The read receipt pings immediately, but there’s no response. Maybe that’s all I need: someone else to know.
The RSVP number is printed in black at the bottom of the card, as if it’s an afterthought. I dial it, the numbers sticky on my thumb. It rings once, twice, then a voice answers, crisp and uninflected.
“Aequitas Society.”
I swallow. “This is Landon Thompson. I received your invitation.”
There’s a pause. I hear the shuffle of cards or papers on the other end, a smile in the silence. “Mr. Thompson. We’re delighted you can join us. Further details will be provided soon. Wear your best.”
The call ends before I can ask anything else. I stare at my phone, heart pounding. I imagine the invitation growing heavier, as if every second until the event adds an ounce.
I place my phone down. The apartment is quiet except for the hum of the fridge and my own uneven breathing. In the mirror, I see my own reflection, caught in the liminal space between curiosity and dread.
I will go, because I have no other choice.
Because if you’re invited into the dark, you don’t say no.
Not when you’re already halfway there.
Chapter Two: Briar
Everythingisperformance.Eventhe way I hold the glass is designed to look offhand, almost bored, when in reality I haven’t moved a muscle in the last five minutes. The ballroom is the kind of cliché a lesser mind would call a fairy tale—crystal chandeliers dripping light, strings of silvered garlands spun across the ceiling, waiters gliding with an efficiency that suggests hours of practice. The crowd pulses below, a tide of black tuxedos and blood-red gowns, every face half-cloaked in velvet or leather or painted porcelain. The night smells of money and champagne and the barest undercurrent of unease. All of it familiar, all of it useless.
The Silent never waste an opportunity to showcase their wealth while pretending to help the less fortunate. Almost all of the Custodians have a representative here tonight. I am here on behalf of House Harrington, trying to regain favor in the eyes of the others after the poorly handled incident at Westpoint Academy and the failure of Mr. Harrington, my uncle, to secure Eve.
Ever since the failures, our House has been cast into a shadow, of which, I aim to release. My role within one of The Silent’smany divisions, is to ensure compliance through psychological study. The Ministry of Design is one cog in the wheel, but it’s my playhouse.
I stand on a small dais at the far end of the room, nominally here as an “honored guest,” in reality to watch and be watched. There’s power in being seen; there’s more in watching without being noticed. My fingers curl around the stem of a crystal flute, the chill of the glass a rare honest sensation. I swirl the bubbles, not taking a sip, content to watch the guests below as they plot and flirt and try not to let their masks slip.
The entrance doors slide open on silent hinges, and the pulse of the room shifts by a single beat. Someone new. I clock him at once, because he doesn’t belong not just in the way he stands, but in the way he moves, a half-second off the rhythm everyone else has been practicing since birth.
His suit is a size too big, jacket shoulders rolling instead of resting, and the trousers break oddly at his shoes. The mask is homemade, the kind of thing a child might cut from craft foam and elastic, painted a flat midnight blue with no attempt at flourish. His hair is a battle between curly and unmanageable, and his glasses—actual prescription, not the decorative kind—fog a little with each breath behind the mask.
He hesitates a fraction of a second at the threshold, taking in the room not with the predatory sweep of the other guests, but with an open, almost disarming interest. It’s as if he’s mapping the exits before the threats. He scans the chandeliers, the flower arrangements, the clusters of high-tier guests, then quickly findsa vantage by the wall. His hands don’t know what to do: he tries them folded, then in his pockets, then by his sides. I watch the progression, amused.
A server offers him champagne, and he declines with a polite, apologetic smile. Real, not practiced. Most people in this room couldn’t muster sincerity if you threatened them. I watch him slide along the wall, picking up details—table numbers, security rotations, the staff comms earpieces—before anyone else registers his presence.
I shift my attention from the new arrival to the guests around me, recalibrating. A few heads turn his way, the way lions sense an unfamiliar movement at the edge of their field. He doesn’t notice, or doesn’t care. Instead he fixates on the display of silent auction items set up in the corner: rare first editions, a set of chess pieces carved from meteorite, a bottle of wine older than most of the attendees.
I check my phone, which I have concealed in the inside breast pocket of my jacket, for the summary dossier sent by the Ministry. The photo is a little out of date, but it’s him. Landon Thompson. Born twenty-seven years ago in a part of the city everyone pretends doesn’t exist. State-school educated, debt-laden, hired as an accountant for the charity front my family is laundering through. Recently flagged for flagrant curiosity and “imprudent pattern detection.” I scroll further. Lives alone. No significant other. No priors, no vices except an overuse of caffeine and a pathological need to be the smartest person in the room.
He doesn’t know he’s being watched. He’s not stupid; he’s just not used to being seen by the kind of eyes that matter.
A voice beside me: “He’s the one.” The words are pitched low, intended only for me. The speaker is a man with the kind of face you forget as soon as he turns away, which is why he’s been in this job for so long. His mask is the Society’s standard—plain black, a single gold line down the center.
I answer without moving my head. “You’re sure?”
He gives a small, efficient nod. “Confirmed by three independent traces. He’s been into every archive we have. Last night he made a copy of the off-books donation flow.”
“Did he share it?”
“Not yet.” A pause, not quite nervous, but aware. “We thought you’d want to deal with him before the clean-up crew.”
That amuses me. I let it show in the set of my mouth, nothing more. “I’ll take care of it.”
I sense the man retreat, his deference as practiced as the rest of him. I shift my position on the dais, so I can track Landon more directly.
He’s found the silent auction, and he’s actually reading the description cards. Not pretending, not playing for time. The only other person at the table is a woman old enough to be his mother, but in this room age is a currency, not a defect. She wears a mask of cut steel, a delicate thing that flashes with each tilt of her head. She’s a Custodian matriarch, which means she’s dangerous.
