by Sarah Ahiers
Leave. I had to leave. Return to the Da Vias.
I looked at her in the mirror. She hummed as she finished my hair.
I would wait until the end of Susten, to enjoy these last few days before telling them I wouldn’t be returning to Yvain with them. A few days more of being a Saldana. I owed them that, at least. But only until Susten ended.
And then I would stay here where I belonged.
I would be a Da Via.
thirteen
I STOOD IN FRONT OF THE MIRROR. MY DRESS WAS silver, with black embroidered flowers covering the bodice so barely any silver slipped through. The flowers then trailed down to the skirts. I slipped on my necklace from Les, the stone sliding beneath the bodice. My hair had been twisted behind my head and I couldn’t help but remember Elbow and her friends and how they’d looked down their noses at me for letting my hair hang freely. They probably wouldn’t even recognize me now.
Neither would Nev, for that matter. My stomach thrilled pleasantly at the thought. My skin flushed as I remembered the feel of his lips on my neck. And then his laugh, when I’d scored a winning hand in the card game. I wanted to hear more of his laughter.
Lea stood beside me, her own dress black and cream. “Everyone will be wearing their Family color, to make it easier.”
“And so lines can be drawn.”
“Yes.”
We found Emile and Les in the living room, also dressed in black and silver and cream. Outside, two carriages waited for us. Les and Lea took the first one and Emile and I the second. The driver cracked his reins and we were off.
I sighed, much of my tension fading now that I’d made my decision. And any lies I’d been told probably didn’t involve Emile. It was easy to be around him now, just the two of us, like when we were children.
The enclosed carriage protected the passengers from rain, or perhaps rowdy revelers. I bounced on the seat, testing it out.
“Legs,” Emile admonished, “I doubt very much Lea and Les are jumping on the seats in their own carriage.”
I stopped. “I bet they’re taking advantage of their privacy, though.” I would’ve. If I’d been in this carriage with Nev.
“No.” Emile scoffed and looked over at me.
“You wait and see. They’ll look rumpled by the time we get there.”
Emile turned away but he couldn’t hide his red ears.
“How about you?” I asked. “Did you and Elena do some rumpling yourselves?”
“Of course not,” he snapped.
“Why not? Look around you!” I leaned over him and pushed aside his curtain. The colorful lantern lights filled the carriage. “You’ll probably never experience anything like this again. This festival is made for excitement and fun, and what’s more fun than taking a girl, the girl you’re going to marry, by the way, and slipping off together to get to know each other a little better?”
Emile rolled his eyes. “Well, with the first night, we’d just met. And then Lea and Les and her parents were with us the entire time. It would have been obvious had we left.”
“Don’t you think they’d be happy to know that you two were . . . compatible? I mean, you do want to—”
“Yes.” He cut me off. “I do. I like her very much and I’m excited to get to know her better tonight without everyone else listening in.”
I leaned back. “Well, good, then. I’d be disappointed if I was the only one getting to know someone a little better.” If he was happy with Elena, if everyone liked her, then maybe she would fit better than I ever had.
“By the gods, Allegra, really?” Emile said. “When did you even have—you know what”—he held up a hand—“I don’t need to know. What will Lea say when she finds out? And she will find out. She finds out everything.”
She hadn’t found out I’d been with the Da Vias yesterday.
“Don’t worry your handsome face about it,” I said.
Emile sighed and leaned his head against the window. “You and I are so different.”
“Yes,” I agreed. “Why do you think that is?”
He shrugged. “Our mothers, I suppose.”
I leaned back against the seat, trying to settle my nervous stomach.
I’d heard enough small remarks from Lea, or quiet conversations between Lea and Les, to know that my father, Matteo Saldana, and Emile’s father, Rafeo Saldana, had been very different and hadn’t gotten along, even if they had been brothers.
But Val and Claudia told me that Lea had killed my father, and that made the least sense to me. Lea was loyal to her Family like no other. She would never have killed one of them.
But then, maybe I didn’t know her as well as I thought I did.
Emile’s mother had been a cleaner, but she had died when he was just a baby. Anything that made us not Saldana came from our outsider mothers. My mother, who was still alive. Who maybe I’d see tonight, again. Who I would return to, after the festival.
My hands trembled. I clasped them together, keeping them still.
Emile sat with his eyes closed, either trying to doze or lost in his own thoughts. Emile and I were very different, but we still got along, were still friends, still loved each other. I could never imagine killing him.
I would miss him, when he left to go back to Yvain. We were the opposite in many ways, but he was more brother to me than cousin. I loved him.
I watched outside my window as we drove toward the palace. Already people packed the streets, even though the sun had just set. Food vendors were preparing for the crowds, their wares filling the air with strange scents that made my mouth water.
“Good clipper!” a man called to our carriage as we passed. He bowed deeply. “You grace us with your presence!”
I snorted and looked over at Emile. “It’s a little early to be drinking.”
“He’s not drunk,” Emile said. “He hopes to gain favor from Safraella. Expect this response from most of the common.”
And he was right. When people saw our carriages heading toward the palace, they bowed and moved out of our way. Or they called out greetings from down the streets, raising their hands as if we were old friends.
