"Hey…" Adam made his way back behind the curtain.
Taumiel and the little girl were packing up to leave. She sat on her knees rolling up the scrolls with the drawings on them, and Taumiel was filling a backpack and a box, though there wasn't much to pack up anyway.
"Hello. Adam, it was, right?" Taumiel said, his tone friendly and welcoming.
The little girl stopped, the scroll half-rolled in her hands, and stood up. Her expression was surprised, and she looked at Adam as if she were scanning him, which made him slightly uneasy.
Only two of them? Adam thought. I was sure there was someone else hidden inside at the door when I played the puzzle. The third member isn't here?
His eyes went to the box of gold sitting in front of Taumiel.
"Um, sir, are you just like me?" the little girl asked him.
Adam was surprised, no way, was she able to perceive my resonance and deduce I was cursed too, that requires to focus the resonance around your eyes to heighten perception, it took me quite the training to do so, how is she…
"Don't be surprised," Taumiel said. "Lilly is quite talented for her age. She's been through harsh conditions, though she doesn't remember any of it." He stood and stepped toward Adam, and without thinking, Adam took two steps back.
"Her name's Lilly," Adam said. "So Lilith was just a stage name for the performance?"
"Yes. My name is Lilly. Can you please answer my question, kind sir?" she added.
"Oh , sorry." Adam walked over and knelt down. "If you mean cursed, then yeah, Lilly. I'm just like you." He patted her head gently.
"So, Adam, is there something we can help you with?" Taumiel smiled. "Perhaps you want to maybe ask how the tricks were done?" He lifted the box and the bag he'd packed. They were ready to leave.
"Well…" Adam hesitated. "I was curious about a specific trick, mostly. If you wouldn't mind."
"As long as it isn't an important secret, I'd be happy to share. You solved my puzzle, after all , a free entrance isn't enough of a reward for that."
Zeren spoke before Adam could get the next line out. "Hey, did you get all that gold from just this one performance?"
Taumiel laughed. "We did, yes. Honestly, it's too much money for the little effort it took. But you know how rich people are , they'll pay a fortune just to be entertained. Don't worry, though. About thirty percent of it goes to the poor."
Thirty percent. That was a lot to give away. Adam hadn't expected that.
"Well, we're kind of poor, if you were wondering," Zeren said, with an awkward laugh.
Adam was embarrassed.
Taumiel looked at the box, then at the two of them, then back at the box. He took out six gold coins and held them out to Adam.
"No, no , thank you, but I can't accept that. Thanks anyway." Adam's embarrassment shot through the roof.
"I see. So you're not the type to take money for free." Taumiel laughed.
"Well, you could say th, "
"I'll take it. Don't mind him, he'll come around." Zeren stuck out both hands, and Taumiel, smiling, gave him the coins.
Adam gave him a light knock on the head. "Ow , that hurts…"
"Adam." Taumiel set the box down. "Surviving in the City of Gold without money is going to be very hard. The economy here is brutal. It's a huge checkpoint for trade across the whole continent, so everything is expensive. Even food isn't guaranteed."
Adam stayed quiet. The words were heavy, but they were true, and he'd already worked that much out for himself.
"Perhaps you could tell me what kind of curse you have," Taumiel said. "It might be possible to have you work with us."
Really? Adam thought. We met two seconds ago. Strange to ask that this fast. Maybe because cursed people are rare , a curse can do what looks like magic to a crowd.
"Maybe," Adam said. "But I won't be staying in this city forever, and I might have other things to take care of, so I could go unavailable out of nowhere. Could joining you be more like… hired for each show, instead of a permanent member?"
"Of course. Though I'd rather you became permanent, if your curse turns out to fit what we need. So , what is it?"
Adam hesitated, then decided it was worth a try. He summoned the two pisces, and they floated up and began rubbing their heads against his hands and shoulder.
"Oh , a summoning curse?" Taumiel said, surprised.
Lilly's face lit up. She liked the fish, and started toward Adam slowly. With a small flick of his fingers he sent them circling around her, and she reached up and pet them.
"They're so coooool!!" Lilly smiled, the first time Adam had seen her do it. He found himself smiling back.
"Those are some very interesting fish," Taumiel said. "But, Adam , judging by your face, there's more, isn't there."
"Yeah, you got me." Adam dismissed the fish and summoned the golden ram in front of him. Then he pulled the lamp hanging above them down with gravity, and it dropped straight into his hand.
Taumiel didn't ask how it worked, he went silent for about twenty seconds, finger on his chin in a thinking stance.
"Constellations," he said. "Your whole power runs on the constellations. Doesn't it."
Adam hadn't said the word. Zeren's head turned from Taumiel to Adam and back.
