by Kim Smejkal
“This doesn’t make any sense,” she whispered. Her clutching hands let go of the back of the chair, and she sank to the floor, pressing her spine to the chair and curling around her knees. Where was Anny now? Anny, who could always tell her which way was up and which was down.
The ink had so much power: Diavala had used it to take over a nation. An entire religion had been born from its blackness, generations of people manipulated by its messages. When they’d taken down the religion, when Profeta had fallen because of the sacrifices of Vincent and Anya and countless others along the way, the ink should have disappeared. The Chest Majestic, the one and only source and the only container that could hold it, had been smashed spectacularly weeks ago. Nothing but the ink in inkling veins should have remained—Anya had given her life for that.
But it was all a lie.
“You can stop panicking, Celia. I’m not going to pour it down your throat.” So far away, so muted. But it sounded like he’d considered it.
Everything had flown away from her. Every consideration, every thought, every drop of control, all reason. Anya had died to get rid of the ink, to strip away Diavala’s power, and yet there was more ink.
Why? What did it mean, this was his life’s work? Had he and Diavala worked together? He seemed to care so little for power, except what he had here in one little beautiful town. So what did the ink do for him?
Breathing heavily, gasping for air, Celia pulled the wisteria-infused bandanna down from her face, noticing how damp it was from sweat or tears, or both. Immediately, she gagged. The smell of the freshly mixed poison, even from so far away, was enough to make her eyes water. Part of her was amazed that she had the faculties left to pull the bandanna back up.
Trying to summon Griffin (find me, I don’t know what to do) and trying to harness Anya (I need you, I need you, I need you), Celia peeked around the side of the chair. Maybe her headaches were giving her hallucinations. Maybe her broken mind had shattered so badly the cracks were filling with madness.
Halcyon’s long, lean form was bent slightly at the waist as he peered into the glass container, examining the deadly poison they’d mixed together, his black bandanna tightly in place. He looked like he was reconsidering its usefulness, as if her reaction had confused him and he wasn’t one easily confused. His profile was so sharp—nose, cheekbones, chin—it was at risk of cutting anything that came close. Sparkles in his eyes reflected off the glass jar.
Still bent at the waist, he turned those eyes toward her again. “Please stop cowering.” He straightened, held out one of his long-fingered hands as if offering to help her rise from across the room. “I’m intrigued by you, your effort, wondering about your endgame. I’ll be honest, I thought you were here to steal from me. But this reaction of yours tells me that I might have been wrong.”
Halcyon took a step forward, then another, his hand still held out, his eyes above his bandanna still swirling and hinting at an abrasive smirk hiding under the cloth. “Unless you’re such a good player that you can fool even me?” He clearly didn’t think that was possible, which might have been the only thing that saved Celia from tasting a drop of that poison and fleeing to the afterlife like a rat.
The shadows behind him had retreated to normal shadows.
What do I do, Anny? In truth, it was a lot easier to stay quiet than to try talking. If she tried making a sound, she’d probably scream.
Halcyon stood above her, where she still cowered behind the chair. Only his lower legs were in her line of sight, heavy black skirt and fancy shoes. The fanciest shoes she’d ever seen; Dante would have swooned at their elegance. She didn’t look up. Didn’t take his hand when he offered it.
He fell with a whomp of extra flair into the armchair again. “This is taking a tad bit longer than I expected. You’re walking a fine line between intrigue and irritation with me, Celia, in case that unsticks your tongue.” She probably imagined it, but she could feel his body heat through the heavy plush chair. His arms flopped over the side, long fingers dangling in front of her, palms open and pointing up at the ceiling in a relaxed curl.
“I don’t understand how you have Divine ink,” she said. Her hands were cursed with tremors, and she clutched her fingers, trying to still their shaking.
He scoffed. “Please, Celia. Of anyone, you know the Divine is not divine in the least. Stop playing games.”
