Whisper (25 page)

“I'm sure she can't either, dear,” the gypsy said matter-of-factly. “But you can't see yourself going through with this, either, so it will be a horizon-widening exercise for both of you.”

And just like that, I became a guinea pig at the mercy of their transformative whim.

*

I went about my duties as usual, ignoring the fact that behind the scenes there were two obsessed nannies working on outfitting me for what they misguidedly thought was some grand pageant to strut me around in. It was easiest to humor them when I ffound myself in my tent with them, and occasionally the female company was even a nice change, but it was safe to say no amount of their fussing or making promises about the end result won me over to their side.

Once, I forgot that my face was all made up in experimentation, and put my regular clothes back on and returned to my duties, obliviously neglecting the effects that existed above-shoulder. Toby took one look at me as I arrived for our daily playing-with-fire and his eyebrows went up.

“Going for a new look?” he asked.

“What?” And then I remembered. A very keen kind of horror shot through me, at having been seen in such a state. One would think I'd been caught in my underwear, or diapers – the horror was on par with such scenarios. Was that an overreaction? I wondered as I tried to stammer up some excuse. But there was no reason other than exactly why I
was
walking around camp like some misplaced fashion model to be...walking around camp like some misplaced fashion model. It must look even more ridiculous next to my ordinary, grungy attire, I thought.

“I'm, um... Oh. This,” I said, touching my dramatically up-swooped hair. It was plastered with some make-shift substance that passed for hairspray. I probably didn't want to know what Lady Alejandra and Cambrie had scraped together to concoct the sticky product. “Cambrie just needed some... Uh... An avenue to get the girlishness out of her.”

“I see.”

“Yes, well – you don't see many soldiers wanting to pose for model guinea-pig duty.”

Holding up his hands, Toby shifted back to his torches. “I'm not judging. You look...fantastic.”

“Maybe you could do me a favor and burn it off. I'd rather not flounce around like this. But you wouldn't believe how long it takes to undo. Take down. Scrape off. Scrub clean.” I sighed gustily, turning to the horse that was our own guinea pig for the day. “I feel like I need a shovel just to get the first layer off.”

Toby chuckled behind me, and I stooped to scoop some dirt into my fingers. Nothing scrubbed off grease and grime like good old-fashioned grit itself. I'd used dirt to fight grime many a time when soap was not an option. Why should this be any different?

When Toby straightened with his torches in hand, he found me scrubbing my face with the arena sand. He stopped to stare. “Are you going to do that to your hair, too?”

That would probably be taking it a bit far though, I told myself. And I could let the hair slide. At least it wasn't some bright, unnatural color.

“Maybe,” I said. “How's this?”

“Scary,” Toby replied when I looked at him. I could only imagine the streaks that must remain, and the dirt that now caked my face to boot.

“Good,” I said.
All the better to blame on Cambrie.
Cruel of me, perhaps, but I had to keep blame alive and fresh where this nonsense was concerned, lest any of it be attributed to my own condoning.

I would not change my stripes on the matter until later.

Until they finished a rough draft one day, and I looked in a mirror. Lady Alejandra worked with the garment she had snared me with until it fit, and Cambrie played with my makeup until she cocked her head to the side and a sound of approval escaped her, and then they flitted off in excitement to drag some mirror into my tent, where I was instructed to look at myself.

Giving my head an unconvinced shake, I humored them and positioned myself in front of the pane, unenthusiastically letting my eyes find my reflection in the glass. At first, I had no reaction, because I didn't find myself. Then I realized the girl in the gown with the exotic, stunning face and dramatic hair was me, and I stared, completely taken aback.

I was...

I was...

Beautiful was too unaccustomed of a word for me to be comfortable applying it to myself, but opting for a synonym didn't do anything to dodge the point. I
was
beautiful. They had worked all of my angles, enhanced my best features. The 'gown' I was wearing was not really a gown of any tradition, but it was the term that came to mind for lack of a better one. It was crimson red, sporting a corset-like bodice with swooping, off-shoulder sleeves that belled off my wrists and drifted in wispy curtains to the floor; the skirt had a crazy long train, but was gathered up at the sides and pinned at my hips for riding's sake. A satiny, rope belt encircled my waist, tying at one hip where the tasseled ends draped down my leg.

“We can add the finishing touches later,” Lady Alejandra declared.

I raised my fingers to my dramatically made-up eyes, my lashes painted dark and tipped with scarlet, the shape of my eyes lined in charcoal, my lids dusted with rose and enhanced by great, winged up-swoops of darker red. Next my hand continued to my hair, french-braided and held in place near my face by a blood-red headband, where curled bits had been left free and cascaded to frame my forehead and brush against my cheeks. My cheekbones had been made to look sharper with blush, and my lips had been painted with a red that was a bit more subtle than the streaks at my eyes.

'Pansy' had not quite been the right choice of words, I had to admit now. This looked...this looked
fierce
. Tribal.

They seemed encouraged by my speechlessness; I found them both smiling when I finally peeled my eyes from the mirror.

“A goddess is born,” Lady Alejandra said. And against all of my expectations and doubts, I actually felt the part, standing there before them.

This could actually work.

If nothing else, I would surely be a distraction. An unexpected, grand, riveting distraction. That in itself, I thought, might actually prove a decent tactic.

I fought the small, sly smile that was tugging at my lips against my will. Curse them for doing it. For leaving my sense of pride pleasantly surprised. I was not prepared for that.

“Well?” Lady Alejandra asked finally.

