Chapter Eighteen
Eriis
In the days after Yuenne and the child vanished from the palace, the Zaal looked around and took a careful count of his friends. The number was a small one and did not include the wife of his missing host. It was the work of only a few days to quietly remove all traces of his presence from her home—a chore made easier by the fact that she rarely ventured out of her room. He threw a traveling scarf over his new, temporary face and found a new place to live in the Quarter. His great work would have to wait until he secured more appropriate accommodations, but at least the fruits of La Naa were safe. He had time, and privacy. He could dabble. He thought about turning his attention to the weather. He thought about Hellne, whom he had sent on his little mission to the Vastness. She’d come home to him, sooner or later.
The only thing missing was an ear inside the palace, and before too long he thought he might have that, too.
Since the prince had taken the throne, many were heard to loudly proclaim they’d known he was the one to watch all along. But there were voices—quiet, at least in the beginning—who wondered about his human blood, and about his human woman who wore a demon’s face. He took to hanging about the owners of those other voices, and he waited.
Soon enough, he found the perfect tool. Wearing his fourth face in as many days, he found her outside the Arch, with a gaggle of demons who spoke about his Hellne. In low (but increasingly loud) voices they spoke of her human lover, her collaboration, her vanity, and her cruelty. And, of course, the crippled son she'd left behind. One girl in particular caught his eye for the ferocity of her expression and the poverty of her dress. Her name was Calaa. He told her he agreed with everything she said; he was worried, so worried about the future of Eriis. And was she free for dinner?
It turned out, as she told him over a decent meal at his home, that she'd actually met the queen and the prince; performed for them, too. Everything seemed fine until word got back to Yridaane, the playwright himself, that the queen had been heard to remark that his 'little actress' put on airs and behaved above her station. In short, she flirted with the prince, he flirted back, and Hellne didn't care for it. Faster than a mouse into a hole, she'd lost her job and her berth with the troupe. Yridaane had been apologetic but couldn't risk losing the family's largesse. She was left with nothing, she said, “And all because I spoke kindly to that hideous freak.”
A grudge against the queen, and the eye of the prince. She was perfect. Only one question remained. “I think I can help you. I think we can help each other,” the Zaal said. “How are you at face changing?”
She wiped her mouth on her sleeve. “It wasn’t lack of skill got me fired. You won’t find better.”
“I’ll need a demonstration, if we are to work together. Let me see…let’s see the queen.”
She gave him a slow smile. “You know perfectly well putting on the face of a royal sends you straight to the Crosswinds. So why are you asking?”
He leaned forward. “You’ll find out, in due time. And I don’t think you’ll need to worry about being caught. Unless,” and here he refilled her glass, “you aren’t as good as you think.”
That did the trick, and she was very good indeed. What a rare pleasure, not having to chase Hellne through his dreams, or close his eyes and picture her perfection. The girl even got his queen’s voice right. And her flame? Hot and bright as he always imagined.
Later, she put her own face back on and they talked into the night. Not only was she a talented face shifter, she was even clever, in an untutored sort of way.
They’d talked about the palace, about magic, about the human woman and how she’d burnt down the only home of those loyal, decent servants of the court. How the prince, that human-lover, did nothing and said nothing but kept her at his side. The stench of her infected the whole city, and if the prince couldn’t smell it, well, there were others who could.
She gave him an appraising look. “I know who you are.” He was thrilled. Could she guess? “You’re no concerned citizen. You’re from the mages.”
He nodded approvingly. “It might be said I was the mage. The only one that mattered, anyway.”
“Hmm,” she said. “Heard you mages only liked scorping each other. That’s why you never took girls down there.”
He wanted to tear her face open and stuff it full of sand, but instead he smiled. “Repeating rumors is a sign of a small mind. Can’t you think for yourself? I’d hate to think I was wrong, to take you in.”
