They were supposed to be better than the Catresou.
“Command me to show you my memories as proof,” said Juliet, “and I will.”
Runajo swallowed convulsively. “No,” she said.
She could never let Juliet in her mind again. She didn’t dare.
She didn’t deserve to have Juliet in her mind, ever again.
“Most of my cousins.” Juliet drew out each word, leaning forward toward Runajo, clearly relishing each flinch. “All the lords of the Catresou. Most of their advisors. Many of their wives. Anyone who got in my way or who would not submit, I killed them. And it is all your fault.”
“I didn’t know,” Runajo whispered. “I’m sorry.”
Juliet looked her in the eyes. “I will never forgive you,” she said, her voice calm and absolutely certain. “I will never forgive you. I swear by my soul that no Juliet will ever forgive you.”
33
PARIS TURNED AWAY FROM THE window. His heart was thudding; his hands were numb and stiff. But he didn’t hesitate. As soon as Justiran went into the other room, he picked up the medallion and bolted out the front door.
He had promised Vai he wouldn’t do anything stupid, and he wasn’t. It was entirely logical to go after Makari right now, because if he didn’t, there was no telling if they would ever find him again. Besides, he needed to try this before Romeo woke up. Because once he woke, there would be no hiding the secret from him, and he would demand to be included in whatever attempt they made to free Makari. And if Makari couldn’t be freed . . .
Paris remembered the crack as Vai snapped Tybalt’s neck. How easily she had done it.
Romeo wasn’t Vai, and he probably couldn’t survive losing Makari a second time. Paris hadn’t been able to do a thing to help Juliet, but he could do this much for Romeo.
Makari didn’t run from him. He walked away with long, leisurely strides. Paris caught up with him quickly and then stopped, two paces away, his heart hammering.
For a few moments they stood looking at each other in silence. Makari was meeting his eyes, but there was absolutely no expression in his face.
“Are you . . . are you free now?” asked Paris. Had disrupting the ceremony somehow shattered the power that the necromancer held over him? That didn’t make much sense, but if Makari was still enslaved, he surely would have tried to kill or capture Paris by now.
“I’m going to help you,” said Paris. Slowly, his hands only shaking a little, he stepped forward and pressed the medallion into his chest.
Makari took a deep breath. Paris looked up, desperately hopeful—
And Makari smiled.
“Did you think I was a slave?” he asked.
“You were dead,” said Paris. He couldn’t seem to think past that. Makari had been dead, and he could only be alive if he’d been raised by the necromancer, and that had to make him a slave—
“Dead and returned,” said Makari, and Paris must have absorbed more of Romeo’s memories than he had thought, because he could tell that there was something slightly yet stomach-churningly wrong about Makari’s voice, his smile.
Perhaps he had gone mad. Being dragged back by the necromancer’s power and then set free by his death must be terrible enough to shatter a mind.
“Listen,” Paris said. “We can help you. Romeo’s here. Do you remember him?”
“Of course I do.” Makari drew his sword. “That’s why you’re going to die.”
Paris tried to run, but Makari was too quick for him. In a moment he was backed against the wall with the sword point against his throat.
Makari clucked his tongue. “You don’t get to coward out of this. Draw your sword and fight, little boy.”
He should have waited for Romeo. He should have listened to Vai. He should have gotten used to danger by now, but Paris’s hands were still shaking as he drew his sword.
“We haven’t hurt Romeo,” he said, in case Makari was confused about that. “He wants to see you again—”
Makari snarled and lunged. He was taller and heavier than Paris, and faster even than Romeo. Every time he lunged, he cut another shallow slice into Paris’s skin: arm, leg, cheek, the other arm. Paris staggered, gasping in pain. His heart was thundering in his ears, but his body seemed to be moving slower and slower.
“I really can’t believe you were even second in line to protect the Juliet,” said Makari. “Did you know she’s alive again?”
For a moment, the words didn’t make sense. It wasn’t possible. Juliet couldn’t be a necromancer’s slave—not the girl who had been so fierce and righteous in her grief, who had loved zoura, who had said she could bear anything if she could protect her people first.
