A Surfeit of Annas #6
“The Knight of All Storms, yes, I’ve heard,” said Ari. “Well, now you’ve got all the false Annas you could want. Why bother with the real Anna?”
“It’s not the same,” Arabella said. “They’re only shades, capable of imitation up to a certain point.
And also,” she added in a slightly less brash tone, “I didn’t intend there to be so many.
I only meant for there to be one. My uncle went too far; he usually does.
I was going to send the extras back, but then I had a better idea. ”
“Kidnapping us.”
Arabella again ignored her. “The idea that you and Anna have some unique extraordinary love is quite silly. If you know Anna at all, you must realize she can feel no differently about you than she has about anyone else she’s invited back to her flat.”
“Anna and I have been through more together than you could imagine,” Ari said.
“The Anna you knew is not the Anna who exists now, the Anna I love, refined by her sorrow, her compassion, her capacity to change.” She looked at Arabella with real pity.
“You might as well make a lover out of one of those empty shells of Anna, for they are closer to the Anna you are fantasizing about than the real Anna is.”
“You insult me,” Arabella said coldly. “I may kill you for that.”
Ari took a step backward. “Well, that would be a waste,” she said, “after you’ve worked so very cleverly to get me here.”
“I have been clever, haven’t I?” Arabella said thoughtfully.
“I always see my plans through, and my plan to rid myself of you has been no different. I set my sister to spy on you and learn your movements. I planned to create a phantom Anna, place her where you’d see her, make you suspicious.
You would confront Anna, argue, lose faith in her—a faith that was misplaced all along. As surely you always feared.”
Of course, Ari thought, Arabella had placed the false Anna in the park deliberately, to make Ari suspicious. But how had she known when Ari was patrolling? “Who was your spy?” Ari demanded.
“My sister, Claribella. She is a mermaid as well, obviously, but she’s the other way round. Fish part on top, you know. We used veils to conceal her face.”
The widow in the rocking chair, Ari thought. “You don’t know me at all. I trust Anna.”
“Mm,” Arabella said. “I did wonder whether the kissing on the front step was too far. Ah well, it doesn’t matter now.” She gestured at the dozen Annas, who still sat mostly inert in their seats. “I thought we could play a little game.
“Hidden among this lot is the real Anna. They have all been heavily enspelled; they cannot see or hear us. The real Anna believes she is locked in an empty room, awaiting my return. My challenge to you is to pick the real woman out from among the shades.”
“And why would I ever cooperate with this—this charade?”
“If you can pick the correct Anna,” Arabella said, eyes flashing, “I will let both of you go, without further consequence, and I will leave you both alone forever after. I am a faerie and cannot lie; I have spoken directly so that you know I intend no tricks.”
Ari narrowed her eyes. “Why would you make such an offer?” She paused. “What if I choose the wrong Anna?”
“Then the spell will be broken, and you may leave,” Arabella said serenely, “in perfect safety, with no danger. But the real Anna will remain here. It is a faerie trial I offer you, Bridgestock. Prove that you know Anna as you say you do, that you know her heart and soul. If you do not, well…” She waved a slightly webbed hand. “You do not deserve her.”
Ari wanted to scream, wanted to drag Arabella out of the pool and set about her with her whip.
But unless she killed Arabella—which seemed an act that would anger some very important fey—Arabella would return, and trouble them again.
But if Ari could choose the true Anna, then she and Anna would forever be free of this madness.
Ari turned away from Arabella and walked slowly toward the lounge area. The Annas did not look at her, but as she drew close, she could see their faces. Their expressions were identically blank.
Slowly, Ari began to circle the lounge area. Each Anna had a face just like her beloved Anna: the same sharp jawline, blue eyes that were wide and darkly fringed, the same curved, lush mouth. Even Anna’s scars, the memory of old Marks, had been exactly reproduced.
Ari searched for something wrong with any of the Annas’ clothes or their hair or their height, but there seemed nothing. She went up to the Anna closest to her and traced the Voyance rune on the back of her hand with her finger, willing it to reveal the truth past magic.
“Get as close as you like,” Arabella called out. “You can touch them if you want, too. They don’t mind.”
Ari closed her eyes and took a breath. She couldn’t allow Arabella to get to her. She resumed her search, walking slowly among the fourteen Annas, taking her time. She could feel the weight of fourteen pairs of blue eyes, even though they weren’t looking at her—
Ari paused. Blue eyes.
Ah.
She looked around once more, and decided. She stopped next to one of the Annas, who’d been seated at a card table with three other Annas, Ari assumed because it had amused Arabella to arrange them like dolls. She felt another wave of distaste for Arabella surge through her.
“This one,” she called out, resting her hand on Anna’s shoulder; it was warm beneath her touch. “This is the real Anna.”
There was a bright flash, and all the other Annas melted into thin air. The real Anna continued to gaze into the distance. Arabella has to bring her back now, Ari thought. She must keep the bargain. She’s a faerie. She has no choice.
Arabella glowered and sank beneath the water. Ari folded her arms and waited for her to resurface. This she did after a moment, her eyes glowing with annoyance.
“You got lucky,” she said petulantly.
“I didn’t,” Ari said. “You were just wrong. About Anna. About me. About love.”
Arabella swam in little angry circles. “I am bound by my promise, and I will let you go,” she said finally.
“And leave us alone after that, as you said,” Ari prompted.
“I will do as I have promised,” said Arabella. “The spell on your Anna shall wear off within the hour, now that the others are gone. Claribella!”
A figure rose from one of the other pools. Ari blinked, trying to make sense of what she was seeing. From the waist down, the second mermaid had human legs, visible through a damp tulle skirt. From the waist up, she was a fish.
