I took Jagger’s hands and looked at the two metal cuffs that were around his wrists. There were symbols carved into the metal that made me think of the Tree.
The metal itself looked familiar, too. It was the same burnished metal that I’d seen on the Enforcer.
“The Enforcer’s suit must be made out of this stuff.”
When I touched the metal, the symbols glowed and a green light danced out of it. My claws retracted. Hastily, I took my hands away.
“Oh,” he said, as if this were new information.
But I wondered if it was what he had wanted all along. For a split second I wondered if I was just there as a guinea pig. Practice for the main event. The Robbers could try out their snow defense powers on me before moving on to King Lazar.
“Relax, Princess. I have no intention of using this on you. You are one of us.”
I wasn’t comforted. I liked the idea of the Robbers’ building an arsenal against the Snow King, but at the same time, I realized their weapons could also be used against me.
“We should get back to training,” I said flatly.
Our heist took on a new color. The Robbers had claimed that we could get into the Duchess’s palace and get the mirror without incident. But after the Enforcer’s visit to the Claret, we were all aware of a potential clash of fire and ice. Even if that fire was manufactured. It was five days until the Duchess’s Ball, when our mission would take place.
“We should get back inside. We need to prepare for tonight,” Jagger said.
“What’s tonight?” Were we stepping up the plan because of the Enforcer?
“Tonight is your first real test as a Robber.”
27
Every hour we drew closer to the Eclipse of the Lights. The clock was ticking down, and I could feel the shift in all of us under the pressure. The Claret girls were plotting a new mission that was tied to the bigger one: to infiltrate a VIP party. We each had to lift as many coins as we could from the partygoers. But they weren’t just any coins. They were coins that granted us entrance to the Duchess’s Ball. The one where we would steal the mirror.
“You can be of help, but there’s one thing that’s nonnegotiable,” Fathom told me in no uncertain terms. Jagger had deposited me in a room that I had never been in before when we got back inside. Fathom had been waiting for me.
The room was circular like mine. But white like Fathom’s lab. And empty except for a single chair and a mirror.
I noticed right away that there was something different about Fathom’s face. She was smiling. For the briefest of seconds I thought that our encounter with the Enforcer had changed something between us. Bonded us.
She caught my stare. “What?”
“You’re smiling.”
“Oh, that.” She produced a vial. It was cherry red. “Smile vial. I call it permafrost. Strikes the right balance, so your mark always thinks you’re happy to see them. Even when you’re not.”
So, no bond then, I noted to myself.
“What am I doing here, Fathom?” I asked.
She motioned to the chair and produced another vial. This one filled with platinum liquid.
“You have to wear a different face.”
A silver case filled with more vials appeared beside her at the ready. This was a Robber makeover.
“And seeing how you are with Jagger, you should definitely take the inhibition bottle when we go. It is possible with enough time and imagination to break your own heart,” she assessed, holding out the vial to me.
“What are you saying about me and Jagger?”
She shrugged. “Just an old Robber expression. I don’t know what made me think of it.”
“I am not in love with Jagger, if that’s what you’re thinking. We’re just …” I didn’t know how to sum up whatever we were to myself, let alone tell Fathom.
“I’ve seen you two together … Once upon a time I loved a girl like that. Her name was Anthicate. She’s Margot’s daughter. We were partners. We were friends. We were as thick as thieves, literally. We pulled all our scores in tandem. And then she just left in the middle of the night. No note. No good-bye. And the next thing we heard was that she crossed the Tree.”
Magpie. She loved Magpie. The idea of anyone loving Magpie was maybe the most surprising thing that I had learned on this side of the Tree. Almost as surprising as the idea of Fathom loving someone. Maybe they were perfect for each other. But it sounded like, in the end, Magpie had stolen her heart.
I opened my mouth to say something about Magpie. But I hadn’t even talked to Margot about her. Did Fathom deserve to know that her so-called love was still stealing at Whittaker? Would it make her feel better or worse? And did I really care how Fathom felt? Things had shifted since the Enforcer’s appearance. She had been the kindest of the Robbers so far, but if she really loved Magpie, she probably wouldn’t love the fact that I had almost frozen her in my world.
I let the opportunity pass. I let her keep talking without saying a word.
“I can’t tell you what to do with Jagger. But I’d be careful. Robbers don’t fall in love. Robber Rules.”
I wanted to correct her again and tell her that I didn’t love Jagger, but she could see the red in my cheeks at the mention of his name and she could probably hear the quickening of my pulse or maybe even my thoughts themselves.
“Out! It’s magic time!” Howl entered, singing and pushing Fathom out.
I tried to push Fathom out of my head like Howl had pushed her out of the room.
“Now let’s make you one of us,” Howl said as she ran a hand over her punk-rock Mohawk. “Why did you wait so long to do this? I did it the second I got here.”
“When you got here? From where?” I demanded.
“Robbers live in the present,” she countered, attempting to squash my curiosity with another Robber Rule. She quickly changed between faces to illustrate her point. Howl traded her pretty pink hair for lavender. Her full lips for thinner ones. Her violet eyes for gray ones. The effect was fascinating and a little disturbing, and as her identity shifted and her usual lightning tattoo faded away, I glimpsed a large birthmark on her cheek. “I can fix your scar, too,” Howl said, looking at the white spiderweb of marks that still graced my arm.