She had never been allowed to protect them.
Paris shook his head. “No,” he said desperately.
“I thought I wouldn’t need her,” said Makari. “Dead keys are so much easier to use than living ones. But now that you broke the other one, I’ll hunt her down and drag her out by the hair.”
There was a dull thump against his ribs. Paris looked down and saw Makari’s sword embedded in his chest.
It didn’t hurt a bit. He thought, very calmly, I’ve been stabbed in the heart.
“I am the Master Necromancer,” said Makari. “I helped begin the Ruining. I have died fifteen times since then, drenched the world in blood so that I could walk back from death of my own accord. And you thought you could save me.”
He pulled the sword out. There was one moment of pure agony, and then all Paris could feel was wet wet red. He realized that his knees had given out, and he had fallen to the ground.
Makari knelt beside him. He gripped Paris’s chin and turned it so they were looking eye to eye.
“Romeo was obedient,” said Makari. “He was mine. He was not going to give me any trouble. And then you got hold of him.”
Romeo was always defiant and always belonged to Juliet and always, always would give everyone trouble. But Paris couldn’t say that, because he couldn’t breathe. His heart couldn’t beat anymore, and he couldn’t breathe.
He was very cold.
“You’re dying,” said Makari. “I’m going to sit here and watch the light go out of your eyes. And then I’m going to raise you back to life. You’ll be perfectly obedient.”
Paris thought, Then why don’t you kill Romeo? But Makari couldn’t hear him. Nobody could hear him now, not even Romeo. He was going to die alone.
He’d always been alone.
“I’ll go back to Romeo,” said Makari. “I’ll tell him that you worked for the necromancers all along. I’ll tell him that you betrayed him, and did your best to enslave me. And you’ll provide whatever proof I need.”
Romeo won’t believe it, Paris thought. Vai will certainly kill me. If Juliet is even half alive, she will find a way to stop you.
But maybe Juliet was too deeply enslaved. Maybe Vai wouldn’t kill him fast enough. Maybe Romeo would doubt him long enough, trust Makari for long enough—he had loved Makari, Paris had felt it, this was going to kill him, and Paris tried, desperately, to move. To stop this from happening. But his whole body was numb now, and he could hear the song of death.
Water, singing with many voices.
He’d heard it twice before. But this time there was nobody for him to save, and nobody to save him.
Makari’s hand ruffled his hair, as if he were already an obedient pet, and it was wrong wrong wrong, but he couldn’t speak, couldn’t move.
This time, the song of death wasn’t terrible. He felt like he was going home, and he would have sobbed if he’d been able, because he knew he wouldn’t get to stay.
He thought of Romeo and he thought, I’m sorry.
And then the world went away.
In Lovers Meeting
MASKS GLITTER IN THE LAMPLIGHT. The scent of smoke and jasmine floats on the air.
They are the least of the three high houses. But on the Night of Ghosts, the Catresou rule the city. The Old Viyarans hold their bloody p
enance services so that the dead will stay dead. The Mahyanai burn candles in memory of the dead, who they believe exist no more.
But the Catresou—whom everyone else calls dour, mysterious, and death-loving—on this night, they dance for the dead. They throw open their gates, offer sweetmeats and wine to all passers-by, and dress themselves in the gaudiest costumes and masks that they can find.
And anyone who wears a mask may dance with them.
The boy’s mask is simple: leather, embossed and dyed to look like leaves. There is no reason for it to catch her eye as she enters the courtyard of her father’s house. And yet she looks twice at him: a slender boy, probably no older than herself and certainly no taller, standing a little apart from the rest of the crowd, not laughing or drinking or flirting. Watching.
His masked face turns toward her and stops. He is watching her.
He is curious to see her, of course. All know of her, but since her training is not yet complete, very few have met her. And all can recognize her now: by the white dress she wears, and the white filigree mask, and the short sword she carries in her hand.
This is her duty and her right: to perform the sword dance on the Night of Ghosts, because alone out of all the daughters of the Catresou, she is permitted to bear sharpened steel. This is the first year she has been old enough to do it.
