“It will be a month in total darkness,” Messenger said grimly. “A month without sensory input. No
thing but your memories and your imagination. Everyone who endures it goes mad within days. The question will be whether she has the strength to come back from madness.”
Given the severity of the punishments we inflict on evildoers I shouldn’t have been shocked, but I was. Isthil had just inflicted madness on Chandra? For an act of kindness?
I looked thoughtfully at the empty thrones. And I thought again of Oriax. Was she right that these gods were cruel?
I had very little doubt that Oriax’s own master was crueler still, but did that justify what I was doing for Messenger and for Isthil?
I felt as if I’d been convinced to attend a cult meeting and had, without conscious decision, swallowed their doctrine. Fear and guilt had made me susceptible.
You have to think about this, I told myself.
But this was not the time, because now the blond apprentice was nerving himself up to join us. He was apprehensive, and how could he not be? But had his former master said something to him that warned him specifically to be wary of Messenger?
As he drew close he nodded cautiously to Messenger, who did not respond. “My name is Haarm DeJaager.”
He had a sort of German-sounding accent, but very slight, and his English was flawless.
“Harm?” I echoed.
“With two a’s.” He made a tight grin. “It’s short for Herman. I prefer Haarm. It’s common in Holland.”
A Dutch boy, then. I would have liked to ask him a hundred questions, and I wondered if he felt the same. He must be as lonely as I was, as far from friends and family. But even as I contemplated the unlikely possibility of sitting down at a Starbucks with Haarm, I felt the twinge of wariness. He, like me, like all messengers, had come to this by virtue of some terrible act. Haarm could be anything . . . a thief, a liar, a killer.
Maybe it was hypocritical to think that way, but I leaped to the assumption that whatever his sin, it must be worse than mine. Another part of my mind, the pitiless part, the honest part, said, Worse than driving a girl to suicide?
Still, something about Haarm felt worrisome. And yet I’d have given anything to find that imagined Starbucks and hear his story.
I didn’t shake his hand. I suspected that even we apprentices, if touched, might force upon the other person the painful memories we already carried. I would not inflict mine on him, and had no desire for the reverse.
Messenger wasn’t revealing much of his feelings—if he had feelings about this—but I could sense that he was not happy about acquiring a new apprentice.
“For now simply return to your abode,” Messenger said to Haarm. “My apprentice—my only apprentice, you must understand, for you remain apprenticed to your own master—and I will continue on existing issues.” Messenger was feeling his way through the words, obviously figuring it out as he went along. I could imagine that this kind of situation had never come up before, or at least not that Messenger had been involved in. “Yes, for now, that’s what we will do. You, Haarm, return to your abode. I will . . . at some point . . . just go, for now, and wait. I will need to seek advice.”
Haarm nodded submissively, but as he did he took the opportunity to let his eyes take me in fully. He shocked both Messenger and me with what he said next.
“Master,” he said to Messenger. “Have I permission to visit your apprentice so that she may teach me what she has learned?”
Well, there we go, I thought: that’s what it takes to startle Messenger. He stared. He blinked. His mouth actually hung open. Of course all of that lasted half a second, but I saw it.
“I . . . I suppose yes,” Messenger said, now clearly disconcerted. “If Mara wishes.”
Is it silly that I enjoyed hearing him say my name? He rarely did. Is it even sillier that I detected just the faintest whiff of jealousy from Messenger, or if not true jealousy at least a vague sense of concern that other boys would spend time with me? Probably, silly, yes. But my heart didn’t care if it was silly, it skipped a beat, maybe two.
Then, before I could respond, Haarm was gone.
We were alone, Messenger and I. The landscape around us was changing. The glowing tile had turned leaden. The thrones now looked more like ancient stone carvings. The whole scene had a feeling of neglect and antiquity. And at the edges of my vision I saw the yellow mist begin to roll toward us from all directions.
Messenger’s lips were pressed tight and his jaw clenched. He was not happy with any of this. None of it.
“Graciella,” he said, reaching a conclusion.
And with that we were gone from Yusil’s imaginary city and standing in a much less exotic one.
12
THE MARQUEE READ, NICOLET! AND BENEATH IT, in slightly smaller letters, the names of two bands that would open for her. From the outside the theater was grand enough—red brick decorated with white limestone and featuring three ornate wrought-iron balconies above the marquee.