Masquerade Read online

  ‘Yes,’ I said, annoyed at the tone of her question, as if she expected the fever to have altered my memory. ‘A man with a blurred face who wishes to kill all Chimaera, just like what happened to you, your partner, and your charges.’

  Her face pulled into a grimace. It was low of me to throw the deaths of Relean, Ahti, and Dev at her, even if they had died close to a thousand years ago. Anisa was proof that some grief never fades.

  ‘If Pozzi is the blurred man, he could be the one to kill us by poisoning me for a start,’ I muttered.

  ‘That is true,’ she admitted with a sigh. ‘Although I believe if he’d wished to do so, he could have just let you die already.’

  ‘I don’t like the sound of this at all,’ Drystan said, pacing around the terrace.

  ‘See if you can steal some of this Elixir,’ Anisa replied, looking at me. ‘If I have the time to study it, perhaps I can ascertain what’s in it. Also, if Cyan does grow ill, it would buy us a little time before we would have to bring her to Pozzi.’

  I thought back to Pozzi’s rooms. Stealing it from his cabinet of curiosities wouldn’t be easy. I remembered what else I’d seen there – the strange little Vestige Aleph on the mantelpiece.

  ‘What was that Aleph I saw at Pozzi’s?’ I asked her. ‘Did you sense anything about that?’

  ‘Sadly, no. It appeared empty to me, or the inhabitant, if they survived, is in deep hibernation. There are so many Alephs scattered about this world. Thousands of crypts that once housed my kind.’ She grew quiet, and I knew she thought of Relean. I wanted to offer comfort, but what was there to say?

  ‘What do we do in the meantime?’ I asked them all.

  ‘We watch, we wait, we keep our eyes wide open,’ Anisa said. ‘It is all we can do for now.’

  ‘Not all,’ Drystan said. ‘Simply sitting around on our arses is a piss-poor plan – sorry, Anisa. I’m going to try and find out more about Pozzi, maybe see if we can find any other evidence of more Chimaera – if we can find others, we can see how common this illness is.’

  ‘I agree,’ Cyan said, her right palm rubbing her left forearm. ‘I don’t like simply waiting to see if I fall ill, too.’

  ‘What you do will hopefully be the right course of action,’ Anisa said blandly, her voice echoing with a certain amount of prescience.

  I sighed. ‘I don’t find that comforting.’

  Anisa returned to her Aleph, Cyan went back to her room, and Drystan and I climbed down to our loft. My body was still strange and not quite my own, my mind almost detached.

  Everything had been wonderful five days ago. We’d won the duel against Taliesin and his grandsons. Maske had learned that Cyan was his daughter. Drystan had said he loved me. Everything had fallen into place. Now my life had fractured again.

  Drystan’s warm arms wrapped around me. Turning, I rested his forehead against mine.

  ‘We’ll get through all of this,’ he said. ‘We always do.’

  So far.

  ‘What did you say?’

  ‘Hmm? I didn’t say anything.’

  ‘Strange. I swore I heard you say “so far” but it sounded . . . different.’

  My mouth formed a little ‘o’. Drystan, I thought at him. Can you hear me?

  He jumped back and swore.

  My mouth fell open. ‘You heard me!’

  ‘Did you just . . . speak in my mind?’ He sounded panicked. ‘Can you read my thoughts?’

  ‘I don’t know. Do you want me to try?’

  ‘Styx! No!’

  I was a little hurt at that.

  ‘I thought only Cyan was psychic,’ he said, his eyes still round.

  My breath hitched. ‘So did I. No one else has ever been able to hear me before Pozzi. Not without Cyan’s help.’

  Drystan just looked at me. It didn’t need a mind-reader to tell he was perturbed at the turn of events.

  ‘It must be the side effects Pozzi was talking about,’ I assured him, just as surprised as he was.

  Drystan came closer, but we didn’t quite touch.

  ‘Are you afraid of me?’ I said, my voice cracking. Am I still a freak?

  ‘You’re not a freak. Never think that.’

  I hadn’t meant for him to hear the last part. ‘Styx, this is just one more strange thing in a series of strange events.’

  He hugged me, and those arms were a comfort, a refuge. The warmth, the feel, the smell, the very presence of him centred me. We’d still not been ‘together’ for very long, and it felt so precious sometimes. So very delicate, like it could shatter at any moment. We curled around this newness, protecting it from anything that could bring harm. Loving him was as natural as opening my eyes after a long sleep.

