“There’s not another man in Attolia, maybe not even in Eddis, who can do the knife dance, so. It’s one of the Mysteries of the Thieves, so. Five knives. All at once. My brother knows the whole thing.”

“Is that true?” the representative asked the timid man.

“So, so,” he said, “but . . .”

It was worth a token. The others all had gone to people from troupes that had won the Cerulis medal in the past; if the anxious little man couldn’t live up to his brother’s big-mouth promises, there were plenty of other seasoned performers to choose from. The representative handed Ruk the token and moved on.

“Ruk, are you mad?” said Druic. “Why not just tell him I can see the future while you were at it?”

“Because you can’t see the future.”

“I can’t do the knife dance, either. Father never taught me.”

“You watched him every day for your entire life and I’ve seen you hiding behind the wagon practicing. You’ll be fine.”

“What if I don’t know all the steps? What if I’ve got it wrong?”

Ruk threw up his hands. “For crying out loud, Druic. We agreed to come to the Cerulis to try to get a place with one of the big troupes. How the hell did you think we were going to do that if you don’t do the knife dance? Did you think anyone needs another juggler spinning plates on a stick?”

Druic hunched his shoulders. “Father said never to do the knife dance.”

“Father’s dead. To hell with father. I am sick of trekking through the backwoods trying to make it on our own.”

Druic shook his head helplessly. His brother got drunk and got in fights and that was why they traveled on their own. That’s why they were so often chased out of town after a single performance. Druic’s juggling skills could have gotten them a place at any mid-sized troupe, but he didn’t have a skill amazing enough to overcome Ruk’s reputation.

“I don’t have any knives,” Druic said.

“Use Father’s.”

“I buried them.”

“Buried them where?”

“With him, where do you think?”

“Why would you do that? No, never mind, don’t tell me. You’re an idiot, that’s why. Who cares? We’ll get you a set of wooden ones.”

“Wood?”

“We’ll paint them. No one will know.”

The audition went perfectly. Ruk, when he was sober, had the attention to detail of a successful con man. The knives he painted looked impressively sharp from a distance, and Druic loved to perform. All of his shyness and timidity fell away once he was out in front of a crowd. He only wished he could hold on to that confidence once his performance was over. The days of waiting after the audition and before the Cerulis feast were a living hell. He picked at his fingers, picked at his food, sat hunched over the terrible queasiness in his stomach, while Ruk tried to encourage him with a steady stream of abuse. “For Gods’ sakes, sit up and stop whimpering. I will smack you, you know. I don’t know why I saddle myself with you, so you just remember this is your last chance.”

The banquet hall was filled. All the members of the court who could fit were crowded together on the benches that lined the walls. The king and queen sat in gold thrones on a raised stage with their attendants seated on the steps leading up to it. Druic stood alone, in the open space before them. He took a deep breath and displayed his five wooden knives in a precise fan, then snapped the fan closed again. He slid one blade across the tiny bladder of red paint he had hidden in his hand and showed the bright red “blood” to the audience. Then he threw all the knives into the air.

The knives went up as if on wings, each to a different height, and as they dropped he twisted and caught them, flipping them up again and again, all the while stepping in an intricate pattern around a center point in a repeating loop like a figure eight. Every throw was perfect, every catch was flawless right up until he turned and found himself face to face with the king of Attolia.

The knives fell to the ground, clattering like the fakes they were against the marble floor. The king looked at them, craning his head to see each one. All of Druic’s fears flooded back.

The king toed the knife by his foot.

“Did your father teach you this dance?” he asked calmly.

“N-no, Your Majesty. The man who taught it to him made him promise never to teach it to anyone else.”

“Then how do you know it?”

“I watched my father and copied it on my own.”

“Ah. That explains the mistakes.” He looked at the knives. “They’re wood.”

Druic nodded. There was no point in denying it.

“I thought maybe you didn’t have a set of real ones,” said the king. “I was going to offer to let you use mine.”

In the crook of his elbow was a narrow wooden box. Breathless, Druic watched the king as he lifted off the top to show five beautiful and no doubt razor-sharp knives nestled like a school of lean and silvery fish on the blue velvet inside.

“I sent someone to fetch them when I heard you would perform the knife dance.”

The king offered him the box. Druic shook his head, backed away. He tried to bluff. “It has to be done with wood knives, Your Majesty.” Many of the moves didn’t involve catching the knife by the handle, or even by the blade. Instead the flat of the blade had to be bounced off the back of the knuckles. Even a slight mistake might cost a finger or all the tendons in one hand. That was why Druic had buried his father with his knives. He thought he would never have the skill to use them.

“Oh,” said the king in dire tones. “Let me show you how it’s done.” He handed Druic the knife case and positioned him just so. “Hold very still,” he whispered in Druic’s ear and plucked the knives out of the velvet. He tucked four under his arm and tossed the remaining one into the air, holding his hand flat underneath it as it fell. The knife blade hit his hand just a moment before his fingers closed on it and a thin red line sprang up, his sacrifice to his god.

Then he danced.

Afraid to lose an ear, or worse, Druic couldn’t even turn his head to watch as the knives rose and fell around him. At first there was an occasional ring of metal on metal as the knives hit against the hook the king wore in place of a hand, but that sound faded and all Druic could hear was his own heartbeat banging away in his ears as the king spun front and back, pulling the knives out of the air and throwing them up again until Druic, subsisting on only the shallowest of breaths, thought he might die if the dance didn’t end soon. Finally, Eugenides halted in front of him. With a last flick of his wrist, he sent the knives up and not one came down.