He'd seen it once, he figured it out this fast, impressive, perhaps it’s the constellation signs on both the Pisces and the Ram’s heads were too much of a tell.
"Yeah," Adam said. "Though it's got some tedious unlocking conditions , I can't fully manifest all of it yet. So… is it good enough for you?"
"More than I expected. You'll be a great addition, Adam."
Adam and Zeren traded a grin. They'd landed a good deal.
Perfect, Adam thought. With this I can make enough to last in here. One less thing to worry about , now I can focus on Evelynn and the Solomon's Rem,
Wait. He almost forgot.
"I almost forgot , about the question I was going to…"
"The memory loss," Taumiel said. "That's what you wanted to ask about. Isn't it."
"Yes, it is."
"We're leaving right now, so let me tell you on the way to our next performance. We'll run out of time if we stay in here any longer."
"The next performance? Right after this one?"
"Yes. We have another in a few hours, on the other side of the city. It's a big place, so we'll barely make it , we'll take the train. I'll explain it to you there. Your role in the performance too."
"The… train?" The word meant nothing to him.
Thaumiel paused, then smiled. "Right , you wouldn't have seen one. They're new. About five to six months old. Utopian engineers came and ran the construction themselves. A line of linked carriages that runs along iron rails, pulled by a single engine , no horses, and faster than anything on the roads." He hefted the box again. "For now the rails only run inside the city; the cross-city lines aren't finished yet. But at the pace they're laying them, it'll be less than two years before most of the major cities in the country are joined up."
Adam turned the idea over. A city building something like that in a month.
"Alright," he said. "That works."
They finished packing, and left.
An hour later…
The carriage lurched, and Zeren grabbed the bench with both hands.
"It's moving , Adam, it's moving on its own!"
"I noticed." Adam had a hand braced flat against the window frame and was trying not to look like he needed it there.
Outside, the city began to slide. Slow, then not slow. The lantern-light smeared past the glass in long streaks, and the cobbles they'd walked an hour ago blurred into one grey river running backward. Zeren pressed his face to the window and made a sound that wasn't a word.
"It's faster than Faracha," he breathed.
"It is not faster than Faracha."
"It feels faster."
Adam let that one go, because he wasn't certain his voice would stay level if he argued it. A whole carriage of strangers, hauled along iron in the dark by no horse he could see. He kept his face calm and his hand on the frame.
Across from them, Lilly sat with the big scroll upright between her knees, watching the boys watch the window. She didn't look out of it once.
Taumiel sat beside her, at ease, the box of gold at his feet.
"You'll be on stage with her tomorrow," he said. "Both of you at once. I've been turning it over." He nodded at the window, at the streaking light, as if the idea were out there somewhere. "She paints a river , silver, the kind that runs along the air over the front rows. Empty water is a pretty thing. But put your fish in it and let them swim the current. A river we made up, with something living in it." He smiled.
"You've thought about this a lot, for someone who met my curse ten minutes ago," Adam said.
"I think about everything a lot."
Adam looked at Lilly. "Your curse , it's the drawing, isn't it. The glyphs."
She straightened a little. "It's, "
"It's exactly that," Taumiel said. "She draws something and adds glyphs to define its properties. Water, glass, objects of any sorts , whatever she draws true enough. A remarkable thing." He said it warmly, and it was over, and Lilly's mouth had already closed. She looked down at her hands.
Adam held on that a second longer than he meant to. Then he let it go too.
"Pretty cool, Lilly," he said, and she glanced up, and the corner of her mouth moved.
The carriage swayed. Zeren had gone quiet against the window, lulled.
"You said you'd tell me about the trick," Adam said. "The man who forgot his name."
"I did." Taumiel reached down, and the black gauntlet was on his hand again , Adam hadn't seen where it came from, the same way he hadn't seen the apple. The mouth in its palm sat open and idle. "No trick. It takes a slice of him. His name, his street, his wife , I lift it off the way you'd lift a card off the top of a deck. Hold it as long as I like. Set it back when I'm done." He turned the palm over, the gesture from the stage. "He was never in danger. I'm tidy."
Adam looked at the gauntlet.
"That's not your curse," he said. "It came on with the glove. Where'd you get it?"
Taumiel's smile changed, just slightly. Like a man whose guest had finally noticed the one good painting in the room.
"Now that," he said, "is a far better question than the one you came backstage to ask."
He turned the gauntlet in the lantern-light, unhurried.
"It's one of a group of things. Old things , older than any curse you'll meet, older than the Epoch. They don't die when the rest of us do." The black mouth caught the light for a moment and lost it. "They're called Solomon's Remnants."