Page 7 of A Dance With Fire
“You will show us your ears.”
Shula could feel everyone in the crowd still. She knew she always had the bad habit of hiding her hair over her face. She knew they wondered, knew they were holding her breath. Shula was beautiful, almost too beautiful. She held herself with grace and elegance, a confidence that they figured was too ethereal to be human. She was friends with all of these people, but for so long, she had read the suspicion in their eyes because of how careful she was to keep her ears covered.
Shula didn’t waste time. She didn’t delay. Everyone’s eyes were glued on her as she lifted her hands and pushed aside her dark locks and tilted her head so they could see her ears.
And the perfect roundness of them.
The soldier blinked with what she was sure could only be surprise. She felt everyone around her relax as if the great mystery of her had finally been solved.
“Is that all you require of me, officer?” She dropped her hands to the side and made sure he could see the iron bracelet around her wrist. He would never know they were fake; they looked all too real.
But he didn’t notice the bracelet. He was still staring at her ears. She didn’t hide them with her hair; instead she’d tucked the strands behind her ears to leave them on display as if they were an artifact in a museum.
They almost panged with the phantom pain of the past, but she ignored it.
“How do you explain your act?” he all but demanded, an accusing note to his voice. “The fire?”
Humans always wanted an explanation for what they didn’t understand. It was how this problem came to pass in the first place. Because the humans couldn’t accept things that were out of their control. Like perhaps the god they worshipped wasn’t real when it came to the race of the Fae. Because they couldn’t accept that the magical life force of Mana lived within the Fae and connected them to the holy elements.
At least, that’s what Shula’s father had told her. It was one of the many lessons he’d imparted before he’d been taken. They were also lessons she struggled to forget in order to become as human as possible.
“Now wait a moment!” Piriguini stepped forward again, his robe trailing behind him like a royal cloak. “It’s one thing to barge in here and question my performers without rightful cause, but to ask them to give up the secrets of their acts? I won’t stand for it! I won’t!” He stomped his little feet and kicked dust up.
“It’s fine, Piriguini,” Shula reassured. “It’s for the emperor.” She looked back up at the soldier. “If you’d please follow me?”
She had planned this as well, of course. When people would question how she was doing it. Even the simplest of human parlor tricks could be considered magic, if done right. All it took was the sleight of hand, one she would be revealing to the officers today.
She led them into the main tent and behind the velvet curtain where they kept all of their supplies. It was easier to let them sit there on hand for their acts instead of hauling them back and forth to their personal tents every night. Shula immediately went to her own pile and pulled out her things.
“The answer to your inquiries, good soldier, is gun powder, oil, and flame. Not particularly in that order, and not always together.” She picked up a long piece of thin cord that had a ball attached at the bottom. She dipped it in oil and stepped back. “Let me give you a demonstration.” Quicker than he could blink, she struck a hidden match and the ball lit in a small flame. “Sleight of the hand, soldier.” Then she stepped back even further and began to move, going through the motions of her dance. “The trick for creating figures is to draw them in the air. I’m an artist, you see, and I have to move as fast as possible for the illusion to stick.” She traced the image of a kitten in the air, moving so fast that sparks trailed wherever she moved the ball of fire, leaving behind works of art. “The cord is thin so the crowd can’t see it.” She stopped and dipped the fire in a bucket of sand to put it out.
The soldier still looked skeptical. “What about the fire dragon?”
“We have a backdrop for that. Thin, string-like structures that are dipped in oil and molded overnight. They harden and the backdrop is placed up just before my act. When I strike a match, the whole thing catches fire.”
“See? And you all better keep your mouths shut about it, too! It’s a secret!”
Piriguini, again, went ignored.
The captain nodded at his soldiers, and they began searching through the things in the tent and they weren’t kind about it. They knocked stuff over, tore through Fanny’s ribbons and ropes. They made a mess of the entire tent, all while keeping his deadly gaze locked tightly on Shula. She met it without fear. If anything, her expression appeared demurely innocent.
Finally, the soldiers all snapped back towards their leader, shaking their heads back and forth. Of course, he wouldn’t find anything.
Shula had ensured that she would never be found out like her parents had been.
“Thank you for your cooperation, Shula Azzarh, and forgive us. You must understand the importance of tracking down any and all Fae.” The captain bowed, but the suspicion never once left his eyes. She could still read the thirst for blood tensing his every movement.
Shula still smiled sweetly at him. “Of course, I understand. I hope you find what you’re looking for.”
When the words left her lips, she wasn’t even sure if she believed them herself. Did she want the Fae found? If they did, then all of this would end. The fear, the bigotry. But if they were found, it would mean their death and how could she ever hope for that, even if it meant her own safety, even if it meant she would remain hidden from the emperor? How could she wish to condemn her own race to die for her own protection?
The truth was, her own had abandoned her long ago. The humans didn’t protect her, and the Fae only brought with them death.
She could count on no one in this entire world. Not on humans, not on Fae. The only person she had to help her survive was herself. Humans wanted her dead, and the Fae were sparse.
And Shula Azzarh couldn’t bring herself to put her faith in legends or cowards who hid in the shadows.
Even while that thought fluttered through her mind, she ignored the pang of guilt. Because if they were cowards, then that made her the biggest one of them all.
