The first blackstripe’s expression remained neutral, without judgment. “Sorry for grabbing you, Credo. I heard the cry and you were in the aisle, rushing in, like. Thought you were the threat.”
“That’s understandable,” I said. As the alarm died down, more and more of the remaining people were peering curiously at our little huddle. The show manager, in obvious distress about the ruin of her opening night, was in close conversation with Varina, who kept trying to make eye contact with me. “It was so dark in here, it’s perfect conditions for an assassin.”
Tain squeezed my shoulder. “Are you sure you’re all right? You don’t look—”
“I’m fine,” I snapped. “I’m not seeing things, if that’s what you’re—”
“Jov,” he interrupted gently. “I just meant, is your neck all right? My man half-choked you there. I didn’t doubt you saw something.” He glanced around. “Not sure we can do much about it now, though.”
If there had been anyone trying to get to him, they were gone now, and even my certainty was slipping. What if it had been a member of the theater staff, up there for some innocent purpose and holding a pen or a straw or a stick of janjan in their mouth, who had simply panicked when I’d cried out?
Most patrons seemed to be regarding the incident as a false alarm, their initial panic fading to be replaced by whispers and condescending looks in my direction. My face grew hot.
“If the Chancellor’s guard check our audience carefully, may we continue the performance?” the show manager asked. Tain hesitated and looked at me, and other heads swiveled in my direction. I had to shrug. An assassin who had waited for us in a dark theater would be unlikely to try again once we were on alert. I couldn’t think of a reason why the play could not go on, other than the obvious reason that I did not want to keep watching it.
“You don’t have to stay,” Kalina said quietly as people began filing back to the benches, and the actors, with nervous looks and some muttering, took their positions again. Kalina’s onstage counterpart, having undertaken a brave and desperate journey to bring word to our army, had uncovered the Warrior-Guilder’s betrayal and was about to be chased down. I had ruined one of the most dramatic moments in the story. “I can keep an eye on things here, and the blackstripes will be patrolling.”
It was tempting. If it had felt strange and wrong watching actors “die” in the earlier battle scenes, it would be nothing to the unpleasantness of watching a reenactment of my sister’s near-death at Aven’s hands. But if I left now it would only make the whole thing look more like a stunt. And I’d be even worse stewing outside, wondering if I’d missed something in there. At least this way I could keep eyes on Tain, Dija, and Kalina. I took my seat again.
This time, the lanterns stayed lit at the edges of the room, and the blackstripes patrolled, alert. One part worried, one part embarrassed, I sat through the remainder of the play in a familiar internal storm of self-recrimination, counting squeezes of my hands to keep the anxious dread at bay, hardly following the events unfolding onstage. So focused was I on staying calm and not jumping at every movement in my peripheral vision, I barely took in the impressive choreography of the battle at the lake, the cunning use of color and light to suggest water. I watched Tain’s grand plea for peace, and numbly noted the cleverness of the production when, just as the battle seemed to be over, the real Os-Woorin emerged, a fluid and strange shape created by acrobats balancing on each other’s shoulders underneath a semi-diaphanous fabric shroud. It shouldn’t have worked but it did; something in the combination of grace and unnaturalness of the thing genuinely recalled the weird and awesome sight of an ancient spirit. I missed Hadrea all over again when her onstage counterpart fought the spirit and felt a bone-deep relief when at last it was over.
I stood with everyone else, politely applauding, counting the moments until I could flee. Varina, in the row below us, turned around. “I know the cast were keen to meet you three,” she said over the applause and the general hubbub. “But if you slip out before the manager gets up here, I’ll make your apologies.” Technically she was addressing the three of us, but her gaze was on me.
“I’m feeling a bit unwell, Uncle Jovan,” Dija said, in a clear, carrying voice. “Would you mind if we went straight home?”
Kalina gave my apprentice a very soft look. Affection and gratitude swamped me, tinged with guilt that she’d already had to learn how to handle me.
“I’ll tell them you had to take her home,” Tain said easily, understanding me immediately and regarding us without judgment. “I hope you feel better soon, Dee,” he added gravely, and she bobbed her head in thanks.
“I could walk her home if you like, Credo?” Tain’s page, Erel, a few years older than Dija, had appeared at the end of our row with the kind of beaming smile and helpful attitude that had propelled him from messenger to Tain’s personal page. I tried not to glare at him.
“That’s fine, thanks, Erel. I’ve got a lot to do at home anyway.”
“It’s no trouble at all, Credo.”
I started to answer, but Tain interrupted with a tap on my shoulder and a whisper. “Looks like Bradomir didn’t appreciate being faceless, eh?” He gestured below and to the right, where Credo Bradomir, in contrast to everyone else, had not stood to applaud.
I shrugged. “I guess they already had enough villains for the narrative.” Bradomir had resigned his Council seat under considerable pressure in the aftermath of the siege and revelations about the extent of his role in the abuses at his estates. Though his family still held considerable wealth and power, their honor and social standing—Bradomir’s particularly—had diminished as a result. “I’m surprised he even came.”
“Gotta keep up appearances,” Tain muttered. “Speaking of those, you’d better head out before we get caught.”
Dija took my hand and started to lead me out just as the show manager called out, “Honored Chancellor!” and I hurriedly followed. Kalina, whose energy levels had not increased with her public profile, joined us without a word. But we’d only taken a few steps when a woman’s voice, raised in alarm, cut through the chatter of the crowd.
“Uncle!”
I glanced back. Credola Karista, Bradomir’s niece and replacement on the Council, was shaking his shoulder, urgent. “Uncle!”
Only then did I register his slumped posture, the tilt of his head. Warmth drained out of my body as if we’d just stepped out into a cold wind. Bradomir wasn’t standing, not because he was an angry old man, refusing to show appreciation for a show he had not enjoyed. He wasn’t standing because he couldn’t.
“Call a physic!” the elderly woman on his other side cried. Varina turned from her conversation with the theater manager, the bright beads in her hair swinging as she spun about and stared up. I sometimes forgot she was a Leka—our relationship had somewhat surprisingly evolved into mutual respect, even friendship—but in that moment her resemblance to Bradomir was vivid.
“I think it’s his heart,” Karista moaned. She took Bradomir’s cheeks in her hands and stared into his face. “Uncle. Uncle.”