Onstage, the lamps spilled across the wood, then struck upwards, their light pulsing and hatching into thin bands to form an incandescent wall that obscured the audience.From here, the only other person visible beyond the stage was Cassius Zadora, and even he became a silhouette shrouded in shadow.He stood on his low podium at the front of the orchestra pit, which stretched beneath the stage, his body midway between the concealed world of the musicians and the spectacle of the performance.From this vantage point, he could see everything—the music below and the singers above.He held his familiar rigid pose, all angles with his raised elbows and stiff shoulders, even though his hand and baton swished the air with the smoothness of a falling leaf.Music didn’t flow through Cassius as he conducted.No, he fought it in his quest to control every note.It beat and bruised him, and he held it, moulded it, then released it into the air.With a swift motion, he brought in first the flutes, then the brass.It was almost time.
‘That’s a secret,’ she answered Maria, then kissed her cheeks in farewell.‘You will see it in the papers soon.Bon voyage, little Maria.’
The trumpet played its short burst of announcement, heralding her entrance.
Odette stepped onto the stage.Turned her back to the audience.Held her pose while the ensemble finished its song.
A beat of silence as she waited for the strings.
It was not a long rest, but tonight, Cassius held it tighter than normal.Like he was reminding her that, although she owned the stage, he owned the music.In these moments, she felt him as if he were standing right behind her, almost but not quite touching, his breath warm against her neck.She didn’t need to see him to know he was watching her, because in this moment,everyonewas watching her.
This was the best part.The sliver of time when they were hers.The audience, the musicians below the stage in the orchestra pit, the lights, the other performers, even Cassius.She held them all in her palm.With a slight flick of her wrist to tell Cassius she was ready, she released them, and the moment melted into something more—the song, the performance, a magic so much bigger than her own voice.Linked by notes and quavers, lyrics and melody, passion and illusion.A transcendent experience.
The violins came in.
And no longer Odette, but now Romeo, she spun to face the crowd and began to sing.
Chapter 2
Hold.
Baton raised, Cassius stretched out the music.Onstage, Romeo declared his love for Guiletto one last time, swallowing poison.The strings, plump with emotion, swelled beneath the singers… and faded into nothingness.For a moment the orchestra lay silent—then burst into full volume once more as Guiletto woke to find her beloved’s lifeless body.The air vibrated, stiff with tension, the focus of the audience palpable, and Cassius melded the notes into the perfect mix of melody and bass to turn their skin to gooseflesh.For closing night, he wanted them to weep.He brought in brass, percussion, all the instruments fast, the chorus sang, and then the performers above and below the stage were making music as one, holding the audience as one.
And he, suspended between stage and pit, was linking them all.
He lifted the orchestra to a crescendo as Guiletto collapsed over Romeo.Capellio, the arrogant fool of this rendition of Romeo and Juliet, walked away from the tragic lovers while the chorus raised their rapiers at one another.Played by an old hand named Gustav, he would sing the last note, but the audience still belonged to Odette.
It always did.
Cassius pinched his fingers, gave one final flourish of the baton, then drew an invisible line before him.
The orchestra fell silent.
Beat, beat, beat.
He always heard precisely where the applause began, because that’s what he did.He listened.Tonight, the first few claps came from over his shoulder in the stage-left box, but they were quickly rivalled by the box on the right, slightly higher, slightly louder.Duelling princes once again, as had been the case for the past three performances.The red velvet curtain lowered, and the lights extinguished, but in the moment before darkness swallowed the stage, Cassius allowed his gaze to linger.Perfect, unmoving, believably lost to life—even as Maria’s chest rose and fell visibly, Odette’s did not.One day, he would tell stories about how the last time he’d conducted in London, he’d led the orchestra for one of the greats of the age.
Damn her.
Applause bounced into the brief gloom, some of it absorbed by the curtains, but most of it jostling to rise towards the ceiling.Cassius stayed motionless as it engulfed them, washing like a wave across the depths of the pit.Another full house, another string of glowing reviews.Newly rebuilt after last year’s fire, the Constellation Opera House had rejoined the world with praise that any conductor would give his best hand for.Even a cursed left hand like his.
Cassius lifted his baton as the curtain rose for the final time.The lights flared, and he brought the orchestra back to life to accompany the performers during their curtain call.In ones and twos, the chorus and cast moved to the front of the stage to take a bow, then lined up along its edges, clapping.Applause waxed and waned as each of them took their turn until, finally, the fresh star Maria met her praises.Then—last, but never, ever least—came Miss Odette Delaney, the darling, the star, the soprano who commanded a thousand pounds a performance.Theatre owners were only too happy to pay such a hefty fee because they knew keeping her name on the showbill for a few weeks would pay the receipts for half a year.
As the auditorium erupted into even louder cheers than before, Odette swept her arm in a wide arc of acknowledgement, leading the cast to give thanks to the stagehands and the orchestra below.Then, she singled out Cassius to blow a kiss in his direction.
A picture of absolute perfection.Even as she shared the lights, she owned them.
God damn her.Why did she have to be so good at this?
He wasn’t expected to clear the orchestra pit, but Cassius kept the habit of waiting behind regardless, to be the last to leave like a captain aboard his ship.Perhaps in a few seasons, the innovation of the newly constructed space would be so familiar that it would meld into the rest of the building.But for now, the little cove concealed beneath the stage, which exposed only him fully to the audience, was such a novelty that he found himself lingering after every performance to enjoy its architecture and acoustics.Instead of sharing the stage with the opera singers or butting up against the audience as before, the orchestra now possessed a space of its own.In the pit, the musicians could hide behind their instruments, enjoy the applause, and avoid being pelted with fruit or stones if the spectators were in a mood.Wagner’s innovation had first been built in Germany only two years ago, but it had proved incredibly popular with musicians, performers, and audiences alike.And as opera houses and music halls burnt down as regularly as kitchen maids burnt toast, it had taken no time for the new design to spread across the continent and cross the channel to become a fixture of every theatre build and rebuild.
‘Mr Zadora?’
Cassius pushed off the pit wall and turned to look up into the auditorium.He hadn’t heard that voice since last season, and she’d not called himmisterat the time.
‘Lady Ofner,’ he said, reinforcing the distance between them.She’d not looked so elegant and poised the last time he’d seen her, either.He climbed a few steps of the conductor’s podium to be closer to her level and scanned the room.Chatting stragglers were still ambling towards the exit, and her husband stood near the doors at the back, engrossed in conversation with some other trussed-up aristocrat.
‘I came to congratulate you on your new position,’ she said.
