“A technicality,” her father says. “A game is completed only when there is a single player left. There is no other way to end it. You can abandon any misguided dreams of continuing to play whore to that
“Who is left, then?” Celia asks, ignoring his comment. “You said Alexander’s student won the last challenge, what happened to him?”
A derisive laugh shudders through the shadows before Hector replies.
“
PLAYING WITH FIRE
The only illumination in this tent comes from the fire. The flames are a radiant, flickering white, like the bonfire in the courtyard.
You pass a fire-eater elevated on a striped platform. He keeps small bits of flame dancing atop long sticks while he prepares to swallow them whole.
On another platform, a woman holds two long chains, with a ball of flame at the end of each. She swings them in loops and circles, leaving glowing trails of white light in their paths, moving so quickly that they look like strings of fire rather than single flames on lengths of chain.
Performers on multiple platforms juggle torches, spinning them high into the air. Occasionally, they toss these flaming torches to each other in a shower of sparks.
Elsewhere, there are flaming hoops perched at different levels that performers slip in and out of with ease, as though the hoops were only metal and not encased in flickering flames.
The artist on this platform holds pieces of flame in her bare hands, and she forms them into snakes and flowers and all manner of shapes. Sparks fly from shooting stars, birds flame and disappear like miniature phoenixes in her hands.
She smiles at you as you watch the white flames in her hand become, with the deft movement of her fingers, a boat. A book. A heart of fire.
EN ROUTE FROM LONDON TO MUNICH, NOVEMBER 1, 1901
The train is unremarkable as it chugs across the countryside, puffing clouds of grey smoke into the air. The engine is almost entirely black. The cars it pulls are equally as monochromatic. Those with windows have glass that is tinted and shadowed; those without are dark as coal.
It is silent as it travels, no whistles or horns. The wheels on the track are not screeching but gliding smoothly and quietly. It passes almost unnoticed along its route, making no stops.
From the exterior, it appears to be a coal train, or something similar. It is utterly unremarkable.
The interior is a different story.
Inside, the train is opulent, gilded, and warm. Most of the passenger cars are lined with thick patterned carpets, upholstered in velvets in burgundies and violets and creams, as though they have been dipped in a sunset, hovering at twilight and holding on to the colors before they fade to midnight and stars.
There are lights in sconces lining the corridors, cascades of crystals falling from them and swaying with the motion of the train. Soothing and serene.
Shortly after its departure, Celia places the leather-bound book safely away, camouflaged in plain sight amongst her own volumes.
She changes from her bloodstained gown to a flowing one in moonlight grey, bound with ribbons in black, white, and charcoal, which had been one of Friedrick’s particular favorites.
The ribbons drift behind her as she makes her way down the train.
She stops at the only door that has two calligraphed characters as well as a handwritten name on the tag next to it.
Her polite knock is answered immediately, inviting her inside.
While most of the train compartments are saturated with color, Tsukiko’s private car is almost completely neutral. A bare space surrounded by paper screens and curtains of raw silk, perfumed with the scent of ginger and cream.
Tsukiko sits on the floor in the center of the room, wearing a red kimono. A beating crimson heart in the pale chamber.
And she is not alone. Isobel lies on the floor with her head in Tsukiko’s lap, sobbing softly.
“I did not mean to interrupt,” Celia says. She hesitates in the doorway, ready to slide the door closed again.
“You are not interrupting,” Tsukiko says, beckoning her inside. “Perhaps you will be able to help me convince Isobel that she is in need of some rest.”
Celia says nothing, but Isobel wipes her eyes, nodding as she stands.
“Thank you, Kiko,” she says, smoothing out the wrinkles in her gown. Tsukiko remains seated, her attention on Celia.
Isobel stops next to Celia as she makes her way to the door.
“I am sorry about Herr Thiessen,” she says.
“I am as well.”
For a moment, Celia thinks Isobel means to embrace her, but instead she only nods before leaving, sliding the door closed behind her.
“The last hours have been long for all of us,” Tsukiko says after Isobel has departed. “You need tea,” she adds before Celia can explain why she is there. Tsukiko sits her down on a cushion and walks silently to the end of the car, fetching her tea supplies from behind one of the tall screens.
It is not the full tea ceremony that she has performed on several occasions over the years, but as Tsukiko slowly prepares two bowls of green matcha, it is beautiful and calming nonetheless.
“Why did you never tell me?” Celia asks when Tsukiko has settled herself across from her.
“Tell you what?” Tsukiko asks, smiling over her tea.
Celia sighs. She wonders if Lainie Burgess felt a similar frustration over two different cups of tea in Constantinople. She has half a mind to break Tsukiko’s tea bowl, just to see what she would do.
“Did you injure yourself?” Tsukiko asks, nodding at the scar on Celia’s finger.
“I was bound into a challenge almost thirty years ago,” Celia says. She sips her tea before adding, “Are you going to show me your scar, now that you have seen mine?”
Tsukiko smiles and places her tea on the floor in front of her. Then she turns and lowers the neck of her kimono.
At the nape of her neck, in the space between a shower of tattooed symbols, nestled in the curve of a crescent moon, there is a faded scar about the size and shape of a ring.
“The scars last longer than the game, you see,” Tsukiko says, straightening her kimono around her shoulders.
“It was one of my father’s rings that did that,” Celia says, but Tsukiko does not confirm or deny the statement.
“How is your tea?” she asks.
“Why are you here?” Celia counters.
“I was hired to be a contortionist.”
Celia puts down her tea.
“I am not in the mood for this, Tsukiko,” she says.
“Should you choose your questions more carefully, you may receive more satisfying answers.”
“Why did you never tell me you knew about the challenge?” Celia asks. “That you had played before yourself?”
