The fiddlers begin a swift, tempestuous tune, and Keenan takes my hip in one hand and my fingers in the other. At his touch, my skin comes alive as if warmed by the sun.
He’s a little stiff, but he knows the steps well enough. “You’re not bad at this,” I say to him. Nan taught me all the old dances. I wonder who taught Keenan.
“That shocks you?”
I shrug. “You don’t strike me as the dancing type. ”
“I’m not. Usually. ” His dark gaze roams over me, as if he’s trying to puzzle something out. “I thought you’d be dead within a week, you know. You surprised me. ” He finds my eyes. “I’m not used to being surprised. ”
The warmth of his body envelops me like a cocoon. I feel suddenly, deliciously breathless. But then he breaks eye contact, his fine features cold. The prickle of rejection tingles unpleasantly across my skin even as we continue to dance.
He’s your handler, Laia. That’s all. “If it makes you feel any better, I thought I’d be dead within a week too. ” I smile, and he gives me a quirk of his mouth in return. He holds happiness at bay, I realize. He doesn’t trust it.
“Do you still think I’m going to fail?” I ask.
“I shouldn’t have said that. ” He glances down at me and then quickly away. “But I didn’t want to risk the men. Or—or you. ” He mutters these words, and I lift my eyebrows in disbelief.
“Me?” I say. “You threatened to shove me into a crypt five seconds after meeting me. ”
Keenan’s neck reddens, and he’s still refusing to look at me. “I’m sorry about that. I was a. . . a. . . ”
“Jackass?” I offer helpfully.
He smiles in full this time, dazzling and all too brief. When he nods, it’s almost shy, but moments later, he’s serious again.
“When I said you would fail, I was trying to scare you. I didn’t want you to go to Blackcliff. ”
“Why?”
“Because I knew your father. No—that’s not right. ” He shakes his head.
“Because I owe your father. ”
I stop mid-dance, only picking up again when someone jostles us.
Keenan takes that as his cue to continue. “He picked me up off the streets when I was six. It was winter, and I was begging. Not very successfully, either.
I was probably a few hours from dead. Your father brought me to camp, clothed me, fed me. He gave me a bed. A family. I’ll never forget his face, or how he sounded when he asked me to come with him. Like I was doing him a favor instead of the other way around. ”
I smile. That was my father, all right.
“The first time I saw your face in the light, you looked familiar. I couldn’t place you, but I—I knew you. When you told us. . . ” He shrugs.
“I don’t agree with the old-timers about much,” he says, “but I do agree that it’s wrong to leave your brother in prison when we can help him—especially since it’s our men who put him there, and especially since your parents did more for most of us than we can ever repay them for. But sending you to Blackcliff. . . ” He scowls. “That’s poor repayment to your father. I know why Mazen did it. He needed to make both factions happy, and giving you a mission was the best way. But I still don’t think it’s right. ”
Now I’m the one flushing, because this is the most he’s ever spoken to me, and there’s a vehemence in his face that’s almost too much.
“I’m doing my best to survive,” I say lightly. “Lest you waste away with guilt. ”
“You will survive,” Keenan says. “All of the rebels have lost someone. It’s why they fight. But you and me? We’re the ones who’ve lost everyone. Everything. We’re alike, Laia. So you can trust me when I say that you’re strong, whether you know it or not. You’ll find that entrance. I know you will. ”
They are the warmest words I’ve heard in so long. Our eyes lock again, but this time, Keenan doesn’t look away. The rest of the world fades as we whirl.
I say nothing, for the quiet between us is sweet and graceful and of our own choosing. And though he, too, doesn’t speak, his dark eyes smolder, telling me something I don’t quite understand. Desire, low and dizzying, unfurls in my stomach. I want to hold this closeness to me as if it’s a treasure. I don’t want to release it. But then the music stops, and Keenan lets go of me.
“Get back safe. ” His words are perfunctory, as if he’s speaking to one his fighters. I feel as if I’ve been doused with river water.
Without another word, he disappears into the crowd. The fiddlers begin a different tune, the dance picks up around me, and like a fool, I stare into the crush, knowing he won’t come back but hoping anyway.
XXVIII: Elias
Sneaking into the Moon Festival is child’s play.
I pocket my Mask—my face serves as my best disguise—and burgle riding clothes and a pack from a Tribal caravan. After that, I break into an apothecary for willadonna, a physician’s staple that, when pressed into an oil, dilates the pupils wide enough for a Martial to pass as a Scholar or Tribesman for an hour or two.
Easy. Moments after putting the willadonna in, I’m swept into the heart of the festival with a tide of Scholars. I count twelve exits and identify twenty potential weapons before I realize what I’m doing and force myself to relax.
I pass food stalls and dance stages, jugglers and fire-eaters, acrobats, Kehannis, singers, and players. Musicians strum ouds and lyres, guided by the jubilant beat of drums.
I pull out of the crowds, suddenly disoriented. It’s been so long since I’ve heard drums as music that I instinctively try to translate the beats into orders and find myself bewildered when I cannot.
When I finally am able to push the thudding to the back of my head, I’m bowled over by the colors and smells and unadulterated joy around me. Even as a Fiver, I never saw anything like this. Not in Marinn or the Tribal deserts, not even beyond the Empire, where woad-coated barbarians danced beneath starlight for days, as if possessed.
A pleasant peacefulness steals over me. No one looks at me with loathing or fear. I don’t have to watch my back or keep up the granite exterior.
I feel free.
For a few minutes I meander through the crowd, eventually making my way to the dance stages, where I’ve spotted Laia and Izzi. The two were surprisingly difficult to follow. While tracking them through the docks, I lost sight of Laia a few times altogether. But once in the Quarter, under the bright lights of the sky lanterns, I find the girls easily.
At first, I think to approach them, tell them who I am, and get them back to Blackcliff. But they look like I feel. Free. Happy. I can’t bring myself to ruin it for them, not when their lives are ordinarily so dismal. So instead, I watch.
They both wear plain black silk dresses, which, while excellent for sneaking around and keeping slaves’ cuffs hidden, don’t blend so well into the rainbow plumage of the throng.
Izzi has let her blonde hair fall into her face, masking her eyepatch surprisingly well. She makes herself small, barely noticeable as she peeks out from the curtain of her hair.
Laia, on the other hand, would be noticeable pretty much anywhere. The high-necked dress she’s wearing clings to her body in ways I find painfully unfair. Beneath the light of the sky lanterns, her skin glows the color of warm honey. She holds her head high, the elegance of her neck heightened by the inky fall of her hair.