Fall of Light (6 page)

“All right, everybody, stand by for rehearsal.” “Rehearsal's up!” “Here we go . . . and . . . rehearsing!” “Rehearsing!” “And . . . action.”

Opal had retreated with Rod and the other Hair, Makeup, and Wardrobe people to the tangle of cast and crew chairs behind the walls that simulated night forest. They could hear but not see as Corvus and Lauren ran their lines. Rod got a small portable TV set from his duffel and tuned in to UHF channel sixteen, which, in the vicinity of the soundstage, carried the signal from the hot camera, visual without sound. All of them bent their heads to watch the rehearsal from the view of the master shot camera.

“Dark God looks so real,” Magenta muttered.

“You're a genius, Opal,” Rod said.

“Thanks,” murmured Opal. She felt both proud and disquieted; she knew she was good at her job, no matter how she did it, but this time she couldn't take total credit. Something had worked through and with her to turn Corvus into who he was now.

“But the lines,” Betty muttered. “This is so cheesy. I hope they can pull it off.”

The rehearsal ended.

“All right, kids,” said the director, “Last looks.”

Opal got Corvus's Set2Go bag out of her suitcase. It held sponges, gilding powder, adhesive, and other things she could use to tweak Corvus's prostheses and bring them back to their original look. She and the other Hair, Makeup, and Wardrobe people took their kits and continuity Polaroids and went on the set to make any necessary last-minute touch-ups.

Opal made the transition from the shadows around the edges to the set, where everything was subject to observation. The lights were bright and hot. Two different worlds existed side by side, the visible world that created the film's fictional reality, and the invisible world where the illusionists lurked. Opal didn't like being on the set; she kept most of herself submerged while she was working, and even though she knew she was skilled enough to maintain her mask of normal, being onstage made her nervous. Nobody would be interested in her; she was part of the scenery that moved, and yet, a camera might turn her way, capriciously, and show a part of her she hadn't hidden well enough. She glanced at the cameras. None had a red light lit. Not a guaranteee.

Coming on set to make sure everything was right was an important part of her job, so she did it. Corvus dropped his hood and leaned forward so Opal could inspect the prostheses on his head. She couldn't find anything she needed to fix. He held out his hands, turned them up and down. Again, they looked perfect. “Any problems?” she asked.

“No.” He stood to his full height and pulled the hood up.

“Ready? All nonactors, clear the set,” said Aldridge.

Hair, Makeup, and Wardrobe retreated. Opening bell rang; sound and camera rolled, slate bumped, action called. Rod got out his TV again. Everybody watched the first three takes of the master shot, but then interest dwindled. People settled back in the canvas-backed chairs, pulled out books or magazines. Rod worked on a crossword puzzle. Craig Orlando, key hair, had a book of sudoku puzzles.

Opal opened her letter case, got out a pen and a piece of stationery with red maple leaves across the top.

“Dear Mom,” Opal wrote. Maybe she was nuts to write an actual physical letter. Magenta thought so. E-mail was easier and faster. Opal's mother liked something she could hold in her hand, and ever since Opal's younger sister's accident with one of the household computers, Mom had been suspicious of them. Maybe even before the computer went wild and caused plants to overgrow the guesthouse. Mom had never been fond of technology, though, as a TV news personality, she tangled with it every day. When she got really mad, studio equipment around her broke down.

“Lapis is tiny and dusty. The sets look good, though, and so does my Monster. You met Corvus Weather at the premiere of
Dead Loss
last fall, remember? This costume is much better. He doesn't have to kill anybody in this movie, either, just corrupt them, so less mess to mop up.”

Maybe she better not mention the human sacrifices. Her mother hated film representations of witchy religions, especially the bloody ones that made witches look bad. Her dad laughed about all the things the movies got wrong, but sometimes Mom had no sense of humor.

Not that her family were technically witches, or used magic as a religion; magic was something they were born with, though it didn't manifest until they reached their teens. Their family had many traditions associated with magic use. They had met witches—a variety of them, some professing Wiccans or Pagans with power and without, and some, well, just witches. The word
witch
didn't explain the LaZelles, but Mom could get upset about almost anything.

The Dark God didn't commit any of the film's murders—that was all human stuff. Opal had read the script a number of times and she wasn't sure if the humans were supposed to be acting under the influence of the Dark God, or on their own, thinking they could tell what the God wanted without asking him. She was pretty sure the film had, as part of its agenda, a veiled indictment of organized religion. Which was pretty silly for a horror film no one important would ever see. Then again, the director had pretensions to art. Always a problem, in Opal's experience. People who thought they were doing art were much harder to work for.

Second bell rang twice, signalling the end of the take. “All right,” called the A.D., “we're switching to Dark God's POV of Serena. Last looks.”

Opal set her letter aside and grabbed her bag. Corvus wouldn't be in this shot, but she might as well check on him anyway.

He smiled at her, and his green eyes glittered. Unnerved, she ducked away from him and left the set. The rest of the day was like that: nothing ever went wrong with the makeup, and each time she faced Corvus, she felt a chill—this was a stranger, and she wasn't sure if he was friendly.

3

Shooting finished at eleven, and afterward, it took Opal an hour to photograph and then remove Corvus's face and hands. The pieces came off easily. The good thing was Corvus slept through most of it. By the end, he looked like his normal self. She astringed the last of the glue from his face, moisturized his skin, and prodded his shoulder gently. He woke with a start.

