Chapter Twenty-One
By the time she and Rhys had descended into the dining room for dinner, Seph had found a soreness in her limbs and joints that she had all but forgotten, in the years since the choreography of the Changeling had been part of her life.
Perhaps naively, she had thought that once they started rehearsing the thing, they’d become distracted by one another in short order and resume their activities from the carriage.
She had underestimated what had always happened to both of them when they started their work in tandem.
She had forgotten the intensity of its grip over mind and heart just as surely as she had forgotten how to use the hidden muscles under her arms and behind her legs as they moved between screens together, synchronized in every breath and heartbeat.
And it had been glorious.
She could not pretend that it had not been glorious.
And now that they could smell the scents wafting in from the kitchen, she remembered the particular pant of hunger that always followed these rehearsals too.
How much she had forgotten!
“Hot bath,” Rhys said immediately to one of the footmen by the door of the dining room, a blond gentleman who had one eye narrowed as he took in the informal assembly of diners plopping into place around his table. “After dinner? Could you see to it?”
“They are in the master suite,” Nini’s voice added as she sashayed in behind him. “Though, Mr. Caradoc, you will need another hour after dinner before you can return to your chambers, so perhaps adjust the order for then. Tonight is the first performance.”
Rhys frowned at her but did not argue, giving a loose shrug and slapping the man on the back. “You heard her,” he said, grinning into the quivering chin on the footman. “That’s a good man.”
“Rhys,” Seph tutted as he found his seat next to her. “Don’t antagonize people.”
“I can’t help it,” he returned, batting his long, black lashes at her.
They introduced themselves to the Breton mesmerist, a red-haired gentleman with long limbs and a longer face. The aforementioned grandmother and child fortune-tellers were apparently taking repast in their room for this night, after a day of hard travel.
“For the best,” Master Yuri said with a little shiver. “I dislike their matching clothes.”
Merlin entered last, looking a lot more gaunt than Seph had thought him just two nights ago at the priory. He didn’t limp or stumble, but he looked drawn, his skin loose over his bones, and he waved his hand at them in annoyance when the guests all stood to await his seating.
“Enough of that,” he grumbled, easing into the chair at the head of the table. “I’ve limited time left. Let us not waste it on manners.”
The poor footman actually sighed at that, the sound escaping him before he straightened up, his disapproving horror now directed inward. As soon as the staff had rotated in with platters of food, the poor man beat a hasty exit, likely gone off to flagellate himself for his outburst.
“Ah, salmon,” said Rhys. “My favorite. And it’s got the skin on!”
Seph glanced at him, an odd, gooey feeling melting through the center of his chest as he eagerly awaited his serving. He was glowing, she thought. His skin was glowing with health and passion and it was such a stark difference to the dying old man who was hosting them.
“None for me,” Merlin said softly to the serving man. “Just the soup and oats, and a bit of ice, if we have any. The ice does soothe me.”
No one commented upon this. Indeed, everyone appeared suddenly very occupied by their place settings and napkins, rather than looking in the direction of their host.
“We were all very pleased to hear that you had arrived,” Madame Ivanova said to them as a footman poured her wine.
She was wearing a garish, red bodice tonight, adorned with piles of crystals and pearls around her throat and in her matching red hair.
“Though we all had hoped to take the largest suite from you should you not arrive. You cannot fault the desires of the extraordinary.”
Seph put her own wine to her lips to avoid reacting in any visible way.
“I have never met a married act,” Master Yuri commented, looking curiously over at them across the table. “What is it like?”
Seph’s mouth fell open, a reedy woodwind of a sound hovering in her throat, but she was drowned out by Nini speaking first instead.
“Oh, both of my husbands have performed with me in the circus,” she said airily as the footman served her. “My first was a strongman, which drew quite a crowd, given his size. My second performs acrobatic feats.”
“Le Petit Géant!” the Breton mesmerist exclaimed, clapping his hands together. “I recall him!”
Nini smiled warmly across the table. “Indeed. ‘The Little Giant’ in foreign tongues, but in the English-speaking world, he went by ‘Tom Thumb.’”
Rhys coughed, glancing at Seph so pointedly out of the corner of his eye that she smacked his thigh under the table, making him choke on his own giggle.
“Of course, our Changelings here share an act, which is its own sort of remarkable,” Nini added, giving them a sparkling, pointed look across the table. “But they are only newly wed.”
“Yes, indeed,” Rhys agreed, far more enthusiastic with this lie than Seph would have expected. “My wife is Brighton’s premiere illusionist, you know. I simply bask in her wake.”
“She has a lovely wake,” Master Yuri observed, with a longer gaze at Seph across their plates than she found necessary.
‘My wife.’
She couldn’t examine the way that had shot directly through her bones just now, surrounded by strangers, but it was going to require dissecting later for certain.