I shook my head.
“I was touched by your King—thus the permanent reminder. A lot of us were.
“When we were pretty young, a group of us got caught selling our wares a little too close to the palace. The Lights were not on our side that day, and the King happened upon us. He was feeling generous.”
“Oh, Howl…”
She switched faces again, a pretty heart-shaped one with darker eyes rimmed in purple kohl and studded instead with crystal lashes, but the expression on it said she was done telling the rest of her story about her interaction with the King.
“You should ask Jagger to show you his scar. Rumor has it he had some one-on-one time with the King.”
“Have you seen it?” I asked.
“I haven’t. But Margot has. Well, if you won’t let me fix your scar, at least let me cover it. See?” she said, and pointed to a tattoo of a snowflake where my scar once was.
“I love it. Thank you.”
But I felt the familiar scratching of my scar and covered it before Howl could see it light up.
Jagger had been hurt by my father? That was another little fact he conveniently left out. The list was getting longer by the second.
“Now, what to wear?” Howl pondered, whisking me off to a room she called the Closet.
Outfits that seemed to suit every type of person in Algid hung from racks inside the deep, brightly lit room. There were maid and soldier uniforms, as well as some very uncomfortable-looking corsets. There was an outfit for every kind of heist.
Howl reached into the rack and pulled out a corset whose bones were held together with as little lace as possible. Also, the bones looked like they might be actual bones.
Howl’s new eyes flashed, a challenge.
&n
bsp; “Exactly where are we going?” I asked.
“Where the wild things are, Princess,” she said.
As I took the corset, I realized that we weren’t just Robbers; we were actors. I wondered about Jagger and the role he was playing. I wondered if I’d ever see his real face … and if I’d ever know the real Jagger.
28
The mission was in a speakeasy called Rime in Dessa. The coins we were to obtain came in the form of gold coins bearing a picture of the Duchess herself. Apparently, the invitations were in such demand that once received, they never left your person. Of course, unless they were stolen from you.
There was a disco ball made of snow in the center of the ceiling. It throbbed with fluorescent light that was just a beat out of sync with the music.
The place was Algid’s answer to a nightclub. There were giant snow globes with girls in high heels dancing in them. The gaunt girls’ white-lined eyes seemed vacant.
Howl whispered, “They dance until they die.”
At first I thought it was hyperbole—another attempt to scare the newest Robber. But seeing the ribs of one of the dancers poking through her sheer dress, I thought maybe Howl was telling the truth. I couldn’t help but make a comparison between my life and theirs. Whittaker had its horrors, but whatever happened to those girls inside and outside those globes made me shudder.
“Why?”
“You saw what happened in Stygian. They police the wrong things here.”
Howl puffed up her rainbow-colored hair and puckered up her lips, getting ready for her set. She’d been hired as a singer for the night. And she was ready. Her barely there dress had a web of blue strips that covered her strategically, and she wore a pair of boots that laced up to her thighs.
I knew this was a mission. I knew it was a scary box to check off in order to get me closer to what I wanted. But it was also my first night out, ever. The part of me that was excited about my first real night out was quickly squashed by the sight of the girl’s ribs.
The other Robbers were dispersed around the room, but I could not recognize them. I looked for errant details, such as the wrong shoes or the wrong stitching on a dress. But the Robbers were aided by magic. Their game was flawless. I was the only one fidgeting in my corset and tugging at the hem of my tiny skirt.
Jagger led me out to the dance floor. He took my right hand in his left and then slid his other hand to the small of my back. I felt myself inhale deeply again. I tried to cover, but he noticed everything.
The plan was for us to garner the attention of one of the VIPs, who sat up in the balcony. They were the high rollers.
The other girls made quick work of it, pairing off with the men one by one. Maybe it was their superior, magically enhanced dancing skills, or maybe it was the length of their skirts. In Fathom’s case, it was just sheer manipulation.
“Watch and learn,” Fathom said before slipping into the throng of people. She found her mark, the friend of the man she was talking to.
The face she wore was pretty, but it was more than that that drew her mark to her. She was having a dialogue with one man, but having a completely nonverbal conversation with her mark at the same time. She caught his eye with a single glance and didn’t break her gaze. When she touched his hand, her mark tapped his friend on the shoulder, sending him away.
Could I do that? I wondered, watching Fathom from the dance floor. Jagger followed my gaze and then spun me into him.
“You don’t have to be Fathom to do this,” he whispered.
I didn’t have to be myself, either. I remembered The End of Almost. I remembered how Rebecca reinvented herself on almost a yearly basis. I just needed to do the same. Quickly.
I had never been shy. But I was more a blunt force like my snow than a seductive one. Still, I tried. And the new face helped the pretense. I caught a glimpse of myself in one of the mirrored columns that punctuated the dance floor.
The eyes that stared back at me were smaller and an electric blue. My hair and lashes were triple the length of my own, and tiny crystals decorated every tip. The lips had a more pronounced bow and a smile that was stretched wide with magic.
