فصل 19

19

Tella’s religious experiences on Trisda might have been limited to desperate prayers and smuggling letters through the priest’s small confessional, but as she entered the Church of Legend, she could instantly tell this was not an ordinary place of worship.

“Welcome.” A dusky-skinned girl in a dainty top hat greeted Tella with a curtsy made of narrowed eyes and red ruffles. So many red ruffles. Tella knew Legend favored red, but this girl seemed desperate. Red ruffles wrapped around her platinum gown like a stripe on a cane of candy.

“Congratulations on finding our door, but now you must choose carefully if you wish to enter the church.” The girl waved a ruffled arm and several brassy candelabras sparked to life, illuminating more than a dozen sets of stairs. All covered in thick ruby carpets, they writhed in every direction, up and down and side to side, like escaped blood veins before they disappeared into the black beyond. Some stairs appeared to be more worn than the others, but all of them shimmered with the same dull oak lighting, hinting at shine that had long since dimmed.

“Only one of these will lead you to where you wish to go,” said the girl.

“And where will the others take me?”

The girl’s crimson smile dripped at the corners. “That’s a mystery you must risk if you wish to join our congregation and serve the great Legend.” Tella didn’t wish to join anything, she definitely had no plans to serve Legend, and she really didn’t feel like climbing up or down any stairs, but she had heard that finding the church was supposed to be like a game.

Tella examined the ruby stairs again. Each possessed a different personality, like the playful golden-lined corkscrews to her right. Then there was the adventurously carved case that stretched straight ahead as if it were a bridge to a fantasyland. The rickety stairs to her left appeared untrustworthy, as did the twisting wrought-iron case without handrails that she wasn’t about to attempt. Lastly, Tella’s eyes fell on a luscious black marble case, polished to a mirror-shine and covered with a deep, untouched garnet-red carpet. They appeared to go down instead of up.

Tella tried to see where the other girl’s eyes darted, curious as to which path she would choose. But her gaze remained narrowed on Tella.

“Decide?”

Tella’s eyes returned to the lush marble case with the untouched garnet carpet. The girl’s expression didn’t shift, but she swore her shoulders stiffened. She didn’t want Tella taking those steps, and Tella had a feeling it wasn’t because this girl feared for her safety.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather choose another set?” asked the girl.

“I think I’ll like what I find at the end of these.”

The girl laughed, but it sounded forced as Tella swept onto the immaculate black marble staircase and took her first step down.

The marble stairway didn’t feel quite like Legend, but Tella sensed that it was trying. With each flight the air grew colder. Candles on the wall winked out, while mysterious black stains spotted the once immaculate carpet and the smooth banister, mimicking drops of dried blood. But Tella had seen enough real blood spatter to know how it usually fell and the color it turned once it dried. Not blood here, an illusion.

Just in case, Tella pulled out Dante’s razor-tipped gloves. They smelled of him, like ink and secrets. But unlike Dante, they were cool to the touch as she slid them on, liking the gentle weight of the hidden blades at the tips of her fingers.

After a few more steps she stole a waxy candle from a sconce. Behind it, holes poked through the wall so bits of dry wind could make the lights flicker. At least they were clever here. Though Tella regretted wearing such a heavy gown as the stairs grew steeper. The wind holes in the walls disappeared next, covered up by thickly framed portraits—all of young men, with top hats.

At first she wondered if these were the church’s members, but the faces were all too handsome, and a little too wicked. Legend.

Not real pictures of him. No one knew for certain what he looked like, but clearly members of the church had attempted to render him. Tella saw skin tones ranging from translucent white to dark shades of brown. Some faces were narrow and as sharp as curse words; others were almost cherubic in their curves or seraphic in their chiseled edges. A few faces were scarred, some grinned, while others glared. Tella’s heartbeat stopped entirely as she spied a narrow face that reminded her of Jacks, with silver-blue eyes and golden hair. The final portrait winked, as if it were all a great joke.

Perhaps it was. Perhaps Legend was toying with her yet again, and the stairs went on forever and ever and ever. Tella’s lethargic legs turned to liquid at the thought. Maybe there was no way to ever truly find Legend, and the church represented an endless search for a man who was unsearchable.

Or perhaps Tella was being overdramatic.

Brighter light lit the stairs below, making it clear there was an ending in sight. Tella shoved her torch in an empty sconce and quickened her pace.

A few steps later pitchy notes of music sounded—a squeaky violin, cimbalom, and a banjo. Tella wouldn’t have said the music was pretty, but it was just the right combination of strange and enticing, matching the tavern she found at the bottom.

She’d expected more red, but everything was green instead, glowing like ripening magic. Tella no longer felt fatigued as she breathed it all in, as if the air was as intoxicating as the drinks the tavern served.

