Nocturne

Nocturne is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.Copyright © 2023 by Alyssa WeesAll rights reserved.Published in the United States by Del Rey, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.DEL REY and the CIRCLE colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATANames: Wees, Alyssa, author.Title: Nocturne / Alyssa Wees.Description: New York: Del Rey, [2023]Identifiers: LCCN 2022017366 (print) | LCCN 2022017367 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593357477 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780593357484 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593722664 (international edition)Subjects: LCGFT: Fantasy fiction. | Novels.Classification: LCC PS3623.E4226 N63 2023 (print) | LCC PS3623.E4226 (ebook) | DDC 813/.6—dc23/eng/20220521LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022017366LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022017367Ebook ISBN 9780593357484randomhousebooks.comBook design by Virginia Norey, adapted for ebookArt used throughout has been adapted from Anna Ismagilova/stock.adobe.com, Dušan Zidar/stock.adobe.com, Olga/stock.adobe.com, vat2522/stock.adobe.com, and jenteva/stock.adobe.com.Cover illustration: Jana HeidersdorfCover design: Cassie Gonzalesep_prh_6.0_142492539_c0_r0 ContentsCoverTitle PageCopyrightPart OneChapter OneChapter TwoChapter ThreeChapter FourChapter FiveChapter SixChapter SevenPart TwoChapter EightChapter NineChapter TenChapter ElevenChapter TwelveChapter ThirteenChapter FourteenChapter FifteenChapter SixteenChapter SeventeenPart ThreeChapter EighteenChapter NineteenChapter TwentyChapter Twenty-oneDedicationAcknowledgmentsAbout the Author THE MASTER CAME INTO MY life like the dusk. Slowly, until all the city was covered in night. And I, a star waiting to burn.It was winter, or nearly so, the cold before the snow when the air goes still around you and inside of you. The radiator in my little room in the boardinghouse was shaky at best and I shivered getting dressed, frost in the corners of the window. With the heel of my hand I wiped away the condensation, an unchanging view of the brick alley beyond. Though it was early I had eaten already—eggs and toast with margarine—but still my belly rumbled because it was not enough and never would be.My breath quickly misted the glass again; I stepped away. Nine years into the economic depression and my basic needs were met, even if this was the coldest of rooms in the creakiest boardinghouse on the North Side of Chicago. Granted, the matron, Mrs. O’Donnell, served us more for dinner than most: baked beans with cornbread and Hoover stew. Dandelion salad, and potato pancakes, and potato soup. Boiled carrots and spaghetti, cabbage and dumplings—all of it fine, though none of it appealing. I knew I was fortunate, I did; and yet, even the guilt of ingratitude was not enough to banish my growing discontent.This can’t be all there is.I was thinking of running away forever when there was a knock on my bedroom door.I had made it part of my routine every morning, imagining how I would manage it: out the window, down the alley, through the park. Hurrying, but not so fast as to appear suspicious, or as if I were going anywhere in particular. Hair up, no wind, a half-melted moon in the dim afternoon guiding me toward the open water, the lake like one long shadow. There I would wade into the water and the waves would carry me to another world entirely—to a place I had never been, and from which I would not be able to find my way back again. Or, at the very least, to a crack in this world, a place where magic coats everything like a layer of dust, where the wind smells sweet and night never comes. A place that has no edges and no end, where there is always more. More life, more light, more to see, and more to explore.It was the fantasy of a little girl. A girl I had not been for some time and of course never would be again. One that still had a mother who would stop her if she tried to leave; one that still had the whole world open to her, and dwelled in that sacred place before a perfect, cherished dream became a less than satisfying reality. For years in the company of Near North Ballet, I’d been another girl in a row of perfect girls, another face, another body in a line of similar faces and bodies. Symmetry and seamlessness, every step and angle of the chin; every curve of the arm and lift of the leg, precisely the same as the girls in front and behind. After a while I’d begun to feel as if I’d run eagerly, wildly into a labyrinth of possibility only to find that it was instead a straight aisle, pressed among a crowd of equally eager girls all trying to unlock the same door at the end of this infinite corridor.And so, stuck in one place, growing stagnant and unsure, a new dream had been born: If I couldn’t dance the way I wanted to—ecstatically, with all eyes on me—I would run. As long as I was still in motion, my heart would keep beating, and nothing, not even death, could touch me.More. There has to be more.“Coming!” I called, as another knock came at the door, louder and more insistent. I turned from the window and hurried to pull on my favorite pale pink dress for church: the last dress my mother had ever made for me, a gift on the day I turned thirteen. A little worn around the seams, and tight across the chest, but seven years later it still fit, and I would wear it for seven years more as long as it didn’t fall apart. I tugged on my stockings, hoping the tiny rip near the hip wouldn’t reach my knees and become visible to judging eyes. Sunday was the only day of the week I wore my hair down, shadow-black and falling in bouncy spirals well past my shoulders, much longer than Mamma ever used to let me keep it. Finally I slipped on my brown penny loafers and went to the door.“Mistress is here.” It was Emilia, slightly breathless even though she stood absolutely still, her dark hair set in pins to curl. It was still half