The following morning, before dawn even broke, they put their plan into motion. Leo and Gianna connived to erect a barrier on the road leading to Mercado's Marina, while Bjørn and various crewmen filled the local alehouses, spreading rumors about Duke Ferdinand II's imminent and unannounced visit. Meanwhile Nico was in his room with Max, working on the disguises. Max made no secret of the fact that he would rather be with Bjørn in the alehouse.

“Ugh. Haven’t had a drop of liquor in ages,” Max muttered, more to himself than to Nico. He was sat in a chair against the wall, legs crossed, a faraway look in his eyes. “I mean, it’s been at least two days.”

Nico said nothing. He had stayed up all night preparing concoctions for their Musea heist. When not buttressed with Illusion magic, disguises were complex, difficult work, touching the periphery of multiple disciplines, including alchemy, chemistry, and cosmetics. Fortunately, Nico’s Disguise Kit included a “cookbook” of recipes for various techniques. He had already taped a wig to Max’s head, giving him a head of thick, jet-black hair, reminiscent of Vincenzo. Now Nico crushed a stone of Parthian carbon into a glass of heated palm oil. Adding a few leaves of enchanted belladonna, he stirred the mixture into a solution.

“So what,” Max said, “are you a teetotaler? You don’t drink?”

“Seldom. Usually only wine.”

“Wine,” he snorted. “A lady’s drink. You ought to grow a pair, Nico. Try whiskey or rum, it’s like — well, it’s like the nectar of the gods…” He licked his lips, as though he were imagining the taste. “Curse sobriety. Reality is life’s worst intoxicant.”

“Sit still. Close your eyes. We need to turn you into a proper Veronan. This solution will darken your skin.” Max was of Edmiri stock, having blue eyes and a pallid complexion, whereas Veronans like Nico and Vincenzo had brown eyes and a tint in their skin tone. “I only have enough for exposed skin. Roll up your sleeves a little.”

Nico dipped a brush into the solution, wiping the excess against the brim. Then he began applying it to Max’s skin, first his face and then his extremities. Nico felt like he was back in Dante’s atelier, painting an elaborate forgery. At its core, a good disguise was an art form itself.

“So,” Max said, as Nico applied the pigmentation to his lower legs, “what’s the plan? As you know I went to Vale. As you perhaps did not know I am a celebrated thespian. Certainly I should take the starring role in this production. I shall be…” he gave a pregnant pause, “the Duke.” He struck an exultant pose, raising a fist in the air, as though the Duke were a young, brawny field general facing an opposing army.

“Hold still,” Nico said, “and no. You will be Majordomo Vincenzo. He is the Duke’s closest adviser, his right hand man. On the rare occasions when the Duke ventures from the Ducal Palace, he is always accompanied by his majordomo. He is a necessary component to the disguise.”

Max reacted like he’d just smelled moldy cheese. “A majordomo? You want me to play a household steward? Me?”

“Vincenzo is a majordomo in title only. He is… ah, more akin to a royal regent.” Nico was embellishing, but it was necessary to placate Max’s ego to buy his cooperation. Still, it was undeniable that Vincenzo had a lot of influence in the Ducal Palace; most nobles and merchants conducted their business through him.

“Well, I don’t think that—”

“What you think is immaterial, Max. Now let’s do your eyes, we need to make them brown.” Nico went to his desk, picking up a potent but volatile formula known as mutachromia. “Tilt your head back, open your eyes wide. I need to put three drops in each eye. Three drops exactly. Four drops will melt your eyes. Five will burn a hole in your brain. And I haven’t slept proper in days, and my hand is not very steady.”

Max gave a lopsided grin. “Surely you jest.”

“I’m not.” He really wasn’t. Ever so carefully, he dropped three fat drops into each of Max’s eyes. The effect was immediate: inky ichor filled Max’s irises. Max blinked, a couple tears running down his cheeks.

“Facial recognition is an implicit neurological phenomenon,” Nico said, quoting verbatim from Hofstadter’s Illusion textbook, “occurring spontaneously and instantaneously. Fortunately you share many of Vin’s physical characteristics, but subtle differences remain. We’ve addressed hair, eyes, and complexion.” Nico stepped back, picturing Vincenzo side by side with Max. “Your cheekbones aren’t as high as Vin’s, and your chin has a slight cleft to it while his is smooth. But these are minor differences. I doubt anyone will notice. However, you’re also an inch or two shorter than Vin, so wear boots with thick soles. Can you manage that?”

