Chapter 144 Cadenza’s Aria

His right foot slid forward before he told it to, whispering across the boards in a perfect waltz step. His left followed it, then his hips, then his arms, each limb answering a wire he could not feel.

"One, two, three, one, two, three, you have a natural turn, Mister Nilo," Lathe said, clapping softly.

"Chin up, dear, a dancer’s eyes belong to the audience, never the floor."

’My feet are dancing and I’m not even in the room.’

The church seemed to breathe around him, pews creaking, rafters sighing, six hundred painted smiles tilting slowly toward his steps. Dust fell from the beams with every step, settling on the shoulders of a boy who never learned to dance.

"Three-quarter time suits you, steady hips, level shoulders, a proper frame," Lathe said.

He whirled across the stage with the Magpie’s tailcoat flaring, his stolen top hat tipping to the pews. Six hundred villagers applauded in perfect time, their hands clapping on the downbeat, their painted smiles never moving.

"I would like it noted that I am not dancing, the dancing is being done to me."

Clangor muttered, "Young man, a gentleman does not waltz with a carpenter, it is simply not done."

The wires walked him through a pirouette, a dip, a bow, each move crisp enough to win a ballroom prize. Above the stage his friends swung gently on their strings, their painted smiles fixed in a hideous parody of joy.

Pipa whined, "Chat, I can hear colors, someone please explain what is happening to my ears."

"A Steelhorn has never been so insulted by a waltz," Bruno grumbled.

Lathe watched from his stool with his fingertips pressed together, nodding at each step like a teacher at recital. Spindle swayed behind the harp with her eyes closed, a faint humming escaping her lips between every single note.

"Class, mark how he resists, the finest dancers always begin by resisting."

"You like numbers, they never argue back," Nilo said between steps.

"Numbers have never betrayed me, dear boy, which is more than I can say for people."

"Then why keep six hundred people on strings?"

"People are the only numbers that misbehave, a town is a sum worth correcting," Lathe replied, tapping his chin.

Zinnia gasped from the rafters, "Count it, the fourth beat is—"

A wire snapped her jaw shut with a crack, silencing her mid-word, though her eyes kept burning down at him.

"Don’t worry, I heard you," he whispered, spinning past the harp.

Every grip he ever escaped, he escaped by becoming someone else a half second ahead of the fingers. Here the fingers were wire, the half second gone, every face he owned locked behind a limp wrist.

"Mister Nilo, you are mumbling again, a dancer should smile."

"Little one, they dance with the pain of six hundred others, I can feel the tune pulling at all of us," the Weeper murmured from the rack.

"Fourth beat, watch her hands," Zilch said.

Cadenza sighed, "Darling, I was born ready for this, I merely require a rest."

"One, two, three," he counted under his breath, his heels sliding in time with the harp.

On the first beat his left arm lifted, on the second his hip turned, on the third his chin rose. On the fourth, Spindle’s fingers lifted from the strings to breathe, every wire sagging slack for a single full heartbeat.

’There, the rest... she has to breathe like everybody else.’

His wrist flicked on the fourth beat, the Magpie’s hat spinning away as a feathered tailcoat flared in its place. Crimson waves tumbled down his back, a tuning fork spear dropping into his hand like a long-awaited encore at last.

Gold trim shimmered along his sleeves, feather epaulettes catching what little light remained like stage lights.

"Behold the diva, grand and bright, who ends your harp’s long gentle night," he sang, in a voice that was not quite his.

Lathe tilted his head as the feathered tailcoat caught the dim light, a connoisseur quietly appraising a rare vase. Spindle clapped her silver fingers together, the wire-tips chiming, her half-late laugh bubbling out of her like a kettle.

"Oh, a soprano, how lovely, I do enjoy a duet," Spindle said, delighted.

He struck the tuning fork against the floor and sang, a golden note rippling out in a white-hot ring. The harp’s lowest strings snapped like rotten rope, their silver ends whipping across the whole stage in glittering coils.

"It is working, young man, observe the strings."

Along the pews the wires went slack, six hundred heads lifting as though waking together from a long, terrible fever. The boy with the hay fork stared at his own hands, fingers curling for the first time in nine days.

At the edge of the pews the woman who hummed the lullaby clapped both hands over her mouth, sobbing aloud.

The boy’s hay fork slid from his fingers, "Mama, is that you?"

Echoes of the golden note rolled on across the whole nave, windows ringing faintly in their frames. Pews trembled, dust leapt from every beam, the bell in the tower tolling once all by itself.

"Oh, that is a lovely note, dear, let me give it a friend."

