When it does, my life as I have known it will be over.
“Miranda.” Papa’s voice summons me from my trance. “’Tis done, and done well. Your work is finished.”
I step down from my stool, set down my brush and pigments. Flexing my cramped fingers, I begin cleaning my brushes.
“There is no need for that, child,” Papa says.
“Oh, but—”
“Leave them,” he says. “You’ll have finer in Naples.”
Save for the pantheon of figures gazing down from the walls and the laden trunks, Papa’s sanctum is empty. Even the Picatrix has been packed away while I finished painting the fish. The little gnomes grin silently and await Papa’s orders. The brazier glows, flames hissing softly. At their heart, the salamander regards me.
I take a deep breath. “Will you give the elementals their freedom as you did Ariel, Papa?”
He smiles and pats one of the gnomes on its stony head. “To be sure, once they’ve carried our belongings to the ship.”
“What of the salamander?” I ask.
“Ah.” Papa glances at it. “For the fire spirit, I have one final task.” With ceremony, he removes the amulets from around his neck one chain at a time, untangling each carefully. Cunningly wrought charms of silver and gold entwined with hair glint in the light of the brazier; my hair, Caliban’s hair, the nameless nanny-goat’s hair, the hair of the king and his men.
I hold my breath.
One by one, Papa consigns them to the fire. The flames burn brighter and there is a smell of burnt hair and hot metal. Gold and silver melt, puddling beneath the salamander’s delicate claws and its pulsing belly. One, two, three … All of them? I am not sure, not entirely sure. It seems to me I caught a glimpse of something shining vanishing up Papa’s sleeve.
I do not trust my father.
And yet … do I trust the king, this Alonso who sought our lives? Do I trust my treacherous uncle the usurper? Do I trust their squabbling courtiers? Do I trust this kind prince with the tender mouth whose affection for me is compelled solely by the artifice of Papa’s magic?
No.
There is only one person on the isle whom I trust, and I sent him away.
I wish Caliban were here.
And yet I am grateful he is not; grateful that I succeeded in bargaining for his freedom.
Papa dusts his hands together. “It is done.”
“And the salamander?” I say.
He spares it another careless glance and a gesture, speaks a word in an unfamiliar tongue.
Fire roars through the grate of the brazier, roars up to scorch the walls of Papa’s sanctum. Papa flings a protective arm around me, bearing us both to the floor. A circle of flame races around the chamber, and the figures I have rendered with such care are darkened to soot. Flames stream through the window of the balcony, dispersing and vanishing beneath the sky. The finality of the destruction is sudden and shocking, and yet it seems fitting, too. It is as though God in His heaven has spoken through the salamander, unleashing a purging fire.
For the first time, I find myself well and truly understanding that this is happening, that I can no more stop it than I can hold back the tide. My life already has changed forever.
Papa helps me to my feet. “I confess, I did not foresee this last working manifesting in so literal a manner,” he says dryly, brushing at the sleeves of his robe. “But you may pack your possessions, Miranda, and I shall notify the king that we’re prepared to take our leave of the isle.”
Other than the finery from the pirates’ treasure that Papa bestowed upon me, my possessions are few. There are the kidskin slippers I wore as a small girl, the sewing casket, and the little hand-mirror that once belonged to Caliban’s mother. I gaze at my face in it, and it seems I am looking at a stranger. I remember Caliban and me putting our heads together, thrusting out our tongues at our reflections and laughing like the children we were.
I could weep at the memory of such innocence.
I glance toward the garden, half-imagining that I might catch a glimpse of Caliban watching from the walls, but it is empty. The only sign of Caliban’s existence is a handful of limp trumpet flowers strewn on my window-ledge.
Unpacking my chest, I place one of the trumpet flowers in the bottom of it, then repack my things; all save the mirror.
I place the mirror on the window-ledge.
Do you promise it?
I do.
Caliban’s absence is discovered. The king and his men are indignant; they offer to delay our departure, to scour the isle that the monstrous villain might be found and brought to justice.
“No, leave him,” Papa says in a decisive manner. “Let him pine away his days in lonely misery. I daresay it is as fitting a punishment as any.”
Dear Lord God, I fear Papa is right.