I did spend quite a while thinking of what to say. While Elise knows about K, it was obvious she wasn’t talking about him, and thus revealing his full name would have gained me nothing. And I couldn’t very well tell her that for one fleeting moment (that might have lasted for quite some time) I had pondered her former lover’s merits.
“No one.” I feebly tried. “There’s no one. Really, it’s just that I find myself terribly unaccustomed to exercise.”
“Is that so?” Elise mused. She extracted a pin from my hair, twirled a lock even tighter around her finger, and then the tip of the pin was grazing against my scalp. I’m not saying she did this on purpose, but I think she might have done it subconsciously. Elise is used to having her way.
What could I reply? Could I ask her if the downright flirtatious thing she’s kept up with Captain Janlav really is all for show, painstakingly maintained to soften and manipulate him to be more sympathetic to us so that he would help us flee when the time comes? Could I really ask her if she’d be fine with me dancing and perhaps even… Yes, Scribs, I know I’m daring and preposterous here, perhaps even kissing him!
No, Scribs, I’m not stupid enough to tell this to my sister, no matter how close we are. So, here’s what I said: “My dear sister, I have no secrets from you.”
“Oh, me neither.” And with that said, she leaned over my shoulder and pinched my cheek. Not terribly hard, mind you, but firmly enough to leave a mark of endearment. “Never have had and never will have.”
Sometimes I hate her, Scribs. That I really do.
Chapter 4: Elise
Five days ago, my sisters and I gathered in the icy garden at midday, there to perform the only rite that takes place under the sun’s gentle gaze. As Celestia cited the holy scriptures of the spring equinox, I led Sibilia, Merile, and Alina six times around her in concentric, clockwise circles, then six more times around her in the other direction. Captain Janlav watched us from the porch, either as a silent observer or as someone afraid to stop us. I still don’t know which, but he skied off right after, without a word said, without a message left behind.
As yet another dinner without him drags on, I can’t stop wondering: did we anger him when we performed the sacred rites or has he somehow uncovered one of the secrets Celestia so carefully guards? Her secrets are more dangerous than mine, the deals she has crafted more intricate, the risk associated with them abominable. She bargained with the witch, swallowed the foul potion, and bled away the gagargi’s seed—a deed, had it gone wrong, that could have harmed her permanently!
“Could you pass the salt?”
I stir from my darker thoughts to Sibilia’s bony elbow. We sit at our usual places, in the second-floor dining room, by the large oval table with our backs against the windows that let in only night. The draft gnaws at our backs, for there are no curtains and the cream-colored tapestries must have been threadbare already years ago. In the light of the chandeliers that never shine as bright as those in the upstairs drawing room our meal looks more meager than it is: beetroot soup and rye bread.
“Please?” Sibilia grits her teeth as if the simple act of seasoning her soup could suddenly make a great difference in our lives.
It won’t. What is done is done. These walls, these rooms have always guarded secrets. First those of the former occupants. Now ours, those of Millie, and those of the guards.
“There you go, dear.” I hand over the white enamel salt cup. In this house, time stands still for long stretches at a time. But when it moves, it does so in great, uncontrollable leaps. The evidence of this is right before us. The salt cup doesn’t match with the porcelain bowls or the plates that bear flowers that bloom stubbornly through the winter. Though we are only eleven—with Captain Janlav gone, with no idea if or when he might return—even the glasses form a mismatched assembly. There are only two or three from each setting, those that the former occupants didn’t take with them when they moved on and that no one deemed pretty or useful enough to steal afterward. No, I’m allowing myself to foolishly fantasize that the former occupants had hope. Did I not hear with my own ears Captain Ansalov announcing this house cleaned and liberated?
“And pepper.” Sibilia offers the salt back. Thank the Moon it’s Celestia who has the pepper closest to her and not me. For lately when my thoughts have veered toward darkness, I have been struggling to keep up my carefully practiced charade of calm. And when I think of Captain Ansalov, my hands, they do shake.
That is how much I dread the day he returns to this house.
I know the sort of man Captain Ansalov really is behind his polite words and seemingly kind smile. I know this even though my sisters and I used to lead a sheltered life where all the evil under the Moon was hidden from us, kept out of our sight. Captain Ansalov is a man ready to follow instructions to the letter, who may not be able to pull the trigger himself, but never hesitates to order others to do so in his place. He takes, I believe, pleasure in seeing pain and misery, and this is what sets him apart from the man I thought I once loved. If there’s a way to obey without hurting others, that’s the path Captain Janlav chooses.
Or that is what I hope, but I can’t be certain of it anymore. Why did he depart? Why hasn’t he returned?
“And some more bread.” Sibilia turns to me again, and from the corner of my eye I catch Merile rolling her eyes at our sister. Hers and Alina’s is still the privilege of childish diversions and secrets that don’t matter. “If you’d be so kind.”
I understand all too well the underlying currents that no one ever mentions, and because of this my hands tremble so badly that I have to hide them under the table. Even if we are safe for the time being, my younger sisters haven’t yet realized that we are treading in the footsteps of this house’s former occupants. As history tends to repeat itself, we already sit on the same chairs and sleep in the same beds, and eventually we will come to see every twist and turn of their path.
“I say, the soup is good as it is.” Beard lifts his bowl to his lips and gulps what remains of his portion down in one go.
Merile and Alina giggle, no longer frightened to share the table with the guards, but rather amused by this willing display of bad manners. I’m happy about this distraction, something else to think about. I don’t know whose idea it was in the first place that we start eating every evening together with the guards. Perhaps it was Celestia’s—this might be a part of her grand plan, a piece that might not seem to fit in anywhere yet, but that will later prove to be crucial. Or then, perhaps, it was Captain Janlav’s idea. His and the guards’ duty is to protect my sisters and me. Be it as it may, this practice is very fitting for the new age of the empire, and it means less work for poor Millie, who never says a single word, not when she sets the table, not when she sits down to eat with us, not when she collects the dishes away. Not even when I offer to help her.
I might not have ever been able to connect the dots if it weren’t for Millie and the drawing room’s clock. Though the years haven’t been kind to her, her eyes are still the same, gray as wisps of smoke, ever narrowed in suspicion. I remember them, even though I was so very young when I last saw her, no more than three. I was taught to forget her mistresses, pretend they never existed, and after so many years of denial, acceptance doesn’t come easily. Celestia and I mustn’t speak of their crimes to our younger sisters, for ignorance in this matter is bliss.
“Was really good.” Beard burps, and his whole massive body expands, then shrinks. Boots and Belly and Tabard burst into laughter and drum their knees with their fists. They wipe their mouths on their tunics’ blue sleeves. With Captain Janlav gone, it feels as if everything in this house were unraveling. It started with manners. These grown men have turned into boys, apart from Boy, who partakes only because not doing so would set him apart, but who at the same time feels ashamed to commit vulgarities.