It made sense, of course. This lie solved many problems that might have otherwise arisen from their unusual accommodations. Still, she could see very clearly that Merlin himself knew it was a falsehood and that he was enjoying the show immensely.
“Who is performing tonight?” she asked, rather than allow this line of conversation to continue.
“I am,” said Merlin, grinning at her across the table as he twirled a chip of ice between his knobby fingers.
“I thought I ought to give if I’m going to take.
Tomorrow, the rest of you will commence.
I had hoped to rehearse today, but alas, it was a difficult set of hours.
Let us hope I still remember my tricks.”
“Will you be watching us rehearse during sunlight hours?” Rhys asked, scooping up a hearty bite of salmon. “Seems like that might ruin the fun, given what you want out of this.”
“No, no, I’d never short myself the full experience,” Merlin assured him, popping the ice chip into his mouth before it could melt any further and giving a little sigh of relief as the coldness embraced his tongue.
“My days have become rather tedious, however, so if any of you fancy a game of chess or simply coming to visit me at my bedside with stories of your performances and travels, you are more than welcome. The staff is instructed to allow for this, even if my physician does not strictly approve of it.”
“D’you like puzzles?” Rhys pressed, his bite of salmon hovering midair. “There’s a brilliant little puzzlemaking git over in the Twittens. We have to go into town for props tomorrow, anyhow, so if your hands are still steady, we could get you some toys.”
“Oh, that is true,” Seph agreed, brightening at the idea. “They are wonderful diversions.”
“I will never decline a wonderful diversion,” Merlin told her. “I can promise you that.”
“I should have brought my sister Hattie,” Rhys mused. “She would have talked your ear off in a dozen different languages.”
“Ah, yes, your siblings,” Merlin said, turning toward him with interest, his blue eyes still bright and alert in the sunken lines of his face.
“I confess I wished to invite them all, but this house has limited space, and alas, their talents are miracles of the mundane sort. Not like your claims to fae origin.”
Rhys licked his lips and gave a nervous clear of his throat. “Speaking of that,” he said, holding a finger up. “A saucer of cream for outside our chambers tonight would be most welcome.”
Father Wheeler, all the way at the end of the table, chuckled.
Seph looked back at him, her brows raised. “You find precautions against the unseen things in this world foolish, Father?”
“Quite the contrary,” said the priest. “I find them rather honorable.”
“So you think such things work?” Master Yuri asked, frowning deeply. “Protection charms and the like?”
“I am Catholic,” the priest replied, raising his brows. “What else is a rosary? A medal of St. Benedict?”
The Russian sniffed. “Perhaps we are more sensible on the eastern side of the chasm.”
The father tittered. “Perhaps. Though I do believe all the Sons of Abraham have equivalents. The Jewish have their mezuzahs. The Moors believe a copy of their holy book protects their homes. Do your people also not have prayer ropes? Ah, what is the word …?”
Madame Ivanova brought her head up, a sly smile on her lips. “Filakto,” she provided softly. “My father was Russian.”
“Of course he was, dear,” Nini replied, patting the other woman’s shoulder. “By way of Brixton?”
Seph braced, expecting the medium to either react with anger or humiliation, but instead, she just smiled widely, revealing a glint of silver in her back teeth.
“Calais first,” she answered, dropping her ridiculous accent entirely.
“Mum was French, wasn’t she? But once they saw I had the Sight, they wanted me in a city.
What city is there in all the world like London? ”
There was a murmur of interest, bodies shifting toward the medium around the table. This unveiling of her true self was perhaps more impressive than any illusion Rhys and Seph could create for this particular assembly of people.
The medium gave a laugh, tinkling and sincere, and heaved a sigh that sounded like relief. “What’s the point of continuing the act with a mind-reader at my side? And tell me, Mrs. Winterstone, with all your powers to reach into my mind—can I speak to the dead?”
“Of course you can,” she answered, winning a few gasps from around the table.
Madame Ivanova gave a smug smile and took another bite of her dinner.
“Of course,” Nini added, holding one of her dainty fingers up, “anyone can speak to the dead. Captive audiences, aren’t they? Corpses. The real question is whether or not they answer.”
The priest chuckled again, but Merlin scratched at his chin, considering. “I think, Mrs. Winterstone, that the question is whether or not they can answer. Plenty likely choose not to. Surely, the dead are just as frequently contrary as the living.”
A little frown played on Rhys’s lips that looked different than his usual performative pouts or disapproval. “And some things,” he said softly, “are not dead or alive. They are something else.”
It brought everyone’s attention around to him, usually something he would have relished in, but instead, he dropped his gaze down to his plate and said nothing more.
It took a moment before the table found another topic, the murmur of conversation resuming in a slow crescendo back to normalcy.
Under the table, Seph put her hand on Rhys’s leg and gave it a reassuring squeeze. He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye and gave her the slightest tick up at the corners of his lips.
And that was enough for her to relax again and know that he was all right.