Illusions of Fate

He smiles, but it doesn’t touch his eyes. “Then I would have to fix your head, too, and I’m much better with fingers.”

I take a deep breath and hold out my hand. I cannot move it past my wrist.

He surveys the damage. Then he reaches into his vest pocket and pulls out a black satin, wrist-length glove. “I already made it,” he says. “As soon as he started . . . well, I wanted to be ready when I got into the house. I didn’t count on you meeting me at the porch.”

He sets the glove down next to me and then looks into my eyes. “It may be best not to watch.”

“You cannot compete with any of the horrors today has already delivered. I’d prefer to see.”

This time the sad smile makes it to his eyes. He reaches out like he would tuck a loose strand of hair behind my ear, but stops short and turns back to his work. “Very well. Take a deep breath. On the count of three—”

I draw in the deepest breath I can, holding it, watching and waiting for him to start twisting and popping my fingers back into place. He picks up the glove, then says, “One . . . two . . .”

Without warning, he pulls the glove over my hand. I scream and kick out, catching him on the chin with my knee, but as soon as the pain registers it is gone, replaced by a strange, crawling, cold sensation, prickling beneath my skin.

I stop midscream and look in wonder at the glove, perfectly fit like a second skin, each finger straight and placed as though they had never known a hammer. I brace myself, then wiggle my hand to find that there is no pain at all, and each finger bends where a finger ought to.

“Now.” Finn rubs his chin where I struck him. “Are you ready for an explanation?”

Eleven

I NOD, DISTRACTED, STILL FLEXING MY FINGERS with wonder. I broke a toe once, when I was six or seven, and even after my friends popped it back into place, it ached for months. Wanting to look at my fingers to see if the discoloration and splits in the skin have mended as well, I move to tug off the glove.

“No! Don’t do that!” Finn grabs my gloved hand and holds it protectively in both of his. “You cannot remove it.”

“Ever?”

“No, no, not that long. But it must stay in place until everything has settled. Can you feel it? The sort of itching crawl beneath your skin?”

I nod. It’s like pins and needles, the way my foot feels when I’ve been reading with it tucked under me for too long. But colder. “What is it?”

“Magic.” But the word sounds tired and ordinary coming out of his mouth. I know I should be shocked, disbelieving, but after everything I have seen and been through, it’s a relief. I’m not losing my mind.

I shake my hand as though I can dislodge the sensation there. “I am not sure I like it, but it’s better than the pain. You’ve felt it before?”

His eyes focused on nothing, one corner of his lips pulls up. “Every waking hour throughout my entire body.”

“Well, a glove and a strange sensation is more than a fair trade. Thank you.”

“I am—you must know how sorry I am for all of this.”

“Yes, though what ‘all of this’ is I cannot begin to fathom.” Needing some fidget to break eye contact—his dark eyes are piercing, and I begin to feel those strange pins and needles across my whole body under their gaze—I pull off my regular glove, wrinkling my nose at the filth caked there. It is then that I’m finally aware enough to take into account the relative state of my clothes and person.

The dress is snagged and torn. The skirts around my knees are black with grime, and I want nothing more than to be shot of it and the associations with the man who sent it to me.

“This is an explanation best made in clean, dry clothes, worn over full stomachs,” Finn says, anticipating my discomfort. “Though I have no women’s clothing here, I’m afraid.”

“I should wonder greatly if you did.” I smile, attempting levity, and then realize I know next to nothing about him. He could be married. He certainly wouldn’t be the first married Alben man to pursue a Melenese mistress.

“How old are you?” I blurt out.

“I am the oldest nineteen-year-old alive,” he says, smiling sadly. “This way.” He waits for me to stand, watching to see how steady I am. I’m pleased to be able to walk more or less confidently. He leads me out a door—which does not disappear, I have kept half an eye on it the whole time—and into an electric lantern–lit hall. I look down both ends, but it stretches beyond what I can see, blurring far sooner than it should. I cannot make out how many doors there are, and they seem too close together to lead to any rooms other than closets.

Finn opens one onto a washroom. It’s generously sized, bigger than my room at the hotel, and far larger than the doors in the hallway would account for. But inside, the walls are free from extra doors, a pale blue color with waist-high wainscoting.

This house makes me dizzy.

I decide to willfully ignore the problem of the doors and inspect the washroom, instead. There’s a claw-foot bath, and a pillar washbasin against the wall, complete with in-room faucet. Running water! A large, gilt mirror hangs above a dressing table and a plush chair. Against the far wall is a window, through which I can see branches of a tree and the late afternoon sky.