He holds the ivy over the ledge, and we watch it float down together. “I’d know you with any face and by any name, Riven.” His golden eyes meet mine, and his words wrap around me like a familiar blanket. “Any voice, no matter how cutting. Through any gaze, no matter how loathing. I would know your touch through a closed curtain and the sound of your step when the last spotlight has gone out. I have known you at the beginning of each performance, and I will bow with you at the brink of every finale.”
Finale.That word seems to wedge itself between us, a rift driving us further apart.
I pull in a breath, an easier one, lighter, and lift my gaze from where it’s stalled on the flecks of gold peeling off my hands—from flesh that’s ephemeral—to watch the light in Jude’s eyes, which isn’t. He and I may be sewn with the same eternal thread, but it still comes unraveled at the end of each show. We’re running out of time.
A thought hovers at the edges of my mind—that slash of lipstick written across Jude’s mirror. I thought a fan must have written it.If not in this one, then in the next.
Not a fan’s handwriting, and not his. Mine. I grin. “If not in this one—”
“Then in the next. Idolove it when you leave me notes,” he confirms with a smile. “And I say that calls for a toast!” Jude wanders across the terrace to the table, full with our abandoned chalices. He plucks two and fills them with what’s left of the wine, returning with less than half a cup between us and shoving the greater of the two into my hands. “To the godsdamned finale?” he asks, raising his cup, a glimmer in his eye.
That word again.Finale.Itrings melancholy in the air as I meet his gaze and raise my chalice. “To the godsdamned finale.”
Act III: Scene XXV
All my worst ideas start with this feeling. A subtle spark that tingles at the back of my head.
Jude frowns. “That’s your scheming face.”
Okay, maybe not all that subtle.
Another torch blows out and startles us both. We should be in our dressing rooms by now. But I’m not ready to go inside yet.
That thought—that horribly risky butvery interestingidea—sparkles in my mind’s eye, but the words aren’t quite there yet. And with it, a deep sense of knowing—knowing I will win our freedom if it kills us.
Looking at Jude, I wonder if it might.
Down below, the nearest city in the South stirs, still bustling with excitement. On the opposite side, in the distance, the North stands silent and watchful, like a garden without sunlight. Somewhere below in the District, the council sits around a table, bickering over the Playhouse’s newfound reentry without ever realizing they’ve each stood witness to a very elaborate show.
Above it all, I can’t help but notice how the moon shines down on both sides of Theatron in equal measure.
Without warning, I abandon my cup and hoist myself onto the railing, balancing on the soles of my feet as I cling to the ivy wrapped around the nearest column. Jude drops his chalice and rushes in my direction, calling out, “Amoment’speace, Riven. I ambegging.Now, what are you— Ow!” My foot loses its purchase and kicks him square in the chest.
“Sorry,” I apologize over my shoulder, already lifting myself up the ivy and onto the ornate dome that caps the terrace.
If all the Craft in the world rests in our veins, the world ought to have a taste of it, too. It was theirs once.
When I peek over the ledge, I catch a glimpse of the crow statue atop the dome frozen in flight, its marble wings stretched to the sky. “Up here!” I pull my body onto the very top of the Playhouse, Jude already close behind.
“And what are we doing up here?” he calls after me, climbing onto the ledge. The wind grabs at his hair, throwing it sideways across his face, which in turn looks annoyed.
“We’re taking bets.” I spin and go for the coin around his neck. Jude doesn’t move as I snap it from its chain.
“On what?” he asks, raising an eyebrow.
“On the arena.”
His shoulders fall. “Weknowhow that ends.”
“What if we didn’t?” I ask. In my head, my spark of an idea takes firmer shape. And that shape is a mountain, with a well at the top. “What if it didn’t end the way it’s supposed to?”
His expression strains. “Riven.”
I hold the coin up between us, the moonlight winking off the stamped frowning mask, then turn it over to reveal its joyful counterpart. “Call it. Comedy or Tragedy?”
Jude rolls his eyes. “How optimistic are we feeling? In a Comedy, everyone lives happily ever after. In a Tragedy, scarcely anyone lives at all.”
“Is that your answer?”
