Her part had been clearly appointed.
“Just show up and don’t cause a scene,” Feodor had said.
“Fine. But that’s all I’m doing.”
“I wouldn’t trust you with anything else.”
“You’re wise,” she said, though she bit her tongue not to let her resentment show.
So she had stayed on the edge of things, waiting with almost malicious intent for another unfortunate to approach and offer some convoluted form of condolence. She imagined herself glittering like some hard bright object. Go on, she willed them. Try me. But fewer and fewer people did. The rest of the family were more accessible, even her mother. Her own friends seemed confused by their leader’s withdrawal from centre stage. They clung together in tiny shoals, chattering over the rims of their glasses.
In the next room, the pianist picked his way through the second half of the programme. A Neon Age interlude drifted into the Broken Ice sonata. Adelaide’s throat tightened. Axel loved this piece. Axel used to play it, badly. Such was the intensity of her longing that she believed, for a second, that she saw her twin standing there-and then she blinked, and the ache of missing was as vast as it had been before.
Adelaide leaned out to get a better look at the performer. It was Ruben Tallak, the composer, who had tutored both her and her brother. Standing alone by the piano was her grandfather.
He had seen her. Slowly, Adelaide extracted herself from the alcove and made her way over, straightening her collar and tie. Her grandfather, though in many ways the most lenient of the family, was meticulous about presentation. Above the lapels of his velvet jacket, his face was an intricate network; a history contained in every line. He held a glass less than half full of an amber weqa. She knew it was because of his shaking hands. He was worried the liquid might spill.
“Alright, Adie,” he said gently.
“I want to go, Grandfather. Please, say I can leave.”
Leonid’s hand rested for a moment on her hair, as it often used to when she was a child. She felt it tremor. She wished that her grandfather could give her a hug. But they were in public, and besides, she had given up that right.
“I’m sorry, Adie. We need you to stay.”
“Leonid.” One of the Councillors approached her grandfather, solemn faced. Adelaide melted away. The Councillor’s pompous tones echoed after her. “Such a tragedy. Barely come of age…”
She stumbled upon other conversations, each flirting sombrely around the same topic, each fading away at her approach.
“Poor Viviana, have you seen her? So wan.”
“She should drink an infusion of red coral tea every night. It may not restore the spirits immediately, but it does energise the body…”
Low murmurs; a group around the canape table.
“-can’t help noticing that this is the second incident involving a founding family. Has anyone even considered that it could be the same people who killed the Dumays? What if…?”
“My dear, that was almost twenty years ago-”
“Eighteen, to be precise-may they rest with the stars.”
“-and anyway, Kaat was convicted.”
“Actually, she was never officially convicted because she never confessed.”
“A sure sign of guilt… of course I am not saying he is dead, you understand, but one does fear the worst. And it might have been easy, you know, the way he was, to lure-”
Finding Adelaide’s eyes cold upon her, the speaker stopped abruptly.
“Adelaide, my dear-” someone else spoke.
Adelaide turned away. She saw Linus talking to one of the krill, and watched him for a moment, wondering what he was saying. The journalist was listening intently, nodding through Linus’s sentences. Then she reached out and put a hand on his arm. It might have been a gesture of sympathy, nothing more, but Adelaide saw him shrink. And something about Linus’s reluctance struck her as important, as if, having listened to a song a thousand times over, she had suddenly noticed a flat note in the vocal. She continued to survey him for some time before she realized it was not her brother she should be concerned with. The discordance lay elsewhere.
“I’m sorry about Axel.”
The voice from behind her was Tyr, who worked for her father. Generally they would exchange pleasantries, but today she did not turn to look at him. She couldn’t.
“Why? He’s not dead.”
Tyr paused. “I mean the not knowing.”
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, that is something to be sorry about.”
Through the doors, she saw her father was engaged in discussion with a black-suited man she did not recognize.
“Who is that?” she asked Tyr.
“I believe it’s the new man in charge of the investigation.”
Her father was tall, but his companion stood half a head above him, a thin angular streak of a man. His head was inclined politely towards Feodor.
“For Axel?”
“Yes.”
She moved away before Tyr could tell her more, pushing through the mourners, or whatever they thought they were. Feodor saw her coming. She knew he was aware of her intent, half expected him to vanish the visitor away before she had a chance to speak to him. But when she reached them, Feodor made the obligatory introductions.
“This is my daughter, Adelaide. Adie, this is Sanjay Hanif, who took over the investigation when it went to Council.”
There was nothing in this pronouncement out of place, other than the abbreviation, which suggested an affection entirely absent from their relationship. Adelaide contrived an equally fake smile.
“Hello. We’ve not seen you before. I haven’t, anyway.”
“How could you have, Adelaide.” Feodor’s voice was light in its warning. Hanif appeared not to notice. He had dark sombre eyes, a listening face. He reminded her of someone but she could not think who.
“I was only recently assigned,” he said. “I read your statement.”
“I hope you enjoyed it.”
He looked at her curiously. “It was through you the family discovered Axel was missing, was it not?”
“Indirectly. It was the delivery girl, Yonna.”
“A girl you employed.”
“That’s right.”
Feodor interrupted before she could say any more. “It was very important to Adelaide that her brother was well looked after. She undertook a lot of organization on his behalf.”
“It is very important,” Adelaide clarified. “And it’s alright, Feodor, I’ve been through these questions before. I have no objection to going over them again if it helps to find Axel.”
An awkward silence followed. Sanjay Hanif glanced at his watch.
“I’m deeply sorry for what you are all going through,” he said. “Hopefully we will have new information soon. But I’m afraid I cannot stay any longer. Thank you for your time.” He pressed his inner wrist to Feodor’s, then Adelaide’s, in formal greeting. She waited as he stepped swiftly through the crowds, gauging the optimum moment for pursuit. Feodor took her arm.
“You can’t go after him.” The genial tone of this pronouncement did not deceive Adelaide. She had grown up in a public environment; she knew the duality a voice could hold.
“Why not? I have to talk to him.”
Her skin was drained of colour where he gripped it, and there was a nerve twitching just above his left eye that she knew of old. She saw it for the first time the day Axel let out a cage of geckos at one of their parents’ anniversary parties. The twins were six years old. The stunt had earned them both a beating. Open it. You open it! I dared you first. Old friends, these memories. She almost smiled, but a twinge of pain shot through her arm as Feodor’s fingers squeezed harder. She wriggled, trying to free herself without drawing attention to her captive
