Unhonored (3 page)

Ellis, frustrated, looked about her. There were knobs to drawers on either side of the table. She snatched at one of them, pulling on it sharply.

The table scraped against the hardwood floor with a terrible squeal.

“It's fake,” Ellis said to Alicia under her breath. “Not even the drawers are real … they're just painted on.”

“I'll ring for the handyman,” Alicia said with a slightly distracted tone. “He'll have those fixed in no time.”

“That's not the point!” Ellis snapped. “There's a cheery fire in the fireplace in this room but it's not giving off any heat! It's as though we are living in a doll's house.”

“You didn't give him enough time,” Alicia said in a rush of whispered words. “This is a very old Book and he wasn't prepared to change the Day. He's never had to build anything this quickly before. It will take him time to get the details right.”

“Who? For who to get the details right?” Ellis demanded.

“The lord of the m-manor,” Alicia stuttered slightly as she replied. “Your husband, of course.”

“And just who is this ‘husband' I'm supposed to have?” Ellis asked, both knowing and dreading the answer.

“Lord Merrick,” Alicia whined, drawing back as though Ellis might strike her.

Ellis hissed her words through clenched teeth. “He set this up so that I am the lady of the house and
he
is the lord? How very convenient for him!”

“He's just trying to please you,” Alicia burbled. “He's just trying to please us all.”

“Please you?” Ellis was astonished at the statement. “Alicia, you more than anyone else know what is at stake. You've seen the madness of this place. You wanted to leave it as much as I. If you could only just—ouch!”

Alicia had tugged sharply on a tangle in Ellis's hair.

“Sorry,” Alicia said. “That was my fault.”

“Stop pretending, Alicia.” Ellis pushed on in earnest, turning to face the woman. “We can do this. Together, with your help, we can find our way to the Gate.”

“No, Ellis,” Alicia implored. “Don't speak of it!”

“You were there,” Ellis continued. “I don't remember much but I
do
remember you were there when I left. You saw what happened. We found the Gate together once and we can find it again. We can leave this place…”

“No!”

“Why not?” Ellis demanded.

Now it was Alicia's turn to shiver in the room. “Don't you know what happened to me after I tried to help you in Gamin? I was cast out. Out into the … into the Bad Place. The Nothing Place. Those were the rules, Ellis, and you made me believe I could break the rules. But I
can't.
I can't go back there again and you can't go back either.”

“Why?” Ellis asked. “Why can I not go back?”

“I don't know,” Alicia said simply. “It's a rule.”

“Rules!” Ellis turned in exasperation away from Alicia. “Merrick's rules! Rules he makes up that benefit only him and punish the rest of us. It's hopeless!”

Alicia stepped hesitantly back toward Ellis as she spoke. She leaned close to her ear as she whispered, her hands resting gently on Ellis's shoulders. “No, not hopeless, Ellis. There are rules that were written before Merrick; rules that cannot be changed or ignored. There must always be a Gate. Whoever's Day we are playing, somehow I know that they must obey that rule. Maybe Merrick likes to hide the Gate and maybe he's gotten quite clever at it but he cannot destroy it and he cannot keep us from it.”

Ellis reached up and laid her hand on Alicia's.

Alicia considered for a moment. “The soldiers know about the Gate and so does Dr. Carmichael. Maybe that friend of yours…”

“Jonas?” Ellis said, her voice flat as she spoke the name.

“Yes.” Alicia stepped again behind Ellis and, hesitantly at first, began again to untangle her hair.

“I don't know who Jonas is,” Ellis replied. “At least, not yet. I know who he
says
he is, but I don't trust him any more than I trust Merrick.”

“It's your funeral, Ellis.”

Ellis considered for a moment. She still did not remember who she was or from where she had come. She was not even sure whether she was alive or dead. All she had were the words of others telling her who she was and those from people she no longer trusted.

You can't win the game until you know the rules …

Ellis closed her eyes. It was a memory from long ago. It sounded in her mind like a woman's voice but there was no name or face or place associated with it.

