Clockwork Twist : Dreamer (3 page)

“Twist!  Oh, my darling!” Myra shrieked, reaching for him.

“Wait!” Jonas said, already out of his seat and hurrying to Twist.  Myra looked up at him in horror, her hands a hair's breadth away from Twist. “Just wait a second,” Jonas said, kneeling beside Twist and reaching out slowly to his shaking, curled-up form.

Twist felt the buzz in his neck grow above the unconscious level it usually hid in these days, and he reached out for it in the chaos of his pain and whirling thoughts.  Then, somewhere very far away, he sensed a warmth at his back, though he noticed no physical contact.  Slowly, a cool brightness began to fill the horizon of his mind, like swiftly approaching rain.  Twist managed to realize what was happening outside of his own chaos, and reached out for the light.  He felt himself ease in anticipation.

Jonas placed his hand gently on Twist's back in obvious response to the lessened tension he could likely feel in Twist's Sight.  Twist took in a sharp breath as the chilly white calm washed over his mind.  In a moment, the pain receded to the farthest reaches of his attention and his thoughts fell still and steady.  He opened his eyes and found Jonas watching him carefully.  In the space of two breaths, Twist felt like himself again.  Jonas's deep-purple eyes lightened back to soft gray and he took his hand away.

“What the hell was that?” Jonas asked Twist.

“An … address,” Twist said, looking to the card that lay on the table. “It was so intense...  But there was no emotion at all.  I never get visions off things like this,” he said, gesturing to but not touching the card. “It's not broken.  It doesn't feel anything.  I shouldn't have seen anything at all.”

Jonas looked to the card with a frown.  An instant later his eyes snapped closed and he gave a hiss of pain.  Twist felt the buzz in his own neck leap sharply into a burning heat.  Twist reached out quickly and took hold of Jonas, with one hand on each side of his face.

“Open your eyes,” Twist ordered, holding his own eyes open and ready.

His Sight flowed through the touch and echoed the same pain and dizzy whirl of uncontrolled thoughts that he had felt inside himself a moment ago, now filling Jonas's mind with fire.  It took a moment for Jonas to comply.  Twist waited patiently.  When Jonas opened his eyes, the color in them flashed quickly between rich blues, purples, and deep blood reds in Twist's Sight.  As Jonas stared back at him, the colors lightened and slowed their shifting.  Jonas took one deep breath, and then another, and Twist felt him relax back down to normal.

“Are you all right?” Twist asked, dropping his hands to Jonas's shoulders but not looking away from his eyes.

“Yeah,” Jonas said, breaking the visual contact with a nod. “I think so.  Was it a house?”

“Number 614?”

“Yeah,” Jonas said, reaching up to rub at his eyes. Twist realized then that he was kneeling close beside Jonas on the floor.  He got back up in his chair.  “What
is
that thing?” Jonas asked, getting back to his feet as well.  He pulled his goggles up from where they hung around his neck and covered his eyes with them.

“It's an invitation,” Tasha said.  She was holding it now, running her gloved fingertip along the edge of it.  Twist watched her, looking for signs of pain.

“Doesn't that hurt?” he asked her.

“Not at all,” she said, looking up to him. “Are you two all right?”

“What is that?” Twist asked her, speaking deliberately.

“It's a Sight circle invitation,” Tasha said, putting it down on the table. “Haven't you ever seen one before?”

“Those simpering, lovey-dovey posers?” Jonas spat. “Why would they make those stupid invitations painful all of a sudden?”

“It's not painful to me,” Tasha said.

“What's a Sight circle?” Twist asked.

“A load of simpering, lovey-dovey posers singing campfire songs and talking about how they
feel
,” Jonas answered quickly, his voice dripping with disdain. “People with minor Sights, or people who just want to feel special, all meeting in someone's mother's house.”

“They're not all like that,” Tasha said with a frown. “There's one in Prague that boasts to have professional artists, poets, and philosophers as members.”

“Everything's more stylish in Prague,” Jonas said with a dismissive wave of his hand.

“Wait, you mean people with Sights gather together?” Twist asked, struggling to keep the conversation on the right topic. “That's today's date.  They are meeting here in San Francisco, tonight.”

“You want to go?” Jonas sounded offended by the very idea.

“Well... I don't know,” he muttered, glancing to the card. “Meeting you was a good thing.  Meeting Tasha was a good thing.”

“How about meeting my sister?” Jonas asked darkly.

“I got Myra because of meeting her,” Twist answered, looking to her.

