Masks and Shadows Read online

  Her fingers tightened around his arm. “That was no trick of the imagination.”

  “More’s the pity. Poor Guernsey’s proof of that.” Carlo glanced up and down the taper-lit corridor and dropped his voice. “But have you thought through the other implications of this evening’s work?”

  She stopped walking to frown up at him. “What do you mean?”

  It was impolitic madness to speak of this. Yet the burning fuse inside Carlo’s chest would be satisfied with nothing less. “I mean,” Carlo said deliberately, “that the great mystery of what caused the singers’ deaths may just have been solved.”

  “What—oh!” She sucked in her breath in a gasp. “No, that cannot be right.”

  “No? You saw Guernsey’s face. The singers were drained of blood, were they not? And—”

  “But Count Radamowsky did not even arrive until this morning. How could it have—”

  “The Prince did not speak to him as to a new guest, did he? Prince Nikolaus asked most particularly for that elemental.”

  “Well . . .” She withdrew her hand from his arm and stepped back, her face filled with distress. “Perhaps they’d discussed it beforehand, in letters or—”

  “Or perhaps he’d already seen and made use of it, only days ago.” Carlo’s arm felt cold, deprived of her touch. “You heard what he said to all of us, Baroness—‘Every new weapon needs testing out.’”

  “But he didn’t mean—he couldn’t mean—”

  “Who better to test it out on than two disobedient servants? They’d broken their contracts and were thus—in his eyes—utterly disposable. Who would care that they had died? They were only singers!”

  “Signor, it is simply inconceivable. No matter what—coincidences, or fantasies you have imagined—the Prince is a gentleman. As is Count Radamowsky!”

  “And?” Carlo stared at her, conscious of a sharp pain in his chest. “What matter is that? Their birth is significant as it relates to their wealth, certainly—and, perhaps, to their thirst for power. But—”

  “It is significant as it relates to honor.” She took a deep breath. “The Prince is—as powerful men often are, I suppose. But that he would knowingly set that creature on any man or woman—and most particularly to ones he had employed and promised to care for—no. No! I cannot believe it.”

  “Then you are not the intelligent woman I took you for.”

  Her head jerked up, and spots of color appeared on her cheeks, but he carried on regardless.

  “Not everyone of noble birth follows the code of honor you believe in, Baroness. You could have been that creature’s victim tonight, and you know it. Does that not give you any pause?”

  “If I were to be frightened off by warnings . . .” She stopped, biting her lip.

  “Warnings? I’d call this more than—ah.” Carlo paused, caught. “Who has been giving you warnings, Baroness?”

  Voices sounded behind them as two noblewomen rounded the corner. They raised their eyebrows and giggled as they passed; Carlo stiffened. Baroness von Steinbeck drew back, lifting her chin. When the other women had passed, whispering to each other, the Baroness curtseyed stiffly to him.

  “I thank you for your escort, signor. My rooms are here, and you have delivered me safely to them.”

  He bowed, cursing inwardly. “It was my privilege.”

  “Then I bid you goodnight.”

  She walked to her room and did not turn to look back even once. The door closed behind her, and Carlo fought down the urge to kick it.

  She could not believe the obvious truth? Hardly. She chose to blind herself—and thus render him doubly a fool: for speaking the truth to her in a royal court and for caring how she responded to it. To him. Damnation.

  Stupidity beyond anything, that he had somehow imagined she might look beyond his birth and believe him before a man of her own station.

  He swiveled around to return to his own room—and stopped.

  He was not alone.

  The man who stood before him was barely three feet tall—less than half Carlo’s height—and looked up at him with a face creased in open amusement. Before Carlo could speak, he bowed with a flourish.

  “Signor Morelli? I’ve been sent to find you.”

  Charlotte stalked into her outer room and sank down onto a chair, burying her head in her hands. She kneaded her throbbing forehead with her fingertips.

  Not possible. Everything about this evening. The beauty. The horror. Guernsey’s screams . . . She shuddered convulsively. Signor Morelli was right. That could so easily have been her.

  “Baroness?”

  It was her new maid. Charlotte lifted her head from her hands to give the girl a reassuring smile.