He nodded. “I have an limitless variety of shoes and footwear.”

“Yes, Cosimo tells me that you have a well-stocked wardrobe. We’ll need something appropriate for each of us. For you, a red silk doublet with a gold belt and hose. Can you manage?”

“Hmm. I have a silk doublet of the shade vermilion, not red. What color hose?”

“Black or white.”

“Won’t work.” He clucked his tongue. “I have ebony and ivory. Do you think obsidian would… What? What is it?”

Nico was pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration. “Either will suffice, Max. No one is going to be holding color swatches up to you. Ebony or obsidian or black, it makes no difference.”

“Au contraire, it makes a world of difference to those of us versed in the sartorial arts. A world of difference, Nico. After all, the most important aspect of a disguise is one’s appearance.”

“The most important aspect, yes, but also the most superficial. The Duke seldom deigns to visit Verona, and so our physical disguise need not be immaculate. But every Veronan, and I daresay especially the Musea’s curator, is intimately familiar with the Duke’s peculiar behavior. His odd quirks. The more difficult aspect of a disguise, and the attribute to which I intend to invest my effort, is in a person’s physiognomy and mannerisms. These attributes, rather than physical appearance, are more likely to arouse suspicion when done improperly. ”

“Right,” Max said, nodding sagely. “Phygio — physgio — whatever. I can do an excellent impression of a Duke’s majordomo. You see, I was once understudy to the great —”

“You,” Nico said firmly, “will not speak. You cannot imitate Vincenzo. You’ve never even met him. Your role will be a silent one. Now returning to the matter of attire — the Duke has an eccentric sense of fashion. Anything will do, as long as it isn’t too refined. Nothing too tight. Perhaps a simple smock, loose-fitting.”

Max nodded slowly, tongue pressing against his cheek. “I have something in mind. May need to make some alterations, but I know my way around a thimble.”

“Good. See it done.” Nico waved his hand. “You may go now.”

Max swept out of the room, seeming relieved by his dismissal.

Nico turned to his desk, where he had arranged various cosmetics. One of the other recipes he was working on was a promising formula of crushed mandrake and trace amounts of Kyonese petrol. Applied carefully to the skin, it gave the appearance of wrinkled skin and advanced age. The downside was that it took twelve hours to cure and quickly spoiled.

Nico had made steady progress on his facility with Illusion magic, though he could not deny that his Level 1 Disguise spell had profound limitations. He could only use it on a single aspect of a disguise. For instance, he could alter his face, but not his voice. Nor could he apply it to anyone but himself, which was unfortunate, for he would have liked to use it to help Max with his own disguise.

Alas, in Nico's running dialogue with Il-ibn in his spell book, the god hinted at tantalizing possibilities. At higher Levels, he would be able to effect multiple disguises in concert. He could, for instance, make his entire party appear as Kyonese merchants, or cloak them in a shroud of translucence. Or he could use it to subsume a person's entire identity, absorbing even their innermost secrets, creating a true "Immaculate Illusion."

But those lofty heights remained a long ways distant. Presently his grasp was such that he had mastered multiple aspects of disguise magic, including the physical (such as facial features, skin tone) and behavioral (unconscious tics, accents). Now he could even orchestrate a symphony of effects, and passively sustain the illusion for hours with minimal cognitive overhead, but he still could not blend both the physical and behavioral aspects. He could either choose to look like the Duke, or to act like the Duke. He intended to use his spell for the latter. This required a full hour of deep concentration.

For a long time he meditated on the Duke’s personality, replaying over and over again in his mind’s eye their conversation with the Duke the other day at the Ducal Palace. He saw the Duke’s face, the subtle quirks of his mouth as he spoke, his proclivity to rock back and forth during contemplation. He heard the lilt of his voice and the occasional cluck of his tongue signaling disapproval. He studied this over and over and over and over…

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For the spell to work he required precisely one hour of uninterrupted focus.

Meditating, Nico drifted into a dazed semi-consciousness…

***

“Nico! Wake up!” Max was snapping fingers in his face. Cosimo stood next to him, looking deeply concerned. It took Nico a moment to find his bearings, to remember what he was doing and why he had been doing it.

