Where can I run? Do I try to fight them all? What do I do? Why am I thinking these thoughts?
Phaestion is taller, broader. His form under his black suit is muscular and powerful, yet still sleek and athletically quick. His thick red hair is shorter and coiffed beneath the silver circlet of victory.
We’re eighteen now, eligible to enter the Combat, old enough to wear the forearm tattoos of a Patriarch, to bear the weight of black robes and white masks of the Census. These boys plan to rule, I realize, while I am standing here in a frozen body on my wedding day. This should be the happiest day of my life, but somehow I have a dreaded feeling that really, I’ve failed to save the ones I love from death. Looking around the room—my brother, Edgaard; my teacher Alberich; my sisters, Lavinia and Phoebe; and of course Phaestion—all those I’m supposed to love are alive and well.
Wait, Phaestion is an enemy of my father, right? Why is he here then? I wonder. To gloat because I did not join him?
I wince. My head hurts. All these thoughts are too much to sort.
On Phaestion’s other side sits a decrepit old man with snow-white hair, Lord Chilleus of the Julii, Phaestion’s father, still alive. Next to the Patriarch is the bald alien with the cat eyes, Talousla Karr. The hairless man attends the old lord like a nursemaid.
A scientist with a favorite lab fish, I think. I know that man. Why do I know him?
The spypsy glances from the old man to Phaestion, gauging their reactions to the scene. More than a century separates father and son. Even so, Phaestion bears a wonderful resemblance to the old man, though younger, taller, and more powerfully built.
This is how a father and son should be, I think. The father old and kind, innocuous. The son the image of his father, only greater.
Phaestion nods at me. Triumph and coldness are in his gaze.
What does that mean? I wonder.
The double doors open again. A hush falls. The veiled girl enters ahead of her father, Old Wusong, who is carried on a palanquin. The old man resembles a corpse; his eyes are black ball bearings staring blindly out of sunken and sallow cheeks. His heavy ornamental headdress looks as if it will topple off his wrinkled eggshell-head and pull him with it, crashing to the floor. I hold my smile. I must be respectful to my future father-in-law, the emperor of the greatest civilization in the known Fracture.
I cannot make out Miranda’s face beneath her veil. It makes no difference. She is the only woman I have ever loved.
It takes them what seems an eternity to arrive at the dais. Miranda helps her father step from the palanquin. Old Wusong clasps his daughter’s white hands with gnarled fingers. He brings them gently to his livered lips. A retainer helps the old man into a seat alongside the other nobles. Miranda ascends the dais to stand beside me. She takes my hand in hers, knowing what’s expected of us both. The oaths are administered.
“Say the words,” Edgaard whispers in my ear, and I do.
“Elder Stars illuminate only because there is darkness. A warrior can know righteous cause only because there is evil. Heart to thought, thought to voice, harmony rises from discord. This is the Balance. Two are now one.”
My tongue moves slowly as I say the words by rote.
I have a horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach that I can’t explain. I want to break down and weep, but I don’t know why. I ignore the impulse and smile. My father informs me I may kiss the bride. I watch myself from outside again as I lift the veil, revealing a painted snow-white face, a perfect moon, soft and doughy. Her thin lips pull back at the corners. Her teeth are painted black, in the ancient tradition of Old Wusong. Who is this? This is not my love!
I gasp suddenly. Images rush through my head—a girl with dark hair, a small mole on her cheek. She pulls me up onto white cliffs, preventing me from falling into a green sea. Now she is older, and we are making love on those same cliffs, our bodies matching the rhythm of the waves. We are in bed on a morning, my birthday, and later she is telling me a child is to be born . . .
Nadia. Her name is Nadia!
“Kiss me,” Miranda hisses. She steps on her tiptoes to kiss me. I try to pull away, but she grabs my neck and pulls me in closer. “The globes are watching.” She clamps her lips to mine. The crowd explodes with applause.
A reception is held upon the rooftop of the House Wusong central scraper. I sit at the head of a table next to Miranda. She smiles black-toothed and nods politely to attendees who offer congratulations and gifts. Musicians fill the air with tinny metallic tunes. Guests dance in the center of the floor.
The drugs have begun to wear off, and I reach for wine, downing a glass in one gulp. Across the twilight sky, I see the thousands of glittering skyscrapers of Tao lit up like ornaments in celebration of the auspicious occasion. This is wrong. I feel it. I don’t know what it is, but I feel an anger boiling inside of me. I cannot get the image of the girl with dark hair out of my mind.
“More wine,” I mutter to the waiter who refills my glass. I gulp it immediately. “More, I said!” I shout again. I want to break something, but I don’t know what. I don’t know why. I have just married the love of my life, Miranda Wusong, yet I’m filled with nameless rage.
She is not your love, a voice whispers inside me. I feel the truth of the words even though I know them to be a lie. What is happening to me?
“Don’t you think you are overdoing it, husband?” Miranda hisses at me through hideous teeth.
I stare at her coldly. “Don’t tell me what I should think or feel.”
Where did that come from? That’s not like me. Or is it? I drink another glass of the wine. She ignores me and returns to greeting guests from some minor noble house who have offered us a jewelry box or some other useless item.
“House Ruska’s tokens of affection will be cherished for all time,” Miranda politely tells the fat youth who presents the gifts.
“If I could have a moment of Lord Edmon’s time?” he asks.
“My husband needs his rest at the moment,” Miranda says, cutting off the boy.
“More wine!” I slam my fist down on the table. The youth blanches and moves to sit among the crowd of other fat, milky nobles.
I need to banish the thoughts in my head. I need to be happy again. I need to forget the girl with the dark hair.
“Do you think that I’m enjoying this?” Miranda whispers at me. I turn, startled. It actually didn’t occur to me for a second what she thought. “I’m just as much a pawn in our fathers’ games as you are, but I have the decency and intelligence to suffer through it and wait for an opportunity to make a move.”
“If the opportunity never comes?” I ask.