Even Jagger was hiding behind a different face for this mission. His eyes were a different color and his skin was darker, but his eyes had a spark and his smile had a place that stopped between happy and knowing. I think I would recognize him anywhere. I still couldn’t pick out all the Robber girls from the crowd, even though I’d gotten a glimpse of them back at the Claret.
I spun away from him and exaggerated my dancing and my sense of abandon for the benefit of the audience on the balcony. Or at least I thought I did. It felt good to be here. I was outside Whittaker. I was dancing in a club with kids my own age. Music was blasting in my eardrums. This was me doing something kids do. This was me doing something normal. Except for one thing: the part where I was distracting creepy guys so the Robber girls could get their part of the job done.
One of the men on the balcony finally nodded at me. I let go of Jagger’s hand and climbed the stairs to the VIP area.
This was a test. I knew that. I had failed many of Dr. Harris’s tests before—sometimes on purpose. But this test mattered. It would affect my ability to stay with the Robbers. As long as I was with them, they were my very best chance of getting Bale and getting home.
“Do you know who I am?” the man from the balcony asked, not bothering to stand up from his couch.
“Someone important,” I replied coyly.
The guy was some sort of dignitary and a definite creep. I could see it in the way he treated his people. I could see it in the way he took up space, as if he owned the air around him. Objectively, he was handsome. Chiseled jaw. Shiny black hair. Piercing eyes. But he was less attractive with every word and every move he made. He berated the bare-chested guy who delivered a bottle filled with blue bubbly on ice. He leaned back on a sofa made of a pelt of pale-gray fur and stretched out his arms as if he were waiting for company. Namely me.
My mission was to distract him. But the idea of being any closer to him did not appeal to me.
“Aren’t you a pretty thing?” he said to me as I reached his couch.
Compliments didn’t come my way often. Even though I abhorred this man, I felt my cheeks flush at his words. I reminded myself that Rebecca Gershon would take the praise as a given. I raised my head haughtily and tossed the weight of my new, magically extended hair.
“Shall we take a walk?”
I pointed down to my ridiculously high heels, which weren’t the best for walking.
“I have something for that,” the creep said, fishing for a bottle of magic.
I shook my head.
“You’re not one of those Eluddites, I hope. You know, the kind who don’t use magic?”
I laughed as if he had said the funniest thing in Algid.
“Hardly … I just like to have all my senses. I don’t want to miss anything.”
“I think I’d like you for my collection,” the creep said, pointing to the girls in the snow globes.
Anger brewed in me. I thought about freezing the glass to free the girls suspended from the ceiling, but I knew I couldn’t or they’d fall to the ground.
Luckily, I didn’t have to do anything. The globes began to descend on their own, which annoyed the creep. He yelled something in the direction of his followers until I distracted him with a spill of my drink.
“Stupid girl. You’ll regret that,” he warned, making a grab for my wrist.
At that exact moment, Howl hit a piercing note that echoed through the place. Glasses began to shatter all at once. The thick glass of the globes cracked, too, and the girls pushed their way out like chicks from eggs. Everyone in the club began to scatter for the exits.
The creep opened his mouth to call for the bouncer, and I saw my opportunity.
“Stop right there,” I demanded.
The creep laughed, but then he stopped abruptly as the edges of his coat frosted over and the clo
th hardened, stiff as a board.
It wasn’t exactly as I had planned. Everything could have gone terribly, terribly wrong. But like Margot had suggested, I focused my energy on the objects around the person instead of the person itself … and it worked! I had frozen the jacket instead of the jerk of a man inside it. And the terrified man didn’t dare move.
My confidence brimmed as I stepped away from him. I had used my frost to keep him in his place. For the first time, I had truly controlled my magic.
I grabbed the coin and showed it to him. It was against Robber Rules to show the mark what you stole from them. The point was to get away clean. But that ship had sailed when Howl screamed.
The man laughed when he saw the coin. “Cinderella wants to go to the ball.”
“Nice doing business with you,” I said quietly. “If you scream, if you so much as move, then I will come back and freeze the rest of you.”
When I hit the door, Jagger was already beside me.
“Isn’t this the part where you tell me how great I did?” I said to Jagger as we raced out of the club.
But he was not smiling.
“You didn’t listen to my instructions.”
“I improvised.”
“Robber Rules…”
“Versus results? I got results.”
I could see the intense bit of a smile forming underneath the approbation as he retorted, “The idea is to get in and out without anyone knowing we’re here. Now, the King’s guard will be looking for us. For the girl with the power to freeze. He’s already on your trail. Now you’ve brought him a step closer to all of us.”
The hair on the back of my neck perked up. Jagger shivered as if he could feel the cold, too.
“I didn’t think of that.”
“Next time, think.”
“So there will be a next time?” I said to him.
He didn’t smile fully, but I could tell by the light in his eyes that he wanted to.
Two of the Robber girls met us outside the club. They were carrying a snow-globe dancer. Her eyes were hollow. She was proof of my father’s wrongs.
“This is Cadence,” Jagger explained as her face morphed into someone new. She had short blue hair and a pretty, soft face that was stained with tears.