She untangled herself and, not looking at Halcyon, crept slowly around the chair, toward the open chest on the bench. The fact that it swirled so close, black and viscous, with only a container holding it at bay from seeking out a host, terrified her in a way she couldn’t put into words.
“You should be honored,” he said. “Not even Illinia’s great ruler—who is it now? Erannio?—”
“Vacilando,” she responded absently. How isolated was this place, that he didn’t know Vacilando’s name? She’d ruled for more than two decades.
One foot in front of the other. The ink beckoned her even as it repulsed her.
“Right, Vacilando,” he said. “Not even she knows I have this.”
With her trembling hands weaving together in front of her, Celia bent toward the swirling ink, adjusting her bandanna and focusing on the scent of wisteria.
“But one creature does know, doesn’t she?” he said slowly. “One immortal devil who you’ve had some recent dealings with . . .”
When Celia was close enough to confirm that it was indeed Divine ink, it made her insides curl. Swiveling away, she went back to her place at Halcyon’s feet.
“I can see why you’d jump to the conclusion you did,” Celia said. “But you can keep your poison well stoppered. I’m certainly not here to steal from you.”
“Aren’t you wondering what I do with it?” Halcyon said.
Celia shook her head, but her heart rate jumped, fluttering like a hummingbird against her ribs. What Griffin had assumed were stage tricks she now knew were ink tricks: the strange way the town turned itself around, the manufactured windstorm, his swirling eyes.
She’d seen the ink’s power. She’d lived with it for ten years. If a tiny bit of ink on someone’s ankle or chest or back could affect the course of their lives forever, what could someone with a full chest of it do? Maybe they could ensorcell an entire town or make wisteria bloom year round. Maybe they could disguise the entrance to their home, make someone disappear, create a vicious storm.
If Celia could command the ink in her blood away, pull it back, change the shape, and manipulate it out into the world as a tattoo, she could only imagine how far it could go when someone made it his life’s work.
But damned if she said any of that out loud.
Halcyon tilted his head. “I think you might have figured it out . . .” he said. “Your face gives everything away.”
Crap. She bit her lip and dropped her gaze, a flush rising up her neck. “I think it’s the fuel for your—” She paused, unsure how to continue. Fuel wasn’t the right word: her tattoos weren’t fueled by ink, they were the ink. She started over again. “I think the ink is the substance of your illusions. And we’re in the middle of a bunch of them.”
“Interesting.” His smile widened. “And correct.”
A flare of pride burst in her chest . . . for being clever, not from his praise.
She sat there in front of his fancy shoes and tried to sort through her thousands of questions for the ones that would give her what she wanted the most.
“I didn’t come for anything to do with . . . that,” she said, flicking her fingers toward the chest. If he thought she’d come to steal it, she wanted to put his mind at ease immediately. Not only was the threat of lethal poisoning still permeating the air, but handling the ink again was the last thing she wanted. “But I know you have some history with the one everyone called the Divine. That’s why I’m here.”
He sighed, as if sorry to abandon the topic of the ink so quickly. “Out of curiosity,” he said, leaning forward, “what did she tell you about me?”
/>
Diavala had threatened Griffin with torture to make sure Celia didn’t disclose where she was, but even if she hadn’t, Celia would have kept her location secret. Everything they knew about Halcyon had come from Diavala’s point of view—Celia needed to know more from Halcyon’s before playing her hand.
“Not much, truthfully. I found your name on the Roll of Saints as the only person who’d survived the Touch, and from my interaction with Dia—the Divine,” she corrected, “I know she fears you. Other than that, I had no idea what I was walking into here.”
Halcyon looked disappointed. He might care nothing for fame, living so apart from the rest of society in this perfect town, but it looked like he wouldn’t have minded being the topic of a little gossip.
He leaned back, lacing his fingers together in front of his face. “I know all about your convincing act, the story you sold to all of Illinia about the Divine’s death. I also know it was a hoax. You might not have come here to steal the power of the ink as I first thought, but I fear our goals are still fundamentally at odds. If you want to finish what you started in Asura—kill her, punish her, whatever revenge you’ve daydreamed about—that’s your business. She’s scared of me for good reason, and I could help you, but I have no interest in getting involved in this. I dealt with her three years ago, and I’m enjoying my freedom immensely.”