He was startled to find a deeply worried expression on her face.  Her hands were clasped tightly together in her lap.  He gave her a curious and hopeful smile.  She looked to his hands, then back to his eyes.  Twist reached out to lay a hand on her arm, hoping to understand what she was feeling.  He frowned as nothing but concern flooded into his Sight, and wondered what could possibly make her so upset.  After a moment of contact, she took his hand in one of hers and leaned closer, reaching up to stroke his face with the other hand, and peered deeply into his eyes.

“Are you all right now?” she asked him softly.

“I'm fine,” he said, smiling as warmly as he could.  He felt hope begin to grow out of her fear.

“He was only in pain for a moment, Myra,” Jonas said gently.  She looked to his covered eyes, not taking her hands away from Twist. “He really is fine now,” Jonas added with a smile.

True relief broke over Twist, following the wave in Myra's heart.  She nodded and sat back in her chair, but she didn't let go of Twist's hand.

“You'll believe him, but not me?” Twist asked Myra suddenly.

She looked at him sheepishly. “You always say you're fine when you're not.”

“True,” Jonas said with a nod.  Tasha nodded silently as well.

Twist tried to swallow the bite of their implications, wondering if the burden of other people's concern might lighten over time.

Twist sat on the thick ledge inside the open window, enjoying the slight chill of the San Francisco winter air against his back.  He looked over his shoulder to gaze out at the rolling hills of dense city, glowing amber under the stars, and wondered idly why the houses on the steepest slopes didn't just slide away over time.  In the distance, the shining green bay had turned into a black mirror, but was still crowded with ships of every possible design.  He turned back to look into the small apartment room above the theater.

The main room badly needed a new coat of emerald paint, the blond wooden molding hadn't been varnished in decades, and the golden floorboards were so scratched that they needed replacing more than anything else.  The furniture was in a similar state, but nothing was actually broken or unusable.  Jonas had called the two-bedroom apartment with its attached kitchen off the main room “careworn,” rather than "run down."  Twist had to admit that whatever it lacked in sophistication, it made up for in a homely sort of comfort.  Something about the scent of the old wood, steeped in years of salty moist air, eucalyptus, and evergreens, struck Twist as inexplicably pleasant.

Jonas sat to one side at the round wooden table, staring with palpable concentration into one of the large crystal balls that Tasha used occasionally in her act.  Twist saw nothing but clear glass in the other man's hand, but knew better than to ask what Jonas saw.  A murmur of conversation wafted up to him from the street as the night's guests began to empty out of the theater, drawing Twist's mind back to Myra's latest performance, less than an hour ago.

She had stood statue-still in the center of the stage after the curtains were drawn back, until the music began to play.  Twist could still hear the collective gasp at her very first movement—raising one arm in a subtle and fluid arc before her eyes opened in the gilding gaslight and her body swayed into the song.  No matter how many times she performed, no matter if she was seen in the city before or not, they always gasped the first time.  Even if the posters said that the clockwork girl would dance, no one ever guessed that she would move so smoothly, or with such lovely and elegant grace.

After the first few moments, the audience would always begin to smile unconsciously as they watched her.  All whispered conversation would fall silent.  Myra's face would match the emotions of the song as well as her dancing form, but Twist could always see the joy hidden in her glittering blue eyes.  Whenever she danced alone, she seemed to glow with a natural light of her own, but when she danced for an enraptured crowd, she was in bliss.  Every time Twist watched her dance, he craved to reach out and touch her, to taste that perfect joy.  It was only after the applause, once she'd taken her bows and run backstage, that he could catch her.  She always found him, and her bright, heady excitement always felt the same, no matter how many times she danced.

Twist listened to the excited and happy sounds that rose to his ears from the exiting audience, and felt a jolt of pride.  None of them would see her again except by chance, but once Tasha's act was over and Myra had changed out of her stage costume, she would come in through the apartment door and run to his waiting arms as she did after every show.  She always stayed backstage to watch Tasha's act, but she never waited a moment longer than Tasha's first bow before she came back to him.

“I must be doing something wrong,” Jonas said suddenly, putting the crystal down on the table and rubbing at his eyes.  “All I see in that thing are funny shapes.  Aren't you supposed to see spirits or the future or something by looking into crystal balls?”

“Maybe your future has a funny shape.”

“You might be right about that,” Jonas said, smiling up at Twist. “I do live on the road with a bunch of freaks, after all.”

“Myra's not a freak,” Twist snapped, narrowing his eyes at Jonas.

“My mistake,” Jonas said, smiling a little more widely. “I live on the road with a freaky magician, a freaky Serbian inventor, a totally un-freaky clockwork girl, and you.”

