Magic Under Glass Read online

  “There’s nothing to loosen,” I said, but then I wondered if my defiance made me look more guilty. I stared at the coin. “I—I do wish I had something to tell you . . . When I first came, I almost wished it would come alive. It looks so real. But it hasn’t.” I looked sadly down at my shoes.

  “Well . . .” Smollings pocketed the coin. “I know women have soft hearts. I suppose even an enchanted automaton might be very charming. Whatever may happen, I hope you’re aware that he is inhuman. And if he is the prince, God help us. I imagine the fairies would kill us all if given half a chance. I know I should not like to think myself responsible for another war because I fancied my enemy to be a pretty little doll to have tea parties with.”

  He handed me a penny. “Here, girl. A little something for your time. Be sure to let me know if you see anything.”

  I shoved the coin in my pocket, unable to hide the venom in my eyes entirely, but I kept my lips shut.

  13

  The next morning, Linza wore a slight smile as she brought my breakfast. “He’s gone, miss,” she said, when I offered a tentative smile in return.

  “Oh, thank goodness.” I went limp in my chair.

  “He rarely stays long, but days seem like weeks with Smollings around, don’t they?” Linza poured me a cup of tea. “We can all breathe easy now.”

  “Did you see the witch he brought with him?” I asked. “The criminal?”

  Her body stiffened. “Witch?”

  “Yes, a girl with these orbs floating around her head ran into my room in the middle of the night, begging for help. Smollings dragged her away. He had this staff that was hurting her and she cried out, and Hollin said she was a witch, a madwoman, that Smollings was taking to prison, but it was all very strange.”

  Spots of pink appeared on Linza’s thin cheeks. “That is strange,” she said. “But—but it doesn’t surprise me. Smollings was chief of the border police when he was younger, I’ve heard. I’d guess he knows about criminals.”

  “Linza, do you know something about it? You’re flushed.”

  She quickly shook her head. A bad liar, Linza was, and I was about to tell her so when her eyes welled with tears. When I opened my mouth, she rushed from the room.

  I couldn’t find her anywhere, so I wandered outside among the sun-baked grasses of the field, gathering the tiny yellow flowers and sprigs of white that swayed in the breeze. I thought to take Erris a bouquet; he’d surely love to see them. He must miss flowers. I twirled daisies between my fingers and played a game I’d read about in a book—does he love me, does he not? I didn’t specify who “he” was . . . but he loved me.

  IS HE GONE? Erris asked, after I arranged the flowers in a vase atop his pianoforte.

  “Yes. This morning.”

  DID HE HURT YOU?

  “What? No. Not really. He tried to bribe me to tell him you’d spoken to me. And he said something about you being a doll I have tea parties with.” I made a scoffing sound, but the words stung. Smollings thought no more of me than he would a dust mote. I should have been happy he didn’t consider me much threat, but I knew many people of Lorinar shared his view. I had come a long way from my childhood world, where my mother was one of the most admired women at court.

  “I should have never left Tiansher. If Mother’s looking down on me, she’d say I should have stayed on the farm with Uncle Sancham. I’ve done nothing but make a mockery of myself since I came.”

  He made a sympathetic sound. SIT.

  I knelt on my knees by the piano bench, keeping his hands just barely in view. “I’m sorry, Erris. I don’t even feel like talking.”

  “Mmm?” he prodded with his tone.

  “Oh, it’s just . . . I don’t know. My mother was so beautiful, so skilled. When she danced, the whole court watched her. She thought I’d follow in her footsteps, but instead I’m here. My home seems like something I imagined rather than a real place half the time, and I’ve grown used to being called a ‘trouser girl’ and worse. I don’t know how to explain it. I don’t know who I am anymore.” I swallowed.

  YOU ARE JUST NIM TO ME. I LIKE NIM.

  “I guess you would know how it feels, if anyone does.” Erris was far from home . . . and far from the person he had once been. I wished, how I wished . . . he could take my hand and murmur words of solace in my ear.

  The thought was a whisper, forbidden even within the halls of my own mind.

  I finally climbed onto the piano bench and sat beside him. I studied him, as I had so many times done. I took a flower from the vase and twirled it between my fingers. I touched the petals to his cheek.

