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I walk through the entryway and through the door underneath the balcony into a sitting room. There are plush white couches and chairs around a central fireplace that stretches all the way up the wall and through the peak in the ceiling.
Several masked men and women sit around on the furniture, clutching drinks in their hands.
I spot a bar cart against the far wall and make my way over to it, pouring myself two fingers of bourbon.
“Were you here last year?” a man with a white mask in the shape of a fox asks.
The woman sitting next to him shifts in her seat. “I don’t think questions like those are common courtesy around here.”
“Oh right, of course,” the man says. “I forget all the secrecy. I have never been too fond of it, so I wouldn’t mind ditching my mask now, though I know it would ruin the integrity of the evening.”
I almost laugh at the idea that this event could ever have any integrity at all, but I don’t. I quietly take a seat in a chair far away from the rest of the guests and sip on my drink. Luckily, the masks cut off just above the lip, allowing for unencumbered eating and drinking. But I can’t imagine feeling something as trivial as hunger while I’m trying to track down my family.
I want to observe everyone. I want to have a good idea of who the people around me are because I have no way of knowing when that information could be useful. Foe or ally—it’s impossible to say. And people like these have a way of changing sides when you least expect it.
For instance, I already know the man in the white mask is confident and thinks himself untouchable. One short conversation with him could probably provide me with his name and job title.
The woman is more reserved. She is wearing a fitted black skirt and jacket with a white button- down underneath, the buttons done up to her neck. She is either here to purchase a labor slave or she runs some kind of upscale brothel and is looking for a high-class worker.
Whatever the reason, she is here for business, not pleasure.
As I’m watching the rest of the room, I notice more and more eyes glancing in my direction. I do my best to look unimposing, but the tension in the room continues to rise.
I slouch my shoulders forward and lower my head, hoping to look smaller. It is difficult, though. I have been raised my entire life to be tall and proud and powerful. Even though I’m aware that everyone around me has tells that give away their station in life, I can’t seem to control my own. They are innate.
“What about you?” Fox-Face asks, finally gathering his courage and throwing his voice over to me. “Were you here last year?”
The woman next to him on the couch sighs and adjusts her position. It is clear she finds the man annoying.
I take a slow sip from my glass and swirl it, while an awkward silence lingers in the air.
“I’ll tell you if it ever becomes your business,” I say, my voice striking a delicate balance between a joke and a threat.
The man gives a nervous chortle and then turns back towards the fireplace. If he didn’t have a mask on, I’m certain his face would be glowing red.
A few more men wander into the room one at a time, taking stock of the other guests before taking a drink and claiming their own seat. When people aren’t looking around at one another, they are checking the clock mounted above the fireplace.
The event should be starting soon.
Nerves twist my stomach, though I don’t let it show. I do a head count and, in addition to a few people I saw earlier who are not in the room now, I guess there are ten bidders. To the right of the fireplace, there is a thin electric screen mounted to the wall, split into two columns. The first is a thin column numbered from one to fourteen and the other column is blank.
It is an intimate affair, which only serves to raise the stakes.
On one hand, it is good to know I’ll only have to compete with nine other people for Eve, but then again, there will be even more focus on us now. If I do find her, people will surely notice if we spend too much time together or if I show her special attention.
They will either become suspicious or, due to the competitive nature of the week, more determined to make Eve theirs. People like this are here because they crave one thing above all else:
Control.
A rail-thin man in a dark suit and blood-red mask gets a drink behind me and then lingers near my chair. He doesn’t say anything, but it is clear he has strategically chosen his location near me, and I intend to use that to my advantage.
“More people here than I thought there would be,” I say.
The man turns to me, assessing my relaxed posture, and then lowers his own shoulders. “About the same as last year. Less than the year before that.”
He must be a regular at this event.
“I suppose I’ve revealed how infrequently I attend the auction,” I say.
