Masks and Shadows (37 page)

“We'll take a rest. Twenty minutes. And I'll call for tea with honey for your throat.” The kapellmeister nodded decisively and hopped off the stage in search of a footman.

Frau Kettner released Anna's arm with a poisonous flourish, raking her long fingernails straight across Anna's bare flesh.

“Ouch!” Anna clapped her hand to her arm. A trickle of blood emerged from the deepest scratch.

“
So
sorry,” Frau Kettner murmured. She smirked and faded back to her giggling admirers among the chorus.

Anna gritted her teeth. The rest of the singers were forming whispering groups. Herr Hofner, the second tenor, threw back his shoulders and strutted before his friends with anticipated glory. Herr Pichler stood alone, pale and ill-looking.

Anna hurried straight to him, holding her chin raised high against the swirling gossip.

“What's wrong?” she asked in an urgent whisper. “Herr Pichler—what's happened?”

He blinked and recalled himself from his daze. “I—don't know. My voice just wouldn't come out for a moment.” He cleared his throat, and some of the rich timbre returned. “It's getting better now, though—do you hear?”

“It's more than just your voice, though. Isn't it?” Anna stepped closer, lowering her whisper. “You've looked terrible all morning. Sick, but—not just sick.” She shook her head, impatient with herself. “I can't say it right! Herr Pichler, what is wrong? Really?”

His eyes widened. He licked his lips and glanced around the stage, then back at her. “I don't think I can—”

“I only want to help you,” she said. “Please. You can trust me.”

He smiled weakly. “I know that. I do know.” His voice lowered to the faintest of whispers. “Fräulein Dommayer, last night I saw—”

The sound of quick, heavy footsteps in the corridor outside roused Count Radamowsky from his writing. He glanced at his pocket watch. Only half past eight. Most of the nobility in Eszterháza wouldn't be awake for hours.

He set his quilled pen back in its holder, covered the sheet of paper he'd been writing on, and rose to open the door just as the first knock sounded.

“Radamowsky!” Prince Nikolaus was caught with his hand still raised in the air. “Good, you're awake.”

“Of course, Your Highness.” He stepped back, gesturing for the Prince to step past him into the cluttered study. “I am merely preparing for tonight . . . and, of course, writing out my notes for the officers who will take charge of our friend here tomorrow.”

“Good, good. Glad to hear it.” The Prince rapped his knuckles nervously across the stacks of books as he walked past them. His gaze crisscrossed the room.

“Are you well, Highness?”

“What? Oh, yes, perfectly well.” The Prince rapped his knuckles against the wooden table, then started backward as the elemental's red eyes flashed open within its lamp. “By God, that thing is always impressive!”

“Thank you, Your Highness.” Radamowsky leaned against an overflowing bookcase, watching the Prince through shuttered eyes. “I trust everything is going well for your visitors?”

“Splendidly, splendidly.” The Prince was still staring into the elemental's red gaze. “I only . . .” He shook himself and swung around to face Radamowsky. “You are certain, are you not, that this will work?”

“Work?” Radamowsky raised his eyebrows. “How do you mean?”

“That it will be safe, tonight. With our guests.” The Prince coughed. “I . . . had been very confident, as you know, but—well, that Englishman died yesterday from his injuries.”

“Yes?” Radamowsky frowned. “With respect, Your Highness, we've already discussed this in some detail. You said you were satisfied with it as a learning experience.”

“I was. Am.” The Prince grimaced. “It's only—ah, damn it, Radamowsky, you know exactly what bothers me. I designed this plan for the Archduke. Now that it's also the Emperor and the Empress herself—”

“The glory of your success will be increased a thousandfold.”

“I hope so. We may both hope so. But if it fails—if there were to be another accident like the last one—if, God forbid, the Empress or—”

“It will not fail.” Radamowsky straightened away from the bookcase and looked directly into the Prince's eyes. “You need have no fear, Your Highness. You will amaze and astound your imperial guests, and the name of Esterházy will be written across history for a hundred years to come.”

“Yes?” The Prince blinked, then threw back his shoulders with a short, hard laugh. “Yes. Of course. How could it not?”

“Quite.” Radamowsky glanced pointedly at the pile of papers on his desk. “But if you will excuse me . . .”

“Of course. Your preparations. Excellent. Good man.” The Prince clapped him on the shoulder. “Quite the challenge for you, I'm afraid, now that our little ruse has been undone—having to playact being a guest, and work as a scholar, both at once.”

“Difficult, but not impossible.” Radamowsky paused, considering, then let his lips curve into a full smile as he met the red eyes of the elemental in the lamp . . . the discovery he would not be giving up to anyone else, after all. “Especially when the rewards will be so great.”

Half past eight o'clock. Voices and footsteps moved in the corridor outside. Friedrich shaved in front of his mirror. He had thrown his valet out of the room. Out of the barracks. The razor moved up and down. He saw it from a distance, without interest.