  He looked at his hands. His chest rose and fell.

  He spelled my name slowly. N-I-M.

  I brought the flower back, now sliding the petals along the palm of my hand. “I’m sorry, Erris. I don’t mean to make you miss—”

  YOU KNOW . . . He paused long. I THINK I AM DEAD.

  I let my hand drop to my lap. “You’re not dead. If you were dead, you wouldn’t be here.”

  YOU ASKED, AM I A GHOST? NEVER WANTED TO ADMIT. PERHAPS . . . I AM. MY REAL BODY MUST BE DEAD.

  “But, Karstor . . .”

  I didn’t finish the sentence, and he didn’t volunteer anything for me.

  “Erris, I can’t accept—I mean, if you are a ghost, and if you can’t be—saved . . . No. No, I won’t accept it. You can’t possibly have waited all this time, just to die. I was meant to find you, I’m sure of it. I will do anything to save you.”

  Every person has a reason to walk the earth, Mother always said. Sometimes the path leads in strange directions. An easy thing for her to say, it seemed to me now, when she married and became a dancer, just as she always expected.

  Still, if I had a purpose, surely it must be to save Erris, and even Hollin himself. I had come to Lorinar to seek my fortune, but in three years, I had found nothing like a fortune. I might as well have stayed in Tiansher if my life was to be an endless round of seedy halls and pennies for pay, watching the songs of my country lose their potency as they touched indifferent ears. This was my chance to be something more, my chance to act.

  If I ever had the chance. I didn’t have the liberty to jaunt off and hunt down Karstor.

  I THINK I MIGHT BE BEYOND SAVING.

  “Hush. Hush!” I cried, as if his words were spoken. I shot up from the bench, furious—at Erris, or at myself, I couldn’t yet tell. “Don’t talk like that—I won’t look at you if you do. There must be something I can do. There’s something, or Garvin would have told you it was helpless. If I don’t save you, this is all worthless. My whole life is worthless.” I shuddered and wrapped my arms around myself.

  “Mmm,” he begged. “Mmm!”

  “Please don’t.” I kept my face turned away from him a little longer, and then my resolve broke.

  “Mmm.” He wanted me to come back to his side. I sunk down again, beside him, and put my forehead to his shoulder. Beneath his jacket, no life, no warmth, only the ridges of metal parts.

  I couldn’t bear it.

  PLEASE . . . DON’T CRY.

  I swiped my hand across my cheek. How could I cry before him, when tears were lost to him? How could I even complain when at least my body was free?

  DON’T DESPAIR YET. TALK TO KARSTOR.

  “Yes . . .”

  WE MUST PRACTICE THESE GHASTLY SONGS. I AM NOT SO DEAD AS TO AVOID THAT.

  “No.” I wiped my eyes and tried to smile.

  “Mmm,” he said gently, and he began to play.

  14

  I had not seen Linza since that morning, so I was surprised when she came to braid my hair for bed, as if nothing had happened.

  Well, not quite as if nothing had happened. Her hands trembled as they formed the plait. I burned to ask her questions, but pushing her would do no good. I couldn’t force answers from her any more than Smollings could force them from me, and I didn’t fancy bribery.

  “There. All ready,” Linza whispered, letting my braids fall a
gainst my back. Then, “Miss.”

  “Yes?”

  “The—the witch . . . did Mr. Smollings really hurt her? With his staff?”

  “Yes.”

  “She begged for help? What did she say?”

  “Not much. Her hands were tied, and she asked me to untie them.”

  “I wanted to tell you this morning, Miss Nimira,” she said. “I’m scared to lose my job, with Mother’s rheumatism . . . but this isn’t right and I ought to tell you.” She closed her eyes tight, like she wanted to hide from her own words. “That woman you saw is Mr. Parry’s wife.”

  I exhaled, and reached for the edge of the table. “His wife?”

  “Yes, miss.”

  “But . . . she died of a fever. Didn’t she?”

  “Not exactly, miss. She’s not well, but she’s not dead, either.”

  “But he told people she’s dead? And he keeps her locked up?”

  “He doesn’t . . . exactly.”

  “Then who does?”

