Page 31 of A Whisper in the Walls

I trust you.

“Come,” Thugar Brood had said. “I’ve found the perfect place to plant you in the ground.”

A carriage pulled around, kicking up dust. That was when Dahvid finally started forward. Instinct outpaced fear. They were taking his brother. To a place where no one else would witness what they were going to do to him.

Ware was thrown in the covered back of the wagon. There were eyes in every window of every shop, but all of them were cowards like him. Dahvid was halfway to the carriage when it happened. The final guard climbed inside. The driver shouted. The horses all shoved into motion. He started running, but deep down, he didn’t really want to catch them. He was so afraid of being thrown in the back of that carriage with Ware. Afraid he would not survive.

He watched them drive around the corner and he knew the only way to save his brother’s life was to go back to their father. He would know what to do. Dahvid sprinted the entire way. He had arrived at the Tin’Vori estate, breathless and unprepared for what he saw at the gates. A group of hooded figures were beginning their raid. Fire was everywhere.…

“Come back to me, love.”

He felt Cath’s gentle arms wrap around him from behind. She pressed herself to his back and kept whispering in his ear. Dahvid realized he was standing over the washbasin still. He had been idly rubbing at the bloodstains on his right wrist. Trying and failing to get out the last dark blots. He saw that the sun had quietly set while he’d been lost in memory. Cath held him there until he released a haggard breath. It was like someone who’d been underwater for several minutes and now finally found the surface again. His chest heaved against her grip. Still she held him.

I trust you.

Dahvid allowed Cath to lead him over to the bed. She kissed his cheek. And then his forehead. Kissed until he kissed her back. Until the past was driven out by the taste and smell of the here and now. Until the only fire was between the two of them. Dahvid’s lips slid down her neck. She whispered in his ear, “Stay with me. Right here.”

He sank back into the pillows, hands grasping at Cath’s hair. Nails digging into her shoulders. They pressed against each other, and it felt a lot like he imagined dying would feel. An intensity that destroyed all else—a shattering of time itself.

Here, there was no revenge plot. No shadow waiting for him at the end of the road. Here, there was no blood streaking the sands. No crowd roaring for his death. Here, there was no boy racing through the labyrinth beneath his family’s estate with a cloth over his mouth to keep out the smoke. Here was so much better than there, even if he knew he could not stay forever.

16 NEVELYN TIN’VORI

The seamstress room was exhausting.

It had nothing to do with the actual work. Nevelyn’s fingers were quite deft. Her skill perfectly adequate. Years of practice in Ravinia had more than prepared her for the actual alterations they made. She realized on the first day that the advanced patterns she’d been using were too complex here. Their work needed to be fast and brutal and efficient. A pace that matched the frenetic world of an opera house that doubled as a theater. Most of their costuming was not inventive or new. The seamstress team built the wardrobe from what already existed in their closets.

What made it so exhausting was not the work but the continuous chatter. Five of them packed in a cellar room the size of a large closet, bumping elbows, gossiping about absolutely nothing. She’d only been working there for a week and already she’d reached her limit on banality.

“I just don’t know what to do,” Edna whined. She was the youngest girl in their crew—and the assistant directly ahead of Nevelyn in the pecking order. “If he liked me, why wouldn’t he just come out and say that he liked me?”

That received an infamous tongue click from Kersey. Their overseeing seamstress seemed as if she’d been born right there in her corner of the room. The woman looked at Edna over the rim of her spectacles, but her wrinkled hands kept moving, perfectly rethreading a jester’s cap.

“Gives you all the power,” Kersey said. “Men can’t stand the idea of being at someone else’s mercy. No offense, John.”

Nevelyn’s eyes darted that way. She double-checked John’s attire to make sure Kersey wasn’t being rude. She’d only known them for a week, but they’d alternated their expressed gender several times. She’d seen them in a range of lovely, self-tailored dresses. Today’s outfit was a checkered cardigan with cloud-white slacks. Regardless of which gender John presented as each morning, they always arrived immaculately dressed. Nevelyn supposed that was a natural byproduct of being the child of the city’s most famous seamstress.

Faith DuNess sat at the corner of the table closest to John, occasionally offering up small squares of completed fabric. The woman lacked Kersey’s longevity with the opera house, but she was the unquestioned head of their flock. If the papers ever praised the cast’s wardrobe in their reviews, it was always for some clever decision Faith had made. She’d been teaching John the same techniques for nearly a decade now. Nevelyn recognized the pair for what they likely were: her most challenging obstacle.

Faith commented on Edna’s debacle without looking up. “I can’t imagine what power you think a busboy actually possesses.”

“But that only proves my point,” Kersey replied. “A man like that has even less control over the rest of his life. Which means he’ll cling tighter to what he thinks he’s got.”

Edna looked quite annoyed by the turn in the conversation.

“It’s not like he plans to be a busboy permanently. He’s got dreams, you know.”

“All men’s dreams sound bigger when they whisper them in your ear,” Kersey replied tartly. Then, to prove her point, she leaned closer to an unsuspecting Edna and shouted, “Edna! Oh, Edna! If you love me, I’ll sail to new lands. I’ll invent new magic. I’ll lead armies for you, Edna!”

An absolutely violent shade of red colored the young girl’s cheeks. Faith and John snickered delightedly, which made Kersey laugh with even more self-satisfaction. Nevelyn watched in silence.

“I’m sorry I brought it up.”

The younger girl slammed down her pattern and stormed from the room. Kersey called after her, but only half-heartedly. Nevelyn saw an opening. She’d been doing her best to develop a friendship with Edna ever since arriving. Small bits of conversation. Now she set down her work and glided after the girl.

The costume room was like a small country nestled inside a much larger, much more chaotic continent. It was easily the most boring part of the Nodding Violet Theater. Nevelyn spied Edna disappearing around a distant corner and rushed to catch up with her. She was nearly leveled by one of the stagehands for her effort, who managed to curse her entire family tree by the time they got past one another.

The labyrinth underneath the stage was vast and complicated. Nevelyn had already committed most of it to memory. Edna and John were both fine with needle and thread, but one of their primary functions was running outfits from the costume room to other specified destinations in the theater. If a seam ripped in the middle of a show, they’d be on hand to rush it downstairs for a quick fix. It was a task she needed to be able to do with her eyes closed if she wanted to replace either of them.

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