  “I beg your pardon, Marta. I am only tired.” For the first time, her gaze took in the rest of the room. “Dear God! What has happened?”

  Quill pens lay scattered across her writing desk. The sheets of music that had been set atop her clavichord lay strewn about the carpet. Charlotte leapt up and threw open the door to her bedroom. Gowns billowed across the bed. She turned to stare at her maid.

  “I don’t know, madam. I found it this way half an hour ago.” Marta gestured helplessly. “I thought I should leave it for you to see. And perhaps the Prince—”

  “No!” Charlotte put a hand to her throat, taken aback by her own vehemence. But—“No, certainly not. We won’t disturb His Highness with this.”

  Of course, she did not, could not, would not believe Signor Morelli’s wild theory. But every nerve in her body protested the idea of Prince Nikolaus walking through her private chambers tonight and surveying the intimate display.

  She took a deep breath, forcing her voice into steadiness. “Thank you, Marta. You decided very rightly. You didn’t happen to see anyone coming out of here, did you? Or anything suspicious?”

  “No, madam. Shall I ask the other servants?”

  “I don’t know . . .”

  Charlotte’s head was whirling. The last thing she wanted was any gossip spread through the servants’ hall—but could she possibly hope to prevent it? Marta must surely feel more loyalty to her fellows than to her new, foreign employer. Charlotte missed Anna, with a sudden sharp pang. Now that Anna was gone . . .

  She looked around the wreckage of her rooms and sighed. Without Anna, Charlotte had no one in this great palace whom she could entirely trust.

  Apart from Sophie, she told herself. And winced.

  “Never mind, Marta,” Charlotte said. “We’ll clean this up together and worry no more about it.”

  “Yes, madam.” The girl’s eyes widened, but she moved forward obediently to begin the task.

  Charlotte knelt to pick up the scattered pages of her music. Weariness so acute that it felt like pain dragged at her arms and her head. If she left for Vienna the next day, she would never have to worry about this or wonder who had done it. If she left, she would never need to fear the possibility of Signor Morelli’s disturbing theory. If she left . . .

  No. Now that Ernst was dead, Sophie was the only true family Charlotte had. She had abandoned her sister once already, with disastrous consequences. She would not do it again.

  “Sent to find me? By whom?” Carlo frowned down at the man before him, fighting to keep his discomfort off his face.

  It wasn’t the man’s size that disconcerted him. Carlo had met several such men and women at other courts, playing much the same role as himself—set on display for the aristocrats’ amusement. But the man in front of him, in turn, showed none of the shock or discomfort that most men displayed when meeting a castrato for the first time. Instead, his expression showed a subversive, lurking amusement that discomfited Carlo far more than any outright horror could have done.

  “The Princess Esterházy, Princess Marie Elisabeth von Weissenwolf Esterházy. My mistress.” The man bowed again, even more deeply. “I am Monsieur Jean, her page.”

  “And what does the Princess want of me at this hour?”

  “Why, noth
ing,” Monsieur Jean said blandly, “but to send you her compliments, signor, and pray that you will wait upon her in the next few days.”

  “She chooses a peculiar hour to issue her invitations.”

  “The hour is of my own choosing, I confess.” He smiled engagingly. “I’d hoped to intercept you in time to invite you for a drink. There’s a charming little tavern in the village nearby. A bit of fresh air? An evening’s respite from the palace?”

  Carlo stared at him. Whether this was the Princess’s plot, or one of Monsieur Jean’s own devising, undercurrents of scheming rippled almost tangibly through the air. The last thing Carlo needed, after this disastrous evening, was another round of courtly maneuvers.

  Yet, for the sake of an escape from the palace . . .

  “Very well,” said Carlo. “Lead on, Monsieur Jean.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Heavy wooden doors closed behind Carlo and Monsieur Jean, and the entire tavern fell silent. Coarse-looking men, huddled over the bar, looked up gape-mouthed at the pair’s appearance. Soldiers halted in their rounds of billiards and drinking games to blink at them. Only the relentless drip of a leaking tap broke the silence.

  Carlo turned to look down at his companion. “A charming little tavern?” he repeated in a faint whisper, barely moving his lips.