  “Mr. Smollings. And Miss Rashten works for him. She makes sure the mistress can’t escape—oh, dear, I really shouldn’t be telling you all this.”

  “Is she mad?”

  “She’s not really mad. Well, she’s odd, that’s true, but . . .”

  “Odd how?”

  “I’m not sure all of what happened. I’d just started working here when she got sick, but Mr. Parry tried some terrible magic to save her, and something happened. He let something dark get into her. I’ve heard she can talk to the dead now. Those orbs follow her around. Spirits. And she stays in the dark. Lights make her sick.”

  “Why is she locked up?”

  “On account of the forbidden magic Mr. Parry used to try and save her. I guess he’d go to jail if the council knew, and none of us want that to happen.” She added, “Mr. Parry is a good man, miss. He pays us all good wages.”

  No doubt he does, with that sort of secret, I thought bitterly. He’d told me she was a witch and a madwoman. His own wife. He dined with me, and hinted at a future, while his wife dwelt captive in this very house.

  “I’m sorry,” Linza said in a hush. “But I thought you should know.”

  “No one shall ever know you told me,” I said. “Thank you.”

  She hurried from the room.

  15

  A door blocked off the stairs to the third floor, but no one had locked it, and no one saw me slip through it—I made sure of that. Some furniture cluttered the third-floor halls: a settee with torn upholstery and a dented wardrobe, covered in dust, save four long lines where fingers had raked through the gray.

  I crept forward on stocking feet. Some doors were locked tight, with only silence behind them, while others hung open to empty rooms, cleared of all furniture. Only the dark drapes remained, blocking the light and stifling the air. Spiderwebs clung to light fixtures and corners.

  A whiff of fresh air drew me to the tower room, above the place where Hollin and I sometimes dined. This room still had furniture, all draped in white sheets. Gauzy curtains billowed in the breeze that slipped through cracked windows, yet even with the sunshine, the loneliness was palpable.

  I pulled up the corner of one cloth, revealing the dainty curved leg of a chair. Pink upholstery covered the seat. Very feminine.

  I wondered if they had been Annalie’s rooms once, and if she had been moved to new quarters. I glanced around at the shrouded forms of chairs and end tables. A red, fringed Karadul rug covered the wooden floor. The wallpaper had faded rectangles where paintings or photographs had once hung. One cloth concealed a vase glazed in a deep green.

  The largest piece of furniture rested under the window. I had assumed it was a desk, and sure enough, lifting the cloth revealed an elegant rolltop. Slowly, I lifted the top to see an array of shelves and pigeonholes, with a few things still housed in them—a book, a few sheets of paper, and a pencil with a chewed end. A tiny spider lay on its back, legs curled.

  I plucked a sheet of paper from the group. Mrs. Annalie Swibert Parry, the letterhead read. I thumbed through the rest, but none had any writing.

  I picked up the book. The Diaries of a Lady Adventurer, penned by Lady Montswire. I cracked the cover, and a pressed flower slid out onto the desktop. The first page bore an inscription:

  To my dearest Annalie—

  Soon you will be my own beloved lady adventurer, and the tales we shall tell will put Lady Montswire to shame. Can you imagine—the two of us in the port of Sormesen, dinner on the river &c.? The God’s Gate, the floating city, the tombs of Gyntia—it’s as if the world was built for us. We’ll end with a safari, and we won’t leave until you’ve seen at least one tiger—and no, we won’t turn it into gold!

  I’ll be home soon, but until then, read this book and dream of our future, while I remain,

  Your Devoted,

  Hollin

  I stared at the fine, slanting hand for a long time before I returned the pressed flower to the yellowing pages and clapped the book shut.

  I moved on. A copper statue of a woman in a flowing dress guarded the fourth-floor stair. Like everything else, she wore a film of dust. The steps groaned under my feet. I walked close to the edge, where the wood wouldn’t bow as much, keeping a light touch on the banister. No dust on the banister. These stairs were still used, then.

  On the fourth floor, I passed a number of unremarkable rooms and several more locked doors.

  Did I hear something creak?

  I froze, looking off down the hall. I heard it again. The stairs. And also, the gentle clattering of silver and china, like the way our dining room table would rattle at Granden’s rowhouse when a train went by.

