Authors: Lisa Mantchev
“Did you want me for my charming companionship, or have you heard about the freak tsunami that crashed into the Caravanserai’s outermost wall?”
Rather than answering, Serefina handed Bertie a cup brimming with liquid the color of amethysts. “Drink this while it’s hot.”
Bertie sniffed at it cautiously and tried to identify the curious aroma, which smelled not of flowers nor herbs nor any sort of tea she’d ever consumed. That the surface of the brew was iridescent, like an oil slick on water, also gave her a moment’s pause. “I’m afraid I haven’t time for refreshments.”
“You have time for this.”
“What is it?”
“Nothing that will harm you.” Serefina sat across from her, pouring her own cup and adding a spoonful of something Bertie knew probably wasn’t sugar. The liquid fizzled up with foam the color of ripe blackberries, then settled back a darker purple than before. Serefina drank, her gaze an unspoken challenge to do the same. “It should help clear your head and give you a bit of much-needed strength.”
“So you know about Sedna.” The brew tasted of salt and bitterness, and Bertie couldn’t help screwing her face up with displeasure. “That wave was her doing.”
“Obviously.” When the herb-seller took another sip, the deepest wrinkles around her eyes smoothed out and the lines about her mouth were suddenly less severe.
But surely it’s a trick of the firelight?
Bertie resisted the urge to scrub at her own eyes like a tired child, instead taking another swallow. “Perhaps you also know about our summons to the Distant Castle? We have to pay our respects to Her Gracious Majesty and perform for her birthday celebration.” She sipped again, pleasantly surprised when the not-tea mellowed into tones of vanilla and buttercream frosting. With the immediate future no longer tasting of panic and salt water, Bertie remembered the wish-come-true and her resolve sharpened once more to the point of a serrated cake knife.
“Queen summoned and Goddess pursued? You’ll need to depart with all due haste.” Serefina rose from the table, moving to the shelves to collect an assortment of bottles and packets. “Though of the two, I don’t know which presents the greater threat. The use of ‘Gracious’ in Her Majesty’s title can be something of a misnomer.”
“Right now I’ll take the trouble I don’t know for the trouble I do, thanks.” Though Bertie scanned the stall’s interior shelves, she could not locate the crystal flask she’d filled with words in exchange for the return of the scrimshaw medallion. The corners of her mouth tightened at the memory of Ariel yanking it from her neck. But physical pain had scored his face when he spoke of being tethered to her. Although she might fault him for the theft, now she could empathize with his torment. “What are you looking for?”
Serefina’s fingers moved over the shelves like skittering spiders. “You’ll need a few things. Medicines for fevers, powders for headaches.” She sorted through packets, their labels written in darkest red script on the parchment. “Do those fairies of yours ever suffer from stomach gripes?”
“They’ve intestines of cast iron.” Given the perfect opening, Bertie leaned forward. “And their innards aren’t the reason I came to see you. I need to trade for a bit of protection.”
Hand hovering over a wax-paper envelope of seeds, Serefina nodded. “You’re thinking you’re too young to be a mother.”
The herb-seller’s words registered beyond their consonants and vowels, and Bertie blinked. “No! I mean, that’s not why I came. I meant protection from Sedna.”
Serefina made a noncommittal sort of noise in the back of her throat. “When a girl keeps the company of not one but two handsome lads, she ought to be prepared.”
Bertie lifted her chin, though her cheeks burned as hot as the cooking fire. “I won’t be like Ophelia, knowing motherhood before I even know myself.”
“Nevertheless.” Serefina selected an additional container from the shelves. “A spoonful of this every day will keep your belly as empty as a drunkard’s flask at the end of a night’s carousing.” She took Bertie by the hand and placed the cool glass in her palm. “It will not, I regret to say, safeguard against anything else that may ail you as a result: broken hearts, broken trust, broken dreams.”
Thinking the herb-seller might as well have handed her a bottle labeled U
NTOLD
I
MPLICATIONS
, Bertie set it on the table before her with all the careful consideration due a ticking bomb. “Understood. And what will you have for payment for the medicines?”
“I told you before I’ve no need of money.” Serefina slid into a chair and narrowed her gaze. “Not for such trifles. Protection from the Sea Goddess is an entirely different matter, though.”
“Then what would such protection cost me?”
