Page 52 of Mistress of Bones
Nereida hesitated. “What if the person were to have died by violent means? Would traces of such violence remain? Cuts? Holes?”
“I told you: Isadora was whole in body and spirit. All her memories, all her essence is—was—still her. The same person, their body rebuilt. No fever, no scarring.”
She reached for a half mask Enjul had given her.
With a shocking economy of motion, Nereida ripped the mask out of her hand. Her eyes were bright, her voice hard as she crumpled the scrap of hard fabric in her fist. “Never wear masks in Cienpuentes, Del Arroyo. Never cover your face while you’re here.”
Azul was too startled to do anything but agree. Then, “But why?”
Unsurprisingly, Nereida did not answer. Azul wondered who could. Her brother? Her shadow outside? Not Enjul—he obviously had no issue with wearing masks around town.
The question nagged her all the way to the Temple, but once they arrived, she forgot all about it. Gentry and nobility mixed with merchants and laborers, and pleasure-seekers filled every walkway, every street, every building with a view into the plaza by the Temple’s side. No wonder Enjul wanted them here!
Children ran around in half capes and skirts, selling dried fruit and small cakes to spectators. Banners hung from the buildings, some too faded to tell colors or crests. Caught in the cloying excitement, Azul elbowed her way to the parapet of the second floor’s open walkway and took in the view, drank in the sounds.
The Temple school pupils stood in pairs in their uniformed breeches and vests and skirts, most of their shirtsleeves rolled uptheir arms, waiting under a tent by the Temple walls for their turn to fight. Joining them was a large contingent of guards of two different kinds—the ones with the palace’s yellow colors, and the ones with the City Guard’s blue tabards.
Nereida carved a spot by Azul’s side, hiding beneath her hat and holding a square of lace to her nose and mouth. An upside-down mask, as it were, since she hated the normal ones so much. And in this, she was almost alone, for well over half the crowd wore masks: white, brown, black; felt, silk, and other things; plain, embroidered, lined with small beads sparkling with summer sunlight, holding feathers like exotic birds. Held by ribbons, part of hats, or threaded into side braids with pearl-ended pins.
No wonder nobody had glanced twice at Enjul wearing a mask a day earlier. City of bridges, city of masks. Wealth and secrets all at once.
Below the masks, below the opening mouths, below the grins and the grimaces, was a show of daylight fashion. Elegant, light summer dresses with tight bodices that left the shoulders bare. Embroidered white shirt sleeves—Azul had never seen such before, but they appeared common here—covered by waistcoats of all kinds of colors that made her wish she could fit into one of Nereida’s beautiful creations.
But those beautiful waistcoats she had seen on the way over the sea lay in trunks back in Valanje. Nereida wore as simple of a waistcoat as Azul did. No shoulder plates here to indicate houses and parentage, though—the illusion of anonymity created by the masks too big an allure to pass.
It was overwhelming. The colors, the ever-moving duelists in the plaza, the ripples of the crowd, the insults and the curses and the bets thrown in the air. Perfume wafted from the spectators’ fans in an attempt to keep the heat and the odor of sweat at bay, adding to the assault on her senses.
After a few minutes of taking in the view, Nereida murmured her excuses and left Azul’s side, not to be seen again until later, back at Almanueva in time for supper.
Enjul filled the space, the same mask he had worn yesterday failingto hide his violet-and-golden eyes, and spoke for the first time since their encounter last night. “You’ve been here already, I gather?”
“Yesterday,” she answered. The emissary was too close, and she fought with the person by her other side to gain some ground. “I’m sure my shadow already told you.” She leaned against the stone parapet, watching the school pupils retreat under their tent and the guards dominate the space. They took turns, using practice swords with blunted ends dipped in paint. The different-colored groups jeered and cheered and demanded a rematch whenever their fighter lost a point to the other one.
“I was told your sister enjoyed duels with her rapier. I have yet to see one on you.”
“Duels aren’t easy to wear, Emissary. They dust and break with too much ease.”
Fingers landed on her braid, right over her nape. A shiver at the warm contact ran down her back, and she feared it might be excitement. “Fragile, like human lives. May I remind you how I know?”
“I spoke out of order,” she admitted easily, if a little breathlessly. The crowd’s enthusiasm made for a buoyant mood, even if his touch somehow anchored her in place. “I did not study at the Temple like my sister. Rapiers and swords are not my weapons of choice.”
“Ah.”
He couldn’t possibly think any lesser of her for her lack of godly education, Azul reasoned, since there were no Temple schools in Valanje.
“Why aren’t you wearing your mask?” Enjul asked.
“Is my being here a secret? If so, who would know who I am?”
Excited whispers rose around them. Whoever was next must be a bit of an event. Azul chose to ignore it, along with the searing heat of Enjul’s lingering touch, and studied the people by the front of the building across the plaza. They were too far for her to see their features clearly, but they must be of some importance, sitting on chairs dragged from inside the building to its wide front steps. Some had decided to remain standing, perhaps not to wrinkle their clothing, but this group had also drifted into halves, like the tabards.
Enjul leaned closer. Her heartbeat sped up, the strange pull she had felt when he first walked into her room in Diel returning in full force. Warmth met her back.
“Are there any?” he whispered close to her ear, so close he might as well be breathing the words into her soul.
Azul made to move away, but he held on to her waist with his hand, his touch all but a brand.
“Answer, Miss Del Arroyo. Do you see any creature who oughtn’t be alive?”