“So that’s what this is?” She looked around his house, and he knew what she saw; bare walls, bare floor, and piles of boxes and crates shoved into corners and serving as tables and chairs. Probably only a step or two above wherever she came from. “You’ve taken me in? What else do I have to do, to be kept by the Zaal?”
“For now? Just keep practicing your faces. And soon we’ll find a place for you inside the Arch. There’s always jobs to be found for someone as clever and pretty as you.”
She thought it over. “I’d like that. A proper job. Like a housekeeper or something.” And then she sat up, the blanket falling down to reveal breasts that were acceptable, even if they did not belong to Hellne. “Maybe I could do something at court, get near the prince himself. I could tell you what he says. His plans, that sort of thing.”
The Zaal reached for the bottle of sarave on the night table and passed it to her. “What a brilliant idea. I knew we’d be great friends. But let’s not get ahead—”
“If I can get a foot inside, he’d be easy enough to get next to. Like all men—no offense—he goes soft in his wits when he’s hard in his yala. When I met him, he had that Aelle with him—the one before the human. And he gave me the eye right in front of her, like she was invisible. And then leaves her flat for a human. Poor girl.” She drank from the neck of the bottle and shook her head. “And you know what they say: if he looks away once, he’ll look away twice. He deserves whatever he gets.” She looked at him with new suspicion. “What is he going to get?”
“As you say, it’ll be what he and the humans both richly deserve, for destroying the Raasth and for the Weapon itself. You are in the service of Eriis now.”
“It’ll be a challenge, though, to give it to him, the ugly beast.” She shuddered.
“You’re an actress,” said the Zaal. “So, act.”
Chapter Nineteen
Eriis
Feeling like it was time to leave the palace and see what people were saying and doing, Rhuun took Maaya to dinner at a cafe in the Old City (greens, soup, bread, everything tasting like paper, and the ever present sarave to wash it down) and Maaya was pleased to see how little notice he appeared to take at all the attention he got, even before the first bottle was poured. He nodded and smiled and even allowed a tap or pat on his shoulder (for luck) without flinching.
The reaction she got was decidedly less enthusiastic. Everyone knew she was the Glass Girl. The remaining Mages—although they had given up that title and gone to live as men above the ground, most of them —had given her that name, and it stuck. The Glass Girl, the human with a borrowed face. No one reached for her arm, and there were far fewer smiles.
“It were brave what you done,” said an elderly woman who stopped to talk with them as they walked back to the Palace. “My clan cousins at the Edge saw you and they said you hadn't but a cupful of life left in you.” She patted her shorn hair as if it were still bound in silky coils. Maaya could swear the old woman was flirting, and that made her smile. “But you come back and sent that Council man on his way. Too bad about the child.”
“Rest her now,” they said in unison.
She looked at Maaya, struggled to find something to add, and finally gave a cool smile before going on her way. “Light and Wind protect you as you protect His Grace.”
Maaya sighed—of course, only inwardly. At least they acknowledged that much.
“She’s always been good at that. Protecting His Grace.” They turned at the sound of t
he familiar voice.
“Aelle.” Rhuun said. “You’re back.”
Aelle shifted her package of groceries from one arm to the other and smiled the same smile she’d worn since the day Maaya had first laid eyes on her, the same one, she figured, she’d been born wearing. “Have I been away?”
Maaya thought it best she stay out of this one, as they seemed to have veered into demon territory. Of course, she’d been away, they all had. But Aelle looked mildly surprised at the question. It only took a moment for Rhuun to catch up.
“Apologies. Your path is your own to travel. How is your mother?”
“A widow,” she replied. “I’ll be certain to send her your regards.” She turned to go.
“Aelle, wait.” He reached for her arm, and she stepped out of reach. Her smile never moved. “I am…we are sorry about what happened. But you knew it was a possibility.”
Her expression softened. “I did. I sometimes forget who I’m to be mourning, these days.” She gave Maaya a glancing look, the one she practiced but never quite got right. “I should be thanking you. Like that woman said, you have a talent for protecting Rhuun. It’s my misfortune you had to protect him from my father.”
