Page 47 of The Shape of Monsters
Lyric drinks it all. He lets the small king move him away from the noise, though the entire courtyard echoes with it. “Thanks given,” he says. They stand beside one of the five silver towers, in the shade of a glass walkway several stories overhead. The shade is fluid, almost like sunlight through water, and Lyric looks up: People walk across the transparent glass. With that and the courtiers and attendants crowding the floor, it’s more people than he’s seen in the entire fortress before now. He really needs to leave, to find Setka.
“What did Lyric ask the old fairy?” Irsu River asks lazily. An waves away an approaching woman holding a bundle of vines and flowers, shifting to block Lyric.
Swallowing, Lyric looks more closely at River. Hadn’t an said things at dinner to suggest an would be sympathetic to Lyric’s undertaking? River waits, long face open and changing eyes slowly rippling green to blue again. An has thin red paint lengthening ans eyes into points, and elegant but loose robes in layers of pale red and pink like a peony. Gentle, welcoming. “Lyric asked for the life of the chimera Setka to be spared.”
River makes a moue of displeasure.
Lyric keeps talking. “River’s cult is against death-design. This festival is full of death. If River is against such things, River should be against the festival, the sacrifice. Eliri the Adept Hand is—”
“This spouse knows what Eliri is,” River cuts in, very lightly.
“Why is Eliri spared but not Setka?” Lyric demands just as lightly. “Because Eliri serves the Moon-Eater and Setka is not so lofty?”
“This small king is not familiar with Setka the Chimera, and so could not say.”
Lyric looks away. He breathes deeply again and blinks at the dazzle of design all around. He has to try something else. “Irsu River lives outside the Moon-Eater’s fortress, yes?”
“The fortress in the Rivermouth district.” Hesitation threads through ans voice.
“And—”
“Stop,” River mutters. An turns and sends a searching look past Lyric toward the Moon-Eater. As if Eliri can sense her spouse’s gaze, she looks up and lifts a hand, but does not smile. Beside her, Iriset is too caught up in her discussion with the numen to notice anything. Could she be arguing Lyric’s case? No. Why would she?
“Lyric Aharté,” River says with a flirtatious smile, leaning nearer. Lyric begins to recoil, but a hand catches his elbow again, fingers like steel, belying the relaxed coquetry painting ans face. “Go. Go join Iriset and enjoy the festivities. Make a chimera’s mask and wander the city for frivolities and—”
“But Setka,” Lyric insists.
River’s smile widens and an presses closer to whisper against Lyric’s jaw, “And after midnight, after the fire, come to the Rivermouth fortress and meet me.”
Lyric studies an as understanding dawns. He turns his face, brushing his cheek against River’s lips. “Irsu River will save Setka,” he murmurs.
Tapping a finger to Lyric’s bottom lip, River teases, “Keep the Moon-Eater’s attention here, and it will be done. The old fairy won’t notice, or care, on a day like today.”
“Why?” Lyric squeezes River’s wrist. It’s bony under the thin sleeve.
“Lyric is correct: River dislikes the Night of Chimeras. Now”—Irsu twists ans hand so that an tucks it against Lyric’s inner elbow to be escorted—“let this River introduce Lyric Aharté to some people.”
There are too many strange and discomfiting people to meet, but Lyric remembers a woman called Sipipia with ink-black birds tattooed against her nearly white face, and those birds soar across her forehead, vanish into her red hair, and reappear in a swoop beneath her left ear. Lyric can barely pay attention to her offer to help him design a chimera mask like hers. When he doesn’t answer, she laughs at him and tells River perhaps Lyric Aharté requires a more peaceful mask. “But Sipipia is the best here, and so Sipipia is where one must begin,” River says with a dashing smile, withdrawing one of the small silk fans tucked through ans hair.
“Ah, such falsities when River’s Eliri is just over there.”
“Eliri does not specialize in masks,” River says, and taps the fan against Sipipia’s shoulder.
“What does Eliri specialize in?” Lyric manages to ask.
“Redesign aesthetic, both internal and external.”
Lyric looks over to where their spouses are talking on the daybed, and while he doesn’t understand the nuance of the description, he thinks he gets the gist.
They’re waylaid at Sipipia’s table by two more courtiers, both with loose-flowing black hair that reaches past their waists, matching bone structure and warm tan skin. The twins are fem-forward, in cleavage-framing bodices, and each of them has real-looking flowers in a bandfrom one temple across to the other. “Hoarding the Moon-Eater’s friend now that Lyric Aharté attends the Pit, River?”
“Hardly, Ara,” River says, fanning anself idly. “Ara and Inised are welcome. This is Lyric Aharté. Lyric, these are the Opal fortress Mirror, Ara and Inised. They’re grafters.”
“Like gardening?” Lyric asks, very relieved to participate. “Lyric enjoys gardening.” His eyes lift to their flower bands, and his mouth doesn’t close: The flowers are growing out of their skin. The sight rolls his stomach. Not gardening.
One of them is speaking, but Lyric watches as the pink bud—some kind of tea rose—slowly unfurls. There are nine flowers in this twin’s crown, each of them alive, each of them growing from her skin. “Does it hurt?” he interrupts quietly.
“Oh, of course not,” she says, almost scoldingly. “This is just a mask, to be discarded in the fire tonight, as it’s not quite perfect.”
