I couldn’t believe it. I had really done it. I had found the Book Man, and he in turn had found the book—or rather, I corrected, trying not to be too hopeful, someone who had worked on the book with Mother. Who knew her. Who might know where she was—or what had happened to her. And I would leave in the morning, mere hours from now.
As I walked down the narrow alley away from the concealed and warded shop door, an antlered deer skull loomed out of the shadows, jaws snapping. I would have screamed, but fear closed my throat, and all I could muster was a gasp as I fell back against the wall, hands outstretched to keep it at bay. The creature laughed and laughed until it was doubled over and wheezing. It reached up and tipped back the mask, revealing Mieka’s face, lit up with merriment.
“Mieka,” I tried to say, but the word came out as a squeak. “You scared me!”
“That’s the idea.” She lowered the deer skull back into place and cocked her head to the side, smiling. I could just see the gleam of her small, neat teeth behind the squarer, yellower ones of the deer.
“I brought you a mask, too. Here.” Mieka fished in her bag and pulled it out partway—a sharp, rodent-like skull with protruding front teeth, top and bottom, meeting together in almost a point. I had no idea what kind of creature it could be.
“Where did you get this? It looks …”
“Expensive?”
“I was going to say terrifying.”
Mieka laughed. “It’s both. So don’t break it.”
“What is it? It looks like a giant rat.”
Mieka lifted the whole thing out. Behind the skull, attached to some kind of mesh, was a forest of black-and-white striped quills, hard as ivory and fiendishly pointed at the ends. The whole thing formed a headdress, designed to cover the head and shoulders as well as the face.
“It’s a porcupine,” she said, sounding very pleased with herself. “It will cover your Hair if you put it up underneath the quills, see? Here, duck down so I can reach.”
I eyed it dubiously, sighed, and dipped my head so that Mieka could place the elaborate thing over it.
“Now stand still.”
She fussed about with it a bit, smoothing the quills and making sure the mesh lay evenly over my shoulders. The Hair wriggled about a bit in protest, but lay obediently once she was done.
“Not bad,” she said when she had finished.
The interior of the skull mask was dry and smelled of something chemical—perhaps the glue that had been used in its construction. The eyeholes were so close to the top of my head that I had to peer out through the mouth, but as the four enormous front teeth formed a pillar of white in the very centre of my vision, I had to turn my head a little awkwardly to see past them.
“It’s so heavy,” I said.
“Good. It’ll keep the Hair down.”
The Hair rustled in mild complaint, but it did seem to be accepting the weight of the mane of quills.
“Just try not to poke anyone in the eye when you’re dancing,” said Mieka.
“I doubt anyone will ask me to dance in this,” I grimaced, running my hands over the giant white teeth.
“Why wait to be asked?” said Mieka, grinning.
The dour, smoky streets of Quell had transformed into a tattered rainbow of color and light. Lanterns made of colored paper swung from ropes strung overhead between the buildings—some shaped like flowers or stars or crescent moons, and still others with eye- and mouth-holes cut in them to resemble skulls.
There were probably more organized, formal parties happening indoors in other parts of the city, but this street revelry seemed to have sprung fully formed from the ground like mushrooms after rain. The crematoriums still pumped their endless clouds of smoke above the rooftops, but colored powders had been added to turn even the ashes of the dead to shades of purple, pink, and orange. The color, noise, and movement were better than meat and drink. The white, whispering void of my memory and the dry, papery air of the bookshop retreated, replaced by a whirl of sensation.
“It’s beautiful,” I said.
“Not bad, is it?” said Mieka. “Come on. I want to get a good spot for the parade.”
I remembered bits and pieces of Plaguenight traditions as we walked. Mother had told me only a little about it, as she disapproved of frivolity in general, but even in the Tower we had baked fresh sugar bread when Plaguenight came around. Bread symbolized life and prosperity for the year ahead, and despite Mother’s contempt for superstition, the tradition was so deeply ingrained that she had continued to observe it.
I saw now that the streets were filled with bakers dressed in white and garlanded with flowers, carrying sacks of sugar and grain dyed in all colors, which they threw in handfuls into the crowds. Soon everyone was covered in a thin, shining layer of sweet dust, which melted with their sweat to become rivulets of color running down the skin. Children with sugar-crusted faces darted between the legs of passersby, shrieking with laughter as their mothers scolded them and singing the old Plague rhyme:
“First the fever, then the flame,