  Putting my hands on either side of his face, pressing my lips to his, I tried to forget everything and only focus on Drystan. ‘I love you, Drystan Hornbeam.’

  After a long kiss, he pulled back, smiling gently. ‘I love you, Micah Grey.’

  He pulled me to the bed, and I followed.

  4

  THE FLAME AND THE FIRE

  We must rise up against injustice. We must take what is ours. And we will. No longer will we let the Twelve Trees of Nobility soak up all the water, the sunshine, and the nutrients of the world. The rest of us are hungry, and we will be fed.

  — Extract from a Forester pamphlet

  The next day, the last thing I wanted to do was stay inside.

  I’d barely slept; my energy was still so high. Skipping coffee for fear it would make me bounce off the ceiling, I sipped apple juice and munched toast at the breakfast table. Drystan was rubbing his eyes and gulping coffee – he didn’t sleep much, after all. I suppressed a wicked grin. Cyan stared at her toast, focusing inward, as if she could sense her body turning against her. Ricket miaowed indignantly in the corner, and Drystan moved to feed him.

  Maske came into the kitchen, and one look at his ashen face made my stomach drop. He set the newspaper on the table and the bold headline carved itself into my brain: ‘CHIMAERA ARE REAL AND AMONG US.’

  That was The Daily Imacharan, a respectable newspaper, not some rag printing rumours for the hope of bolstering their circulation numbers. I grabbed it, skimming it.

  ‘That’s already out of date, according to the delivery man,’ Maske said. ‘I’ll turn on the radio. Said there’d be an update on the hour.’

  Another new purchase that Maske couldn’t afford before the duel. It took him a few moments to find the right station, and then the crackly, discordantly upbeat music filled the room.

  The two minutes until the clock in the hall struck nine had never seemed so long. The music faded away, replaced with the announcer’s smooth tones. It was not a Vestige artefact, though the inventors had spent many hours taking Vestige apart and putting it back together again to find a way to communicate across land and sea.

  ‘Good morning, Imachara. It is nine in the morning, and many of you will be at work, but I hope your employers are feeling generous and letting you listen on one of the days that will go down in history.

  ‘Yesterday evening, a small group of people claiming to be none other than the Chimaera of myth presented themselves at the Royal Snakewood Palace, asking for a meeting with the Princess Royal Nicolette Snakewood and her uncle, the Steward of the Crown. Many, of course, assumed that they were simply pranksters. One of them, however, put on a display that can only be described as magical. We at Radio Imachara managed to conduct an exclusive interview with one of the guards, who has chosen to remain nameless. He told us there were three people at the gates. One was tall, pale-skinned, dark-eyed, and very handsome, yet looked normal, our guard said, aside from his eyes. They glowed a reddish orange in the growing darkness, like coals. The other was a woman with spots on her skin like a leopard, her teeth pointed canines.’

  Drystan and I exchanged a look. Could it be Juliet the Leopard Lady of R. H. Ragona’s Circus of Magic? Had another Chimaera been right next to us the whole time?

  ‘The th
ird person was a man with fine auburn hair all over him, slick as a horse’s hide. We asked our guard if he thought this could all be done with tricks and cosmetics, but the guard had shaken his head, vigorously. He said the three supposed Chimaera asked very politely if the Royal Family would see them, as they wished to make themselves known to them. They claimed they came in nothing but friendliness and peace, and all three were loyal citizens of Ellada.

  ‘And, Imachara – the Royal Family did indeed let them in.’

  He paused for effect. My mouth was so dry I had to steal a sip of Drystan’s coffee.

  ‘We do not know what happened once these people entered the palace, but I do know that this morning, at noon, they will address the city. There will be a full security presence, and anyone who wishes to attend is urged to be silent, peaceful, and listen to what they have to say. We will also be broadcasting their words live if you wish to remain in your homes. Whatever they say, I have a feeling Imachara, Ellada, and the Archipelago as a whole will never be quite the same.’

  Maske turned off the radio. The silence in the kitchen was deafening.

  ‘Well,’ Drystan said. ‘I suppose we know what we’re doing this lunchtime.’

  ‘You shouldn’t go,’ Maske said. ‘It isn’t safe.’

