A few nights a week, I work in the public hospital run by the nuns of Saint Izelea. Helping Cannis’s poor with my song is a kind of penance, time I give back to Adela to atone for the way I befoul her magic in the queen’s name.
The hospitals aren’t allowed to admit folk out of favor with the queen, so although Elene doesn’t understand my reasons, she doesn’t care that I go, as long as I don’t strain my voice. The public hospitals are often overcrowded and smell of rot and blood. Most of the magic I perform there is tedious and routine: setting bones, delivering babies, the monotony occasionally broken by more difficult cases that are outside their usual singer’s ability.
“Do you think it’s a good idea for you to go tonight?” Lacerde asks. “You’ve used so much magic today already. Her Majesty lets you go because it doesn’t interfere with your work, but if she visits you tomorrow and you’ve strained your voice or gotten sick…”
“I have to. I’m on the schedule. They’ll be expecting me.”
She sighs. “At least have something to eat before you go. And remember to make your report to the chief justicar in the morning.”
I sigh but incline my head. Elene requires me to make a report when I visit Saint Izelea’s. She’s convinced that the hospitals are secret breeding grounds for trouble. If I spot a hooded noble lady slipping coins to the orderlies or treat any injury inflicted by magic, I’m to inform the chief justicar immediately. Ren is a bloodhound—he can sniff out the smallest irregularity in a person’s tale as easily as I smell magic. No one ever lies to him and gets away with it. I have seen the room he calls his Parlor of Delights, where he interrogates suspects.
But Sister Elizabeta doesn’t have anything to hide. Maybe hospitals outside of Cannis act more rebelliously, but Saint Izelea’s is only a stone’s throw from Cavalia. Elene can practically see the nuns from her balcony. It would be foolish for them to act against the crown.
“I always do,” I say.
Lacerde squeezes my shoulder. Her touch lingers, and relief shivers down my back. The tears I have tried to hold back all day flow freely. For just a moment, I feel the childish impulse to throw myself into her arms. I wrap my arms around my chest instead.
“I’ll fetch you some broth and lay out your clothes,” she says.
CHAPTER 4
REMI
AFTER THE HEALING SONG ends, Lord Durand helps Cadence to her feet. She stumbles from the stage, bracing herself on his offered arm. The baron gives me a clean handkerchief to wipe the sweat and tears from my face.
With the magical Performing over, the orchestra delivers a full program, each song beautiful and entirely devoid of magic. I barely listen, taking the hour to fix my hair and dab red paint on my lips instead.
I can’t let Papa see me with snot dripping from my nose. He feels guilty enough already, just knowing that I had to attend before my time. Maybe I’ll tell him that the song was weaker in my section of the theater. That we could hardly hear. It is Cadence’s first season, so maybe he’ll even believe me.
When it’s finally over, and the queen’s stewards unseal the theater doors, Papa waits for me in the atrium. He’s so tall that I can see the back of his ginger head easily over the crowd. He wears a black waistcoat that despite its age still fits elegantly. The rest of the audience scrambles past us as he looks me up and down, then wraps me in a one-armed hug.
His hand trembles on my back. “I’m sorry, Remi.”
“For what?” I ask, and bury my face in the warmth of his chest.
Papa scowls. “You shouldn’t have to go through this—none of us should! It’s an—”
I tug on his arm and steer him out of the Opera Hall. If he gets too worked up, Papa may say things neither of us wants the queen or her guards to overhear. Where my safety is concerned, he doesn’t always filter his words. I may take a few risks myself, but I can’t bear the thought of Papa getting arrested.
I look through the open doors of the Opera Hall. Stewards are already moving between the rows, cleaning up. I want to get as far away as possible. If we linger, we might see Cadence again. The sooner I can start to forget that I was tortured by my childhood friend, the better. I can’t help but wonder, though: If she recognized me, would she even be sorry? Or has she been so completely transformed by the queen that she wouldn’t feel even a touch of remorse?
We make our way through the lobby and onto the busy streets of Cannis. The city avenues are wide, bustling with carriages and people. The buildings have been redesigned in recent years, their facades done up in the fashionable pink stone the queen likes. I’ve heard most of their interiors are crumbling, but the queen only pays for the parts of the city she can see from the palace up on the hill.
All around us, dozens of nobles clamber into hackney cabs. The lineup of carriages extends around the corner and as far as I can see down the street. Beggars swarm, hands outstretched, brandishing malnourished babies and buckets for coins.
I look away, but Papa thrusts a crumpled franc note at a woman with two skinny, dirty children at her feet.
“Don’t look away,” he says gently, after the woman moves on. “We all did that for too long. It’s why we’re in this mess now.”
I bite the inside of my cheek. Papa likes to say that in the old queen’s days, the court was too inward-looking, too focused on ourselves to understand what was happening in the rest of the country. The mages resented us and the commoners hated us, so they didn’t come to our aid when Queen Elene murdered her way to the throne and cast us all aside. By the time the commoners were ready to help us, the queen and her mages had already defeated our armies and cemented their hold on Cannis. It was too late.
“I told Rook to park the carriage down the lane. I need to visit the dressmaker. Your mother wants us to pick something up,” Papa says, shaking his head with a forced laugh. “It’s only a few blocks. You don’t mind the walk, do you?”
I glance down at my shoes: delicate satin heels with green bows and white trim. They were the only nice, new thing I wore today, and ironically, the most endangered during the Performing. But after what we’ve endured, it feels indulgent, even seditious, to walk. I nod.
Together, we stride down the lane. Papa exchanges terse glances with a few people I recognize but doesn’t stop to greet them. Now that we’re outside, in the brisk, fresh air, he’s remembering to be cautious. Right after a Performing, the queen’s spies will be everywhere on the boulevard, listening for any hint of rebellion. The simplest greeting can be interpreted a hundred different ways, twisted until it’s incriminating.
I won’t mention the little pouch of lemon drops to him right now.
As we walk, I don’t bother to avoid the puddles that dot the streets. The water soaks through my shoes and stockings, deliciously cold against the tender new skin on my soles. Papa rolls his eyes when I crash through a particularly deep pool, drenching the hem of my dress.
I want to get home, away from this city, away from our murderer queen and Cadence, but we don’t come to Cannis often. Mama has been one of Master Dupois’s patrons since she was a girl, and she trusts no one else with our dinner clothes and evening dresses. And while Mama can travel, it requires preparation and a route with inns to stop at along the way, so she does not often make short trips to buy clothes. She submits her orders by courier, and Papa dutifully picks them up whenever he visits the city on business errands, or on Performing days.