Caraval (Caraval 1)

“You need to leave.” The girl grabbed Scarlett’s arm and wrenched her back to the steps.

Another scream rocked the walls, and dust shook off the corridors, mixing with the torchlight, as if flickering to the wretched sound.

It was only for a trembling second, but Scarlett swore she saw a woman being tied up—the same woman in the dove-gray dress who Scarlett had witnessed being carried away earlier. Jovan had told her it was only a performance, but there was no one in this place to hear this woman’s wails, aside from Scarlett.

“What are they doing to her?” Scarlett continued struggling with the red-lipped girl, hoping to get to the other woman, but this girl was strong. Scarlett remembered the force she’d used to row the boat the night before.

“Stop fighting me,” warned the girl. “If you go deeper into these tunnels, you’ll end up mad, just like her. We’re not hurting her; we’re stopping that woman from hurting herself.” The girl pushed Scarlett a final time, knocking her to her knees at the bottom of the staircase. “You will not find your companion down here, only madness.”

A fresh scream punctuated her sentence; this one sounded male.

“Who was—” A sand-slate door slammed in front of Scarlett before she could finish. It cut off the girl, the stairs from the corridor, and the screams from Scarlett’s ears. But even as Scarlett climbed back up to the courtyard, echoes lingered in her head like damp on a sunless day.

The last scream hadn’t sounded like Julian. Or that’s what she tried to tell herself as she caught a boat to take her back to La Serpiente. She reminded herself it was only a game. But the madness part

was starting to feel very real.

If the woman in gray truly had gone insane, Scarlett couldn’t help but wonder: Why? And if she hadn’t, if she was just another actor, Scarlett could see how going after her, how believing her cries of pain were real, could make a person mad.

Scarlett thought of Tella. What if she was tied up screaming somewhere? No. That type of thinking was exactly what would drive Scarlett mad. Legend had probably provided an entire wing of lush rooms for Tella; Scarlett could picture her ordering around servants and eating strawberries dipped in pink sugar. Hadn’t Julian said Legend took excellent care of his guests?

Scarlett hoped she’d find Julian in the tavern, teasing her about how she’d run after someone who looked like him, and how long she’d spent inside of Nigel’s silken tent. Scarlett convinced herself Julian had just given up on waiting for her; he’d gotten bored and taken off. She’d not left him screaming in the tunnel. It was a different dark-haired young man she’d seen run into that garden. And Nigel’s words had been another trick of the game. She was certain of all this by the time she made it back to La Serpiente. Almost.

The Glass Tavern was even more crowded than it had been the day before. It smelled of laughter and boasts, laced with sweetened ale. Half a dozen glass tables were cluttered with windswept women and red-cheeked men all bragging of their finds—or bemoaning their lack of discoveries.

To Scarlett’s great pleasure, she overheard the silver-haired woman she’d met in Tella’s room talk of how she’d been taken for a fool by a man who claimed to sell enchanted doorknobs.

“We tried the knob,” she said. “Put it in the door up there, but it didn’t lead us anywhere new.”

“That’s because it’s just a game,” a black-bearded man replied. “There’s not really any magic here.”

“Oh, I don’t think—”

Scarlett would have loved to continue eavesdropping in the hopes of learning something, as the lines between the game and reality were starting to blur a little too much for her, but a young man near the corner caught her eye. Dark, chaotic hair. Strong shoulders. Confident. Julian.

Scarlett felt a swell of heady relief. He was all right. He wasn’t being tortured; in fact, he looked quite well. His back was turned, but the tilt of his head and the angle of his chest made it clear he was flirting with the girl near his table.

Scarlett’s relief shifted into something else. If she wasn’t even allowed to chat with another young man because of their make-believe engagement, she was not going to let Julian make eyes at some tart in a bar. Especially when this particular tart was the pregnant strawberry blonde who had made off with Scarlett’s things. Only now the young woman didn’t appear to be with child at all. The bodice of her dress was smooth and flat, no longer curving around a bulging stomach.

Slightly seething, Scarlett placed a hand on Julian’s shoulder as she approached. “Sweetheart, who is—”

Scarlett’s words broke as he turned around. “Oh, I’m sorry.” She should have realized he was wearing all black. “I thought you were—”

“Your fiancé?” Dante provided, in a tone full of nasty innuendo.

“Dante—”

“Oh, so you remember my name. You didn’t just use me for my bed.” His voice was loud. Patrons sitting at the next tables shot Scarlett looks ranging from disgust to desire. One man licked his lips, while a group of boys made inappropriate gestures.

The strawberry blonde snorted. “This is the girl you told me about? From the way you described her, I thought she’d be much prettier.”

“I’d been drinking,” Dante said.

Red heat burned Scarlett’s cheeks, far brighter than her usual peach embarrassment. Julian might be a liar, but it looked as if he was right about Dante’s true nature.

Scarlett wanted to say something back to both Dante and the girl, but her throat was tight and her chest was hollow. The men at nearby tables were still leering, and now the ribbons of her dress were beginning to darken, shifting into shades of black.

She needed to get out of there.