Celia inhaled hard and looked at her hands, wringing themselves into knots in her lap. She’d been foolish to think that finding him would translate to unconditional help.
“She’s still out there,” Celia said, “and she wants revenge for what I did to her and her religion. She’ll take it out on everyone I love, one by one. You’re right that I want to finish what I started in Asura, but my only goal is to make sure she never hurts anyone ever again. If you can just tell me how to save my people from the Touch, I’ll leave and never bother you again.”
His eyebrows arched, skeptical. “No revenge? Are you sure? I told you I know what happened between you.”
“That’s not why I came,” Celia said, pressing her lips together. Although revenge would be nice sat there on the tip of her tongue.
Halcyon assessed her and nodded slightly, though it didn’t look as if she’d fooled him. Tap-tap-tappity tapping his fingers on the arm of the chair, he met her eyes.
He’d said he didn’t want to get involved with Diavala again, and Celia had nothing to offer him; if their dynamic was a scale, she was underground while he was among the stars. What could she possibly offer him to balance it out?
Perhaps the same thing that had gotten his attention.
The ink in her blood.
She closed her eyes and whispered, “I’ll do anything.” That phrase felt familiar on her tongue, as if she’d said it to him before, recently.
“Anything . . .” He said the word slowly, quietly, and she imagined his steepled fingers tapping together for emphasis. It took him a long time to answer, and as she waited in silence and darkness, her headache screamed back with force. There were so many thoughts skittering around in her head that her bees had passed out, mumbling and kicking each other in a stupor.
“I don’t have any skills beyond inking, but they’re the stuff of legend now,” she said, forcing herself to open her eyes and meet his.
“But clearly you hate it,” he countered. “And I’m trying really hard not to take that personally.”
“I do,” she admitted. “But when I said anything, I meant it.”
Surely skilled inklings didn’t come through Wisteria often, if ever, and to someone who’d made the ink his life’s work, her one talent had to be appealing.
“What you did in Asura was impressive,” Halcyon finally said. “Your talents with the ink, even without any real training, show promise . . .”
She waited, holding her breath.
“I travel a lot, and it would be nice to have someone look after Wisteria while I’m away. Fix roof tiles after storms, for example, tend the flowers, and make sure my people stay content. A caretaker, if you will. But you must understand by now that Wisteria needs a special kind of caretaker. One who has mastered all aspects of the ink and knows how to apply them in accordance with a specific artistic vision.”
Tears prickled at her eyes. A few moments ago she’d thought he might be drawn to having a messenger or a town tattoo artist. Of all the solutions to save Griffin and others from Diavala’s Touch, this was the most vile one imaginable. Everything they’d done against the ink, and now she’d have to use it to sustain more lies?
“What I’m asking is no small thing, Celia Sand. It would take a commitment of the lifetime variety, one you couldn’t walk away from. But more important, it would involve you getting over your deep revulsion and using the ink in a number of ways. I think you’re willing to offer the first—you seem desperate enough to save your friends, even at your own expense—but the second?” He tapped his fingers along the length of the armrest, playing an unheard symphony.
He was right. She’d lived her entire life in a prison, and Wisteria was a far prettier one than the temple. Running a town when he was away was a small price to pay to know that Griffin would be safe from Diavala’s wrath. She would never see the stars in Kinallen, but she’d never deserved Kinallen to begin with.
He was also right about the second part being far more loathsome an idea to her. “So that I’m perfectly clear—” she said. “I have to prove myself to you. Then, in exchange for pledging my life to taking care of Wisteria, you will tell me how you survived the Divine’s possession? And it’s not some unique, impossible thing—your answer will be helpful, and it will protect my people from the Touch. No tricks?”