She takes her place. The music starts. And then there is nothing but her and the dance and the naked blade. Sometimes she whips it around as if striking invisible foes, sometimes she tosses it in the air and catches it, sometimes she whirls her body around it as if it is the axis of the world.
The sword has always been her heart and her life.
And then she realizes that he is walking toward her.
He moves in slow, careful strides, keeping time to the music. She watches him. She does not slow in her dancing. She sees him count her steps, track the way she moves. He has the eyes of a duelist.
When she next throws the sword up into the air, he spins into the sphere of her movement and catches it, then whirls away.
The next few minutes are the strangest dance the Night of Ghosts has ever seen. She does not miss a beat as she spins after him, leans into him, reaching for the sword. He catches her wrist and spins her out again. Her finger crooks around his. She will not be let go, and she draws him in again, catches the sword from his fingers—
He lets her take it, and takes her waist instead, lifting her up and spinning her around.
When her toes touch the ground again, at last their eyes meet.
She has seen the way he grips the sword, and knows that he is Mahyanai. She should be angry that one of their enemies has dared to break in upon her dance, but finds that she cannot. Not when the music is thrumming and laughing, and he is smiling that terribly bright, innocent smile.
And they play. As simply and easily as children, they play, catching and capturing the sword back and forth between them as they keep time to the music. They whirl, and his back presses against hers; they duck, and her fingers wrap around his wrist for one brief moment before she snatches the sword away.
The dance lasts but a minute, or perhaps ten thousand years. When the music stops, they are a pace apart, both their hands wrapped around the hilt of the sword.
Then he lets go. Still he does not speak.
“You dance as if you knew the sword,” she says. “But how many have you fought, and how many killed?”
“None,” he says, still breathless and still smiling. “And you?”
“None yet,” she says, and cannot help returning his smile.
He grows solemn then. “I will not lie to you,” he says quietly. “I am Mahyanai Romeo.”
As the music starts again, she says, “I am the Juliet. I am the sword of the Catresou.”
And in another time, another place—soon and very near—she will be his enemy and perhaps compelled to kill him. But this is a night for ghosts, and revelry, and impossible things.
She holds out the sword hilt first, a clear invitation. “If you think that you are strong enough to dance with me a second time—let us begin.”
Acknowledgments
First of all, I have to thank Sasha Decker, Tia Corrales, and Megan Lorance, for being the kindest and most supportive friends that any writer could hope to have.
Hannah Bowman continues to be a fantastic agent who believes in my stories even when I don’t, while Kristin Daly Rens still amazes me with how hard she works to make my novels the best they can be. I’d also really like to thank Jenna Stempel and Colin Anderson for the gorgeous cover, as well as the entire Balzer + Bray team.
Bethany Powell, Natalie Parker, Brendan Hodge, and R. J. Anderson all read various drafts of Bright Smoke, Cold Fire and gave not only excellent feedback but also some desperately needed encouragement. Also, while E. K. Johnston didn’t read the manuscript, she still gave some world-class encouragement.
Finally, I have to thank Sergei Prokofiev and Jean-Christophe Maillot, whose ballet Roméo et Juliette convinced me that I loved this story—and William Shakespeare, who wrote the play to begin with.
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About the Author
Photo credit Janelle Bighinatti
ROSAMUND HODGE grew up as a homeschooler in Los Angeles, where she spent her time reading everything she could get her hands on, but especially fantasy and mythology. She received a BA in English from the University of Dallas and an MSt in medieval English from Oxford. She now lives in Seattle, Washington, with seven toy cats and a plush Cthulhu. She is also the author of Cruel Beauty; Gilded Ashes, a Cruel Beauty novella; and Crimson Bound. Visit her online at www.rosamundhodge.net.
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Books by Rosamund Hodge
Cruel Beauty
Gilded Ashes
Crimson Bound
Bright Smoke, Cold Fire
Credits
Cover art © 2016 by Colin Anderson
Cover design and lettering by Jenna Stempel
Copyright
Balzer + Bray is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
BRIGHT SMOKE, COLD FIRE. Copyright © 2016 by Rosamund Hodge. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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