The sight as they took up opposite places on the stage, the rippling, ever-shifting black and white, the inhumanly blank masks and a certain too-quick, almost insect quality in their movements all made my skin want to crawl off my bones.
I didn't feel any better when they each pulled fanned handfuls of knives from the recesses of their cloaks.
What followed was indescribable, even as I watched it. It possessed qualities of a juggling act, an acrobatic display and a sadistic fight to the death, all in apparently random combination. Knives flashed through the air, were caught — with hands, feet, occasionally teeth — and ricocheted back, in a blur of blades and limbs that was impossible to follow, let alone make sense of.
I had no idea how long it went on for. It felt like hours. When they stopped — when they finally stopped — I let out a long-held, shuddering breath, and realised my forehead was slick with cold sweat. I'd sat paralysed through the performance. Now, every muscle ached with the exertion of stillness.
I didn't think I'd ever been as relieved as I was when they closed with a jagged bow and scuttled off the stage, back into the waiting darkness behind their curtain.
I tried to speak, managed a muffled squeak. With a struggle, I calmed myself enough to form actual words. 'What — who — what was that?'
'They call themselves Stick and Stone,' murmured Alvantes. 'Rumour has it, they're brothers. They're the King's favourite entertainers.'
'That's funny. I feel the exact opposite of entertained.'
If it was possible, Alvantes's voice sank even lower. 'Rumour also has it they've been known to operate in other capacities.'
Then I understood why they'd seemed familiar. The way they'd moved — it had reminded me of Synza. It was the absolute, incontestable confidence of men who could kill without qualm or effort. I said, 'Someone has a funny idea of keeping us amused.'
'Perhaps.'
'You think it was some sort of warning?'
'I think someone doesn't want me here. Or else wants me here for reasons I wouldn't like.'
'Alvantes, why do I get the feeling none of this is going how you intended?'
His mouth turned up slightly, in a smile that went nowhere near his eyes. 'You know what they say, Damasco. If you want to make the gods laugh…'
'What? Tickle their feet? Let them win at cards? Given the state of their creation, I'd think the difficulty was getting them to take something seriously once in a while.'
'You tell them your plans,' he replied.
A fanfare of trumpets sounded from somewhere invisible — and Alvantes's faint smile vanished. Everyone, Alvantes included, slid from his or her seat and onto the floor, where they kneeled with heads hung low. I followed their example — just too late for the King's entrance, so that his first impression of me was my falling face first into the clumsiest grovel imaginable.
For the instant it took my head to smack the tiled floor, I got a clear view of him. He arrived from the right of the throne, flanked by four black-robed guards. I wasn't the least surprised to see Ludovoco amongst their number.
King Panchessa was recognisable as Panchetto's father — but barely. The same features were there, the bulbous nose and broad lips, the piggy, jewel-like eyes. However, the softness that had defined his son was entirely absent; what had been fat in the son was bulk in the father. Panchessa was imposing, despite his age. It was as if those indulgences that had kept Panchetto a plump, extravagant child had turned inward, been focused into something altogether less pleasant. I couldn't guess what was going on behind those gimlet eyes, but it was hard to imagine I'd like it.
In fact, it was someone altogether other than Panchetto he put me in mind of. Someone who shared that impression of violent intensity, of darkness shifting beneath a still facade — someone who'd set my nerves on edge in exactly the same way.
Strange as it was, Panchessa reminded me not of his son but of the man who'd murdered him.
One of the guards stepped forward — though not so far as to place him in front of the King. With a look and a wave, he dismissed everyone else in the room, one by one. They appeared more resigned than annoyed, and I guessed this wasn't the first time they'd waited, only to be unceremoniously banished.
When the chamber had emptied, the guard called to Alvantes, 'Step forward.'
Alvantes raised his eyes, not enough to meet Panchessa's gaze. 'Yes. Altapasaeda is in the hands of enemies. Northern soldiers, many of the families — perhaps under duress — and an alliance of criminals led by a man named Castilio Mounteban.'
Panchessa nodded, slowly and deliberately. 'Then my son…' he asked, letting the question hang like a sword blade.
'With the greatest sorrow and shame, I must tell Your Highness that Prince Panchetto is dead. He was killed by Moaradrid, in a cowardly and unprovoked attack.'
Panchessa's voice remained cold and level as black ice. 'And Moaradrid?'
'Dead as well. It was… an accident, of sorts.'
Panchessa reached out one hand to the throne, steadied himself just slightly. The four guards edged closer. He warned them away with his free hand.
'My sons…'
Or so I thought I'd heard, and the sentence hung tantalisingly unfinished. Surely he must have meant to say 'son's'. But his son's what? His son's body? Could he be asking about the crown?
Then he drew himself erect, not looking at Alvantes. Abruptly, he turned to leave, and his entourage fell in around him. At the last moment, Ludovoco — who until then had played no part in proceedings — leaned to whisper something in his ear.
The King stopped. With a gesture, he picked out two of his personal guard. Without turning, he motioned to where Alvantes still stood on the stage.
'Take him to the dungeons,' he said, 'and cut his damned traitorous head from his body.'
CHAPTER ELEVEN
'Easie Damasco. I fear you fail to appreciate the severity of your situation. You are guilty of treason, despised in the eyes of men and gods alike. And tomorrow, your head shall be struck from your shoulders.'
'It isn't that I don't appreciate the severity,' I said. 'It's more that I don't see it as being significantly worse than any other day I've had lately.'
The Royal Inquisitor looked at me with struggling annoyance and disdain, as though I were an insect and he was trying to decide whether swatting me would justify the effort involved. 'I'll ask one more time. Will you answer my questions sensibly? I can't promise clemency, but perhaps your honesty will be rewarded in another life.'
All I could manage was a weary sigh.
If I'd learned one thing that afternoon, it was how underrated boredom was as a tool of interrogation. It was a constant struggle not to confess to something, anything, just to enliven the conversation. My questioning was well into its third hour, and it was fair to say that progress had not been quick.
I looked to Alvantes for the hundredth time, desperate for some hint of affirmation. He was sat just as he'd been since our incarceration had begun, knees tucked to his chest, eyes focused on some distant point beyond the barred window. The fingers of his right hand played idly around the grubbily bandaged stump of his left arm. All told, he seemed to be taking imprisonment for treason even worse than I might have hoped.
The Inquisitor tutted to draw back my attention and said, 'Let's start from the beginning.'
I managed one word, which sounded to my own ears like, 'Gfargh.' Summoning what mental energy I had left, I tried to rephrase my complaint into something more like language. 'We've started again five times now. Why won't you believe I'm telling the truth?'
He rolled his eyes. 'Because I strain to find one aspect of your story that's less than preposterous.'