I didn't know how to admit it. How to admit even to myself the possibilities that I saw opening up in my mutinous mind's eye where these unlikely antics were concerned. I'd been such a skeptic, but now – now the potential was coming to life in my own accursed, dreamer-oriented imagination. They had done it. Managed to snag that fantastical sixth sense of mine, pricking it by a corner and turning over a new leaf in its dormant exile.

“The Lieutenant is still going to piss her pants when she sees me,” I said, and even Cambrie flashed a lip-sticked grin of triumph.

*

I couldn't help myself – I kept the get-up on after my two attendants had gone and considered their handiwork at length in the mirror pane they had left for me. Admiring the effects, I dreamed up scenario after scenario of what might transpire while I wore this alter ego. Self-gratifying clips that played through my head much like epic movie previews.

Of course, there had been no movies for years. Real people in real situations
had
to be the ones that filled all those glorified roles. Stars didn't exist anymore except in real-life dramas. In our age, heroes
were
the ones that would become celebrities.

When it grew too dark to make out my increasingly inspiring features in the mirror, I hatched a delightful little impulse, and slipped out of my tent to go visit the horses. Work was done for the day, and most everyone had retired to their tents. Still, I was careful to watch for lingering eyes, not keen on any witnesses. This was to be a secret midnight excursion. It wasn't quite that late, in actuality, but that was beside the point of the matter. There was nothing more romantic than sneaking out by night for a late ride, bare-foot and beautiful, secret and wild, complete with the costume to make it a full-blown charade.

I was eager to try out my new persona. Quite in spite of myself, I added a little teasingly, but never mind all that prior skepticism.

The horses were not the least bit fooled by my disguise; they recognized me instantly and greeted me like an old friend. I meandered among them for a time, letting the ridiculous train of my gown weave a snake-like pattern of satin and chiffon between them. The satin bits gleamed in the moonlight, I saw as I took stock of my wake. It was like a trail of blood making a twisted river behind me.

The horses snuffed at my extensions of excess, snorting softly here and there and sending ripples through the fabric. It was odd to them that I would bring such an effect along with me, but not without its entertainment factor. They were more curious than toddlers, following me as I mastered my train and toted it about, until one of them broke into a frisky trot and stepped on it, and a cringe-worthy rip resulted.

Ah. I would have to have Lady Alejandra fix that.

It was a little bit of a struggle to swing up onto the back of horse with so many gallons of fabric weighing me down, but after bundling it all up and draping it in folds over my shoulder, I managed the feat. The other horses followed as we picked up a trot around the arena, my train tumbling out of its crude order and flowing out behind me. It did feel glorious, I had to admit. Lady Alejandra and Cambrie were onto more than I had given them credit for.

I climbed from one horse's back to another's, repeating the transition after a few tricks here and there to spread the play around. Only after a thorough distribution of attention, and a series of played-out, fantasized scenarios that was surely overkill, did I retire for the night. It was undoubtedly midnight by then, and I applied even more care picking my way back to my tent. The last thing I wanted to do was make some unfounded noise in the quiet camp and have the light-sleeping soldiers start emerging from their tents, weapons in hand to confront the 'intruder'. Especially because they would never recognize me, and might very well take appropriate action.

I passed all the tents without any such incident, but it was just my luck that I hadn't quite made it to mine when the flap of Jay's was thrust aside, and he emerged from his. I stopped in my tracks, a deer in the headlights, caught in the act.

No!
He couldn't see me like this. Especially not when we hadn't spoken yet in my normal state. This was not the way to re-break the ice between us.

But he had stopped in his tracks as well, seeing me. I was cast in shadow, and he squinted at me, frowning. Encouraged, I planted myself, going rigid and refusing to move a muscle. Maybe if I stayed perfectly still, he wouldn't be able to make the connections necessary to make sense out of my get-up. I willed the rustling of the glorious layers of fabric to resist.

Jay struggled to come to some logical conclusion, but I knew there was no such conclusion to come to. Something would have to give soon, or this would progress in a direction I very much did not desire.

“What...” he finally began, but that was all the prodding I needed to bolt like the deer that finally came to its senses in the face of oncoming traffic.

“'Night, Jay,” I peeped, and all in one motion swept up my train in an arm and ran into my tent.

“Alannis,
what
–?” he persisted with a little more certainty of what he was getting at this time, and I heard him take a step toward my tent.

“Don't come in, Jay!” I called a little more frantically than I intended.

“What are–”

“I'm getting un-dressed!” Desperate to keep him out, I quickly brought truth to my words – oddly more comfortable with the idea of him barging in on me like that, if it meant sparing him the visual of me all amidst the glory he would surely disapprove of. And if he did follow through with barging in, I was much more comfortable having a valid reason to slap him across the face to get him out.

He resisted though, graciously not risking it. I breathed a sigh of relief, even though he was still outside the tent. Tossing the wad of costume into the corner, I climbed quickly under my covers and pulled them safely up to my chin, instantly dedicating my limbs to a fetal position as if I'd been there for hours.

“Goodnight, Jay!” I whispered again a moment later when I heard no signs of him leaving, and then came the sound of his own breath going out, and his steps turning to saunter off in the other direction.

A second breath of relief collapsed out of me, allowing me to relax into my bedding. I would regret sleeping in my makeup when morning came, but I wasn't about to climb back out of the safety of my covers that night. Not when perilous Jay-figures were walking about, in danger of stumbling upon the secret undertakings I was much more comfortable keeping under wraps until the right time came to reveal them.