I steady myself and open the door to my quarters, a dozen attendants turning toward me and sinking as one to their knees, greeting their goddess.
There is no room, in a life like mine, for wanting.
FOURTEEN
NORTH
The celebration of the Feast of the Dying begins at sunset, a solemn ritual on a large terrace that overlooks the city. Nimh stands on a platform that raises her above the others, bathed in the dying light, her arms outstretched.
She’s dressed in an exquisite robe of red silk, so fine it’s just this side of sheer, the edges catching in the breeze and rippling around her like a living thing. She has golden bands around her wrists and upper arms that match the crown on her head, and golden paint around her kohl-lined eyes, across her cheekbones, and at her lips.
The light seems to caress her, intensifying around her, until she’s glowing, brighter even than the glorious sunset spread out across the thick forest beyond the city.
Every face, even the sun’s, seems to turn toward her.
Low drums beat out a deep bass. Chanting priests act as counterpoint to her ringing voice as she carries out the ritual. I learned as I waited quietly in my place among the crowd that the ritual is all about the approach of the solstice—they’re fare-welling the sun, acknowledging that the shortest days lie ahead. In three days’ time, Nimh will preside over another ritual that marks the end of mourning for the sun—the Vigil of the Rising—an all-night affair where they await the sun’s rising as a symbol of hope in the coming months.
I wonder how much will happen here between now and then.
Nimh’s voice dips into a rhythm that’s nearly musical, her hands lifting, the sun glinting off the gold bands at her arms, and in this moment sheisthe sun, come down from the sky to shine warm upon our faces. I want to just surrender to the moment, to let the beauty of it—ofher—sweep me away.
I want to be a part of this, to share it with everyone around me, to lose myself in the crowd. But I know I have to observe, to think. I can’t afford to missanythingthat could help me.
I make myself look at Nimh objectively. She has all the presence my mothers have tried for years to cultivate in me. She’s regal, distant from all of us, but not remote. After my time with Elkisa, Matias, and Techeki, I was itching to see her again, to talk to her. But the girl I’m watching now seems impossibly far from the one I know.
Still, there are so many questions I want to ask her.
I want her to tell me why she led me here without admitting who she was. I want her to tell me what she thinks will become of me—why she didn’t want me to tell anyone I’m a cloudlander. What danger lies in that. Who her allies are, and her enemies, and whether they’re mine. Should I trust Matias, who seemed to care for her? Should I distrust Techeki because Matias does?
But it’s a battle to look at this world from the outside when everything about the ceremony urges me to step inside instead.
The ritual ends with a sigh that seems to ripple out through the crowd, and as if on some unseen signal, the gravity of the moment is over. Servants begin to light torches against the growing dark, and I’m caught up in the river of humanity that streams into the temple for feasting and dancing.
Once the feast begins, it’s harder and harder to remember there was ever any solemnity about this night at all. I’ll say this for them: Nimh’s people know how to party. I’ve thrown quite a few dusk-to-dawn blowouts in my time at the palace, and I like to think I’m pretty good at it, but I have to give credit where credit’s due. Techeki hasearnedthe title Master of Spectacle.
The place is a riot of color, food, and music, song and laughter echoing down at us from the ceiling tiles. I’m not quite a part of the celebration tonight. I’m dressed all in black—Techeki had no other option, given my unknown status here, but I can’t pretend I don’t envy the gold paint daubed on those around me. Back home, my face would be painted up with exquisite flash and glitter, my clothes shot through with gold. After all the time I’ve spent shedding it to make my escapes from the palace, it’s ironic that I miss my golden thread. But I’m trying to keep myself a blank canvas, unknown to these people, so that Nimh and I can paint me with whatever pictures we want, and later on, whatever picture will get me home.
Also, I don’t know the steps to any of their dances—literally or metaphorically.
I decline an invitation from a pretty girl who wants to draw me into the middle of the crowd, and another from a handsome boy with a head full of braids, who offers me a drink I can’t identify. Shooting him a rueful grin, I slip around to the far side of a column. The architecture here is spectacular, and I tip my head back as though I’m admiring the mosaicked ceiling.
Then something bumps against my ankles, and when I look down, Nimh’s cat is staring at me meaningfully.
“Where did you come from, Captain Fluffypants?” I ask, dropping to a crouch and offering him my finger to sniff. He reaches up to hook it with a paw, pulling it in closer. Then he very gently bites me—not hard enough to break the skin—and turns away, stalking off a few steps. He looks over his shoulder to see if I’m following.
I only met my first cat yesterday, but I’m already clear that it’s better for everyone if I do what he wants. So I follow him around the edge of the room. Bordered by columns, the huge, circular chamber has six grand entrances, but we take none of them. Instead, he butts his head meaningfully against a service door, and when I open it for him, we both slip through.
The hallway waiting for us is empty of decoration and of people, but there’s a lantern hanging on a nail, and I bring it with me to light our way. After a couple of minutes and a flight of stairs that takes me up a floor, the cat pauses at a section of the wooden paneling that looks no different to me from any other and makes a loud, talky sort of noise.
“Here?” I say, holding up my lantern to study it. I knock on the wooden panel.
Nimh’s voice rings out from the other side, startling me. “Come in.”
Only when the cat butts his head up against the wooden paneling do I see it give a fraction. When I push on it, a door swings open soundlessly to admit us. The room inside is carved from rock, and strings of glowing lights illuminate plants that tumble down from high-up ledges. An intricately carved wooden screen lets through pinpricks of light, and the soft murmur of voices and music—it must look out on the hall I just left.
In the center of the room is a large pool, the dark water gently rippling. Nimh’s standing in it waist-deep, her eyes rimmed with black, her lips dusted gold, and …
… and she’s not wearing a single thing.
