The Return: Shadow Souls

tempting people to sloth. Elena made a mental note to ask Meredith whether this meant tempting them to eat sloths, which she knew were some kind of wild animal that didn’t move around much, or something else.

Then Elena thought that Lady Ulma had called the dress a “goddess dress,” hadn’t she? It was certainly a dress you could only wear if your body was very young and very close to perfection, because there was no way to fit corsetry into it or even to drape it to minimize an unflattering feature. The only things under the dress were Elena’s own firm young physique and a pair of scant, soft flesh-colored lace underwear. Oh, and a spray of jasmine perfume.

So it’s a goddess I feel like, she thought, thanking the demon (who stood and bowed). People were taking their seats for the Silver Nightingale’s first performance. Elena had to admit to a longing to see

Lady Fazina, and besides, it was too early to try for a restroom trip — Elena had already noticed that guards were posted at all the doors.

There were two harps on a dais in the middle of a great circle of chairs. And then suddenly everyone was on their feet and clapping, and Elena would have seen nothing, if the Lady Fazina had not chosen to walk down the same aisle Elena and Damon had taken. As it was, she paused right beside Sage to acknowledge the roar of acclamation, and Elena had a perfect view of her.

She was a lovely young woman, who to Elena’s surprise looked hardly older than twenty, and was nearly as small as Bonnie. This diminutive creature obviously took her sobriquet very seriously: she was dressed entirely in a gown of silver mesh. Her hair was metallic silver, too, swept high in front and very short in back. Her train was barely attached to her, by two simple clasps at the shoulders. It floated horizontally behind her, constantly in motion, more like a moonbeam or a cloud than like real material until she got to the central dais and ascended it, then walked once around the tall uncovered harp, at which point the suspended part of the cape fell softly and gracefully to the floor in a semicircle around her.

And then came the magic of the Silver Nightingale’s voice. She began by playing the tall harp, which seemed even taller in comparison to her small body. She could make the harp sing under her fingers, coax it to cry like the wind or make music that seemed to descend from heaven in glissandos. Elena wept throughout her first song, even though it was sung in some foreign language. It was so piercingly sweet that it reminded Elena of Stefan, of the times they had been together, communicating by only the softest words and touches…

But Lady Fazina’s most impressive instrument was her voice. Her tiny body could generate an extraordinary volume when she wanted it to. And as she sang one poignant, minor-tuned song after another, Elena could feel her skin break out into gooseflesh, and a trembling in her legs. She felt that at any moment she might fall to her knees as the melodies filled her heart.

When someone touched her from behind, Elena started violently, brought back too quickly from the fantasy world the music had woven around her. But it was only Meredith, who despite her own love for music had a very practical suggestion for their group.

“I was going to say, why not start now, while everyone else is listening?” she whispered. “Even the guards are out of it. We agreed on two by two, yes?”

Elena nodded. “We’re just having a look around the house. We may even find something while everyone is still here, listening, for nearly another hour. Sage, maybe you could sort of liaise between the two groups, telepathically.”

“It would be my privilege, Madame.”

The five of them set out into the Silver Nightingale’s mansion.

28

They walked right by the weeping door-guards. But very quickly, they discovered that while almost everyone was listening to Lady Fazina, in each room of the palace that was open to the public, a black-clad, white-gloved steward awaited, ready to give out information, and to keep a watchful eye on his lady’s possessions.

The first room that gave them any kind of hope was Lady Fazina’s Hall of Harpery, a room devoted entirely to the display of harps, from ancient, bowlike, single-stringed instruments, undoubtedly played by individuals who were similar to cavedwellers, to tall, gilded, orchestral harps like the one Fazina was now playing, the music audible throughout the palace. Magic, Elena thought again. They seem to use it here instead of technology.

“Each kind of harp has a unique key to tune the strings,” Meredith whispered, looking down the length of the hall. On each side the line of harps marched into the distance. “One of those keys might be the key.”

“But how will we even know?” Bonnie was fanning herself lightly with her peacock feather fan. “What’s the difference between a harp key and the fox key?”

“I don’t know. And I’ve never heard of a key being kept in a harp, either. It would rattle around the sound box every time the harp shifted slightly,” Meredith admitted.

Elena bit her lip. It was such a simple, reasonable question. She should feel dismayed, should be wondering how they could ever find one small half of a key in this place. Especially considering that the clue they had — that it was in the Silver Nightingale’s instrument, suddenly seemed absurd.

“I don’t suppose,” Bonnie said a little giddily, “that the instrument is her voice, and that if we reach down her throat…”

Elena turned to look at Meredith, who was looking heavenward — or at whatever was above this hideous dimension. “I know,” Meredith said. “No more drinks for birdbrain here. Although I suppose it’s possible that they give out little silver whistles or instruments as favors — all big parties used to do that, you know — give you a gift.”

“How,” Damon said in a carefully expressionless tone, “would they possibly get the key into a favor for a party being given at least weeks away, and how could they ever hope to retrieve it? Misao might as well have told Elena, ‘We threw the key away.’”

“Well,” began Meredith, “I’m not at all sure that they did mean for the keys to be retrievable, even by them. And Misao could have meant ‘You’d have to search all the garbage from the night of this gala’—or some other party Fazina performed at. I imagine she gets asked to play at a lot of other people’s parties, too.”

Elena hated bickering, even though she was a champion bickerer herself. But she was a goddess tonight. Nothing was impossible. If only she could remember…

Something like white lightning struck her brain.

For just an instant — one instant — she was back, struggling with Misao. Misao was in her fox form, biting and scratching — and snarling out a reply to Elena’s question about where the two halves of the fox key were. “As if you would understand the answers I could give. If I told you that one was inside the silver nightingale’s instrument, would that give you any kind of idea?”

Yes. Those had been the exact words, the real words that Misao had spoken. Elena heard her own voice, repeating the words distinctly now.

And then she felt something like an arc of lightning leave her mind — only to meet another’s not far away. The next thing she knew her eyes were flying open in surprise because Bonnie was speaking in that blank toneless way she always did when making a prophecy:

“Each half of the fox key is shaped like a single fox, with two ears, two eyes, and a snout. The two fox key halves are gold and covered with gems — and their eyes are green. The key you seek is yet in the Silver Nightingale’s instrument.”

“Bonnie!” Elena said. She could see that Bonnie’s knees were trembling, her eyes unfocused. Then they opened and Elena watched as confusion surged in to fill the blankness.

“What’s going on?” Bonnie said, looking around to see everyone looking at her. “What — what happened?”

“You told us what the fox keys look like!” Elena couldn’t help this exclamation — almost a shout of joy. Now that they knew what they were looking for they could free Stefan; they would free Stefan. Nothing would stop Elena now. Bonnie had just helped move this quest to an entirely different level.

But while she was quaking inside with joy at the prophecy, Meredith, in her own level-headed way, was taking care of the prophet. Meredith said quietly, “She’s probably going to faint. Would you please…”

Meredith didn’t have to ask further, for the vampires, Damon and Sage, were each quick enough to catch and support Bonnie on opposite sides. Damon was staring down at the diminutive girl in surprise.