“A mere token … something you shouldn’t mind bartering. Something I already know is unwanted, by way of your own words.”
Bertie twisted her fingers in the tablecloth’s fringe. “An unwanted thing? That sounds like a business transaction for Waschbär.”
“He is the expert in such matters, but not even his power of thievery can steal something that doesn’t yet exist.” Serefina’s gaze slid from the flask upon the table to Bertie’s midsection. “I want the child you’ll never have.”
The demand hit Bertie in precisely the place where a baby might grow. Several seconds passed before she was able to drag a ragged breath into her lungs, and only then did she manage to wheeze, “Absolutely not, and you’re a horrible creature for even suggesting such a thing.” She fell back from the table as though it was aflame, nearly knocking over the chair in her haste to escape.
The herb-seller’s next words brought Bertie to a standstill. “Protection from the Sea Goddess is a costly magic indeed. And what is it to you, a faceless, nameless child?”
“I spent seventeen years wondering who I was and where I belonged!” The temper that rolled through Bertie surprised her, sending blood coursing to her cheeks until she thought her head might explode. “What makes you think I’d wish the same upon a child of my own?”
Serefina slapped her palm on the table. “I’m not asking for a true child, you silly wretch, but the idea of a child. The life-spark of a person who will never exist.”
“How can there be such a thing?” Thinking over the proposition was like trying to gift wrap an octopus without putting it in a box first. “I am a playwright, a teller of tales whose words become reality. There’s little difference between the idea of a child and the reality of one, if I so wish.”
“This isn’t about your word-magic! Someday you will choose one of your handsome lads over the other or someone else altogether or no one at all, and all those decisions will create children-that-will-never-be. The living almost never notice their tiny shades. They mistake their laughter for water or wind or rustling leaves, their tears for errant rainfall.…” Now Serefina’s voice seemed to reach Bertie from a great distance, from a place where small, shimmering bodies moved with unhindered freedom like so many dust motes caught in a brilliant beam of light. “Too many years ago to count, I was one of those children, pulled from a place of never-was to this world of always-has-been. The time has come for me to train my replacement, and I must have another such child to take my place.”
“Then you can jolly well get ‘another such child’ from someone else—”
Distant screams interrupted Bertie’s refusal, replaced seconds later by the tidal shriek of an angry goddess. The sound of rushing water spurred Serefina into action. She leapt to her feet and slapped her hands against the stone wall.
“Oh, no, Sea Witch,” she said, her shoulders trembling with tremendous effort, “now you are pushing things too far.”
The water thundering down the alley dissipated the moment it passed the herb-seller’s stall with only a gush of foam left to spatter the cotton curtain that served as a door. Whether that was due to Serefina’s strength or Sedna’s weakness, Bertie couldn’t tell, but turning back the tide had greatly cost the herb-seller. Serefina sat down hard upon the stone hearth, the lines about her eyes and mouth back in evidence and deeper than before. Her skin was ashen and her breathing ragged.
Rushing to her side, Bertie grasped the other woman’s hand; it felt like onion skin, papery and thin, but it was slicked with a thin sheen of sweat that glistened in the firelight. “You’re feverish.” She turned to the wall of crystal vials in desperation. “Tell me which of these will help.”
“Not a one.” Serefina leaned back against the wall, her iron key ring dragging against the floor with dead weight. “My elements are out of balance. The fire inside me grows stronger, fanned by the wind. The water dries, the earth erodes. I must have the child to take my place. I can live long enough to teach her the potions and powders and draughts, to train her in the art of the healing magic. Someone must be here…” She traced the stones nearest her with golden fingertips. “To ensure the Caravanserai yet stands.”
Bertie’s earth-magic sang in response. “You’re the reason this sand castle doesn’t crumble into the sea.”
“Now you know the truth of it.” Serefina pointed at the table. “Bring me the kettle. Add two spoonfuls of powder this time.”
Stumbling to the tea service, Bertie poured the liquid, now tepid and pale pink. She spilled a bit on the cloth, muttered an apology to both her hostess and the linen, and reached for the herbal spoon. The odd powder caused it to bubble up twice more, this time the color of raspberries. Carrying the cup carefully to the hearth, Bertie knelt and pressed its rim to Serefina’s mouth.
The herb-seller swallowed deep and grimaced. “It works better when it’s hot.” But the moment she finished drinking, she was able to stand. “What say you now to my proposal, earth daughter?”
