“In fact, this guest planted one of the Roses here with us in this very room right now. Which is why we invited him to join us tonight.”
One of us? Which one of us? I look at my fellow moonbright ones. But they are all too busy looking at themselves in their mirror trays. Even Lake is looking down now. Smiling at herself. “Beautiful,” she is whispering. “Brightened.” Salt water dripping from her eyes.
The veiled ones clap. Murmuring among them. Wonderful is a word I hear. “Oh, oh! A delightful surprise.”
I see there’s an empty seat at the head of the table. The Queen of Snow’s gloved hands are resting on the back of this chair. The sort where a king or a queen might sit. The word throne appears in the pool of my mind. Probably this throne is for this honored guest.
“I wonder who this guest is,” I whisper to Lake. “He sounds very impressive.”
“I don’t know, I don’t know,” Lake says, shaking her head, still staring at herself in the mirror tray. She says it like I’m bothering her. She’s getting paler. The darkness around her eyes is blacker. I’m worried. Maybe she needs to eat something. Good thing we are at a feast. Hopefully once this honored guest arrives, they’ll start severing us.
Applause as someone enters the room from the dark mouth. Another person in black. A man. He wears a black-horned mask. Though I don’t see his face, the veiled ones sitting at the table seem to know who he is very well. The clapping gets much louder, is thunderous. All those black silk hands. Little gasps and squeals of delight behind the veils. The man bows slightly. I feel his smile in the back of my neck. He appreciates the claps. His stance says, Yes. I am all of this. There’s something in his footsteps that’s so familiar. I’ve heard those footsteps before in my life. Walking through the dark rooms of my life. Entering a door of glass. A door of glass?
A crashing sound. Someone has dropped their mirror tray. Me, I have dropped my mirror tray. What a sound it makes. A rattling and a rattling. And then what a sudden silence. All the ones in black are staring at me now. The Queen of Snow, too, she has murder on her face.
I am frozen, but the sound has snapped Lake out of her trance. She tries to bend down to pick up my tray for me, but the honored guest raises his gloved hand like stop. Allow him, please. He reaches down and picks it up like it’s the most delicate thing. Smiles and hands it to me.
“Here you are, seedling,” he whispers. A soft ripple of laughter among the veiled ones. He turns away from me, continues to make his way to the throne at the table’s end where the Queen of Snow waits. As I watch him walk away, there is a pain in my heart, familiar and deep. This man is its shape. The hand beneath the black glove has stroked my hair in the dark. The mouth once spoke words like a cold breeze in my ear, making my heart drum and drum. The eyes behind the mask have looked into my eyes. Suddenly there is a name on my lips. It swims up like a quick, bright fish. “Tom,” I say before I can think.
All is dead silent again. All the veiled ones look at me. Hands stop clapping. The Queen of Snow’s face changes from murder to surprise. The man whom I called Tom stops walking to his throne, pauses in mid-step. I stare at the back of his white neck, a pale, smooth slash between the collar of his black suit and his waving dark hair. I stare so hard, salt water drips from my eyes.
“Tom Cruise,” I whisper.
Laughter. From the veiled ones, from the Queen of Snow. They laugh and laugh, even the Statues of Cold chuckle. How funny are the words Tom Cruise that I have whispered. They repeat it to themselves. “Tom Cruise, Tom Cruise, the actor? Oh, Seth, Seth, how brilliant. Stroke of genius, really. And the resemblance is striking. Take my breath away.”
I can’t laugh with them. I can only stare at the back of Tom’s neck. My fellow moonbright ones aren’t laughing either. They also stare at the one I called Tom Cruise, whose name apparently is Seth, their faces full of the opposite of laughing.
Meanwhile Seth takes his throne, smiles indulgently at the laughing table. Yes, yes, says his white smile through the mask. “It serves its purpose, I suppose.” He pretends not to look at me, but I feel him looking still. “Definitely it does.”
The table’s laughter at me makes him smile awhile, but then suddenly he doesn’t like it anymore. He frowns, and the laughter stops immediately.
He raises his goblet.
“Thank you all so much for having us,” he says. Us? I think. But aren’t you only one? And then he turns to us moonbright ones along the wall. “But we are not the only honored guest, of course. The true guests of honor are all around us here. We are so happy to have you.”
Some of the moonbright ones smile shyly. Most are still looking at themselves in their mirror trays, saying “Beautiful, Brightened, Poreless” over and over. Beside me, Lake is shaking. “I want to go home,” she pleads. “Take me there, Moonbright.”
Laughter again from the veiled ones, this time milder. Seth joins the laughter.
“Well”—he claps his hands—“shall we eat?”
Roaring applause.
“Oh thank god,” I whisper. “Lake, we’re going to eat now. They’re finally severing.”
Lake is shaking and shaking her head. “I don’t want to eat in this room. There are too many red jellies in that tank. How ugly they are.”
Two Statues of Cold step forward—the ones standing on either side of the tank, holding their nets. Now a great light shines down onto the tank water. It is the light of the full moon shining directly over the floating red jellies. Oh, it’s beautiful.
“Isn’t it beautiful, Lake?” I ask her.
“I want to go,” Lake is whispering in my ear.
“But we’re about to eat, Lake.” And inside, I’m thinking, Eat what? Eat what, I wonder?
“I’m not hungry, I’m not hungry!” Lake cries.
The Queen of Snow is frowning. She hears us. “Why doesn’t Tom select this evening’s catch?” she shouts, looking right at me and Lake with a scolding face.
Laughter again from the veiled ones. “Yes, Tom. Why don’t you?”
Seth isn’t smiling. He’s looking at me and Lake. Lake releasing a hand from her tray to clutch my arm. Telling me again that she isn’t hungry right now. Her house has thirteen windows. It’s on a hill, she believes. If I can only take her there.
“She,” Seth says, pointing a gloved finger at Lake.
The Queen of Snow smiles. “Oh, a young one. Only just opened, just joined us. Perfect, I can assure you. Full of our favorite delicacies. But perhaps still requiring some… marination. Are you sure you wouldn’t prefer—?”
“She,” Seth says again. And he’s looking at me as much as he’s looking at Lake. With eyes cold and bright. With a smile that is movie-star white, blinding.
The Queen of Snow nods. She looks at the Statues of Cold and they smile. They begin to walk toward me and Lake, still gripping my arm. Her nails are sinking into my flesh but I do not scream for Lake’s sake. But when they approach, she smiles suddenly. Lets go of me. Looks at the Statues of Cold. The ripple of longing is in her face again. It is a dangerous rippling. It says, I will go anywhere with you. The Statues are so extraordinarily beautiful up close.
“You have been Selected, Beautiful,” they say. Their voices sound like an echoing music.
At the word Selected, all the moonbright ones look up from their mirror trays.
“Selected?” Lake repeats. Salt water in her eyes again. “Did you hear that, Moonbright? I’ve been Selected.” She looks so terribly happy. Her happiness hurts to look at.
“Yes. I heard.” And it’s funny the feeling that comes over me then. A feeling full of shadows. A dark, aching want that consumes. A hate for Lake.