  Monsieur Jean shrugged, still beaming, and strode forward. “Two beers for the gentleman and myself, barmaid,” he called out. “The Prince’s most honored guest deserves your finest.”

  The tavern slowly settled back into a normal low-level roar, and Carlo walked across the sanded floor, conscious of the still-staring eyes fixed on him.

  “Is that a woman or a man?” someone whispered, piercingly, from the soldiers’ billiard table.

  Another soldier whispered back knowingly: “Neither one. It’s a castrato. Heard one of them in Vienna, once.”

  “What does it do?”

  Carlo swung around, fixing a determined smile on his lips. He let his voice rise until it filled the tavern. “It sings,” he declared, in his purest and most ringing tones. “For kings and empresses, and for your prince. And it also has ears to hear what’s being said about it.”

  “What the devil—!” The first soldier stepped away from the billiards table, reaching down for the hilt of his sword. “I didn’t ask you to listen in on my private conversation. Freak.”

  “I didn’t ask to hear it, either. And yet . . .” Carlo raised his eyebrows, holding the rest of his face rigidly still. “We appear to be at an impasse.”

  Monsieur Jean was back at his side in a heartbeat, smiling dazzlingly. “What are such small misunderstandings between friends?” He bowed sweepingly to the angry soldier. “My esteemed employer, the Princess Esterházy, would like to buy the entire house a round of drinks.”

  The sizzling tension dissipated into a roar of huzzahs as the soldiers surged forward. Monsieur Jean led Carlo to a secluded table in a back corner, stepping carefully between the larger men. The soldier who’d spoken earlier nodded stiffly to Carlo. Carlo nodded, infinitesimally, in return, conscious of the burn of frustration in his chest. It would have felt shockingly good to fight, just then, and release the night’s simmering store of outrage.

  Truly, he was losing all his wits.

  “Now, then . . .” Monsieur Jean set the two beers on the table and sat down across from Carlo, smiling intently. “Tell me, Signor Morelli, all about yourself.”

  A new group of soldiers burst into the tavern just as Carlo began his fourth beer. It had been some time since he’d drunk beer instead of wine, he realized. It was a plain drink, for plain men, not the refined nectar of the aristocrats. He’d forgotten just how much he liked it. His head felt pleasantly dizzy as he glanced across at the incoming group, led by the Esterházy scion who’d so dramatically won the battle games on the opera stage the night before.

  As the Esterházy lieutenant—Anton Esterházy, that was it—strode inside, his eyes swept across the room and passed over Carlo without interest.

  “Anyone seen von Höllner?” he called out. “We’ve been searching all over the palace for him.”

  “Off with his wench in Vienna,” one man called out, waving his beer stein.

  “Or with his wife,” someone muttered, sniggering, close by Carlo.

  Stifled laughter sounded. It was cut off hastily, though, as Anton Esterházy turned to that corner of the room, his face taking on a chill that made the resemblance to his cousin suddenly inescapable.

  “I didn’t hear that piece of idiocy,” Anton said. “And I trust that no one else did either.”

  A dead silence greeted his words. He raised his eyebrows, waiting, then shrugged. “Good enough. I’m giving up on him for the night. Who’s for a game of billiards?”

  Carlo turned back to Monsieur Jean as the byplay ended. The expression he saw on his companion’s face made him blink. It cleared away instantly, and Monsieur Jean smiled winningly, his face open and trustworthy. Carlo hadn’t merely imagined that look of narrow-eyed calculation . . . had he? He set down his beer, keeping his own expression bland. Perhaps he’d drunk enough for one evening.

  “A pretty performance, that, was it not?” Monsieur Jean said. “I always enjoy visiting the soldiers’ tavern to watch the drama, particularly as the night goes on. Much like stags fighting over dominance in the wild, I think. Fascinating for any student of human nature and philosophy.”

  “If you find such conflicts fascinating, perhaps you should spend more of your time in Prince Nikolaus’s court.” Carlo narrowed his own eyes, searching the other man’s face. “There is surely more primitive jostling for precedence and domination in a royal court than anywhere else on earth.”