No, he thought, the hour was interrupted. The spell was broken. He would have to start all over. By nature, at lower levels of facility, the spell was all or nothing.

“What do you want?” He could not hide the annoyance in his voice. “You interrupted my spell — I was preparing the disguise. I was minutes away from completing it.”

“Well, our time has elapsed,” Cosimo said darkly. “Bjørn spotted the Black Cabal in one of the taverns. There was an altercation. They seized him, questioned him. Questioned him about me, Nico. I think you were right. The Empress may have been reluctant to move against me before, but now the noose tightens around my neck, as my ship sits moored in her harbor.”

Nico took a moment to absorb this new information. “What happened to Bjørn?”

“Escaped. Pummeled a few guards to mincemeat. No doubt they’ll want to ornament him on the public gibbets if they find him. I’ve an ultimatum for you, Nico: act now, or I shall leave you and this Quest behind me.”

They had been planning to enter the Musea at noonsbell. Crowds in the museum were a little more sparse in the afternoon, and it would give Nico ample time to prepare his disguise and for Leo and Max to do their own preliminary work.

“We’ll need to accelerate our timetables,” Nico said.

“Considerably,” said Cosimo, just as Leo and Gianna burst into the room. He looked at them and then back to Nico. “How much more time do you require?”

“I have very little ready,” Nico said. “I do have the cosmetics we need for majordomo Vincenzo, but my own disguise as the Duke is still a work in progress. You just interrupted my Disguise spell, and I’m still waiting for my mandrake solution to fully cure.”

“Well,” Max said with his usual sneer, “for my part I am ready. I have the clothes, the outfits we will wear.” He had been holding the Duke’s white smock, which he tossed at Nico.

“Clothes alone do not make a disguise,” Nico said. “Unless…” A thought occurred to him. “I could renew the Disguise spell, and apply it to my physical appearance.”

“I thought that’s what you were already doing?” Leo said.

“No. I was using it to help me emulate the Duke’s behaviorisms. Instead of waiting for the mandrake to cure, I can use the Disguise spell to alter my appearance. Physical appearance is easier to simulate than behavior. It would take only…” he rapidly consulted his spell book, “twenty minutes. And his behavior… well, I’ll have to improvise.”

“Then do it,” said Cosimo.

“I need twenty minutes uninterrupted,” he said, placing special emphasis on the last word.

“You’ve got it,” Cosimo said.

“And one other thing. The Black Cabal obviously knows about us. Gianna — you know how to use the Disguise Kit. Arrange minor disguises for each of you, enough to confuse the Black Cabal.”

Gianna saluted. “Aye captain.”

Everyone filed out of the room, and Nico slipped back into his meditative state…

***

When Nico emerged from his cabin he physically felt a century older than his years. There were aches in his bones, sores in his muscles and tendons. His skin felt brittle like the bark of a birch tree, and there was a constant throbbing ache in his skull. The best illusions must first be believed by their crafter, wrote Hofstadter. Nico did not actually feel these things physiologically, but by duping his own mind he could feel them psychologically. It was, ultimately, nearly the same thing. This of course was not the result of his Disguise spell but rather the product of his own conscious belief. To the mind, the most vivid imaginations were indistinguishable from reality.

He climbed to the deck of the ship. A couple crewmen cried out in alarm at the sight of him, one of them nearly tumbling over the taffrail. Nico turned his head slowly, casting a penetrating glare at his shipmates, before his gaze fell upon Maximilian, who was having a lively conversation with Bjørn about the buxom barmaids of Verona. Max had not changed into his new clothes.

Nico snapped his fingers at him — and regretted it instantly. His joints, or at least how he had imagined them, could not endure the stress of the action. Pain lanced up his fingers.

“Vin, you fool, why are you dressed like a court jester?” His vocal chords ached, but he had excellently channeled the Duke’s own speech patterns.

Max broke into a wide smile. “Azrael above, that’s one hell of a disguise, Nico. You almost had me duped—”

“Majordomo Vincenzo,” Nico said slowly, enunciating his words in the Duke’s commanding tone, trying to find the character, “do you mistake me for another? Do you mistake me for a subordinate?”

Max’s face blanched. “No — I, erm. Well…” He smiled awkwardly, not knowing what to say.

