Many of the partygoers here were masked, most likely celebrities and prominent alums. Some wore fanciful gowns, others jeans and T-shirts.
“Do you see the purple tongues?” Darlington asked, bobbing his chin toward a boy covered in glitter pouring wine and a girl in cat ears and little else carrying a tray. “They’ve taken Merity, the drug of service. It’s taken by acolytes to give up their will.”
“Why would anyone do that?”
“To serve me,” said a soft voice.
Darlington bowed to the figure dressed in celadon silk robes and a golden headdress that also served as a half-mask.
“How may we address you this night?” Darlington inquired.
The wearer of the mask represented Lan Caihe, one of the eight immortals of Chinese myth, who could move amongst genders at will. At each gathering of Manuscript, a different Caihe was chosen.
“Tonight I am she.” Her eyes were entirely white behind her mask. She would see all things this night and be deceived by no glamour.
“We thank you for the invitation,” said Darlington.
“We always welcome the officers of Lethe, though we regret you never accept our hospitality. A glass of wine perhaps?” She raised a smooth hand, the nails curled like claws but smooth and polished as glass, and one of the acolytes stepped forward with a pitcher.
Darlington gave Alex a warning shake of his head. “Thank you,” he said apologetically. He knew some members of Manuscript took personal offense that Lethe members never sampled the society’s pleasures. “But we’re bound by protocol.”
“None of our suggestions for the freshman tap were accepted,” said Lan Caihe, her white eyes on Alex. “Very disappointing.”
Darlington bristled. But Alex said, “At least you won’t expect much from me.”
“Careful now,” said Caihe. “I like to be disarmed. You may raise my expectations yet. Who glamoured your arms?”
“Darlington.”
“Are you ashamed of the tattoos?”
“Sometimes.”
Darlington glanced at Alex, surprised. Was she under persuasion? But when he saw Lan Caihe’s pleased smile, he realized Alex was just playing the game. Caihe liked surprises and candor was surprising.
Caihe reached out and ran a fingernail up the smooth skin of Alex’s bare arm.
“We could erase them entirely,” said Caihe. “Forever.”
“For a small price?” asked Alex.
“For a fair price.”
“My lady,” said Darlington in warning.
Caihe shrugged. “This is a night of culling, when the stores are replenished and the casks are made full. No bargain will be made. Descend, boy, if you wish to know what’s next. Descend and see what awaits you, if you dare.”
“I just want to know if Jodie Foster is here,” Alex murmured as Lan Caihe returned to the banquet table. She was one of Manuscript’s most famous alums.
“For all you know that was Jodie Foster,” said Darlington, but his head felt heavy. His tongue felt too big for his mouth. Everything around him seemed to shimmer.
Lan Caihe turned to him from her place at the head of the banquet table. “Descend.” Darlington shouldn’t have been able to hear the word at this distance, but it seemed to echo through his head. He felt the floor drop away and he was falling. He stood in a vast cavern carved into the earth, the rock slick with moisture, the air rich with the smell of turned soil. A hum filled his ears and Darlington realized it was coming from the mirror, the vault that still somehow hung on the cave wall. He was in the same room but he was not. He looked into the mirror’s swirling surface and the mists within it parted, the hum rising, vibrating through his bones.
He shouldn’t look. He knew that. You should never look into the face of the uncanny, but had he ever been able to turn away? No, he’d courted it, begged for it. He had to know. He wanted to know everything. He saw the banquet table reflected in the mirror, the food upon it going to rot, the people around it still shoveling spoiled fruit and meat into their mouths along with the swirling flies. They were old, some barely strong enough to lift a cup of wine or a withering peach to their cracked lips. All but Lan Caihe, who stood illumined by fire, the golden headdress a flame, her gown glowing ember red, the features of her face changing with each breath, high priestess, hermit, hierophant. For a moment, Darlington thought he glimpsed his grandfather there.
He could feel his body quaking, felt dampness on his lips, touched his hand to his face and realized his nose had started to bleed.
“Darlington?” Alex’s voice, and in the mirror he saw her. But she looked the same. She was still Queen Mab. No… This time she really was Queen Mab. Night ebbed and flowed around her in a cape of glittering stars; above the oil-black sheaf of her hair, a constellation glowed—a wheel, a crown. Her eyes were black, her mouth the dark red of overripe cherries. He could feel power churning around her, through her.
“What are you?” he whispered. But he didn’t care. He went to his knees. This was what he’d been waiting for.
“Ah,” said Lan Caihe, approaching. “An acolyte at heart.”
In the mirror, he saw himself, a knight with bowed head, offering his service, a sword in his hand, a sword in his back. He felt no pain, only the ache in his heart. Choose me. There were tears on his cheeks, even as he felt the shame of it. She was no one, a girl who had lucked into a gift, who had done nothing to earn it. She was his queen.
“Darlington,” she said. But that was not his true name any more than Alex was hers.
If only she would choose him. If only she would let him…
She touched her fingers to his face, lifted his chin. Her lips brushed his ear. He didn’t understand it. He only wanted her to do it again. Stars poured through him, a cold and billowing wave of night. He saw everything. He saw their bodies entwined. She was above him and beneath him all at once, her body splayed and white as a lotus flower. She bit his ear—hard.
Darlington yelped and flinched back, sense flooding through him.
“Darlington,” she snarled. “Get your shit together.”
And then he saw himself. He’d hiked up her skirt. His hands were braced on her white thighs. He saw the masked faces around them, sensed their eagerness as they leaned forward, eyes glittering. Alex was looking down at him, gripping his shoulders, trying to shove him away. The cavern was gone. They were in the banquet room.
He fell backward, letting her skirt drop, his erection throbbing valiantly in his jeans before humiliation washed over him. What the hell had they done to him? And how?
“The mist,” he said, feeling like the worst kind of fool, his mind still spinning, his body buzzing with whatever he had inhaled. He’d walked straight through the blast of that fog machine and hadn’t thought twice about it.
Lan Caihe grinned. “You can’t blame a god for trying.”
Darlington used the wall to push to his feet, keeping clear of the mirror. He could still feel its hum vibrating through him. He wanted to rage at these people. Interfering with representatives of Lethe was strictly prohibited, a violation of every code of the societies, but he also just wanted to get clear of Manuscript before he humiliated himself further. Everywhere he looked he saw masked and painted faces.
“Come on,” said Alex, taking his arm and leading him up the stairs, forcing him to walk ahead of her.
He knew they should stay. See the night past the witching hour, make sure nothing got past the forbidden floors or interfered with the culling. He couldn’t. He needed to get free. Now.