“We were all playing, but for you, and I saw you staring at me from behind long leaves.”
“Elephant grass,” Nothing whispered.
“Yes! You were so small and intense. I stared back. I stared back and I didn’t know what you were! A little boy or a little girl, or a spirit or a ghost—I still thought we could have ghosts in the palace then. No matter how I studied you, I didn’t know. So I walked nearer and I saw it unfurling in you, the name. The answer. It came from you, so you must know it.”
Nothing dragged at her mind, at the Fire Garden, at youthful, beautiful Kirin, at elephant grass and the first time he smiled at her: it wasn’t a dark smile, but a brilliant one. Soft, delighted, perfect. He spoke in her memory.
Kirin’s hand fisted in her hair, but only enough to tug gently.
She lifted her face. Disappointment drained through her. “Command me to remember,” she said.
“You just said if I do it on purpose I’ll lose you forever.”
Nothing scowled at him.
The prince bit his lip, dragging it against his teeth.
With a little huff, Nothing stood. She left them in the altar chamber, promising to take them to the mirror lake in the morning. Then she returned to her room to dress for dinner.
Insistent Tide awaited her and helped her choose a gown and paint and combed her hair.
For the first time, Nothing gave in to her impulses, instead of fighting expectations or fear or trying to decide what would upset others, and simply pleased herself. She wore a shell-pink underdress with an orange organza robe embroidered with hundreds of tiny butterflies that reminded her of the box of wings in the library. Insistent Tide braided tiny pieces of her hair and secured them with pins shaped like jewel-toned beetles. Nothing asked for dark-red lacquer on her nails and bright pink on her lips and eyelids. Insistent Tide painted sweeping butterfly wings onto her cheeks.
Nothing felt like a swirling swarm of beautiful bugs. She wrinkled her nose in the mirror and forced a laugh. She didn’t have to worry. Her friends were safe for now, and even if she didn’t know her name, she knew a few things that she wasn’t.
Insistent Tide snorted and went back to sleep even as Nothing left for supper.
As she walked, she had to lift the voluminous organza butterfly skirts, feeling her steps more than seeing them. Her feet were bare and her toes painted red to match her fingers. Would the sorceress like it? Nothing hoped so—then realized she was eager to see the sorceress again.
Nothing brushed impatient fingers down her skirts, fluttering the butterflies the way her heart fluttered.
The facets of vivid purple and pale violet amethyst of the dining room complemented Nothing’s orange and pink and rainbow bugs, but the dress itself was ridiculous to kneel in. When she settled onto the golden cushion at one end of the set table, the pink skirts settled with her, but layers of butterfly organza crackled and fluffed around her as if she were the center of a soufflé.
Nothing was giggling as she pulled and pressed at different parts of her dress to make the butterflies flutter and swoop, when she noticed the presence of the sorceress.
She froze, catching her breath at being caught in childishness.
But it wasn’t judgment or irony or anything condescending on the sorceress’s face: it was wonder.
Nothing cleared her throat and the sorceress bowed her head, bending her body in a slight, elegant curtsy. Not as to a child, but to an equal. Nothing froze again.
The sorceress lifted herself and said, “Nothing.”
“Sorceress.” Nothing smoothed her hands down her diaphanous dress.
The sorceress swept to the table and knelt, tucking her skirts simply around her legs. She wore an old-fashioned wrapped dress in three layers: black, green, and violet, with a wide sash tied in elaborate, stiff loops at her back. Her hair was knotted atop her head, decorated with sprays of orange tiger lilies. White and green pearls very like Kirin’s hugged her neck and fell over the collars of her dress. She poured wine, sent a cup floating to Nothing and lifted hers—tonight a cut-crystal swan with its neck curled around itself.
Maybe it was a goose, Nothing thought, taking her cup from the air. She saluted and drank.
“My demon played too,” the sorceress said.
“Played?” Nothing took another sip of the light wine, rolling it a bit on her tongue. Honey and cloves and something sharp as pine resin coated her mouth. She liked it.
“With butterflies and color—anything that made it curious. When I walked in, you might never have been gone.”
Nothing swallowed at the sorceress’s light tone. She was hiding something, Nothing thought, though she could not pinpoint how she knew. “Tell me about your demon?”
The sorceress nodded, but first brushed her hands together gently. Silent, invisible servants lifted trays and stirred sauce, serving a first course of buttery soup to Nothing and the sorceress.
After they’d both tasted, the sorceress asked, “What do you know of demons?”
Nothing set her spoon down. “They are dead spirits. They need a house to make their own, either one that is abandoned, one that never had a resident, or one they can steal. They either want very specific things or not much at all.”
“Yes, that is true. But do you know why demons like to be familiars, why they seek sorcerer or witch partners?”
“No.”
“Demons are livid with the power they take and can do what they are meant to do—stagnate a pond, hold the walls of a palace together, explode a mountain, or trick crossroads travelers. But they cannot move from their house without the risk of forever death. For plots, for plans, for movement or change, they need a witch to anchor them or a sorcerer to strengthen their house. Even a great demon, who has not lost its connection to aether, does better with a sorcerer.”
“Your demon needed you.”
“It was mutual.” The sorceress smiled nostalgically. “I left my village when I was sixteen because I knew I wanted to be a sorcerer.”
“Why?” Nothing leaned forward, ignoring her food.
“I wanted to marry the girl next door, but my mother told me it was foolish. I needed children to take care of me when I was old. She said only sorcerers don’t need to worry about family. I said I would be a sorcerer then, and left.”
“Just like that!”
“More or less. I went to the Third Mountain, and the Second, but both sorcerers told me the same thing: we cannot make rivals by taking apprentices! Find a spirit to teach you, or a witch. They both suggested I be a witch.” The sorceress raised her eyes to the ceiling, then smiled again. “Instead I came to the Fifth Mountain and asked a great demon.”
Nothing watched her, waiting, but the sorceress fell quiet. Nothing drank the last of her wine and said, “There must be more to it than that.”
The sorceress floated Nothing’s cup toward herself and poured another. As the cup returned along a strand of air, the sorceress said, “Naturally. I bargained with a dragon for entry to the mountain, climbed its face until I was nearly dead, my blood smeared against the rocks, and with my final, soft desperation, the demon appeared. What are you, child? it asked in an empty voice that touched my equally empty places. I had nothing left, you see, by then. Nothing but my bones and will and a tiny bit of blood. Exactly right to impress a demon when I stood and told it I was a sorcerer and it would submit to me. It laughed but took me inside and gave me the power to heal. It gave me food and lovely clothes, and when I felt stronger, we bargained in truth. Power for power. I had realized, you see, that while a great demon has everything it needs, it may not have everything it wants. The demon agreed to help me grow my skills, and I would be its vessel to see beyond the mountain. We traded shards of our shadows, binding to death or destruction.” The sorceress paused, sipped, and added, “My demon… was a slip of darkness, a shadow that changed on impulse. A slight child, a winged man, a scaled woman, and everything between, or nothing at all but a breeze and a voice. A silver flame dancing in the air. Its eyes, though, when it had them, were like old black pearls. Always. And its touch tender.”