Dark green kerosene lamps illuminated pale mint-green glass tables, while velvet green settees cushioned people sucking on glowing cubes of green sugar, or sipping vials of vivid lime liquid. Even the floor was covered in tiny emerald tiles, which reminded Tella of mermaid tails. This was nothing like the taverns back on Trisda, which only came in shades of dull and smelled of dashed dreams and cheap rum. It wasn’t quite like the pubs of Caraval, either, but it was an interesting attempt.

With its quirky music and glowing green drinks, it bordered on the type of surreal that made Tella imagine it could have been a Fate pictured on the Decks of Destiny. Tavern Emerald, she would have called it. Where answers to dangerous questions could be found. There was the Blank Card in the deck, and Tella may have wondered if this saloon was perhaps that undepicted Fate. But for all its sparkle, once Tella looked closer she thought it seemed more like glitter pretending to be stardust.

It seemed even the steps she’d seen upon first entering weren’t as dangerous as the ruffled girl wanted Tella to think, but merely a test as Tella had been warned. Between the tables, the bar, and the floating balconettes, Tella spied the ends of all the other staircases—every set led to the same place. Like Caraval it seemed this church was full of illusions, and clearly its members enjoyed them.

The patrons in the tavern seemed to have traveled from all over. As she wove deeper inside, Tella’s ears picked up hints of different languages, while her eyes saw skin colors ranging from pale to dark. The fashion choices were varied as well, but almost everyone had one thing in common: top hats.

Tella had no idea if people wore them because they worshipped Legend or wanted to be him, but almost every person in the bar had one. Some hats were stout, some were straight, others curved or were purposely bent out of shape. A few had feathers, veils, or other bits of cheeky adornment. Tella even spied a top hat with horns coming out the sides, and one young woman had two miniature pink top hats that popped out of her head like ears.

Maybe this was the real reason why Dante had fled rather than followed her. Perhaps he was jealous of all of the people who so blatantly worshipped Legend. Not that Tella should have been thinking of Dante, or wondering what he would have said if he were there with her.

Tella looked past all the merriment, searching for where a clue might be hidden, until her eyes landed on a queue of people. They lined up in front of a pair of black velvet curtains rimmed in gaudy gold tassels. Again, it was a bit too garish, a touch too blatant to truly feel like Legend. It felt more like the way people perceived him, an image she believed he was happy to perpetuate. In the last Caraval, Caspar, the actor who had played the role of Legend, had put on a performance that had been dazzlingly over the top. But Tella did not imagine the real Legend was that way.

Although Tella had not uncovered Legend’s true identity, she had received letters from him. The messages came without adornment; one had only contained a single sentence, and still she’d felt his magic pulsing through those simple words.

As beguiling as the Church of Legend was, Tella imagined it had Legend all wrong. Caraval might have been extreme in all of its splendor, but she didn’t think he was.

Yet she found herself drawing closer to the tasseled curtains. The line in front of them buzzed with eager whispers, lots of hands tightening cravats, pinching cheeks to bring color, and straightening top hats. Though, unlike the rest of the tavern, it appeared not everyone wore a top hat, giving Tella the impression these people weren’t members of the church, but players in search of the next clue.

Tella neared the front of the line, not wanting to wait at the end, nor thinking it wise to try to sneak in without waiting at all.

“Excuse me,” she asked a girl who wore a feathery fascinator with a gauzy crimson veil over her eyes. “What is everyone waiting to see behind the curtain?” “If you don’t know, then maybe you don’t belong here.”

“Ignore her,” said the lanky boy at her side. Dressed a little more casual than the rest, in a collarless shirt and a pair of loose gray striped trousers held up by two cherry-red suspenders. “My sister forgets we’re just playing a game, and gets a little too competitive.” “It’s all right,” Tella said. “My sister, Scarlett, thinks I’m the same way.”

The lanky boy’s eyes stretched wide, and Tella swore the girl in the veiled hat inhaled sharply. “Did you say Scarlett, as in the Scarlett who won the last game?” “Oh, my sister and I didn’t play the last game,” Tella said. But she made her voice shake enough to instill a sliver of doubt. It was a risk to her true identity, but Caraval wasn’t won by playing it safe. And it seemed to be working already.

The lanky boy stepped back, looking more protectively at Tella as he made room for her to join them in the line. “I’m Fernando, this is my sister, Patricia, and this is our friend, Caspar.” Tella tried to hide her surprise as a familiar performer reached for her hand.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you.” Caspar treated Tella similar to the way Julian had, as if they’d never crossed paths before. It wasn’t quite as unnerving as Julian’s disturbing performance. But it still threw Tella off balance, making her feel as if perhaps Caspar really was a stranger after all.

Caspar had pretended to be her fiancé as well as Legend in the last performance, but he now used a musical accent that Tella had never heard from him. He’d also changed out of the posh clothes he’d favored during the last Caraval to a rugged ensemble similar to Fernando’s attire.

