Shadowplay

Qarish knaves have come down from the north to interfere with honest players’ livings.” Hewney paused to clear his throat, as though acknowledging the shadow suddenly cast on their amusement. “But, hist, that is not the only way in which we players and poets are the most dangerous guild of all. Think! When we write of things that cannot be, or speak them, do we not put ideas in people’s mind—ideas which sometimes frighten even kings and queens? It is always the powerful who are most fearful (now that I think on it) precisely because they have the most to lose!” He wiped his mouth again, almost roughly, as though he did not feel much from his own lips. “In fact, in all other occurrences, is counterfeiting not a crime punishable by the highest courts? To make a false seeming of gold enough to gain the artisan the stockade at best, or the white-hot rod, or even the hangman’s rope? No wonder they fear us, who can counterfeit not just kings and princes, but the gods themselves! And there is more. We counterfeit feeling... and even being. There is no liar like a player!”

“Or a drunken scrivener,” said Feival, amused but also a little irritated now. “Who loves to see what shiny things come from his mouth like a child making bubbles of spit.”

“Very good, young Ulian, very good,” said Hewney, and took another drink. “You yet might make a poet yourself.”

“Why bother, when I can get poetry from most of ’em any time I want just by showing my bum?”

“Because someday that alabaster fundament will be old and raddled, wrinkled as a turkey’s neck,” said Hewney. “And I, once the prettiest boy in Helmingsea, should know.”

“And now you are a buyer, not a seller, and any fair young tavern maid can have your poetry for a copper’s worth of pretending, Master Hewney.” Feival was amused. “So lying, too, is for sale—that is the whole of what you’re saying. It seems to me that what you describe is the marketplace, and any peasant knows how a market works.”

“But none know so well as players,” Hewney repeated stubbornly. Briony could detect just the smallest slur in his words now.

The others gathered by the fire seemed to recognize this as a familiar game. They urged him on, pouring more ale for him and asking him mocking questions.

“What are players afraid of?” shouted one.

“And what exactly is it that players know?” said the fellow named Waterman.

“Players are afraid of being interrupted,” snapped Hewney. “And what they know is...everything that is of worth. Why do you think that the common people say, ‘Go and ask in the innyard,’ when they deem something a mystery? Because that is where the players are to be found. Why say, ‘As well ask the mask whose face it covers?’ Because they know that the matter of life is secrets, and that we players know them all and act them all, if the price is right. Think of old Lord Brone—or our new Lord Havemore! They know who it is who hears all. Who knows all the filthiest secrets....” Hewney’s head swayed. He seemed suddenly to have lost his thread of discourse. “They know what...they know who...will sniff out the truth in the back alleys. And for a little silver, who will tell that truth in the halls of the great and powerful...”

“Perhaps it’s time for you to take a walk, Nevin,” said a voice from just behind Briony, startling her so that she almost squeaked again. Finn Teodoros was standing on the steps of the wagon, his round form almost completely hiding the painted door. “Or simply to go to your bed. We have a long day tomorrow, far to walk.”

“And I am talking too much,” said Hewney. “Yes, Brother Finn, I hear you. All the gods know I would not want to offend anyone with my o’er-busy tongue.” He smiled at Briony as sweetly as a squinting, sweaty man could manage. “Perhaps our newest player would like to come for a walk with me. I will speak of safer subjects—the early days of the theater, when players were criminals and could never set up in the same pasture two nights running...”

“No, I think Master Tim will come with me.” Teodoros gave him a stern look. “You are a fool, Nevin.”

“But undisguised,” said Hewney, still smiling. “An honest fool.”

“If snakes are honest,” said Feival.

“They are honestly snakes,” Hewney replied, and everyone laughed.

“What was he talking about?” Briony said. “I hardly understood any of it.”

“Just as well,” said Teodoros, and then spoke quickly, as if he did not wish to dwell on the subject. “So tell me, Tim... my girl,” he grinned. “How long has it been since you left Southmarch?”

“I do not know, exactly.” She didn’t want to set things exactly the same as in truth—no sense making anyone think too much about Princess Briony’s disappearance. “Sometime before Orphanstide. I ran away. My master beat me,” she said, hoping to make it all sound more reasonable.

“Had the fairies come?”

She nodded. “No one knew much, though. The army was going out to fight them, but I have heard...heard that the fairies won.” She caught her breath. Barrick...“Has anyone...learned more about what happened?”

Teodoros shook his head. “There is not much to report. There was a great battle west of Greater Southmarch, in the farmlands outside the city, and fewer than a third of the soldiers made it away again, bringing reports of great slaughter and terrible deeds. Then the fairies took the mainland city, and as far as I know they are still there. Our patron Rorick Longarren was killed, as were many other noble knights—Mayne Calough, Lord Aldritch, more than anyone can count, the greatest slaughter of chivalry since Kellick Eddon’s day.”

“And the prince—Prince Barrick? Has anyone heard anything of him?”

Teodoros looked at her for a long moment, then sighed. “No word. He is presumed dead. None can go close enough to the battlefield—all are terrified of the fairies, although they have done no violence since then, and seem content to sit in the dark city, waiting for something.” He shrugged. “But no one travels west any more. The Settland Road is empty. No one passes through the mainland city at all. We had to take ship to Oscastle to begin our own journey.”

Briony felt as though someone pressed her heart between two strong hands—it was hard to breathe, hard even to think. “Who...who would believe such times would come?” “Indeed.” Teodoros suddenly sat forward. “Now, though, you must brighten a little, young Tim. Life goes on, and you have given me a most splendid idea.”

“What do you mean?”

“Simply this. Here, these are the foul papers of The Ravishment of Zoria. I thought it was finished, but you have provided me with such a daring inspiration that I am adding page upon page. For just the jests alone I would owe you much praise—you can never have too many good jokes in a work where many bloody battles are fought, after all. The one sends the audience back for the other, like sweet and savory.”

“What idea are you talking about?” Did all playwrights babble like this? Could none of them speak in plain, sensible words?

“It is simply this. Your...plight put me in mind of it. Often in plays we have seen a girl passing for a boy. It is an old trick —some daughter of the minor nobility playing at being a rustic, calling herself a shepherd or some such. But never has it been a goddess!”

“A...what?”

“A goddess! I had my Zoria steal out of the clutches of Khors the Moonlord disguised as a serving wench, and thus did she pass herself among the mortals. But with you as my worldly inspiration, I have changed her disguise to that of a boy. A goddess, not merely passing as a mortal, but as a human boy—do you not see how rich that is, how much it adds to the business of her escape and her time among the mortal herd?”

“I suppose.” Briony was feeling tired now, sleepy and without much strength for being talked at anymore. She remembered all Lisiya had said, and could not resist tweaking Teodoros a little. “Here’s another thought for you to consider. What if Zoria wasn’t ravished by Khors? What if she truly loved him—ran away with him?”

Teodoros stared at her for a long moment, more shocked than she thought a man of ideas should have been. “What do you mean? Would you speak against all the authority of The Book of the Trigon?”

“I’m not speaking against anything.” It was hard to keep her eyes open any longer. “I’m just saying that if you want to look at things differently, why settle for the easy way?”

She slid off the edge of Teodoros’ bed to the floor and curled up under the blanket he had loaned her, leaving the playwright staring into the shadows the single candle could not reach, his expression a mixture of startlement and surmise.