Act I Scene VII
Compliments! Three compliments. Pay a Player three compliments and they’ll leave you alone.
The rule comes back to me with ease. It was drilled into my head around the same time I learned how to read.
That said, it doesn’t matter, because I have nothing nice to say. Even if he is admittedly the most staggeringly beautiful person I have ever seen.
Jude Stepharros. Lead Player of the Playhouse.
I grip onto my common sense before I can reach for my knife and start a fight that I most definitely will not win. Their director is one thing. But Jude, like the others, stands at least a foot taller than me—and I’ve been regarded as comically tall my entire life.
My second thought is that if I were to take him in a fight, I’d pierce one of his eyes first—which are glowing and golden and lined with kohl. And watching me like I’m live entertainment.
Probably because I’ve been staring in stunned silence for about thirty seconds now.
JUDE: “So, you are hiding, then.”
My gaze flutters longingly to the hall, where a smarter woman would have escaped moments ago.
Growing up, I always fantasized about this moment: fearlessly facing a Player. Confronting whichever cast member cursed me. Reaching for my knife and plunging it through the Player’s dark heart. But I don’t feel fearless, and my hands are not reaching for my knife.
I feel small.
SILENUS: “Always intent on making an entrance of his own, isn’t he?” The director’s voice booms on the other side of the curtain as the audience hushes to an amused titter. “Now, if you please…a warm welcome for our Lead Player, Jude!” he tries again.
“Well, don’t look so scared over it.” Jude pouts at me. “It could be worse. I, for instance, am terribly late.”
The crowd screams the Player’s name, as if this will magically summon him. He makes no move for the curtain.
JUDE: “You know, I looked just like you at my audition—nervous and all. Better dressed, though.” His golden eyes look me over as I pray to the floor to open up and swallow me whole. “But anyway, it isn’t so bad. Do you know what the trick is?”
I have a feeling he’s going to tell me whether I respond or not. He hasn’t seemed to notice I’m inching backward or that my right hand has crept into my coat toward my blade.
JUDE: “Take three deep breaths like this— Gods, you’re standing like I’ve got a knife to your throat. Try sitting down? Here.”
Before I can say anything, Jude sits himself down and politely pats the ground next to him like I’m a lost puppy. Meanwhile, the onlookers outside have taken to chanting his name.
This is their vicious Lead Player? I imagined sharper teeth. Maybe an evil cackle.
Jude blinks up at me. “Well, I’m not going out there if you don’t sit first.”
It occurs to me that if he doesn’t go out there, someone is liable to come get him.
I quickly sit down across from Jude, crossing my legs the way his are and keenly avoiding his eyes, staring instead at the dark copper of his hair, which flickers like candlelight at the ends.
Jude looks like he does in his playbill solagraph, with smooth olive skin and tousled hair that probably took an absurd amount of styling to look intentionally messy. One dark eyebrow is arched just slightly higher than the other in amusement. He wears far too much jewelry for one person.
JUDE: “Good! I’m Jude, by the way.” As if I don’t know exactly who he is. I mouth nasty insults at his statue each time I pass it in the District.
I glance nervously toward the closed curtain as the crowd cheers louder.
“Oh, that? Never mind it. All right, like this—” He rests his forearms on his knees, inner wrists to the ceiling.
I tightly cross my arms over my rib cage instead but wince at the discomfort.
Jude closes his eyes. “Breathe in and picture what you’re frightened of.”
I breathe in and picture him.
After holding his breath, he adds, “Now breathe out and picture what you want.”
I breathe out and picture that damned Script. And maybe a gag to shut him up.
This is not helping.
He peeks an eye open.
JUDE: “See? No need to be nervous. Between you and me, this crowd is nothing but a pack of weeds with only a handful of flowers to pluck.” He pauses, stares me up and down. “Maybe a few thorns, too.”
RIVEN: “I’m not auditioning!” The words fall out of my mouth before I realize my mistake. I shouldn’t say anything to him. I can’t lie.
JUDE: “Oh?” He tilts his head, curious. For the first time, he seems to take in the rips in my jacket, where my attackers tore it.
The holes in my boots. “I see. Have you come to rob us? You don’t look like you’ve had a full meal in—well, I don’t know.
I don’t think it’s normal for a person’s cheekbones to stick out like that. ”
The director’s voice cuts through the applause.
SILENUS: “Our Jude, he…he does like to make an entrance, yes? Perhaps if we cheer louder!”
The audience obeys, and Jude sighs dramatically, pulling himself to his feet. I follow.
Then, to my horror, he plucks a golden ring from his index finger, motions for me to hold out my hand, and drops it into my palm.
JUDE: “Tell you what. Why don’t you steal this from me?
And go find yourself something to eat. The food is free, you know.
” He makes it three steps before pausing and throwing a look over his shoulder.
“And for the record, even if you aren’t auditioning, you most certainly are scared. Would you like to know a secret?”
I say nothing.
Jude shrugs. “The best actors always are.”
Then he just saunters off through the curtain.
SILENUS: “Well, look who it is!”
The crowd bursts into a final surge of roaring applause.
Snapped a guard’s neck for stepping too close to Silenus, Galen said.
I’ve been seen. It’s time to abandon this plan before Jude spots me again. Surely there’s a better place to take Silenus by surprise, away from Jude’s eyes. An office belonging to the director, maybe…
Dressing rooms! I’ve read Players are particularly territorial about their dressing rooms—their director would have one. Wouldn’t he? And he’d be alone, away from his Players.
I stare at the golden ring in my hands. It’s so warm, it almost hurts to hold, with a flat surface that carries the inscription Finders Keepers. Which oddly feels like a threat.
I pocket the ring anyway. I don’t know what the going rate for a Lead Player’s ring is, but I imagine it’s enough to take the burden off Galen and pay for all the school materials I could possibly need when I’m well on my way to Orkestra.
“To our next Player!” Silenus shouts, followed by the clinking of chalices.
I take that as my cue to move as fast as I can, and trust my intuition to lead me to the dressing rooms.