  Oh, God, someone was coming.

  I dashed through the nearest open door, heart fluttering like a rabbit’s, nearly tripping over a stack of books on the floor. A desk faced the window, and shelves lined the rest of the walls, full of tiny stoppered bottles containing strangely colored liquids, crystals, and other trappings of sorcery, and books—great musty tomes with strange letters on their spines, with gold embossing, with locks on the covers.

  “Someone there?” I heard Miss Rashten call, her voice nasty. She drew ever closer.

  My eyes swept the room again and again, to no avail. There was no closet or wardrobe to duck into, nowhere to conceal myself.

  Miss Rashten stepped through the door, her curls bobbing beneath her cap. She held a silver-covered tray of food—I smelled boiled meat—which she quickly put on the desk. Before I could move, before I could speak, she set upon me. She struck my arm so hard that I gasped with pain. Then she grabbed me, her fingers bruising, and yanked me from the room.

  “What are you doing?” She spoke close to my ear.

  “I—I—”

  Miss Rashten pulled shut the door and locked it. “You answer me: why were you up here where Master Parry told you not to be?”

  “I—”

  “You were looking for something.”

  “I just wondered what was up here. I heard a strange noise.”

  “Likely it was the sound of your common sense dashing off,” Miss Rashten snapped. “You need to keep from poking around. Do as you’re told.”

  “I was afraid it could have been a ghost.”

  “No ghosts in this house. If you want to stay here, you’ll keep quiet and behave yourself. And you never, ever mention anything you may have seen or heard up here, or I will tell Master Smollings and you’ll reckon with him. You understand me quite clearly?”

  “Yes’m.” I fidgeted. I felt utterly foolish for getting caught, but it was best if Miss Rashten thought me a fool as well.

  “You will not come up here again?”

  “No.”

  “The consequences for trespassing next time will be far, far more severe.” She pointed at the stairs. “Go on with you.”

  16

  If I seemed preoccupied when I spoke to Hollin, if I shied back when he gave me a compliment, he never called attention to it. I suspected that
Smollings’s visit had ruffled him as much as me, although I might not understand all his reasons.

  It was wrong for Hollin to lie about his wife, no doubt of that. But I wondered if Hollin might be as much a prisoner as she was. Linza said he had used illegal magic to save her life, the action of a desperate man, not a villain. If Hollin could stand up to Smollings . . . Surely it wasn’t too late to set things right.

  I dreaded the performance at Aldren Hall. Hollin told me that the guests would be Lorinar’s elite, and I must let him take the lead. I imagined a vast house full of people who would laugh at me behind gloved hands, and somewhere in the midst of it all I had to find Karstor, a man I had never met, and warn him of Smollings’s plan. The day arrived all too soon. Hollin appeared in the doorway with Linza at his heels.

  “Mr. Smollings requested you wear your trousers to Aldren Hall,” he said.

  “I thought you had the gown made for my performances!” I didn’t want to appear as Smollings wished, encouraging those rich ladies and gentlemen to gawk.

  He frowned. “Well, what am I to tell him?”

  “Tell him I have a gown.”

  “But you also have trousers.” He nodded for Linza to proceed, while he turned from the door.

  Linza gave me a weak smile. Perhaps she feared what I might say with temper rising on my face. “You will look lovely in your mother’s clothes,” she said.

  I sighed and flung open my trunk.

  She helped me tie the embroidered sash behind my back, over the dancing tunic with the shawl collar that barely touched my shoulders, and “trousers” that buttoned just below my knees like knickers. I let my braids down, and atop my head she placed the only jewelry I had taken from home, a gold-plate circlet of little value. A fan of stiff wire draped with beads rose from the back of it.

  “I pin it like this?”

  “That’s right. A few pins in back and it will stay.”

  I lifted my dark eyes to my mother’s reflection. Oh, I had Aunt Vinya’s nose, of course, but so many vague memories of my mother now sharpened, seeing myself as she had been. I recalled how she would sit in front of the mirror and run color across her lips with a fingertip, how she would let me paw through her jewelry and drape extra bangles on my skinny little-girl arms.