“Rest him now,” said Maaya. Rhuun and Aelle both looked at her with surprise, and she wished she was either invisible, dead, or somewhere else, preferable through a Door. Two Doors. “Sorry,” she muttered.
“Hm. You must come by for dinner. We’ll talk again soon.” They watched her vanish into the crowds heading away from the Arch.
Maaya blew out a sigh. “I think she wants to set me on fire.”
“Aelle? No, she’s…well, not fine, exactly.” He pulled on his horsetail and she followed him towards the palace. “She just needs some time.”
Maaya thought about what Aelle had said, and asked, “Why did she act like she’s never been away?”
“Ah. When someone is in mourning, it’s customary to go into seclusion, or on retreat, until you can present a proper face to the world.”
“It’s rude to grieve, you’re saying?”
“Isn’t it?” She didn’t reply. “But it’s even ruder to ask about it.”
“I get it,” she said. “When I was little, no one was allowed to talk about my mother. I guess it’s like that.” There had been a painting of her mother on the second-floor landing, until one day it was gone, replaced by a landscape with a dog and a boy on the beach. She hated that painting.
“No one wants to be reminded of their pain,” he said. Then he paused. “I’m sorry about your mother.”
“Thanks. I guess I’ve had enough time. Maybe that’s what Aelle needs.” That, and me, on fire. “But at least that old lady was happy to see you.”
“Yes, actually I wanted to talk to you about that,” he said, brightening. “About the Edge. Now that things are a little calmer, I'm going to go out there and thank those people.”
“Her clan cousins?” Maaya recalled the grey-tan desert and close-mouthed workers who were happier at her departure than her arrival.
“I was there for only a day, or so Ilaan told me, but I should let them know how important they are.” He gestured at the street and people moving past them. “Most of what we have comes from what they do. They're either ignored or admonished. I want to change that.”
She smiled up at him, letting a human emotion appear on her placid Eriisai face. “You're good at this.”
He smiled back and shook his head. “I’m sure my mother never spared a thought for those people. I want to change that. Also, the Zaal is still unaccounted for. I want to ask some quiet questions, if I can.”
The idea of Moth alone on the sand encountering the Zaal made her shiver. But the thought of what she became when he was threatened was even worse. That old woman who had spoken so kindly to Moth, she knew what Maaya had done, how the rock and bone of Eriis had simply taken over and turned her into a weapon. Well, that, and Maaya was known to be a human masquerading as a demon. She supposed the people in the city had reason to wonder what she was capable of. After all, when one thought of humans, one thought first of the Weapon. She gave another inward sigh, feeling eyes on her back, and was glad to have the gleaming stone of the palace close around her as they left the courtyard behind. It was far from welcoming, but at least it felt more private.
“And anyway, you’ll have Aelle to keep you company.”
“Wait. Keep me company where?” They paused their conversation to nod politely at the black-clad house guard. Rhuun took no one for granted. Anyone willing to stand for his family was worth at least common courtesy. One day, he told her, he hoped it could be more, and he intended to begin at the Edge.
Once back in their room, Maaya tossed her scarf over a chair and immediately unpinned her hair. She was far from an expert at putting it up by herself, and the best part of her day was letting it down. “Did you say you were thinking of going without me?”
“It's only three days. I'll be back before you know it. I'll bring you a present.”
She laughed. “From the Edge? What, a bag of sand?” She watched him open the huge windows in his—their—new room. He hadn't hesitated when moving his possessions to this upper floor, although it had raised some eyebrows as it wasn't among the family suites. It was a small space on the back side of the palace and had once been an office, but it had tall windows that looked towards the cloud-hidden mountains, not back over the city. He wanted those windows, she knew. He could practice flying without being observed. She had a vivid image, a memory of watching him fly, a tiny speck above the Guardhouse, and was struck by a dizzying wave of homesickness, followed by guilt. She couldn’t leave him, she didn’t want to. Her home was at his side. And she couldn’t leave without finding Thayree. “No, sweetheart, you should take me with you. You might need protecting.” She checked her hands, just to be sure, but they were only hands.
