Act I Scene XIII
The Playhouse departs at midnight.
According to the clock, that gives me two hours to convince Jude to let me out of his bargain before the Playhouse vanishes from the District and takes me gods know where.
“You’ll be expected at the cast party,” he says flatly as I emerge from the arena, leaving me to ponder how the hell he changed clothes so quickly, exchanging the tailored black suit for a wide-sleeve shirt and wine-colored vest, dramatic flairs of gold at the neckline to match the ring through his nose.
I watch the gilded walls longingly as we go, eyes peeled for an indicator of where we are, of where an exit might be.
Didn’t I already pass through this way? Part of me suspects the Playhouse is teasingly shuffling and rearranging itself.
Like it knows I’m scheming a grand escape and has taken to taunting me with its labyrinth of winding corridors.
JUDE: “Let’s play a game: I’ll talk and you nod, yes? We can make you the quiet, mysterious type.”
RIVEN: “I don’t like parties.” At least, I don’t think I do. I’ve never actually been to one.
JUDE: “Shocking! You seem like such a social butterfly.”
SIL: “Jude!” The director turns the sharp corner ahead, his gait too young for his age. My eyes lock onto his left suit pocket, imagining the Script beneath it and weighing how I might snatch it on my way out. Jude seems to think I’ll combust into ash if I touch it, but Players are liars.
“There’s been a situation.” Sil’s eyes flicker my way as he approaches. “A word with my Lead Player, please. Privately.”
Perfect! I’ll slip away while they’re talking—
A second thought slices through the first.
Unless I’m the situation he’s referring to.
“Nonsense! There are no secrets between Alistaire and me.” Jude tosses a meaningful look my way that conveys he isn’t foolish enough to let me out of his sight. “What’s the trouble?”
Sil sets his jaw. Arguing with Jude must be commonly regarded as pointless, since the director doesn’t bother trying. “Someone slipped into the casting call earlier tonight—a pretender.”
My heart drops to the floor. I’d bolt if Jude didn’t right then clamp an iron hand around the back of my jacket. The heat of his palm feels like it might singe the fabric. “A pretender, you say.”
SIL: “It would seem our old friend Dorian sent one of his imposters in again.”
Just barely, the tension eases from my chest. He doesn’t mean me.
Jude twists his lips, his humor gone. “Of course he did.”
Dorian. The name clicks at once. Dorian is a myth of a man, a bounty hunter of Players, probably funded by the Players’ richest enemies. A vigilante legend North of the Cut and a disgraced god killer South of it.
SIL: “I’ve sent Parrish to deal with it, but—”
Jude barks a laugh. “That’s a nasty way to go. Poor soul.”
I shudder, wondering what Player Parrish is doing to the spy. And for that matter, what the Players would do to me.
“But I think it best to cancel the cast party,” Sil goes on lowly. “Dorian rarely sends only one of his little assassins. Who’s to say there aren’t more lurking about?”
A network of Player bounty hunters? Hope blooms in my chest at the thought as I try to school my expression.
Jude’s grin tenses at the corners. “The North already do their worst to keep our curtain closed. Why should we let their threats ruin a good party?” With that, he ushers me away and calls over his shoulder, “And tell Parrish to clean up the mess this time when she’s done with the spy.”
As soon as we’re out of earshot, Jude murmurs, “I saw your face. You know that name.”
“Of course I know it,” I respond smugly. “Dorian has killed two cast members.” I find that hard to believe, though—that one man could assassinate two Players. A single Player has taken out entire armies. “He’s called the Playhouse Bounty Hunter.”
Jude frowns. “And he’s raising more of them. Sends one of his sheep into the Playhouse to be slaughtered every once in a while, pretending to be an auditionee or even a patron in the audience. One tried to attack Arius at the stage door not too long ago.”
We come to a set of steps that lies just beyond the dressing rooms. “Stop walking like that. They lead to the rooftop, not a guillotine,” Jude mutters after me. I walk even slower in response and hear a scoff as we climb the flight of stairs.
The rooftop glows silver in the moonlight. A great dome shades the terrace, braced upon a colonnade laced together by an ornate railing and gloved in emerald ivy. Torchlight dances between each set of opulent pillars, illuminating a gathering of plush armchairs and sofas.
Three Players drape over the seating like spoiled royals.
Across the terrace, their respective auditionees have taken to picking at the feast off to the side like little birds.
My eyes widen at the dishes piled with more food than I’ve ever seen in my life—sweet melons, fresh figs, and aged cheeses arranged on silver platters beside trays of roasted meat.
