“They aren’t pleased with the conduct of their citizens here. The religious officials had hoped their citizens would behave more...well, behave.” He frowns. “But it is more than that. An extremely influential Frician duke has gone missing. They were here searching for him.”
A thousand insults, a thousand sarcastic comments cross my mind. But I don’t say them in front of Villiam. He can be quick to scold if I say something he deems out of line. Which includes most things I wish to say.
“Are you all right, Sorina? You look troubled,” Villiam says. He always knows when something is bothering me before I say so. “Would you like tea? Some honey biscuits?” Villiam views food as a cure-for-all.
I run to him and press my face into his chest. In practically one, drawn-out breath, I relay him the details of Gill’s murder. I talk quickly because if I slow down, I will start crying again. And I have to be strong. I need to be able to present the facts, so Villiam can work out the answers for me. Villiam always knows how to handle a difficult situation and solve even the trickiest problem.
Throughout the story, Villiam keeps a stoic expression, as if contemplating a puzzle from one of his books. I don’t know how he can keep himself so contained. He knew Gill. He knows all my illusions. He examined my sketches of them before I finished them; he interviewed them soon after their creation to make sure they were suitable for performance. He knowsthem aspeople. Even though they are illusions, they are considered to be members of Gomorrah like anyone else.
He must be upset, but I’m grateful that he’s remaining calm for my sake.
“Are you all right?” he asks. “You haven’t been hurt? And the others? You didn’t see—”
“I’m fine. The rest of us are all fine.”
His eyes scan over me, as if searching for invisible bruises. Then his shoulders relax. He unties my mask and hands me a tissue, so that it’s easier to blow my nose.
“I’m so sorry, Sorina. I’m so, so sorry.” He rubs my back and then sits me down in a chair at his table. I grab a throw blanket to wrap around myself for comfort.
“I just don’t understand how it’s possible,” I say. “Gill is an illusion.”
“It shouldn’t be possible,” he says. “I don’t understand it. I’m at a loss. None of your illusions should be able to die.” He squeezes his hand into a fist until his knuckles whiten, releases his grip and then repeats, over and over. He does this whenever he is in a tizzy, as he would call it.
“We need to find out who did this immediately,” I say. “I wish I could’ve seen more. That I’d been paying attention—”
A sharp knock sounds, and Agni pokes his head through Villiam’s door. “Sir, there’s a fire in Skull Market.”
Villiam grimaces. “None of this is your fault, Sorina. And it destroys me that I cannot give you all the help and support you need right now. But with the problems with Frice, Gomorrah leaving at sunrise and apparently a part of the Downhill on fire, there is too much I must do. I need you to promise me something, my dear.”
“What?”
“You must hurry and bury him—I’ll send a few of Gomorrah’s guards to help you and to search your neighborhood for anything to help us find the killer. You must act quickly. If the Frician officials see him with their duke missing, they will grow suspicious. The entire Festival could face trouble.”
Packing up all of our belongings and the stage equipment usually takes several hours. If we’re leaving at sunrise, we would need to get started now. This doesn’t give us a lot of time to bury Gill’s body, let alone to say a proper farewell.
All because one Up-Mountain politician got himself lost. He’s probably somewhere in the Downhill, drunk and falling off his bar stool, and we need to pack up, forgo our grieving and move out, just to give the Frician officials peace of mind. Where is our peace of mind? I tear a loose thread out of the blanket and squeeze it in my hand.
“Sir,” Agni says from outside, “the fire.”
“Another minute,” Villiam grunts. He kisses my forehead, where he always kisses me. Then he kneels down in front of me. “I’m so sorry, but there are ten thousand people to pack up and move in a few hours. I must focus on them first, but I promise you, tomorrow—once Gomorrah is moving—we will discuss what happened to Gill.”
“But the killer could be gone by then,” I protest.
“There is nothing I can do right now.” Villiam’s voice cracks. I’ve never heard him so frazzled. “I’d give anything to help you, but Gomorrah is in a crisis.” He hesitates. “Do you want me to send Agni with you?” Agni is always at Villiam’s side. Villiam considers his advice and presence to be invaluable.
“No. I don’t know what he would find in the tent that the rest of us wouldn’t,” I say. “But do we really need to bury him tonight? That’s...that isn’t enough—” I’m crying. Villiam hugs me and shushes me but still allows me to finish. I feel a hundred things at once. Grateful for the comfort. Embarrassed that I’m keeping him here when thousands of people are depending upon him. Angry at Frice. Angrier at the killer. Lost. Confused. Horrified.
Because I’ve been training with Villiam and learning about how Gomorrah works for years, I also know that moving the entire city is no easy feat to accomplish in several days, let alone a few hours. He genuinely does not have time for me.
“Send my apologies to our family. Tell them I’m thinking of them. I wish I could be there to help them in person. This is...such a tragedy,” he says, tears glistening in his eyes. “And promise me you’ll return when the commotion has died down.”
The commotion won’t disappear for several days, not until we reach the next city. It’s hard to think that far into the future. It’s hard to picture anything except the night ahead of me, of packing up the stage where Gill died, of burying him without a coffin, without a ceremony. It’s impossible to think beyond saying goodbye.
Nevertheless, I mutter, “I promise.”
CHAPTER FOUR
The Gomorrah Festival does not travel like other circuses, groups of wanderers, bands of musicians, thieves or markets, because it is all of those at the same time. If someone stood at the peak of the Winding Pass—the stony, barren mountains we are crossing to reach the city of Cartona—it would appear as if an entire burning city were on the move beneath them. Due to the suddenness of our departure, tents are still raised and wheeled on platforms, parties continue in the Downhill as the sun begins to rise and the white torches glimmer within the haze of smoke. It goes on for miles, with a population of over ten thousand inhabitants. Our nickname is “The Wandering City.”
