But what else is there, when your past, your roles, your upbringing and parents and culture—your very name—are stripped away? What’s left? So far my answer has been: not much.

Eventually I doze, if only for a half hour, afraid of what my sleepwalking self might do, unable to turn off my mind.

24

When Claudia said I could use whatever I wanted in the closet, I didn’t realize the sheer trove of weirdness I’d walk into. Alice in Wonderland skirts, pin-striped corsets, gladiator sandals, straitjacket shirts, black shorts with fringe to the ankle, velvet bodices covered with timepieces—or cocktail umbrellas or buckles—purple wigs, and masquerade masks. Miniature hats that look like shrunken-head versions of something from the Kentucky Derby. It’s as though Cirque du Soleil, a goth ball, and a gaming convention all crash-landed in the same eight-by-three-foot twilight zone that is Claudia’s spare closet.

“What is all this?” I say when she comes to check on me. And then I pull up short. She’s outfitted in a pair of leather riding breeches, an abbreviated tuxedo coat, and a tiny top hat with a veil over a fall of pink hair.

“Clothes,” she says, as though I were the village idiot. “You can’t meet Tibor dressed like that.”

“Who’s Tibor?” I say, exasperated.

“The Zagreb Prince. Who answers only to Nikola.”

“Nikola?”

“The Prince of Budapest. The oldest court.”

None of this means anything to me.

“I wasn’t aware that I had to look like Lady Gaga to meet him.”

She huffs and starts rifling through the closet, pulling things from hangers, tossing them on the bed.

“What about the passports?” I say.

“Jester’s working on it.”

“Jester?”

“You didn’t think I could just go pick one up at the pharmacy down the street?” she snaps.

A loud exclamation sounds from the other room. Luka. Piotrek talks over him in protest.

“You both need to change your attitude,” Claudia says, getting on her hands and knees to dig in the back of the closet. She tosses out a pair of boots.

“So you want me to look like a freak.”

She gets up and stares at me, indignant in pink hair, and I could almost laugh at her. She throws a pair of blood-red velvet pants with zippers down both sides at me, hard.

“It’s almost ten. You’d better hurry.”

I let out a long exhale as she laces me into a black corset, fits me in a purple wig. It’s piled high with curls and topped with a giant black rose. She brushes fuchsia lipstick on my mouth, ties a black mask behind my head, and attaches a pair of golden chandeliers to my ears.

“Well, well,” she says, looking me over as I zip up the pants, almost catching my skin in the metal teeth twice.