Even crouched next to the hearth, Bertie couldn’t get warm. “I … I cannot give up even the idea of a child. I’m sorry. It’s a turning-straw-into-gold sort of bargain, something I would surely regret later.”
“What of your other talents?” Serefina’s questions drifted down to settle on Bertie’s shoulders with the weight of falling snow. “You can breathe water into your lungs without dying and ride the winds like a bird. Would you trade me either of those?”
Bertie reflected upon the abilities she’d inherited from her parents, which had saved her on her journey through Sedna’s underworld. “To be quite honest, I’m not certain I can do either of those things when not in the clutches of the Sea Goddess, but I can’t trade them either.”
“There is little, it seems, you are willing to give for the sake of safety, then.”
Bertie heard the wheezing rattle of the wind in the woman’s chest, the slosh of water behind her eyes. “What you need most is a bit of my strength. Enough to tide you over until you get the wish-child you seek.”
Serefina made a noise so small that it was only the suggestion of a sigh. “I will take your strength and thank you for it. Clever thing you are for offering it to me, for I think such a trade will also safeguard you from Sedna.” The herb-seller drew a small hand mirror out of her pocket, its silver backing scratched and pockmarked. “We all wear masks. They start out plain, decorated with the various small artifices of childhood, an innocent lie or two. As the years pass, we add laughter born without humor, tears shed for the sake of those watching.”
Without thinking, Bertie took the mirror and peered into it. Only her own puzzled visage peered back at her, though it was still a shock to see herself with silver hair. “What’s that to do with Sedna?”
“The Sea Goddess tracks you through the water like a shark, drawn to the scent of your deceptions. Once you remove the mask you wear, she will find it much more difficult to recognize you.”
“But I can always build another mask.” When Bertie spoke, it was equal parts statement and question.
Serefina smiled. “True enough, wordsmith, but the one you give up today will not be the one you wear tomorrow or the day after that.”
Though such an idea gave Bertie pause, it seemed a small price to pay for her safety and, by proxy, the safety of the troupe and the Caravanserai.
Especially in comparison to Serefina’s other requests.
Hand shaking just a bit, Bertie raised the mirror again. Ophelia’s eyes looked back at her—
you have your mother’s eyes
—but everything else wavered. What was left of Bertie’s eyeliner formed ridges under thickly painted eyebrows. Traces of glittering eye shadow crystallized into fog-smudged half-moons. And, perhaps most disconcerting, the silver of her hair ran in rivulets down her face to form a translucent mask, glass-trapping her features.
“Lift it from your skin, child,” Serefina murmured.
Bertie obeyed, sliding her fingernails under the mask’s knife-thin edge and lifting it as one would the lid from Pandora’s box. There was a blast of frigid air, and the object in her hand was as much ice as it was glass. Fingers trembling, Bertie held it out in offering to Serefina.
The herb-seller hastily wrapped the mask in a length of silk that smelled of sandalwood and secrets. “My thanks.” Her voice was already stronger, clearer, ringing with the brass-tenor of a gong.
In stark contrast, Bertie’s knees wobbled. “My apologies that I couldn’t do more.”
Or wouldn’t.
“This will suffice for the time being.” Serefina tilted her head to one side. “How does it feel to be without your various artifices, wordsmith?”
Bertie lifted her hand to her face, suddenly self-conscious. “No different—”
But she couldn’t finish voicing the falsehood, not when her skin felt softer than Opening-Night roses. There was a disconnect, as if she touched the flesh of another, or perhaps the fingers grazing her cheek were not her own. When she dropped her hand, other sensations rushed at her: the heat from the fire suddenly a dozen degrees warmer; steam from the hissing kettle as moist upon her face as though she’d walked into vapors of the theater’s fog machine.
Raising the mirror to look at herself again, Bertie was somehow unsurprised by the anxiety shimmering on the surface of her skin. Though Ophelia’s eyes yet peered back at her, though her nose had the same impudent tilt at the end, though her freckles were as much in evidence as ever, rising panic revealed itself in the flare of her nostrils and the twist of her mouth. Try as she might to tame it, to shove it below the surface, to smile, to grimace, to summon any facial expression that would have belied her inner turmoil, Bertie couldn’t manage it. There was nothing there behind which she could hide, and the terror of it settled into her very bones.