Faces (9 page)

It still took her a minute or two to work up the nerve to step into the open, from the narrow space between the tailor's and the baker's, and walk toward the bridge, an elegant stone arch erected, no doubt, by magic. The village seemed too small to need three bridges: Mara suspected the Lady had built them in tribute to her father, and the thought made her feel closer to the Gifted young girl the Lady had once been.
If I'd known her then, we might have been friends
, she thought.
With the same Gift in common, the same fears . . .

...the same enemy . . .

The villagers turned to look at her as she strode toward the bridge. She slipped the hood back from her face and gave them bright smiles. No one smiled back. She couldn't tell what they were thinking, but they didn't look afraid. In fact, they looked . . .

Hopeful?

Now why would she think that?

As she crossed the bridge, she met a woman coming the other way. The woman stopped dead, mouth open. “Hello,” Mara said.

The woman's mouth clicked closed. “Hello,” she said. “I . . . you're . . .”

“Mara Holdfast,” Mara said.

The woman stepped closer. “Is it true?” she whispered. “You have the same Gift as the Lady? You're as powerful as she is?”

“I don't know,” Mara said. “My gift is similar, but of course she's far more experienced . . .”

“Help us,” the woman said, so softly Mara could barely hear her. “Help . . .” And then she looked past Mara and, sudden terror on her face, slipped by and hurried away.

Mara glanced back . . . and saw one of the Lady's wolves trotting across the courtyard behind her, seemingly unconcerned with her presence or the presence of the villagers, though they all drew back from it.

The wolf disappeared between two buildings.
Did it see me? Has the
Lady
seen me?

Those uneasy possibilities propelled her on across the bridge and into the streets beyond. A few minutes later she hurried out through the village's main gate, hood once more drawn up over her head, and, two minutes after that, into the camp of the unMasked Army.

There was no point hiding her face
there
. They all knew who she was. And even though she knew many of them blamed her for what had happened to the Secret City, she would not slink among them. She pulled back her hood and strode boldly into the camp.

There weren't very many people in among the tents: presumably many were in the village, doing . . . whatever it was Catilla and Arilla had arranged for them to do. Chopping wood? Carrying water? Digging holes? Mara was uneasily aware she didn't have a clue how the affairs of the camp had been ordered.

Which meant there was no guarantee Keltan was even
in
the camp—a little flaw in her scheme she rather wished she'd thought of before she was actually walking toward his tent . . . assuming he was still using the same tent he had shared with Hyram during the journey to the village, recognizable by a distinctive black patch sewn into the white canvas.

He wasn't there . . . but Hyram was.

The great-grandson of the leader of the unMasked Army emerged from the tent as Mara approached. For a moment he looked blankly at her as if he didn't recognize her; then he straightened abruptly. “What are
you
doing down here? Shouldn't you be with your precious Lady?”

Mara felt a surge of anger, but pushed it down. Hyram had plenty of reason to dislike her, but he
had
saved her from falling overboard from Chell's flagship,
Protector
, during the storm that had driven them ashore. He might no longer be a friend, and the infatuation he had shown with her when she had first arrived at the Secret City was gone without a trace, but he wasn't her enemy.

“I'm looking for Keltan,” she said levelly. “Do you know where he is?”

“He's with my great-grandmother,” Hyram said. “Talking about you, I suspect.”

He's trying to hurt you
, Mara told herself, still holding her anger in check. “And where is
she
?”

“Arilla has provided her with a house in the village,” Hyram said. “Just inside the gate. You must have walked right by it. You didn't need to come out here at all.”

“If I hadn't, we wouldn't have had this lovely conversation,” Mara said. She tried again to force down her anger. “Hyram, I'm sorry for what happened. How long are you going to hold it against me?”

“I don't know,” Hyram said. “How long will my friends who died defending the Secret City stay dead?”