“We’re not even Caffarellis,” I said.
The carriage turned down a side street, away from the slowly filling main roads. “Purple can look an awful lot like black in the right light. And there haven’t been Saldanas in Lovero in over fifteen years. People see what they expect to see.”
This was true. It was why it was so easy to work jobs. People didn’t expect a person to be waiting for them on the roof, so they didn’t even think to look up, to check for danger. A person’s routine could get them as killed as straying from the course.
Which was one of the reasons I couldn’t stand a routine. Emile liked things just so, liked things to remain the same so he knew what to expect and could prepare himself accordingly.
But there was no freedom in that. A routine was just another trap, one you forced yourself into. I refused to trap myself. I was already caged enough.
It was one of the things that drew my thoughts back to Nev. He’d gone along with me, a strange girl he’d just met. He had the sort of freedom to do what he wanted, and he took advantage of it.
Our carriage turned another corner and I gasped.
The palace of Lovero stretched into the sky, its stone walls sparkling against the torches and lanterns lighting its grounds. “Wow,” I said.
The carriage rolled through the gates of the palace, then pulled to a stop. Footmen opened our doors, and then we were escorted inside the palace.
The floors were smooth wood, polished until they gleamed like a mirror. The ceiling soared above us, and windows stretched equally as high, letting in the stars and the light from the colored lanterns outside.
My dress was brand-new but I still felt too dirty to walk these halls. Like this place was only made for royalty, or dainty women who never had blood staining the corners of their fingernails or men who preferred pipe smoke instead of bomb smoke.
>
A servant led us down the halls, the floors changing from polished wood to thick carpets that my shoes sank into, leaving an impression behind. We reached a set of double doors, propped open.
The ballroom was packed with people, and not just clippers. Many of the higher-born common and nobility had been invited as well. It wasn’t just a clipper event, but an event celebrating Camelia Sapienza’s fealty.
In hindsight, it seemed like a bad idea.
We entered and stood off to the side, surveying the room. There were plenty of people dancing, and more people hovering around the food tables, but there were also pockets of people like us, studying the crowd. These pockets of people all wore matching colors. Members of the nine Families.
Lea sighed. “Let’s just get through this without anyone dying.”
She led us to the east end of the room, where the king and queen and princess sat, welcoming guests, accepting congratulations on the princess Camelia’s oath of fealty to Safraella. We stood in line behind an old couple dressed in expensive clothing that looked too young for them. They glanced back at us, then did a double take.
“Family Saldana.” They bowed deeply. “Please, don’t wait on our behalf.” They stepped to the side.
“It’s quite all right,” Lea said in her voice I’d come to call her common tone. She always sounded different when she was speaking to the common as a clipper. It wasn’t the same as when she spoke to customers in the shop, or even to the Family. Lea wore more masks than only those crafted from bone.
“We insist,” the old couple said.
And so we stepped forward to take their spots. And the same thing happened again, and again, until we found ourselves at the front of the line.
“At least we’ll eat sooner,” I mumbled to Emile. His mouth twitched.
When the royal family of Lovero saw us, they got to their feet and more than one person in the ballroom took notice.
“Lea,” Costanzo Sapienza, the king, said as he approached us. “It has been too long.”
I don’t know if I was more surprised that he hugged her, or that she hugged him back.
“It has.” She pulled away from him. “But we’re here now.” She turned to face Camelia. “Congratulations on your fealty.”
She nodded her head primly. “Thank you. It is my honor to serve.”
Clearly she had been coached in what to say. Lea introduced us, and there was some bland conversation about how much Emile looked like his father, Rafeo, and subtle glances in my direction that they thought I wouldn’t notice. But I did, and I knew what they meant—that I looked like my mother in the way that Emile looked like his father. But they couldn’t talk about it because they thought I didn’t know about my mother.
I resisted the urge to run away from the entire ordeal. But then we were done conversing with the Sapienzas, and we took our leave while they returned to their seats and their greeting of the rest of the guests.
I made straight for the food tables. Food always made me feel better. Food would help cover the twisting in my gut that had grown as I stood there, feeling the lies press in on me.
I grabbed a plate and filled it with tiny cuisines from the table, each made to be eaten in one bite, and then filled my other hand with a glass of red wine so dark it was almost black.
“The wine matches our Family,” I said, turning.
But Emile was gone.
I searched the crowd behind me, then the dance floor. And there I found Emile, hand in hand with a girl. She had dark skin, as dark as my old suitor Denny’s, black hair plaited at the base of her neck, and a stunning purple dress.
Elena Caffarelli. Emile’s soon-to-be wife.
Lea stepped beside me, her dress brushing against mine as I sipped my wine and watched Emile and Elena dance.
“Sometimes, things change quickly,” she said, rather enigmatically.
I understood the truth behind her words, though. Yesterday morning I’d had an identity. Maybe I’d worn it like a secondhand dress that didn’t quite fit, but it had been mine. And soon I would shed that dress and don a new one, tailored for me, with a new Family.