“That's right,” Twist said with a nod. “It's Myra and her four freaks.  Why does that sound like a bad pantomime?”

“Hey,” Jonas snapped, looking serious. “Nobody calls you a freak but me, remember?  That includes you.”

Twist gave a sigh.  “Talking to you makes me dizzy sometimes.”

“Are you implying that that's my problem?” Jonas asked, appearing aloof.

“Well, I would say that it's my own shortcoming, but you might get offended on my behalf.”  Twist frowned into space. “Wait, is that right?  Hold on, I need to draw myself a map of this conversation.”

Jonas laughed and seemed about to form a reply, but thankfully Twist was rescued as the apartment door opened and Myra stepped through it.  She had changed back into her ruffled white dress, but her smile matched the one she had worn on stage as she'd taken her bows.  Twist was on his feet instantly, while she bounded happily across the room and threw her arms around his neck.  His Sight washed over with the bright and bubbling flavor of Myra after a show, and he held her close for a moment, savoring every sense of her.  She pulled back just enough to smile at him, leaving her hands on his shoulders.

“They stood up and clapped for so long this time!” she said, surprise still ringing in her voice. “I think they really liked my dance.”

“I'm sure they did,” Twist said, her pleasure melding into his pride for her. “I swear your  dancing gets lovelier every time.”

Myra giggled brightly and covered her mouth with one hand, sending a rush of glee over the top of her sparkling waves of happiness.  Twist felt lightheaded for a moment and let his hands drop away from her, leaving only her other hand on his shoulder to connect them.  The effects of her on his Sight lessened until he felt stable again.  It was only then that he realized that Tasha and Niko had also returned and were talking with Jonas.

“It's not going to start for an hour,” Tasha was saying to Jonas. “We have plenty of time.”

“But what's the point?” Jonas asked her. “We've already been here for the week.  We're leaving tomorrow, aren't we?”

“It might be fun,” Tasha said. “I've met many interesting people at things like this before, in other cities.”

“I told you, everything is better in Prague.”

“Not just in Prague,” Tasha said quickly.

“What are they talking about?” Twist asked Myra.  Myra watched them now too, glancing curiously between them in turn, and gave Twist a shrug.

“The circle,” Tasha said to Twist. “It starts in an hour.  Didn't you want to go?”

“Oh yes!” Twist said, his mind returning to the world outside of Myra. “I did, actually.  It sounds interesting.”

“It probably won't be,” Jonas said, crossing his arms.

“Why are you so against attending?” Tasha asked him gently.  Twist looked to him curiously.  Jonas gave a sigh.

“I've been to three before, in England and in South Africa,” he said. “They were all a waste of time.  Well, for me anyway.  Ara had a great time,” he added bitterly. “She loves all that fairy-loving, 'lets share our feelings and talk about how great it is to be magical' stuff.”

“It's not all about fairies,” Tasha said levelly.

“Fairies?” Twist asked, suddenly confused.

“Oh, you never heard about the fairies?” Jonas sounded impressed. “Believe me, ignorance is bliss.”

Tasha gave a sigh and shook her head before she looked to Twist. “Some people believe that we have Sights because we were born with the souls of reincarnated fae,” she said. “The legend says that if a high-level fae dies at the same moment that a baby takes its first breath, the fae's soul can be reborn in the human child.”

“What, like changelings?” Twist asked.

“No, not exactly,” Tasha said, looking at Twist with surprise. “Changelings are said to be human children who are stolen and replaced by full-blood, low-level fairies.  I am speaking about the souls of dead royal fae ending up in people.  But how do you know about changelings?”

“I grew up surrounded by orphans,” Twist said with a shrug. “Some of them would rather believe they were taken from their families by changelings than simply abandoned.”  The others looked to him silently, their eyes suddenly filled with sympathy.  Twist looked away from all of them. “Anyway,” he said. “People in these circles believe in fairies?”

“Yeah,” Jonas said. “And you two want to go hang out with them all night.”

“I think Twist should go to a circle,” Tasha said, looking at him thoughtfully. “Everyone with a Sight should go at least once.  I'm not going to drag you along if you really don't want to come,” she said to Jonas, “but it would be more fun if we all went together.” She reached out to pet at his arm gently.

Jonas watched her hand and gave another sigh. “Fine, whatever,” he said looking at Twist as his eyes shifted into lilac. “I'll go with you.  I'm not doing anything else tonight.”

Twist felt the slightest change in the vibration at his neck.  Though Jonas's face showed no signs of it, Twist felt a hint of his apprehension.  Something about going to the Sight circle was worrying him, although he didn't seem inclined to say what.