Reign of Beasts (Creature Court) - By Tansy Rayner Roberts Page 0,3

secret corners. We had less than two market-nines to pull the Lord’s show together and we sweated to make it happen. The ill luck from our last performance dogged us. Props broke, costumes were lost, and it turned out that Aufleur had some daft law that restricted horses and wheeled vehicles during daylight hours, which meant we had to transport everything we owned across three districts in dodgy hand carts.

Matthias fell sick, a hoarse cough that racked his body and took his appetite. That left us without a merchant’s son, and the stagemaster lined up the lambs, demanding that one of us take his place.

‘Baby should do it,’ said Madalena.

‘The lad’s not eight yet,’ the stagemaster said in disbelief.

She stretched and smiled. ‘He has the voice of a princel, if you give him a chance.’

Madalena was so much happier here than she had been back in Oyster. She really thought this was her big break, her dream come true, singing to fine toffs in a city instead of in our own little musette back home. I missed the smell of salted crab and the sound of the sea.

The stagemaster reluctantly agreed that my pipes were up to the role of merchant’s son, but I was too short to fit Matthias’s costume so he made Kip do it instead. I tried not to care too much. There would be other roles. I minded more that Madalena was head over heels in love with the toff who called himself Lord Saturn, and she was going to get her heart broke clean through.

Her dressing room at the Vittorina Royale was no bigger than the one back home, though it had fancy giltwork around the mirror, and I caught her gazing around sometimes like the room was a steak dinner. Something to be proud of, rather than something she’d been tossed by a cove who only wanted to impress some other lady.

Oh, aye. There was another lady. Of course there was.

2

It was the nox before Saturnalia, and we were about to raise the curtain of the Vittorina Royale for the first time. The Lord had told us we could open the doors to the general public from tomorrow, so Benny and I had been out pasting posters just like at home, except there were vigiles patrolling the streets here who’d give us a whack if they caught us pasting on public buildings. We’d been as far as the Forum — a jaw-dropping place full of every kind of temple and building imaginable. Our posters were merry and bright and called us the Mermaid Revue, making us sound like some exotic troupe from the far south. But this show — the first show — was open to no one but his Lordship and his guests.

We peeped through the side of the curtain, watching them enter.

Lord Saturn wore that high hat of his, and a long coat that shone green and violet. He led his crew through to the dress circle — a gang of demmes and seigneurs all dolled up to the nines. Liv and Ruby-Red giggled, laying bets on whether they were real aristos, or another theatre troupe, or something a lot more scandalous. They always talked like that around me, assuming I was too little to know what they were on about.

I watched them, Lord Saturn’s crowd. They were finely dressed, but only some of them knew how to wear the clothes. They weren’t aristos, that was for sure. They were all gathered around this golden demme with short curling hair and a frock more daring than anything the columbines would wear on stage. Her arms were bare and you could see that she had taut muscles, like she knew how to haul scenery. That was no lady.

She was Saturn’s, though. You could see it in the way she moved, the way she laid her hand on his, the look on his face as he presented her with … us.

We were a trinket to please his lady. The worst of it was, she wasn’t impressed. The whole time the saints-and-angel play went on, Saturn’s lady looked bored, like she was waiting for the real show to start. Some of her retinue applauded at the closing song, but she shrugged one golden shoulder and they stopped.

Madalena had sung her heart out, and almost convinced me (who knew her better than anyone) that she was a real angel made of sugar and steam. When that half-applause stopped, she looked like she was going to slit