and then twirl the other. The person who you end up with is supposed to be your soul mate,” she answered quickly. She blushed a little, proving that she thought it was silly.