“Caspar’s the one who told us the man who started this church is on the other side of the curtain,” Fernando said.

“This man is also an expert on the Fates,” Caspar cut in smoothly.

“He knows about the object we need to find, the one capable of destroying them,” Fernando added.

Patricia made a show of rolling her eyes. “You keep forgetting this is only a game. The object is just a symbolic item needed to win. Legend doesn’t really want to destroy the Fates. They’ve already been banished. When you say it like that, you sound like an idiot.” Fernando’s cheeks reddened.

Tella agreed with his sister’s assessment but she didn’t like the way the girl was making a point of embarrassing her brother.

In front of them, a couple stepped behind the tasseled curtain. Fernando and his sister were up next. But all of Fernando’s giddiness was gone. He was now peering at the green tiles on the floor while Patricia gazed up at Caspar for approval, as if she’d just said something very clever. To his credit Caspar didn’t encourage her.

But Tella decided to take things one step further. Siblings were supposed to support each other, not tear each other down.

“I think you’re wrong.” She directed each word toward Patricia, speaking quickly so that the girl couldn’t interrupt with any sighs or rolling eyes. “Legend has never held two Caravals so closely together. Experts on the game are saying it’s because this one is real. If you pay attention, you’ll feel it. The magic in the air isn’t merely Legend’s—it’s the Fates, trying to come back. But the only way they can do that is by taking Legend’s power.” Caspar’s brows arched up in surprise, his eyes piercing Tella with a look that made her feel as if she’d just spilled a secret she wasn’t even supposed to know. “Where’d you hear all of this?” “I heard something similar,” Fernando chimed in. “But I was told that if Legend succeeds in destroying the Fates, he won’t only keep his power, he’ll take all of their powers as well.” Dante hadn’t mentioned this part. Not that Tella had decided to believe his story. But it was difficult to ignore the way Caspar’s face had turned bone-white.

“What if the Fates’ powers have something to do with the mysterious final prize?” Patricia interjected, speaking with the sort of confidence that made it impossible to tell if the pressure of the group had changed her mind, or if she didn’t want to be left out of the conversation. “Maybe Legend will give the winner one of the Fate’s powers. I think I’d take the Undead Queen’s. She never ages.” “None of the Fates are supposed to age,” said Tella, Caspar, and Fernando in unison.

Now it was Patricia’s turn to blush. “You didn’t let me finish.”

“Go ahead, then,” Caspar said.

But apparently Patricia didn’t know that the Undead Queen’s true power was the ability to control anyone foolish enough to pledge service to her. Patricia stayed silent until Caspar turned to Fernando. He looked at the other young man with a smile so warm it made Tella wonder if she’d only imagined Caspar’s skin turning pale.

“What about you?” Caspar asked. “Which Fate’s power would you want?”

Fernando toyed with his suspenders as he appeared to think on it. “I’d probably pick Maiden Death.”

Tella stiffened.

Patricia gaped at her brother. “You’d want to kill people?”

“Maiden Death doesn’t kill anyone,” Fernando said. “She’s one of the good Fates. She senses when tragedy is about to happen and she warns people. I’d want to be able to do that.” If only Fernando was right. In Tella’s experience, the Maiden Death sealed rather than thwarted Fate. Though perhaps things might have turned out differently if Tella had actually known what the Maiden Death represented when Tella had first pulled her from her mother’s Deck of Destiny. Then maybe she could have done something to prevent her mother from leaving.

Caspar turned to Tella. “What about you, which power would you desire?”

Tella might have been fascinated with the Fates, but she wasn’t sure she wanted any of their terrible gifts. The Fates weren’t all bad; Mistress Luck brought people fame and good fortune, but given the capricious nature of luck, even that could turn sour. And while the Aracle gave Tella helpful glimpses of the future, it had also brought her grief after grief. The Assassin could move through space and time, but as tempting as that power was, Tella also imagined it could bring bits of madness. It would be even worse to have all the Fates’ powers. She could see why someone like Legend would want them. With that much magic he could rule the world. But Tella doubted that Legend or the world would be better for it.

The curtains before them parted again, saving Tella from answering the question as Fernando and Patricia were beckoned inside.

Tella turned back to Caspar, but he’d already slipped away, most likely off in search of another pair to play with.

It was probably for the best. Caspar’s reaction to Tella’s story had made her question things better left unquestioned. Tella didn’t know what she’d find on the other side of the black tasseled curtain, but if it involved the next clue, she assumed her head would be toyed with even more. Best to have it on straight before she stepped inside.

There were no clocks on the tavern walls, only mirrors and lanterns, bottles, and more attempted renderings of Legend. So Tella didn’t know how long she waited, just that too much time seemed to slip past before the curtain finally parted once more and a familiar voice beckoned her inside.