“You’re teasing me. In what way can I—”
“The darashi oyun is coming up. The performances are not all strictly for asha. In the hours leading up to the main dance, the stage is open for all who’d like to participate. It’s what makes the darashi oyun special—they encourage people to take part, to experience being a part of the ceremony for themselves. It gives those who’ve been taking lessons a chance to join in, if informally.”
“But only children perform there,” the boy protested. “It’s a chance for parents to show off their daughters, and the association encourages it. It’s easier to find gifted dancers that way, and I’m not.”
“You’re forgetting that you’re barely thirteen and still a child yourself. And I can tell you’re lying. You can dance, can’t you?” I shot a pointed glance at his heartsglass, which was now peppered with blue ripples across the surface. “Have you been taking dancing lessons?” His heartsglass turned a beautiful cobalt blue, and my eyes widened. “Likh! You’ve been taking lessons?”
“Some schools don’t require you to be asha to take them,” he said defensively.
“I’m pretty sure they require you to be female though,” Fox said.
“You didn’t!” I gasped as his heartsglass flowered into a deeper indigo.
Likh grinned sheepishly. “I wore a few spells to disguise myself. Most of the students use them, so no one gave me a second look.”
“I know that look she’s got on,” Fox said, watching my face. “You may not be in trouble right now, Likh, but I have a feeling Tea will gladly volunteer you for it.”
“It’s not illegal,” I said. “And I’m helping out a friend. How much trouble could that be?”
Fox saw it before I did. He leaped to his feet, and I caught a quick glance of the robed figure before it turned a corner and disappeared from view.
“Stop!”
My brother took off after it, and we abandoned our paloodeh to give chase. By the time we had caught up to him, the robed stranger had vanished from view.
“Did you see him?” Fox demanded of a passing maid.
“I saw nothing,” the girl said, thoroughly confused.
“But you must have! He passed right by you!”
“I’m sorry, milord, but I didn’t see anything.”
“What’s going on?” Likh demanded.
“Did you see him?”
“I didn’t see anything.”
“You saw him too?” I asked Fox.
“Of course I did. I could sense it stalking us. It was looking at you, Tea.”
I felt cold. “How could you tell? It was—it was dressed all in black, and it had a mask on.”
“I’m not sure. I just know.”
“I didn’t see anyone fitting that description,” Likh said. “Lots of people here wear Drychta clothing. What makes you think there was something wrong with this one?”
“Because we shared one thing in common, at least,” Fox said grimly. “It had no shadow.”
“I knew it was foolish to make Likh something that he was not, but I never did understand why the role of an asha was restricted to women alone. In the course of my wanderings, I have seen men who could be just as graceful as women. Men who, with the constant training we have had to endure, could perhaps rival even the likes of Lady Shadi. Are there any male dancers in Drycht?”
“The royal court seemed to prefer the women more,” I said.
“In a court of men, it is likely. But males are not the only people who can rule a realm. If women are encouraged to fight and draw runes and strive to be a man’s equal in those regard, then why can’t a man be encouraged to sing and dance and entertain as we do?”
“In Drycht,” I admitted, “men consider such trivialities beneath them. The performing arts are not a show of strength. They are a sign of weakness.”
“Then perhaps we should carve a world one day where the strength lies in who you are rather than in what they expect you to be.”
15
I heard that the Heartforger was in the Willows almost by accident. Chesh mentioned it only in passing when I visited her and Likh at the zivar shop. “The asha are abuzz with the news,” she told me, pinning a new selection of dovetail combs into my hair while Likh looked on. “They say he’s taking up lodgings for a couple of nights at the Snow Pyre, since he’s a close friend of its owner.”
I was no stranger to the Heartforger’s work by then. Some of Lady Mykaela’s books talk about him in detail, including stunning illustrations of the heartsglass he forged over the years. He had discovered a cure for smallpox and spotted fever and was notorious for charging the wealthy exorbitant prices for his wares while giving them away to the poor at practically no cost. The book also went on to say that the Heartforger, like most heartforgers before him, had close ties to Dark asha, though they were never specific on the hows and whys of the relationship.
“How long do you think he’ll be staying?” I asked, keeping my voice casual.
Chesh shrugged. “No one knows. Perhaps a week but probably no longer than that. I don’t think he stays for too long in the Willows.”
“I wonder what he plans to do here,” Likh mused, weaving gem-studded ribbons through my hair. “He hasn’t been to Kion in years. He dislikes both royalty and asha, and Ankyo has both in spades.”
I didn’t know either, but I wanted to find out.
? ? ?
I was in a rebellious mood all that week; Mistress Parmina had grown impatient with my lack of progress with my singing skills and had decided banning sweets and cold drinks was the answer, to protect my throat. Looking back, it was probably a ridiculous excuse to break my curfew, but deprived of my favorite paloodeh, I was looking for a way to get back at Mistress Parmina. And I was curious: if heartforgers maintained close ties with Dark asha, I reasoned, then sneaking out to meet him was merely preemptively establishing the friendship.
I wished I could say that Fox did his best to stop me, but he was just as curious about the Heartforger as I was. Mistress Parmina was already asleep, and everyone else had gone out. Only Kana had been taken into my confidence.
“People tell me that this current heartforger is something of a recluse,” my brother said as we crept toward the Snow Pyre, making sure we didn’t meet anyone who would recognize us on the way. The night was warm, but I carried a paper umbrella behind me, which was perfect for shielding my face when people walked by. Fox had found a top hat, much to my amusement, and wore it over his eyes for the same reason. “He used to be friends with King Vanor, I believe—I think he even encouraged his romance with Lady Mykaela—but after the king shunned her, the Forger turned his back on the king too.”
“Maybe he knows more about what went on between the king and Lady Mykaela.”
“Are you going to ask?”
I thought that over. “No. I think Lady Mykaela explained everything that she wanted me to know. I shouldn’t be nosy.”