She sang in a clear soprano, her voice sliding gently under his until the two notes locked together. Every wire in the church trembled in answer, the sound twisting in midair like a rope pulled taut.

"Darling, no, she is harmonizing with me, that is the oldest trick in the opera."

A heartbeat later the wires snapped taut again, yanking the boy’s fingers back around the fork.

The doubled note whipped around the nave, slamming into the rafters where the squad hung from their wires. Zinnia screamed, Bruno’s pauldron burst open, Pipa’s glasses cracked down the middle with a sound like breaking ice.

"Stop this tune, it’s far too soon," he gasped, though the song kept pouring out of his throat.

Her voice broke, "Child, I cannot, my price will not let me, a diva sings until the final bar."

Spindle’s hands moved faster, drawing the doubled note through every wire in the church like thread through a needle. Nilo’s mouth opened wider against his will, the aria dragging itself out of him toward the people he loved.

’She’s not fighting the song, she’s feeding it to them.’

"Hold the rest, darling, hold the rest, I beg you."

Nilo clamped his jaw with every scrap of will he owned, biting off the aria at the root. The last note died in a ragged cough, leaving a ringing silence that smelled of scorched silver strings.

[ BOND ]

[Madame Cadenza: Bond 4]

[Learned: Tacet, a rest that still counts as a note]

Plain words came back to him in the rests, a gift of the mask.

"A lovely duet, dear, a little short on stamina, but lovely," Spindle said kindly.

Dust and splinters rained from the rafters, leaving the three students sagging on their wires like limp laundry. Brickle alone kept kicking, his shoes drumming a frantic rhythm against the rafters while he muttered about forms.

"Do not sing again, whatever you do," Zinnia gasped, blood on her lip, "just do not sing."

"I am unharmed, I am merely rearranged," Bruno wheezed.

"Chat, my left lens is a spiderweb, I see half the room."

"I must request a refund from the entire Field Trial, this is the worst inspection of my career," Brickle called.

"Examiner, kindly stop kicking, you are rocking my half of the rafters."

"Four-part counterpoint from a boy and a harp."

"Four masks in nine minutes, a wardrobe that large surely wants a catalog, I would be glad to draw one up for you," Lathe added.

"It is the nicest thing anyone has sung to me in forty years, dear," Spindle added wistfully.

The crimson waves fell limp around his shoulders, the feather epaulettes drooping like a bird that forgot its own song. Even the tuning fork spear dimmed, its bright hum shrinking to a thread no louder than a single held breath.

"I forgot the oldest rule of the stage, darling... a soloist must listen for the choir."

Nilo shook his head, "You couldn’t have known she’d answer you like that."

"Every house I ever sang in answered me, I should have known, I called it applause."

"I once sang for a general who loved my voice so much that he marched an army to it, darling, I never asked where they were going."

"That’s not a lesson, that’s a nightmare," he muttered.

"A voice is a leash when the wrong hand holds the other end."

The loops around his wrists tightened with each wrong step, biting shallow red lines into his skin. Blood beaded where the silver cut, running down his fingers in lines that dripped onto the boards.

"A diva who cannot yield the stage is merely a puppet of her own applause," she went on softly, "she is not pulling you, darling, she is playing you, the way I once played a hall."

"For the record, I thought the aria was lovely, I only wish it did not break everyone," Jingles whispered.

"Even a knight loses the first skirmish, young man, it is the second that proves him."

The wires tugged again, swinging his arms into a flourish he never chose, bowing him toward the pews. Lathe began to hum along under his breath, tapping the beat against his thigh with the folding rule.

’Four beats, the rest on the fourth, a song only works if there’s air to carry it.’

"Darling, the fourth beat is the only note she does not own, take it from her," Cadenza whispered.

"I would like to remind everyone that I have no plan, only very strong opinions."

"Then we shall borrow Zilch’s, young man, a plan is a plan," Clangor answered.

"Whispering with the masks again, dear, is such bad manners toward your partner."

Nilo stared at the harp, then the pews, then the dangling squad, the pattern clicking together like a lock. Six hundred wires, a lone harp, a single player, a tune that lived only while somebody carried its sound.

"Little one, listen, the song needs a body, a body needs a breath," the Weeper whispered.

Silence settled over the stage while the harp waited, a thousand silver strings humming like a held breath. Nilo’s wrists hung loose in their loops, the grip of the wires humming in time with his pulse.

"Two masks, one fourth beat, and exactly one chance."

"So I stop being a note," he said, rolling his shoulders as far as the loops allowed.

"Wear us both," Zilch said.