Read Online The Hidden Twin by Adi Rule - Free Book Online Page B

talk to young men. You will even fall in love someday.”
    Jey, who falls in love every other week, forces a feeble smile. I will her to keep her response short and vague. We don’t know yet if Papa has found out about her secret meeting with Bonner.
    â€œHopefully!” she says, too loudly. Good enough.
    Papa grasps the message again, as if he isn’t certain what he is supposed to do with it. “But, Jey, dear one, you know what the rules are. You can’t speak to anyone there. School, yes. The tea shops, yes. But there—it just isn’t safe for your sister. You must know that, my girl.”
    Jey frowns. “Papa? I don’t—”
    â€œThere’s nothing to do now,” he says. “You must decline. Whatever you did, whatever you said, it got his attention, so you simply must not go.”
    â€œGo?” Jey says. “Go where?”
    I can’t take any more. “Papa, what is the message?”
    He seems to notice me for the first time. He is silent a moment, then hands it to me. The paper is heavy with a gold coat of arms embossed at the top. A sturdy wax seal has been broken, and a gold tassel dangles off the back.
    Miss Jey Fairweather, 162 Saltball Street
    Her Imperial Majesty the Empress of Caldaras
    and
    The Esteemed Azizi Zan, Commandant of Caldaras City,
    Protector of the Nation
    humbly request the Honor of your Presence
    at an afternoon’s Entertainment
    to be held next Restlight
    at the Copper Palace on Roet Island,
    at the specific request of their Devoted Son,
    the Admirable Zahi Zan.
    I gasp. The Admirable Zahi Zan? The Empress’s son? I thought he and his brothers were away, getting university educations in the snowy mountains of southern Caldaras. Questions and confusion stay my voice, the most vibrant of which is, Why in wet hell was he mowing the lawn?
    How was I supposed to know? And now he has invited me to a private party at the Copper Palace!
    Correction: He has invited Jey.
    But neither of us is going.

 
    six
    The face of the dead obsidian redwing of High Ra Square finds me in my sleep, haunting me because he doesn’t look like a redwing. Because he looks human, as I do.
    I stare at the outlines of the stones in the wall next to my bed. My mind refuses to drift into unconsciousness; it swirls with memory and rapture and worry. I follow the slow progress of a beam of moonlight, and when it reaches my face, I give up on sleep and swing my legs out from under the blanket.
    I leave the impression of my body in the hay mattress as I clamber out of bed, black fog pressing against the glass walls of the Dome. I spark a candle stub to life, eliciting feathery rustles from the perches above me, and reach up on tiptoe to the top of my armoire.
    The old metal wrench-box I find there takes some coercing before it slides jerkily off the edge and into my hands. It came from Val Chorm, from the house that is now only the green memory of ashes. Inside is a ragged square of linen tablecloth, carefully folded, and a small collection of soft-worn pages from the penny pulps Jey brings home. Each page is from a different story, with lurid titles like “Taken by the Monster,” “Duplicate of Evil,” and “Bride of the Blood Prince.” All the stories contain redwings in their most depraved and brutal manifestations.
    The pages I’ve saved are the illustrations, usually melodramatic line drawings of beautiful people unfortunate enough to be terrified and lose large swaths of their clothing at the same time. But, gorgeous, frightened, and scantily clad as these people are, my interest lies elsewhere. Each illustration also depicts a redwing.
    Hairy, most of them. Wild eyed. A lot of teeth and claws. I pore over them again, trying, straining to see myself. My hair is long, but I keep it brushed. My fingernails are filed and my teeth clean. The eyes that look out from my mirror seem placid enough.
    It’s ridiculous to think