“Are you going to help me or not, von Höllner?”

The lather from his soap had been used up. The razor scraped across bare and reddened skin.

“What the devil is he talking about?”

The razor moved in a stinging path. A spark of pain flickered against Friedrich's cheek.

“Friedrich, don't let him—!”

“I couldn't help it!” Friedrich screamed.

The voices in the corridor cut off. Friedrich stared into his mirror, panting. Blood trickled down his face from three different cuts.

A tentative knock sounded on the door.

“Von Höllner? Are you all right?”

“Fine,” Friedrich called. His voice cracked. “I'm fine.”

He put on his uniform quickly, haphazardly, not bothering to straighten his jacket or comb out his hair. He waited until the corridor was silent, then hurried out of his room, out of the building, and across the grass. Toward his next task. The opera rehearsal.

“It wasn't my fault,” he whispered as he walked. His feet thudded against soft grass. “I couldn't help it. I couldn't—”

“Von Höllner!” Lautzner intercepted him, just five feet from the opera house. “Have you seen Esterházy?”

“Anton?” Friedrich's mouth went dry.

“He's late for maneuvers. How late were you two out last night, anyway?”

“Ah . . .” Friedrich shrugged. His heartbeat thrummed behind his chest. “I haven't seen him.”

“Well, I'm off to check his room, but Forgàcs said he never heard Esterházy come back in last night. Didn't he say anything to you, then?”

Bile rose up Friedrich's throat and nearly choked him.

“I haven't seen him,” he repeated, and broke into a run.

She was so earnest. And he needed so badly to talk and lift some of the madness. “Fräulein Dommayer,” Franz began softly, “last night I saw—”

The door to the audience burst open. Lieutenant von Höllner stumbled across the floor and fell into his usual seat.

“My God,” Franz whispered.

The man looked like walking death. Yet he was still here—on assignment? It could only be that. He, of all men, was wholly under the Brotherhood's thrall. He raised his head and looked straight up at Franz. His face twisted.

“What were you starting to say, Herr Pichler?” Fräulein Dommayer asked.

Franz wrenched his gaze away from the lieutenant's tortured face. Fräulein Dommayer's blue eyes were wide and worried.

“I want to help you,” she whispered. “I'm sure, if you tell me what's happening, we can think of something to do about it. The Baroness—my former employer—her sister is very close to the Prince. And the Baroness promised she would always help me. If she goes to the Prince and lays your problem before him—”

“The Prince?” Madame Zelinowsky purred. She'd slipped up beside them, her gaze avid. “What on earth can the two of you be speaking of now?”

“Nothing worth writing about,” Franz said crisply. He stepped back and forced a contemptuous glare. “You have an overactive imagination, Fräulein Dommayer.”

“But—”

“My voice will be perfectly recovered by tonight. And even if it weren't, I certainly wouldn't have any desire to consult the Prince about it.”

“Did you really imagine that His Highness would be interested?” Madame Zelinowsky stared at Fräulein Dommayer and began to laugh. “Oh, Anna, my dear little Anna, what sort of education do you maidservants receive, nowadays?” She stepped back, opening up the joke to the other singers standing nearby. “You have so much still to learn.”

Fräulein Dommayer flushed bright red. “Apparently I do.” She stared at Franz accusingly.

Forgive me
, Franz thought, as he turned away. His gaze passed over Lieutenant von Höllner, and he repressed a shudder.

For a moment, he'd felt so tempted to share his terror with someone who seemed to care. But it would only have put her in danger, too.

It's for the best
, he thought bleakly, as he walked away from her.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“Something holds me here just as strongly as your love for your sister binds you,”
he had told her. Charlotte had memorized his words. Easy enough, as they sounded anew in her ears at every moment. Uttered in his high, pure voice, they had resonated through her entire body. The look in his eyes, as he had said them . . .

Had she understood him? Or had she been hopelessly naïve? Surely she couldn't have been mistaken. The surge of joy that had suffused her at his words had felt so right. She had looked up at him with—with pleasure, yes, with admiration, with—

With adoration
, she thought. Helpless adoration. And he had looked back at her, and she had felt—

“Lotte, are you even listening to me?”

Charlotte blinked, and snapped back into the present. She was sitting on her younger sister's bed, and Sophie was holding up two different gowns for her inspection.

“I like the blue,” Charlotte said.
It doesn't matter what I like
. She drew a deep, restraining breath, fighting to calm her racing heartbeat. Trying to stop counting the hours, and the minutes, until she would see Signor Morelli again. She was as pathetic as a girl of fifteen—and as hopeless. As a responsible, adult woman, she should not even wish him to admire her.
To desire her
. The thought that he might find even half the appeal in her that she found in him—it should be a pity. A shame, to be quietly and kindly discouraged. It shouldn't bring this host of fantasies into her head. Impossible fantasies. Improbable, immoral . . .