I set down my glass and shoved a little piece of bread spread with something pink into my mouth. Fish, it seemed, delightfully delicate and sweet. “I was mostly just thinking about how they look good together,” I replied. “They’re the same height, which is nice.”
I glanced at Lea, knowing full well she couldn’t measure up to Les. I pushed more food in my mouth. “Where’s Les?”
She pointed behind her, never taking her eyes off Emile and Elena. I looked over my shoulder and found Les speaking to Brand Caffarelli. They were laughing together like they were old friends. Maybe they were.
I ate the rest of the food and then set the empty plate on the table, clutching my wineglass as if it were a canal boat and a ghost was pulling at my cloak. My chest felt . . . strange. I couldn’t quite figure out what I was feeling, watching Emile and Elena dance, watching the rest of the nine Families whisper and look at us, some of them surely hoping for our demise. Lea may have been the chosen of Safraella, but no one ever liked losing power.
Les appeared at my side and kissed me quickly on the temple before he turned to Lea. “Dance with me.”
He held out his hand and she only hesitated a moment before she accepted, and I was alone, watching the rest of my Family dance with someone they loved.
The food felt heavy and cold in my stomach. I downed the rest of my wine in a single gulp.
A man approached me from the left.
He was a clipper, that was apparent even without the elegant yellow clothing marking him as a Maietta. He had close-cropped silver hair and dark eyes that were almost black.
“You are Allegra Saldana, yes?” he asked.
I kept my left foot in place and slid my right foot back, giving me more space while keeping the illusion that I held my place. Not that I thought he’d try anything, with my Family so close, in such a group of people. And as far as I knew, the Maiettas weren’t one of the Families who particularly hated us, but still. It seemed dumb to throw caution completely to the ghosts.
“I am.” I resisted the urge to rub my face and just had to hope there weren’t any crumbs.
“I am Tulio Maietta,” he said, as if this should mean something to me. He waited a moment for a reaction, and then when he didn’t receive one, sighed and reached into his pouch.
My fingers twitched at my side, begging for me to take out my stiletto, or a push dagger or something.
But his hand returned from the pouch with a sealed letter. “I was hoping Marcello Saldana would be with you tonight.”
“Oh,” I said, before I could help it. “He doesn’t like to travel.”
He nodded, like this made perfect sense to him. “I understand. But perhaps you would give this letter to him? It’s not from me, but my brother.”
He passed it to me and I looked down at the soft paper in my hand. The ink had faded and the paper was worn from time, but the name on the front still clearly read Marcello.
“I’ve had it for a long time. Too long,” he said quietly. “But I don’t think it’s too late to do the right thing. At the very least, perhaps my conscience will be lighter, though I suspect it will still be weighing me down when I stand before Her at the end of my life.”
I looked up at him, and it did seem something weighed him down. But when I nodded and slipped the letter into my purse he smiled quickly, and it brightened his face.
“Lea Saldana strives for peace between the Families,” he said. It wasn’t a question, but I nodded anyway. “It is a noble endeavor. One worth fighting for.”
He inclined his head to me and then strode off, leaving me alone once more.
“The Maiettas can be a strange lot,” a voice said behind me.
I turned and found a Caffarelli. He wore an elegantly embroidered purple vest and though he had black hair instead of blond, it had been slicked back with oil until it nearly shined in the
lamplight.
“So it would seem.” I glanced once more in the direction that Tulio had disappeared. I faced the Caffarelli. “I’m Allegra.”
“I know,” he said. “We’ve met.”
I examined him more closely. Older than me. Older than Emile, too. But his face didn’t strike me as familiar. I shook my head in apology.
“You helped me with a well-placed foot.” He pantomimed tripping someone.
“Ah!” I said. “Thorns, yes?” I gestured to my face and where my bone mask would be if I were wearing one.
“Indeed. Would you care to dance?” He held out his hand.
I hesitated, though I wasn’t quite sure why. He was a Caffarelli and therefore no threat. And he was handsome enough.
I shook off my hesitation and took his hand. He pulled me onto the dance floor, where we joined the spinning and twirling people.
“That mark was trying his damnedest to get away,” I said. “I’m sorry if I interfered. I just couldn’t help myself.”
“No, it’s fine, actually. It meant I returned home all the sooner and could start enjoying the festival.”
“I’m surprised you were working at all.”
He spun me and my dress flared out. He was a good dancer. Light on his feet. I wondered if Nev would be a good dancer.
“The jobs don’t stop just because of Susten Day. I’d been waiting for that mark to make an appearance for two weeks now. The festival drew him out.”
I nodded. “I know what that’s like. Well, not the festival. We don’t have these kinds of events in Yvain. But the mark that just won’t make an appearance.”
I remembered slipping into the window of Jonus Aix’s house, fed up with waiting for him to leave. Not that that had ended as well as . . .
I blinked. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I never got your name.”
He laughed and I joined in. Seeing the face behind the mask was just as intimate as knowing a name, so it hadn’t even occurred to me to wonder who it was I was dancing with.
“Dario Caffarelli.” He led me past a tight group of dancers. “And have you had much time to enjoy the festival yourself?”