“I am your Duke,” Nico said, feeling the full weight of the Duke’s essence settle upon him, “and you are my underling. Why are you dressed in filthy rags like a penniless leper?”

“I apologize… erm, your — my duke. I’ll change. R-right away sir,” he said, with a nervous titter, and swept away.

“Well done,” Cosimo said, climbing up the steps behind Nico and looking him up and down. “You cut a striking image… Bjørn will stay behind with me, but Leo and the others already left for the Musea. Time to put your plan into motion. Move fast.”

***

Strolling down the Via Murani, Nico felt like a god — an ancient, maimed, and debilitated god, but a deity nonetheless.

The Via Murani was the city’s oldest thoroughfare, a street paved in flagstones centuries ago. Traditionally it was where fishermen cried their catch — tuna, swordfish, barramundi. It was arguably the city’s epicenter, a hectic and wild and pleasantly carefree place. But as Nico and Max crossed its length, fear spread like a contagion. The fishermen fell silent, whispers spread, and many people went into their storehouses and shut the blinds. Even the Whitecloaks, who were numerous, quavered at the sight of Nico as the Duke.

It was a cloudless and sultry day, the sun burning with feverish intensity as it rose to its zenith. It was the sort of day where the sun seemed to bore holes in your skin and melt your eyes. Yet Nico, true to character, hobbled with a limp slowly down the street. Agony blossomed with each step. The pain, while imaginary, was no less debilitating.

I have a reputation to maintain, Nico thought. A necessary but ugly aspect of the disguise. They must see me act mad.

He pointed at a fisherman who was on his lunch break. He was watching their procession in slack-jawed awe, rooted to the spot, a half-eaten persimmon in his hand. He was completely frozen until Nico’s gaze fell upon him, and then he started backing away, disappearing behind his stall.

“Persimmons are prohibited in Verona. They spread the Scarlet Pox.” Nico motioned to a nearby pair of Whitecloaks. “Seize this man, and have him contemplate the gravity of his transgression in solitary confinement for 17 hours and 32 minutes.”

In fact there was no such prohibition against persimmons. The two Whitecloaks exchanged befuddled glances, giving an imperceptible shrug, and then they pounced on the hapless fisherman. One picked him up by the scruff of his collar; the other wailed him with a cudgel.

I am a monster, Nico thought, guilt swelling inside of him. He repressed the emotions. A good disguise began in the mind: you had to think the way they thought, feel what they felt.

So far he was doing quite well, Max’s impression of Vincenzo was also quite serviceable. His gait was a bit jaunty and he lacked Vincenzo’s poise, but it was not something anyone was likely call out. He just had to keep his mouth shut, and no one would be any the wiser.

“Let me do the talking,” Nico said, momentarily dropping character. They had just turned into the Musea’s courtyard. The line was quite long, middle class artisans and day laborers jockeying for position.

“I'm not a fool, Nico. Rest assured, my dialogue contributions will be slight—”

“Not slight. Nonexistent.”

“—and surgical.”

“Nonexistent.”

“Then, pray tell, how am I to exhibit my theatrical facilities if —”

“You’re not,” Nico said. “You’re not to exhibit anything. Just keep your mouth shut.”

“Well,” Max said, trying to keep his voice low so that passersby could not overhear, “that would likely arouse suspicion, wouldn’t it? I am your royal regent —”

“Majordomo, not regent. And you’ve never even met Vincenzo, nor heard his voice. Your disguise in this performance is purely ornamental. It is paramount that no one doubts it.”

“They will doubt it,” he said, voice now rising slightly, “if I stay mum, following you around like a whipped dog, gaping like a fool.”

“Then don’t gape. Shut up and let me do the talking.”

In the corner of his eye, Nico could see Max glaring at him, fumbling for a reply. To his credit, he didn’t press the point any further. Together they cut the line, striding straight up to the Musea’s entrance. The attendant was a willowy fellow, a Vedic man with ginger hair. At the sight of Nico, the attendant on duty seemed paralyzed in fear.

“I wish to speak with the curator,” Nico said.

The attendant blinked, his forehead already glistening with sweat. “Erm — yes, of course, your erm, your Dukeship.”

“Your grace will do just fine. One more errant title and I shall have the Whitecloaks excise your tongue. Now hurry, my business with the curator is pressing.”

“Yes, of course, right away. Follow me… your grace.”