Mara's anger ran away from her, then, slipped through her fingers like water, even as she tried to hold onto it to shield herself from the dagger-thrust of his words. Her eyes blurred with tears. “I'm sorry, Hyram,” she whispered. “I knew them, too. I'm so, so sorry.”

“You already said that.” Hyram's voice did not thaw at all. “Better go find your friend. He's the only one you've got down here.”

Blindly, Mara turned and stumbled away from the tent and back through the camp, back toward the village.
So many mistakes
, she thought.
So many wrong decisions. So many people hurt and killed because of me . . .
by
me.

But all of that pain and suffering, she reminded herself, as she slunk out of the camp she had promised herself only a few minutes before she wouldn't slink into, could be laid ultimately at the feet of the Autarch. The Masks were
his
creation. The mine of magic operated by the slave labor of the brutalized unMasked served
him
. The Watchers who manned it, the Watchers who had attacked the Secret City, were
his
warriors. The magic that had driven Chell's ships ashore after they had rescued the unMasked Army had been triggered at
his
command.

Everything came back to the Autarch. And only one person had the power, and a plan, to defeat him: the Lady of Pain and Fire.

Despite all her mistakes, Mara was convinced that following the Lady was absolutely the right thing to do now. She offered the only hope any of them had for the overthrow of the Autarch, and a future for Aygrima free of Masks and tyranny. Without her magic . . .
and mine
, Mara thought . . . the pitiful forces the Lady had assembled—eighty unMasked Army fighters, fifty sailors, and about two hundred villagers—would be crushed the instant the Autarch turned his full attention to the task. With the Lady's magic, they just might stand a chance. Without it, they stood none at all.

And so Mara stiffened her spine again and put Hyram's words behind her . . . though she did not forget them, or the pain they had caused. Not because she hated Hyram for uttering them, but because they were true. The pain was her well-deserved punishment for past mistakes . . . and a spur to drive her to atone for them in the future.

She recognized Catilla's house, a modest two-story structure just to the left of the village gate, by the burly black-bearded man standing guard at the door: Captain Stamas, one of the unMasked Army's leaders. She had first met him at a meeting of the captains she had been summoned to in the Secret City months ago. She wondered how many of the other captains who had been at that meeting still lived.

His eyes narrowed. “You,” he almost spat. “What do
you
want?”

“I'm here to see Keltan,” Mara said. “Hyram said he was meeting with Catilla.”

“So he is. But
you
are not invited.”

“I think he'd want to see me.”

“He might. But would Catilla?”

Mara glared at Stamas. Stamas stared back.
Impasse
, Mara thought, but even as she debated rushing the front door and seeing how far Stamas would go to stop her, it opened to reveal Keltan.

His eyes widened. “Mara?”

She nodded, her throat suddenly closed tight.
I should have come to see him before now
, she thought miserably.
He probably hates me.

She heard a voice from inside the house, an old woman's voice.
Catilla.
Keltan turned. “Yes, she's here,” he said. Another murmur. “I will.” Keltan turned back toward Mara, stepped onto the porch beside Stamas, and closed the door firmly behind him.

“She doesn't want to see me, I'm guessing,” Mara said.

“Not right now,” Keltan said.

“What did she ask you to do?”

Keltan glanced at Stamas, then came down the steps to Mara. “It's good to see you,” he said. He hesitated. She felt frozen in place. Then finally, tentatively, he reached out and pulled her to him. He felt warm and solid and she suddenly found herself returning the hug, tears in her eyes.

“I'm sorry I didn't come sooner,” Mara said, her voice muffled by the shoulder of his leather coat. “I don't know why I didn't.”

“I do,” Keltan said softly. “It's what you said. You've been with your own kind.”

She stiffened, pulled away. “Keltan, I never should have—”

“It's all right,” Keltan said. He held her at arm's length, and smiled a little. “I was hurt when you said it, but I understand. At least I think so.” The smile faded. “You have a Gift I can barely imagine, Mara. And it's dangerous. I've seen what it can do. I've
felt
what it can do. The most important thing
you
can do is learn to control it. I do understand. Really, I do.” He glanced over his shoulder at Stamas again. “Let's take a walk,” he said. “We need to talk.”

