“I didn’t know seduction was a crime,” Tella murmured.
“Depends on who you’re trying to seduce.”
Tella spun around. But instead of finding the ink-stained crone, Tella came face-to-face with a girl in a luminous parchment-white gown, sewn together with thick black stitches that made her look as if she could have been one of the inked portraits escaped from the wall. Aiko, another one of Legend’s performers.
She was always difficult for Tella to read. Aiko generally kept to herself, since her job was to observe. She worked as a histographer, immortalizing the history of Caraval by drawing significant events in a magical notebook, which was currently tucked under her arm.
Her appearance clearly meant that Tella was on the correct path. But Tella couldn’t honestly say she was happy to see the girl.
Tella liked Aiko well enough outside of the game. But she’d preferred to have avoided her inside the game. Aiko was known for making unforgiving bargains. During the last Caraval she had made a deal with Scarlett that had cost her sister two days of her life; Scarlett’s temporary death had not been like Tella’s, but it was still not something Tella would ever willingly experience again.
“You’re welcome to look as long as you wish,” Aiko said, “but choose wisely before asking a question. I’ll only answer one for free, and after that each will cost you something irreplaceable.”
“Can I just ask for the next clue?”
“You can, but I won’t give it to you. The most I can do is guide you toward it, if you manage to ask a better question next time.”
Blast it. Tella hadn’t meant that to come out like a question.
She kept her mouth shut as her eyes wandered over several more posters, searching for an actual figure from the Deck of Destiny, hoping it might possibly lead to the next clue.
She didn’t spy any Fates, but she did see crimes ranging from blood-drinking and cannibalism to necromancy, selling bad spells—
Tella halted. All thoughts of crimes and clues and Fates fled from her thoughts as she reached a poster in the center of the back wall.
She forgot how to exhale. How to speak. How to blink. How to move.
Trimmed in a starry border, this portrait was prettier than the others, though maybe that was also because of the beautiful face beneath the word Wanted—a face that bore an uncanny resemblance to Tella and Scarlett’s missing mother, Paloma.
23
Paradise the Lost.
Wanted for thievery, kidnapping, and murder.
Tella couldn’t pry her eyes from the picture. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to believe it.
After so many years of wondering about her mother, finally Tella might’ve found an answer to one of her unanswerable questions. But it was not the answer she’d hoped for. Her mother was a thief. A kidnapper. A murderer. A criminal.
Tella wanted to believe the poster was wrong. The mother she knew was not any of those things and yet as Jacks had said, The reason you couldn’t find her before is because Paloma was not her real name.
Her mother’s real name was Paradise, and Paradise’s resemblance to Paloma was unmistakable. It wasn’t just that she had the same oval-shaped face or thick dark hair. It was the way her lips were curved into that enchanting, enigmatic smile that Tella had grown up mimicking. Her large eyes were just the right amount of narrow at the corners, the perfect balance of clever and thoughtful. With a stab of jealousy, Tella realized she looked almost exactly like Scarlett. In the poster she even appeared to be around Scarlett’s age.
Did Scarlett know about this? Was this why her sister refused to ever speak of their mother?
“What can you tell me about Paradise the Lost?” Tella asked.
“She was special.” Aiko glided toward the portrait and ran an unadorned finger down Paradise’s cheek. “I never noticed until now, but she looks quite a bit like your Scarlett. Although Paradise was much bolder than your sister.”
“What else can you tell me about her?”
“Your sister or Paradise?”
“I know my sister better than she knows herself. I want to know about Paradise.”
Aiko’s dark eyes sparked with a familiar gleam. With her enchanted histographer’s notebook, the girl was almost magical and tricky enough to be a Fate. Or maybe Aiko was Legend—it would be brilliant if the Great Master Legend turned out to be a girl. “I’ll tell you all I know, but I’ll need your payment first.”
“You can’t have a day of my life,” Tella said.