  ‘We can’t miss this,’ Cyan said. ‘It involves us.’

  Maske pressed his lips together. ‘I can’t face it. I’ll listen here.’ He loved performing in front of large crowds, but he could not stand to be amidst the crush of bodies. After so many years living alone, he was still a hermit at heart.

  ‘We’re going,’ I said, keeping my voice gentle.

  ‘You need to be careful,’ he said. ‘Emotions are high. Stay out of the way.’

  ‘We’ll watch from the rooftops,’ I said.

  He nodded and turned back to his coffee cup.

  The three of us left our dishes in the sink and almost ran upstairs to finish dressing. My heartbeat hammered in my chest.

  Other Chimaera.

  Less than an hour later, Cyan and Drystan accompanied me through Imachara towards the Celestial Cathedral. My senses had always been sharp, but now I could detect scents from half a street down, and hear sounds from even farther away. This was not always pleasant – it meant that as well as chimney smoke and unfurling flowers, there was the more noisome pollution of city life; manure, rotting rubbish, stale body odour and that much more. The late spring morning was busy, with shopkeepers setting out their wares, paperboys crying the headlines from the corners, and the engines of cabs and carriages sputtering and growling. Horses drawing carts whinnied. The sun emerged, glinting off the mica in the soot-stained granite of Imachara.

  My energy was so high it was hard not to skip down the pavement, despite the dread I should have been feeling. Other Chimaera in Imachara. We would see them, maybe even meet them. We couldn’t out ourselves as Chimaera, public scrutiny would fall on us even more than it already had as winners of Maske’s duel. Maybe they’d even say we cheated at the magician show by using our Chimaera powers – also not entirely untrue. Still, though. I’d see others like me.

  My excitement soon sobered.

  The Foresters, the anti-monarchy party, were already here, lining the streets in protest. The Foresters wished for ministries, for democracy, for elections. For the most part, the demonstrations so far had been peaceful, if emotionally charged. A few months ago, a group had splashed paint on the windows of the noble estates in the Emerald Bowl out of town, but the main Forester party was quick to proclaim that they were a fringe group unaffiliated with the main movement. Cyan and Drystan were in varying degrees sympathetic to their cause, even if they didn’t agree with their methods. Having grown up in the family I had, and raised to be utterly loyal to the crown, it was difficult to know what to believe.

  My stomach dropped – these Foresters were here to protest about the Chimaera. The Royal Family had let them into their palace, listened to whatever they had to say, and given them a platform to address the city. The Foresters had no say in the matter, and they were unhappy.

  This protest was utterly silent. No cries, no fist-fights, no chanting. Hundreds of people crowded the front of the Royal Snakewood Courthouse. Many held signs with slogans: ‘FROM THE LOWEST ROOT TO THE HIGHEST BRANCHES’, ‘THE TWELVE TREES ARE FULL OF TERMITES’, or the simpler ‘FREEDOM FOR ALL’. Other signs, the paint still wet, proclaimed ‘CHIMAERA ARE FABLES’, ‘NO MONSTERS IN ELLADA’, and ‘FAIRY TALE NONSENSE’. Policiers were clustered around the protesters, hands resting lightly near their guns, probably unnerved by the quietness of the crowd.

  ‘The Chimaera aren’t here, though, are they?’ Drystan asked, puzzled. ‘I thought they were speaking in front of the Celestial Cathedral.’

  ‘Security probably herded the crowds this way,’ Cyan said. She closed her eyes. ‘Yes. They’ve been here since just after that announcement.’

  There was still an hour and a half until noon and already the streets were so packed. We threaded our way through the crowd. Someone pressed a flyer into my hand and I crumpled it into my fist.

  We managed to find a small side street that was less crowded than the others. Spying scaffolding, we climbed up to the rooftops.

  ‘Over there,’ I said, pointing.

  We climbed over the tops of a few tenements, built so close together we only had to step over the narrow gaps between them. Soon, we found another scaffolding-skirted building and climbed down to the second platform from the bottom. We had an excellent view of the Celestial Cathedral. A few children sat on the platform below us, but no one else had been brave enough to climb up higher, so we had space to breathe. The cathedral dominated the square, shining in the sun. The white and black towers representing the Moon and the Sun jutted towards the sky. Its doors were closed, a hasty, temporary stage erected in the middle of the square. Something about it made me shudder – it looked like a gallows.