You have to learn the rules before you can break them …

Another voice in her memory and this time a man's voice. A voice that made her smile. She tried desperately to hang on to the memory but it was gone as a wave retreating from the shore. Nothing more.

“Alicia, just when is this masquerade?” Ellis asked.

“Within the hour, I believe,” she replied.

“Indeed.” Ellis nodded. Ellis eyed the costume dress still draped over the chair. “You say I've been mistress of this house before?”

“I don't believe there were any others before you,” Alicia said more cheerfully.

“Was I a good mistress?”

The strokes of the comb through Ellis's hair hesitated for a moment before continuing.

Ellis considered for a moment and then rephrased her question. “Perhaps what I meant to ask was, ‘Was I good at playing the part of the mistress?'”

“You were always the best in your Day,” Alicia replied.

You have to learn the rules before you can break them.

“Thank you, Alicia,” Ellis sighed. “Let me rest for a few minutes and then come back with Margaret to help me dress.”

“Of course, dearest friend,” Alicia replied.

Ellis turned toward the window. She could not see through the sheets of rain pelting the glass to anything that may be in the darkness beyond. “I guess the weather will prevent us from going outside.”

“Outside?” Alicia giggled. “What a fanciful notion! May I be of any further service, Ellis?”

“Not now,” Ellis said with a smile playing at the edges of her lips. “But perhaps later.”

 

3

MASQUERADE

Ellis set her jaw and started up the stairs. The treads were covered in a deep pile, crimson carpet held firmly in place by bright brass carpet runners. The mahogany railings on both sides were ornately carved and polished to a gleaming shine. The newel posts at the top of the railings each supported a golden candelabra, each of which was fitted with a plethora of small electric bulbs that filled the space with bright illumination. At the top of the stairs was a landing, the back wall of which was composed almost entirely of a stained glass window that rose nearly fifteen feet to the coffered ceiling overhead. It was a bright and inviting space that seemed to gently beckon her toward the upper rooms.

Ellis took every step with dread.

She wore the costume that Margaret had laid out for her. Despite Alicia's repeated assurances that Ellis had chosen the costume herself, she had no memory of doing so.

Ellis hesitated on the stairs and smiled grimly to herself. It would not have been the first thing that she had forgotten. Indeed, it seemed far more likely that she would have no memory of something than that she should recall it. Nevertheless, she felt certain that this would not have been a costume that she would have chosen for herself. The outfit was perfectly tailored to her form but there was something about this costume in particular—a black-on-white rendition of a clown—that she found distasteful and slightly obscene. But her own clothing was soaked and this was the only option that presented itself.

Besides, she reminded herself, if one were to learn the rules of the game, one had to play the part.

“Ellis, are you all right?” Alicia, only a step or two behind her and slightly to her left, reached forward and took Ellis's elbow in her hand as though to steady her.

Ellis turned and smiled at Alicia, conveying a gentle humor that she did not feel. “Quite all right. Perhaps just a little overexcited.”

Alicia, resplendent in her Egyptian accoutrements, smiled sweetly back at her in reply.

I wonder if she is lying to me as much as I am lying to her,
Ellis thought as she turned and continued up the staircase.

Her eyes became fixed for a moment on the stained glass window. It was a beautiful design with an intricate, high level of detail. It was a curious depiction and yet somehow familiar. There were two figures: one each of a man and a woman. The man was shown wearing a powder-blue morning coat and pants while the woman was in a long gown of a matching color. They stood side by side with their arms extended slightly from their bodies, their palms facing outward. From their open hands, great swirling patterns of glass and color flowed, spiraling outward, forming patterns on either side of them that when taken together reminded Ellis of the wings of a lunar moth. As she reached the landing she could make out minute details embedded in the glass more clearly: ruins, castle towers, forests, jungles, desert dunes, schooners, along with buildings and towns of every era and description. One in particular caught her eye. It looked almost exactly like the home that she had occupied in Gamin with her cousin, Jenny, before the world had gone mad. Ellis leaned in closer as she thought she had seen figures moving in the glass depiction of her seaside home.