He laughed uneasily. “I generally do. But.” He sat with her on their bed and gently massaged the back of her neck. “I don't need to tell you this is a slow thing, these people accepting you here with me. And at the Edge, well, they're old-fashioned.”
She pulled away. “And they all know what I really am, under this face.”
“It'll take time—”
“That I saved your life doesn't matter. They don't want to see us together. Or me at all.”
“Do you want me to say it isn't complicated? Because to me, it isn't. They don't understand why—”
“You're sleeping in the toolshed.” She was sorry as soon as she said it, and he looked as though she had slapped him.
“It's just a stupid expression. I'm sorry you had to hear it, you know it's not true.” He ran his hands through his hair, she knew that meant he was wrestling with things he preferred not to say. “I'm sorry if you're upset, Lelet. And maybe next time we can go together. But I'll be leaving tomorrow in the morning. Please, may I try to apologize?” Back on Mistra, she’d once told him about ‘make up sex’, and he appeared to have remembered the concept. He reached for her and she let him pull her down onto their bed. This was another way Eriis had come between them: he was the same lover she'd been so delighted with on Mistra, but she was different. And worse, as they lay together afterwards, she realized she'd gripped his wrist hard enough to leave a mark. He shrugged it off. “I didn't feel anything.” Me either, she thought. Maybe I really am his sdhaach. Of course, she'd rather die than say it, but if he didn't know, he suspected. Even so, she felt guilty, and gently stroked the underside of his yala, making it jump and twitch.
He said, “And none of you adorn yourselves?” He mentioned the golden studs, she supposed, to remind her there were things here on Eriis she might enjoy.
“None that I've ever seen, not like this, anyway. We generally pierce our ears and that's about it.” He leaned forward and examined the tiny dimples in her earlobes, which for some reason had come along with her new Eriisai body. “I have some pearls I'm partial to. They're back home, unless Rane's swiped them.” Sh
e twirled his long hair around and through her fingers. “Do you know what a pearl is?”
“A jewel?” he guessed. “The moon?”
“The moon?” she laughed. “No, you were right the first time. What do you mean, the moon?”
“The Pearl Moon. That's what we call them—the Fire Moon and the Pearl Moon.”
She leaned back against him. “The Fire Moon. When I first arrived, Ilaan told me the story of Lelee and the Fire Moon. That's why we changed my name.”
He shook his head. “That's a terrible story for someone new. You must have thought we were all savages. But the daughter in the story? The Pearl Moon was Lelee's daughter.”
“I didn't know that.” She rested her head against his shoulder and he folded his arms around her. For a moment she imagined the stars were out, the moons were up, and she could see them. “Tell me the story of the Pearl Moon.”
“Well, the elementals aren't bound by the same morality that we are. So once the Fire Moon grew bored of Lelee and disposed of her, he took it upon himself to raise her daughter to be his perfect bride.” Maaya made a disgusted face. “I didn't make this story up,” he reminded her. “It's as old as Eriis. So the daughter grew to be as he intended: chaste, pure, and pale as ash.” He paused. “I don't know why he would have thought those things made her perfect, but that's how it goes. He raised her to be his consort, but the Pearl Moon's blood betrayed her. She was a demon, after all, and only an elemental by adoption. So, every night, the chaste and lovely Pearl Moon flees from the wicked, lustful Fire Moon. She isn't like him, no matter what he wants or even what she desires.”
“Did he love her? The Fire Moon?” Maaya hoped he did.
“As much as one thing can love something unlike itself. It is said he did love her truly, but whether he loves her still or only desires to set her free, he is bound to follow her through the night sky until one or another of them fall into the sand.”
The Glass Girl Page 11