  The last time I had been here was Lady’s Long Night, when the service had been interrupted by a very different type of Forester protest. Timur, the leader of the group, had cut the power and threatened to expose a secret that would bring the monarchy down if they did not start acquiescing to the Foresters’ demands. As far as I knew, the Snakewoods had not caved to his blackmail. Had Timur ever known a secret at all?

  The square below was packed with bodies, but not to the point where people couldn’t move. Many more stayed away, frightened by the possibility of actual Chimaera. These people could be frauds, I reminded myself, but so badly wanted to believe that more Chimaera were returning and that we were not alone.

  The crumpled flyer was still in my pocket. Drystan and Cyan leaned closer to look over my shoulder. It showed a sketched tree, its branches weighed down with food and gold. Below, people with roots for legs reached up towards the food in vain. There was a short article listing the discrepancy of social wealth and a call to action.

  ‘The other Forester flyers had Timur on them,’ I said, remembering his unruly mane of hair and intense eyes. He’d once worked for the palace and the crown, but had turned against the monarchy and now hoped to undo its power. He thought they hoarded their wealth, and so many went hungry who couldn’t. He wasn’t wrong, but I disagreed with his methods.

  ‘Maybe they realized his face was scaring people off the cause,’ Drystan said with a laugh as I put the flyer away.

  We quieted, staring down at the crowd. As it grew closer to noon, the square grew even more crowded. The area behind the temporary stage, nearest the cathedral, was blocked off, so the three Chimaera would have an escape route into the church if the crowd grew too rowdy.

  Anisa’s Aleph was cold as I clutched it within my pocket, next to the Forester flyer. Time passed and the tension grew in the heart of Imachara.

  The clock of one of the cathedral towers finally struck noon. The twelve gongs sounded out over the square, and a hush fell over the crowd.

  The three Chimaera emerged from the cathedral, hooded and cloak
ed, surrounded by a security detail. They walked with careful steps up onto the stage. A pulpit with a Vestige amplifier waited to project their voices across the square.

  They lined up behind the pulpit and as one, removed their hoods. Gasps and low murmurings rippled through the crowd. Drystan and I exchanged another look. The woman in the middle was definitely the Leopard Lady from R. H. Ragona’s Circus of Magic. Vertigo made me woozy, and I gripped the metal scaffolding tight. Juliet had been a friend to both of us, though we didn’t know her well. She preferred to keep to herself. Once, I’d asked Drystan if he thought she could be Chimaera, due to her spotted skin and sharp fangs. He’d waved it away, saying she probably had a skin disorder and surgical enhancements. He’d been wrong.

  Though the crowd surged forward, no one came closer than six feet from the edge of the stage. Cyan’s mouth pursed.

  ‘They’ve put up a Vestige Shroud,’ she said.

  My eyes widened. ‘I’ve never seen one of those in effect before.’ A Shroud put up a barrier around a set perimeter. Nothing could go in, nothing could go out. The Royal Family or prominent political figures used one whenever they addressed the public, to stave off any assassination attempts. The fact that the family had presumably given the Chimaera one for their own protection would rankle any who felt threatened by these three.

  My breath caught in my throat and I leaned closer to the edge of the platform.

  Juliet stepped up to the pulpit. The darker rosettes on her skin stood out in stark relief. She’d shaved in the circus, evidently, or her body had changed – she was covered in a soft down of fur, barely visible, but my eyesight was keen enough to spot it. The other two were as the guard had described. One had short hair like a horse’s coat on all visible skin. The other man’s eyes glowed slightly, even in the bright light of day, the irises a brilliant orange and red, his skin so pale as to almost be translucent. I wasn’t afraid of them – how could I be? They were Chimaera, even if they were Theri instead of Anthi like me and Cyan.

  Juliet took a shaking breath. She’d performed in front of crowds time and time again, but there she’d simply stood, gazing imperiously at the gawkers who came to the freak-show tent, hissing if they came too close. She’d never spoken to large crowds. I wondered where Tauro was – he’d also been a member of the freak-show tent at the circus. He’d looked part-human and part-bull. He couldn’t speak, but understood everyone around him, and I remembered him as sweet and kind. I hoped Juliet was looking after him, somewhere safe, and that he’d escaped a workhouse or worse.