So in honor of the troupe, I suggest our immersive finale be a garden, like the one that Billy and Ral built in the clearing, on that first day Gunn was testing us.
Because there’re some things that you can’t speak, but that magic can say.
“The finale is perfect, Joan,” Ral says, after we break a little early, all share a smoke outside the Den’s door, the winter breeze a welcome change from the trapped air of the show space. His smile has returned, as has his normal olive skin, the aftereffects of his shine bender gone. It relieves me, and I nod and touch his shoulder. I guess we all need to escape once in a while.
“The garden might be one of our best finales yet. It’s beautiful.” Grace blows a steady train of smoke circles that she somehow enchants into a parade of smoky flowers. I laugh as I attempt to grab them.
“They’re right,” Alex whispers beside me. He’s so close our arms are touching, his forearm putting the slightest pressure on my recent blood-magic scars. He looks up at me with his perfect smirk. “The crowd’s lucky that Gunn got called away—that it’s you at the helm. Tonight’s going to be extraordinary.”
And when the doors open tonight, I taste things I’ve never tasted so exactly before, though of course I’ve gotten whiffs of them—pride, and ownership. Like the Red Den really could be my show. Like I was made to dazzle and win over a crowd, and make them fall in love.
“Let’s light this place on fire, Joan,” Alex says, as the first wave of patrons in their black-tie best and dazzling dresses floods the cocktail bar.
I match his smile. Not going to lie: when he came back to the show space wearing a tux, I almost wrapped myself right around him. Alex reminds me of what magic can feel like. He reminds me of the best kind of performance, one that taunts and teases and slowly sneaks up on you, until it has you completely.
“I’m ready,” I say. “Just hope you can keep up.”
“Getting a little cocky, aren’t we, considering last night I had sixty-three percent of the crowd on my side of the mirror?”
“Sixty-three percent? You’re sure about that?”
“Positive,” he teases, as he takes his place on his side of the glass stand. “You might need to step up your performance, Joan. I daresay the pupil is eclipsing the master.”
A group of older women dressed to the nines in furs and red lipstick settle into the front row on my left, while a few couples in matching silky black sit down on my right.
“Put your magic where your mouth is, Danfrey.” I nod to my side of the glass stand. “Prediction: I’ve got the whole crowd by the end of the show.”
He gives a put-on, theatrical gasp. “She raises the stakes,” he says. “Challenge accepted.”
Alex warms the crowd up with a manipulation of my replica that must be impressive, but not jaw-dropping. I can tell by the whispers of the ladies on the front bench, the ones ogling and whispering about Alex, instead of his magic.
When it’s my turn, I go for broke and light Alex’s replica up from the inside, as if I’m turning him on like a jack-o’-lantern. His face, suit, skin—they glisten. He looks otherworldly as he glows from the glass. A few audience members on his side actually stand up because of the whispers on my side and angle around to see. Alex even breaks our protocol, takes a few steps toward me instead of returning my trick with another of his own, and peers around to spy on what I’ve done.
“You’re supposed to wait until the end of the round,” I stage-whisper, and the patrons closest to us laugh.
“I couldn’t.” His actual face looks almost as radiant as his replica’s.
We’re flirting, sparring, pushing each other with our magic—we both know it. I want to beat him so badly. A very small part of me wants him to beat me.
Truth be told, I want us both to soar.
And then I block out Gunn’s warnings about Alex with everything I’ve got. Because Gunn’s not here right now. For once, I focus not on what I should do, but on what I want. And maybe, just tonight, I deserve that. I want to lose myself in this. . . . I want to lose myself in him.
We run through it again and again, and before I feel like I’ve fully settled into the trick, the clock chimes its hourly bell, nine chimes for nine o’-clock, marking the end of the performance hour.
“I’ll meet you over by our spot on the right after the intermission, okay?” I say to Alex, once I reach him.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m working the floor tonight, remember?” I wink at him. “Pretending to be Gunn? I need to check in with the rest of the team.”
Alex folds into the crowd for the parlor trick intermission, and I start making the rounds, checking in on the troupe, making sure everyone has their part to play in the finale. To me, it sort of feels like our first show.
“I know you’re nervous, but this is going like clockwork, Joan,” Grace says when I find her near the front. “And I’d sure as hell rather answer to you than Gunn.”
“Billy and Ral all right?”