He nodded. “Much like the poison we made together only moments ago, it’s a little of this and a little of that, mixed together into a tea. It’s not painless, but it will buffer the mind against an onslaught of memories. Protection and immunity from a brain flood, so to speak. I’ll even mix the dose myself. In addition to being dashingly handsome, infinitely clever, and remarkably creative, I’m also a passable apothecary.”
Well, that sounded perfect, which made Celia instantly suspicious.
“I’ll give you a day to think about it,” he said. “Either you show up here tomorrow and we get to work, or you leave Wisteria with your beautiful friend and all your problems, and never look back.”
He stood abruptly, towering over her. She felt a tingling in her center that had nothing to do with anxiety or elation, and when she looked down, her hands were a little less defined, a little erased.
“Understand, this is a unique courtesy I’m offering you, Celia,” Halcyon said. “I don’t give everyone the opportunity to simply walk away.”
Just before she disappeared completely, she looked once more at the jar of lethal poison and the chest of Divine ink next to it.
She imagined the ink waving at her with long, beckoning fingers.
Interlude
“Stop pacing, plague doctor,” Diavala growled. “You’re making me dizzy.”
The plague doctor looked through the front window of the inn just in time to see Davi glance quickly away, caught staring. Earlier, when he’d asked her for a map of Wisteria, she’d stared at him with a look of What is this map thing you speak of? So rather than go in circles (which he’d already done for an hour), he paced a trail back and forth in front of the inn, waiting for Celia to return.
He’d never been fooled this way before. No sleight of hand, mirror trick, or misdirection had ever confused him for more than a few minutes. Ever since he was six years old, his one talent had been seeing through any stage trick. When Celia and Anya had swindled most of Illinia (and, embarrassingly, most of his own theater troupe) with their Devil in the Bell Jar show, he’d known that they were somehow communicating with their ink, even though he’d understood next to nothing about how their ink magic worked.
But he had no idea how he’d been there only to end up here. It was like an invisible Obi the Giant—the hero of
Bicklandian folktales—had come along, plucked him up in his massive hand, and set him down in a different spot. But Obi wasn’t invisible, so even that unlikely scenario couldn’t be true.
Halcyon Ronnea had managed to stump him, and it was driving him to distraction.
“Ah! Michali!” The plague doctor bellowed a greeting across the street, grateful that a diversion decided to walk by. The town’s tailor, a tall, reedy soul who always wore as much color as possible, inclined their head and sauntered over. Their wheatlike hair—an unusual color in Illinia—flowed down to their waist, and every time the plague doctor had seen them, they’d had it loose. The two of them had bonded the day before over a love of leather, and Michali had offered to mend the plague doctor’s favorite pants free of charge. A fast friendship was forming, when you could bond over leather.
Michali clapped him on the back, matching the plague doctor’s grin with one made of all teeth. “You look worried, my friend,” they said. “What plagues you?” Michali flipped their hair over their shoulder and chuckled at the pun. The plague doctor had shown Michali his mask the first day and they’d been enthralled by the craftsmanship.
The plague doctor smiled wider. As much as he loathed the reason for their visit to Wisteria, the townspeople were lovely. How had he and Kitty Kay never thought to veer off the main road with the Rabble Mob and perform there? It was as if invisible Obi guarded the place well, warding off visitors without their even knowing. “You have a certain flair that would fit so well with Rovers,” he said. “Tell me, do you like Commedia?”
Michali shrugged. “I might like it more if so many story lines didn’t extol Profeta.”
Then they hadn’t seen a Rabble Mob show. “Not a believer?”
Michali huffed and looked dramatically affronted, their light features pinched as if they’d tasted a sour cherry tart. “Do you take us for fools here? You’d be hard-pressed to find a more secular town in all of Illinia.” They said it as if it were a point of fierce pride among the population, and the plague doctor imagined it on a playbill: “Come! See the Rover troupe that doesn’t Rove! The most secular town in all of Illinia beckons you to join their illusion!”