Mara remembered that low murmur from Catilla, and realized Keltan had never answered her question. “What does Catilla want you to do?” she said.

“Walk with me,” Keltan said firmly, and took her arm. He turned toward the village, but Mara resisted.

“Not there,” she said. “Outside the walls. The Lady is in the village. She told me not to come down here. I disobeyed.”

Keltan's left eyebrow lifted. “Really? That's good.”

Mara's own eyes narrowed. “Why?”

Keltan said nothing, but led her out through the gate again. He didn't head toward the tents of the unMasked Army, though, instead taking her right, along the base of the wall, where snow drifts still lingered. They crunched along for a moment before he said, “I've missed you.”

“I've missed you, too,” Mara said. “But, Keltan, the Lady has taught me so much . . . I can control my magic so much better now.” She told him about her success with the trial the Lady had set her earlier that day, when she had lifted the stone from the table and hurled it out through the window. “Ethelda was wrong, Keltan. I can use my Gift safely. Thanks to this,” she touched the amulet at her neck, “I can use it without turning into a monster. I can—”

“Are you sure about that?” Keltan said softly.

“What? Of course I am. Arilla is proof that it's possible.”

“Is she?” Keltan stopped, pulled her closer to the stones of the wall. “Mara, you haven't been in the village this past month,” he said in a low voice. “I have. There's something
wrong
with these people. Not all the time. But every now and then, some of them, at least, are like . . . like Axell, my best friend who was Masked before me. Like your friend . . . what was her name?”

“Sala?” Mara said.

Keltan nodded. “Sala. Remember how you told me she'd changed? There's something not quite right with the villagers. Some . . . spark . . . missing. Stolen from them.”

“But there are no Masks here,” Mara said. “I don't—”

“You told me,” Keltan said, “that the Autarch has the same Gift as the Lady. As you. He can see, and use, all kinds of magic. He can draw magic to him. But he's not as strong as the Lady. As strong as
you
. He needs the Masks in order to pull magic from those around him—the ones on his Child Guard, and the new Masks, the ones made in the past couple of years, the ones that started failing more often, especially on the Gifted. But the Lady . . . the Lady doesn't need Masks in order to draw magic from people. What if this ‘Cadre' of hers is the equivalent of the Autarch's Child Guard, the ones she draws a lot of magic from when she needs it in a hurry . . . but the rest of the villagers are like the kids wearing the new Masks, the ones the Autarch draws a little bit of magic from all the time, to keep him strong, keep him healthy, keep him young? What if the Lady is doing exactly same thing the Autarch is doing, only without any Masks at all?”

Mara stared at him. “That's crazy.”

“Is it?” Keltan said. “Why? Because you don't want to believe it? Because you don't want to believe
me
?”

Mara felt anger building in her. “That's what this is all about, isn't it?” she said. “You're jealous of the time I've spent with the Lady. You want to turn me against her so I'll turn to you, like I was some . . . some princess from an old storybook that has to be rescued by the brave prince.”

“You're being silly,” Keltan snapped. “Mara, listen to me—”

“Silly?” The anger reached the surface. “Is that how you see me?
Silly?
A silly girl? Too stupid to understand anything? To make her own decisions?”

Keltan took a step back. “Mara, please,” he said. “I didn't mean—”

“Yes, you did,” Mara said. She heard again in her mind the murmur of Catilla's voice from the house by the gate. “That's what Catilla asked you to do, isn't it? To try to plant a seed of doubt in me, so I'll turn to her instead of the Lady.” She pointed back the way they had come, at the gate. “So maybe you should go back and tell her your attempt to drive a wedge between me and the Lady has failed.”

“Mara, I'm not trying to turn you to or away from anyone,” Keltan said urgently. “I'm trying to warn you. To be careful. The Lady isn't—”