Except for them, the Makeup trailer was empty. A production assistant had been by earlier to leave off call sheets and script pages for tomorrow's scene. Lauren had an early call the following morning, and had left as soon as she was clean. Rod and Magenta had cleared all the counters and locked all the drawers and cupboards, then left. Hitch had left the Lincoln's keys with Opal before he clocked out; he was done for the day and Corvus wasn't working any longer, so Corvus had control of the car.

“Are you hungry?” Corvus asked as he levered himself out of his chair. He went to the clothes valet and pulled on a shirt.

“I suppose,” said Opal. “Are you? I have a couple more of those liquid diet things.” She checked the tiny fridge that was part of her counter. A few diet drinks, some protein shakes, and some makeup items that needed refrigeration.

Lapis had a coffee shop and a family restaurant, but neither stayed open late at night. There was no place nearby to get food. “I'm hungry, but not for another shake,” Corvus said. “Want to go out for dinner?”

Opal checked the call sheet for the following day. Corvus had a scene where he incited the sisters to fight with each other. They wouldn't need to get to makeup until ten A.M. “Sure,” she said, feeling a little strange. She had spent hours and hours with him, but mostly in the context of playing with his face, or waiting to play with his face. They had lunch together, catered meals—along with all kinds of other people at the same table. Most dinnertimes, each of them took their per diem and went separate ways, but that was when they were on a more normal schedule.

The nearest open restaurant Opal knew about was on the highway, ten miles from Lapis, near the characterless hotel where most of the crew and the lesser cast had rooms. Opal drove the Lincoln there with Corvus relaxing in the passenger seat. The restaurant was an IHOP truck stop, and none of the strangers sipping coffee inside had ever seen someone Corvus's height before, from the reaction they got when they walked in. Everybody gawked. Corvus was used to it.

“You movie people?” the waitress asked. She was young and blond and looked wilted but game.

“Yep,” said Corvus. “How could you tell?”

She grinned and avoided the obvious answer. “Don't get many black Lincolns in the parking lot, not till you folks started dropping by. You want to sit with the others?”

“Where?” asked Corvus.

She gestured with a pink-feather-poof-topped pen toward the corner booth. Travis Roy and Bethany Telfair, the
Forest of the Night
scriptwriters, were holed up there with pots of coffee, laptops, and color-coded pages of script. Opal had met with Bethany in preproduction to discuss her concept for the Dark God. In those meetings, the young scriptwriter had been energetic and confusing, full of contradictory details. Opal had gotten a clearer picture from the production designer, who would dictate the look of the whole picture anyway.

Now Bethany looked frazzled. Her hair, ginger, thick, and shoulder length, stood up in tufts, as though she had been tugging at it.

Travis, Bethany's husband and mentor, blinked blearily at his screen. He was older than Bethany. His hair was a thick shock of gray, and he had deep character brackets around his mouth. He wasn't smiling now.

“They look busy,” Corvus told the waitress. Then Bethany glanced up, brightened, and beckoned them over.

Opal wondered what Corvus really wanted to do. He was good-natured enough to head for the table.

“Want something to eat?” asked the waitress, following them.

“Yes, please,” said Opal.

“You one of the stars, hon?” asked the waitress.

Opal smiled and shook her head. “I do makeup. Mr. Weather is the star.”

Corvus slid into the booth beside Bethany, then shook his head. “The makeup is the real star, Jenny,” he said.

Opal checked the waitress's nametag, saw that Corvus had her name correct. She sat next to Travis, who scooted over to make room. He stacked some of the pages and pulled them closer to his laptop.

“You been in anything I might have seen?” the waitress asked Corvus.

“Depends on whether you like horror films,” Corvus said. “I play a lot of monsters.”

She shook her head, handed them menus. “Naw. I got enough scares in my daily life. Rather see romances. Your voice sounds familiar, though.”

“I don't usually have speaking parts. Could I get some coffee, please?”

She started. “Oh, sure. You want some, too, hon?”

“Please,” Opal answered.

The waitress went to a neighboring table and grabbed mugs and silverware wrapped in white paper napkins, set them on the table in front of Opal and Corvus, and headed for the kitchen and the coffeepot.

“What are you guys doing?” Opal asked the writers.

“Rewriting scenes twenty-five, twenty-six, and twenty-seven,” said Bethany.

“Adding in scene twenty-five A. Aldridge wants more monster, Corr,” said Travis. “After he saw yesterday's dailies, he decided to beef up your part. You got an extra week?”

“If they have the budget for me, sure. What am I supposed to be doing now?”

“He wants you to do an extra scene with child Caitlyn, really mess her up.”

“It makes dramatic sense,” said Bethany. “I always wondered about her motivations, anyway, Trav. She has everything going for her, looks, talent, youth, and she's just so
bad
.”

“Caitlyn and Serena both have father issues,” said Travis. “Their mom killed their father, remember? Years before she killed herself.”

“What? That's not in the script,” Corvus said.

“It was part of the brainstorming we did early on. Serena was out there at one of the rituals. She was five or six. Mom was high on something. Dad was, too. In the grip of the drug, Mom sacrificed Dad. Lots of blood. Dark God shows up. Serena saw what happened, but she suppresses it. Caitlyn never found out. To Caitlyn, Dad went away one night and never came back. She's been searching for him or a reasonable facsimile ever since.”

“
Eww.
Serena thinks Dad's blood was spilled to summon Dark God? So maybe she thinks of Dark God as her replacement father?” Bethany tugged at her hair, then attacked her laptop's keyboard.

“Which is pretty disgusting, since
he
thinks she's his
bride
,” said Travis.

Bethany shrugged. “Hey, they're creepy witches. What more do you need?”