Claribella, Ari thought, in sudden realization. She recalled the story of James’s disastrous bachelor party. Surely this could not be the same faerie? Then again, how many fish-headed mermaids named Claribella could there possibly be?
“Claribella and Arabella?” Ari said. “Your parents must truly have disliked you both.”
“Sister. Lead them out,” Arabella said imperiously.
Ari turned to help Anna to her feet—and froze.
Anna’s eyes were wide, fixed on Ari, and her stare was anything but blank.
Instead, she was gazing at Ari as if Ari was a pure miracle, and in the light of Anna’s eyes, Ari could not help but feel like a knight who had cut through a hedge of thorns to rescue his beloved.
“Ari,” Anna said, rising to her feet. Her voice was husky. “I knew you would find me. I knew it.”
As Anna and Ari stared at each other, Arabella made an angry splashing sound. “Do get them out of here, Claribella,” she said, “before they start kissing. I really couldn’t bear that, after the night I’ve had!”
—
Once Anna and Ari emerged from the bathhouse, they hurried through the crowded nighttime streets of Soho and waved down the first hansom cab they saw, desperate for some privacy.
Inside the cab’s dark interior, Anna drew Ari close and kissed her until Ari nearly fainted. It was so lovely to have Anna back in her arms, Anna’s lips against hers, Anna’s heartbeat in her ears.
When Anna and Ari finally drew apart, they were both smiling at each other.
Anna wound a tress of Ari’s hair around her finger. “How could you tell?”
“What?” said Ari, caught off guard; they were already turning onto Percy Street, and her mind was on getting home.
“How could you tell which one was me?” Anna asked. “There must have been something that stood out, that the magic couldn’t duplicate. What was it?”
Ari turned to face Anna and gently put one hand to her cheek. “You were the only one,” she said quietly, “whose eyes held real sadness.”
—
Then they were home, and inside their flat; they were putting away their damp clothes, and they were getting ready for bed. They were both quiet and thoughtful, going through the steps of turning in for the night with a kind of reverence, gaining back ground that the evening had taken away.
And then Ari was in her nightgown and Anna in her green-and-white-striped pajamas, and they were in their bed. And Ari lay on her side, while Anna folded her arms behind her head on the pillow and gazed up at the ceiling.
And Anna said something that was not at all part of their usual routine. “What did you mean before? That my eyes held sadness?”
“Are you sure you want to talk about this now, love?” Because, she did not say, you usually don’t want to talk about this ever.
“I think I do, yes,” Anna said. “I know it’s the first time. But indulge me.”
“Well…” Ari said. “I know you’re usually…very social. You like going out, you like spending time in crowds having a good time together. Just because you’re not leading the, ah, tempestuous romantic life you once did, doesn’t mean you can’t still go out and enjoy yourself.”
“I know that,” Anna said mildly. She thought for a moment before she spoke. “I suppose I have become something of a homebody recently.”
“In the past year, yes,” Ari said. “And that is a problem, because I am naturally a homebody, and one of us needs to want to get out of the house sometimes or we’ll never do it.”
“For many of the nights of the past year,” Anna said, and her expression changed subtly as she caught Ari’s gaze with her own, “I have regretted nothing about staying in.”
“Neither have I,” said Ari, taking Anna’s hand in hers. “But I don’t think that’s the only reason you’ve stayed in. Much as it is a compliment to me to say so.”
“I mean every word,” Anna said. “But…no, it wasn’t the only reason. At first, I was, you know. Sad, about Kit.”
Ari nodded.
“But then it started to seem like the topic of my monogamous commitment was the talk of the town,” Anna went on, a trace of bitterness creeping into her voice. “And I hated it. Bets were being placed on whether I would be faithful to you.”
“Only by those who don’t know you,” Ari said, defensive against even imaginary dullards. “Honestly, you have never seemed like someone who cared about that kind of gossiping.”
“I don’t,” Anna said. “I cared about whether it would hurt you. Break your faith in me. Whether, if I continued to go out as I used to, you would begin to wonder if I regretted what I had put aside. Or what I was up to when you weren’t present. So I suppose I just…stayed home.”
“You didn’t need to.” Ari lightly drew her fingers through Anna’s hair. “I am proud of you when we are out, not jealous. You are the loveliest, wittiest creature in the room, and yet you love me.”
“Ari—”
“I want you to be whole and happy, my love, and that means you should go out with your friends. You adore your friends. And as for me, well—I miss having fun. Non-private fun,” she added, and Anna smiled. “Before you I was with Charles all the time, and I never got to have fun with Charles.”
“Because he is not a fun person,” Anna said. “The fun is very unevenly distributed in that family.”
“True,” Ari said, smiling. “Listen to me, my darling. I do trust you. I trust you implicitly. I trust you because I know you, and I know you mean what you say. You absolutely should go out, to see a performance at the Hell Ruelle, or to catch up with friends, and sometimes I will come with you and sometimes not, but I trust you regardless.”
Anna’s eyes were glittering, with tiredness and love and, perhaps, tears. Ari couldn’t tell. But she knew if they were tears, they were good ones. “Why?”
“Because you have the truest heart I’ve ever known,” said Ari. “Because you love your friends and would die for them. Because you are honest to a fault. And all that means I find it not just easy to love you, but impossible not to.”
Anna rolled over on her side to curl her body against Ari’s. “Me too,” she said sleepily.
“You never have to be anything else with me,” Ari whispered to her, “than what you are. That is the only thing I ever want you to be.”
She waited for a response, but in the silence came only steady, gentle breathing. Anna was asleep. Ari closed her eyes, safe, snug, her heart so full it almost ached, and let sleep carry her away.