The Ten Thousand Doors of January(26)

“Ah.” Silence. I wished I were a thousand miles away. I wished I were a yellow-haired girl named something like Anna or Elizabeth who laughed like a clockwork bird and always knew just what to say.

The corners of Samuel’s eyes crimped. He folded my fingers around the stem of the champagne flute, his hands dry and summer-warm. “It might help,” he said, and vanished back into the crowd.

I downed the champagne so quickly my nose fizzed with it. I raided several more silver trays as I made my way through the parlor, and by the time I reached the smoking room I was placing my feet very precisely and trying not to notice the way colors sloshed and oozed at the edges of my vision. My dark veil, that invisible Thing that had curled around me all day, seemed to flicker and warp.

I took a breath outside the door. “Ready, Bad?” He dog-sighed at me.

My first impression was that the room had shrunk considerably since I’d last seen it, but then, I’d never seen it crammed with a dozen men wearing crowns of bluish smoke and conversing in low rumbles. I recognized this as one of those important, exclusive meetings that I’d never been permitted to attend: those boozy late-night congregations of men where the real decisions were made. I ought to have felt pleased or honored; instead, I tasted something bitter in the back of my throat.

Bad sneezed at the cigar-and-leather reek, and Mr. Locke turned toward us. “You made it, dear girl. Come, take a seat.” He gestured to a high-backed armchair in the rough center of the room, around which the men of the Archaeological Society were ranged as if posing for a portrait-painting. There was Havemeyer, and the ferrety Mr. Ilvane, and others I recognized from previous parties and visits: a red-lipped woman with a black ribbon around her throat; a youngish man with a hungry smile; a white-haired man with long, curling nails. There was something secretive about them, like predators stalking through tall grass.

I perched on the armchair, feeling hunted.

Mr. Locke’s hand landed on my shoulder for the second time that evening. “We’ve asked you here tonight for a little announcement. After much careful thought and discussion, my colleagues and I would like to offer you something rather rare and much sought-after. It’s quite unorthodox, but we feel it is warranted by your, ah, unique situation. January”—a dramatic pause—“we’d like to offer you formal membership in the Society.”

I blinked at him. Was this my birthday gift? I wondered if I ought to be pleased. I wondered if Mr. Locke had known how, as a girl, I’d dreamed of joining his silly society and trotting around the world having adventures, collecting rare and valuable objects. I wondered if my father had ever wanted to join.

That bitter taste returned, and something else that burned ember-hot on my tongue. I swallowed it back. “Thank you, sir.”

Mr. Locke’s hand knocked me twice in hearty congratulations. He launched into another speech about the formal induction process and certain rituals and oaths that must be made before the Founder—see that capital F like a saluting soldier—but I wasn’t listening. The burning in my mouth was growing stronger, scalding my tongue, and my invisible veil was crumbling to ash and char around me. The room around me seemed to pulse with heat.

“Thank you,” I interrupted. My voice was flat, almost toneless; I listened to it with detached fascination. “But I’m afraid I must decline your invitation.”

Silence.

A silver-eyed voice in my head was hissing at me—be a good girl, mind your place—but it was drowned out by the alcohol thudding in my blood. “I mean, why should I want to join your Society, really? A bunch of fussy old aristocrats who pay braver and better men to go out and steal things for you. And should one of them disappear you don’t even pretend to mourn him. You just carry on—as if nothing—as if he didn’t matter—” I broke off, panting.

You don’t really realize how many small sounds a house makes—the tocking of the grandfather clock, the sighing of the summer breeze against the windowpanes, the moaning of floor joists beneath a hundred pairs of expensive shoes—until you’ve stunned a room into absolute silence. I clutched Bad’s collar as if he were the one in need of restraint.

Mr. Locke’s hand tightened on my shoulder and his munificent smile became something gritted and painful-looking. “Apologize,” he breathed at me.

My jaw locked. A part of me—Mr. Locke’s good girl, the girl who never complained, who minded her place and smiled and smiled and smiled—wanted to fling myself at his feet and beg for forgiveness. But most of me would rather have died.

Locke’s eyes found mine. Chill, steel-colored, pressing into me like two cold hands against my face—

“Pardon me,” I spat. One of the Society men gave a crack of derisive laughter.

I watched Mr. Locke work to unclench his teeth. “January. The Society is a very old, very powerful, and very prestigious—”

“Oh, yes, so prestigious.” I sneered. “Far too prestigious for people like my father to join, no matter how much garbage he steals for you, no matter how much money you make auctioning it off in secret. Am I light-skinned enough to sign up, is that it? Is there a chart I can consult?” I bared my teeth at them. “Maybe one of you can add me to your skull collection when I die, as some sort of missing link.”

The silence this time was absolute, as if even the grandfather clock were too insulted to make a sound.