  “And if you do not share my fascination for the subject, signor, perhaps you should spend less of your own time in royal courts.”

  “A veritable point, monsieur.” Carlo gave a half-laugh. “But not the key to a brilliant career for a musico. For that, one must play the nobles’ game.”

  But never be accepted as one of them.

  He bit his tongue at the memory of Baroness von Steinbeck’s horrified expression. “The Prince is a gentleman.” And Carlo was not. He lifted the beer stein to his lips and took a long, burning draught that emptied the stein.

  Monsieur Jean signaled to a barmaid, and replacement beer steins arrived at the table.

  “Tell me,” Monsieur Jean said, “what brought you to accept the Prince’s invitation to Eszterháza? Surely, there were other invitations. Other courts, other kingdoms . . .”

  Carlo shrugged. “I’d never been to Eszterháza. And the Prince’s musical establishment is famous throughout Europe. The chance to meet Herr Haydn in person was not to be brushed aside.”

  “And others in the court?”

  “Pardon?” Carlo met the other man’s gaze. His fingers tightened around the handle of his beer stein. “I’m afraid I don’t take your meaning, monsieur.” The Baroness’s light brown eyes looking up at him through the darkness outside the opera house . . .

  “Surely you’d met one or two of the gentlemen at this court before your arrival,” Monsieur Jean said easily. “Was this not an opportunity to renew any old friendships? Or, at any rate, acquaintances?”

  “Not at all.” Carlo’s shoulders relaxed. “No, I’d never met any of Prince Nikolaus’s courtiers before.”

  “Or his other guests?”

  Carlo frowned. “You seem remarkably interested in my acquaintances, Monsieur Jean. Are you compiling a list?”

  “You are too quick for me, signor.” Monsieur Jean’s face broke into a grin. “Indeed, I’m certain I could sell off such a list for hundreds of ducats to connoisseurs. The private acquaintances of Europe’s most celebrated musico . . . Alas, you’ve found me out in my dastardly plan.”

  He leaned forward, his eyes sparkling. “Tell me, though, man-to-man. In strictest confidence: with whom would you wish to become more intimately acquainted, here at Eszterháza? For the palace is f
illed with a multitude of beauties at the moment. His Highness’s own niece is a fine figure of a woman, as are a number of the singers in his opera troupe.” He lowered his voice. “With all due respect to our fiery young lieutenant across the room, I wouldn’t mind spending an hour or two alone with the lovely Sophie von Höllner, myself.”

  Carlo sat back in his seat, shaking his head. “You are asking the wrong person to share in your game of what-if, monsieur,” he said dryly. “Did not you hear the soldier who greeted us? An ‘it’ can hardly even fantasize of such things.”

  “Perhaps an ‘it’ may not, indeed. But we are men of the world, you and I. And I know a fair bit more than our charming guardsmen about the astonishing reputation of the musici across the courts of Europe, and of how well a few of them have deserved it.” Monsieur Jean added, smirking, “I heard, as well, that the noblewomen of this court were fairly swarming around you after your performance a few nights ago.”

  “Not all of them,” Carlo said. He looked into the murky depths of the beer, but did not see it. “Even men of the world must accept their own limits, one day, and give up on impossible dreams.” His fingers tightened around his beer stein, and he bit off his words with careful precision. “Eventually, no matter what our preferences might be, we must all learn to play the roles in life that were assigned to us.”

  “Perhaps you are right,” Monsieur Jean murmured. But the tone of his voice contradicted his words. Rich satisfaction rippled through it.

  Carlo glanced up quickly, searching the other man’s face. Monsieur Jean smiled back sunnily and lifted his own beer stein.

  “To the theater of life, signor!”

  “To the theater,” Carlo echoed, warily, and drank.

  Alone in her grand salon, the Princess Esterházy sat by the window. Darkness filled the room, unlit by a single candle. Her pet dog snored on her lap, and she stroked his white fur absently with her bejeweled fingers as she gazed through the arched window into the darkened gardens outside.

  The still water in the fountains gleamed in the darkness, reflecting pale moonlight. No figures moved across the manicured lawns that lay between the palace and the tall hedges beyond.