Four or so shadowy figures, clothed all in black, attend to another table, arranging luxurious displays of honey cakes and fruit tarts. But before I can glimpse any of their faces, they exit silently as ghosts, vanishing down the stairs. Stagehands?
I look to the tables and push off my hunger. It’s late, inching toward midnight. I need a plan.
Unless I accept his offer—
I wince, shaking off the thought.
“Jude.” I hate how desperate my voice sounds but push on. “What will it take for you to let me out of this?” My soul, probably.
Jude crosses his arms, armlets winking in the moonlight. “Interested in a second bargain to undo the first?” He leans back onto the railing, looks at me. “There is nothing you could say to convince—”
A horrible wailing assaults the night, and my gaze jumps to the ledge behind Jude.
Down below, thousands of dismissed auditionees smother the gates, weaving their fingers through the bars like the dead reaching from their graves. Faces—so many—stretch with agony, like departing from the Playhouse is the most treacherous fate imaginable.
It occurs to me that I don’t know how the auditionees were selected while I was snooping around. Did they audition? I certainly didn’t.
TITUS: “Stop crying!” The Player’s voice strikes the night like thunder. He leans back in his chair, drinks deeply from a gold chalice. “At least the lot of you can leave. Be grateful.”
I raise an eyebrow at the odd comment, but the wailing only grows louder at the acknowledgment of a Player, their voices searching for a way up to us like little monsters clawing out of hell.
Jude rolls his eyes. “Don’t worry about them.
They’ll get over it. Now, listen closely.
” He gestures to the cast from afar, to where one of the auditionees is approaching the Players with the caution one might use to approach a vengeful god.
Which, I suppose, the Players aren’t all that far off from being.
“The other auditionees are not your competition. Worry about the Players. And especially about Sil. The ones who go first are usually whoever he finds the least amusing.”
At Jude’s prompt, I study the cast as their searching gazes rake over the unnerved auditionee. One of them asks a question I can’t hear.
RIVEN: “Shouldn’t you be over there?”
JUDE: “And leave you here to plot and seethe by yourself? Never.”
I scowl.
“Now, that loud one is Titus,” Jude murmurs as the burliest of the Players leans back into his seat, looking at the others like a king regarding his loyal subjects.
Titus is frequently cast as such. His herculean arms stretch wide over the sofa, knees spread so as to take up as much space as possible.
As if on cue, Titus throws his head back and laughs, a hearty baritone that pulses in the marble.
One hundred and ninety years in the Playhouse, if I remember right. Titus specializes in Tragedy, and the deathless arts with it.
JUDE: “Do not challenge him. Doesn’t take losing well. And that there is Mattia—”
My gaze falls to the woman beside Titus, who casually stretches the longest legs I have ever seen over his lap.
She’s all supple curves, wrapped entirely in jade diamonds that cling to her like a second skin.
Her jawline might have been carved by the gods themselves.
While the other Players favor their cosmetics, Mattia’s face is bare, save for a clean slash of maroon lipstick.
Like anything more would only obscure her beauty.
I shrink inward, wishing I’d never seen my reflection. Embarrassment presses against my skin like ice. They’re all so beautiful—
“The oldest Player,” he says. “Close with Titus—and about a hundred times more lethal. Keep your distance; few are fortunate enough to not fall in love with her.”
I wonder briefly if he’s speaking from personal experience as Mattia dangles an empty cup at Titus and asks him to refill it in a tone so sultry, I nearly volunteer to do so.
RIVEN: “Are they…together?”
JUDE: “Gods, no! Sil forbids it, doesn’t like us getting attached.” I blink, surprised at the brevity of the remark as Jude throws a bored look at the gates below. “Most dalliances are kept to whoever interesting shows up at the stage door.”
Well then.
“Last year,” he goes on, “a woman impaled herself trying to scale the gates, all to bring Mattia a rose. Whole mess.” Jude jerks his chin toward his cast. “Anyway. You see the man across from them? That’s Arius.”
My eyes go to the slender, golden-haired man with an overly friendly smile, who crooks a finger at another two auditionees, motioning them over.
“Seems nice, doesn’t he? He likes to think so, too. But remind him he isn’t a saint, and you’ll see how quickly he becomes a demon.”
“Was he really a healer?” I ask, noticing the decorative purple glass bottle Arius pulls from his pocket, which looks more like perfume until he brings it to his jaw and sprays the mist into his throat.