“Ellis, please hurry,” Alicia urged. “Everyone is waiting for you.”

Ellis turned reluctantly away from the stained glass. The landing led to a pair of staircases on either side that doubled back to either side of a balustrade that overlooked the stairwell. Ellis could hear the loud clatter of her heels against the stone treads echoing about the stairwell. There seemed otherwise to be a terrible silence, as though the house itself were holding its breath.

At the top of the stairs was a set of double doors with frosted glass into a pattern of leaded panes. Beyond the glass, shadows shifted back and forth.

Ellis hesitated.

“What is it now?” Alicia demanded.

For a moment, Ellis wished that she were back in Gamin. There, at least, the world largely made sense. She knew little more now about herself than she did when she had first arrived at that train station. But at least in that seaside town she had some hope of normality. Now, however, she was in a world where she could trust nothing and no one.

You have to know the rules before you can win the game …

She furrowed her brow and then stepped resolutely toward the doors. She grasped both handles, turned them and pulled.

The sudden cheer startled her.

The room beyond was crowded in the extreme, packed tightly with costumed revelers from blue wall to blue wall. All of them turned the caricatures of their masked faces toward Ellis, each adding their voice to the tumult that struck her like an unexpected wave on the shore. She was confronted in that moment by a dizzying array of costumes and false faces. The woman whose gown was that of a shepherdess but whose mask resembled the visage of a lamb. A samurai wearing a grinning Kabuki mask. A figure in pantaloons covered entirely in pinfeathers with the hood that obscured their face in the shape of an owl's head extending down into a cape resembling wings. The strange menagerie poured out through the double doors, chattering, screeching and burbling as they surrounded and engulfed Ellis.

“It's all for you, Ellis,” beamed Alicia. She took Ellis by her arm, drawing her into the blue room. “He did it all for you.”

The crowd surged around her. The room was far too small for this number of people. Ellis felt the stifling closeness and a rising panic within her. Between the masked faces, overly elaborate headpieces, farcical hats and hairdos, she glimpsed open doorways that led to further rooms that seemed to be just as crowded and claustrophobic as the one she was in.

Ellis turned, searching for the door through which they had just entered, but she was having difficulty seeing it through the press of people. She felt dizzy, disoriented, and her breaths were coming quickly. She closed her eyes, trying to push away the confusion and overwhelming colors surrounding her. Then, as if at her will, everything stilled.

“Welcome home, Ellis.”

Ellis's eyes flew open, her head jerking toward the sound.

“Merrick,” she said, her tone as much accusation as recognition.

Merrick stood before her, beaming at her with a toothy, brilliant smile. His costume struck Ellis as that of a jester: a carefully fitted jacket with narrow matching pants, both of which displayed a symmetrical pattern of rectangles each made up of two opposing red triangles with green and blue triangles filling out the remaining sides. His gleaming white shoes were topped by ridiculously large balls made of the same material. Like Ellis, he, too, sported a ruff around his collar, although his was much smaller than hers. In his right hand he held an elaborate mask comprised of the features of three faces, each sharing the eye socket with the face to either side. In his left hand, he held a club-like object composed of two wooden slats bound tightly together at one end. Ellis took all of this in quickly and moved on in her mind. She knew that this plumage was just camouflage, bright colors and patterns meant to distract her.

She concentrated instead on his face. It was a visage that she had come to know well since her arrival in Gamin. It was a painfully handsome face. His jawline had sharp and soft angles at once, obscured by the shadow of his heavy beard, which no amount of careful shaving could completely eradicate. He had a slightly aquiline nose that put Michelangelo's
David
to shame. His unfashionably long hair was coiffed in a way that might have suggested a nonchalance to his appearance had he not so obviously taken such care in creating its look.