Ronan held his script and pulled in a slow breath. Then, without a word to anyone, he slipped into the half-immersion and let it take him down into Elijah.
Only this time it came on different.
The room rebuilt itself around him the way it always did, but harder now, fuller. The deck heaved further underfoot, the salt and the tar of it thick and real in his throat, everything sharper than a half-immersion had ever been on him. If he had it right, this was the same weight he’d felt as Thomas that first day in the casting room, a world solid enough to reach out and touch. And yet the thing was still only running at half.
He didn’t understand what had changed. He only knew his stomach had rolled over with it. "Ugh... shit," he got out, barely more than a mutter. And under the nausea, Elijah moved in closer, more his own than before.
Beside him, Jane caught the look on his face. "Hey. You good?" she said, low, under her breath.
Ronan surfaced enough to answer. "Y-yeah. I’m fine."
Off to the side, Ian caught the two of them with their heads bent together, Jane leaning in to murmur something to the guy, and a sour taste crawled up the back of his throat.
’How in the hell did that nobody land the male lead?’ Ian thought. ’It isn’t possible.’ He wanted to say it out loud, and couldn’t.
Then something better occurred to him, and he raised a hand toward Henry.
"Yes, Ian?" Henry said.
"Mr. Hill." Ian pitched it to carry across the room. "I’ve got a good feel for the scene already. Why don’t we just dive in? No sense everybody sitting around on my account."
Henry looked over the group. "Everybody good to go?"
Woody, Albert, and the rest nodded along, all but Jane, who glanced over at Ronan.
"Give Ronan a minute first." Jane didn’t dress it up. "His part’s carrying a lot more lines than the rest of ours. He’s earned the time to get inside the character before we throw him at it."
Henry watched Ronan a beat longer. The kid gave a small nod, ready. "Alright. From the top."
The read began. At once, the world around Ronan went live. The background figures, the sailors and deckhands who’d stood frozen a second before, began to move, mannequins turning into living men. The cast never left their seats, but to him their clothes had gone to period dress now, each of them settled into character. It pulled him the rest of the way into Elijah.
The brain injury came with the role. He felt it behind his eyes, and it showed in the careful, still way he sat. He wasn’t playing Elijah anymore. He was him.
Woody went first, as Alphonse, the old head of a company of players. He tipped his nose toward Ronan. "What is your name, young man? And what were you doing out there, adrift in open water? Are you pursued? Soldiers? Brigands?"
Now it was Ronan’s turn, and the room waited on it. Ian most of all, watching close. And Jane too, curious what five years and all of Henry and Jenny’s praise actually came to.
And at that, Ronan was in the role, fully. His whole manner changed. His eyes went hard and unblinking, his back drew up straight, his jaw set, and when he spoke the words came clipped and spare, like a man used to reporting rather than talking.
"My name is Elijah." He pressed two fingers to his temple, wincing. "There was a storm. It’s... fuzzy. The ship went over and I fell into the water. My head—" He stopped, steadied himself, and looked up. "Can you tell me where I am?"
For a second nobody read their line. They just stared. Nothing about him read like a first-timer who’d never carried a real role. He was a soldier through and through, calm on the surface, worn underneath.
’He got into character that fast?’ Jane thought. ’How has a man like him been a nobody for five years?’
Ian almost missed his cue, too caught up in watching. When those eyes found him, he cleared his throat and hurried to catch up, as Thomas. "You are aboard a merchant vessel. It was I who saw you adrift, and had the sailors haul you up."
Ronan’s eyes fixed on him, cold. "Is that so. My thanks."
"...Think nothing of it," Ian said.
Then it was Jane’s turn, as Rose. She leaned in with an easy, courtly interest, every bit the great performer at home in front of a crowd. "And from where do you hail, Elijah?"
"I’m a soldier. Stationed in the Middle East." His face turned uncertain. "But... I’m from the United States. The USA."
Jane held the puzzled look flawlessly, a fine crease forming between her brows, as though the words meant nothing to a woman of her time. "The... U-S-A? And where might that be?"
"It’s—" He stopped short. His face twisted, his hand went to his head, and he gripped it hard, breath catching.
The table startled. Henry half stood and Jenny’s pen stopped, both of them remembering the last time the kid’s body had given out in a room like this. And Jane’s composure cracked clean through. The great actress forgot Rose entirely, forgot the scene, because for that moment she wasn’t watching a performance at all. She was watching a young man in real trouble.
"Are you alright?" It was out of her before she could think, nowhere in the script.
Ronan raised a hand to wave her off. "I’m fine." Steady, still Elijah’s voice, level through the pain. "It’s a condition. A brain injury." His eyes came up to her. "May I ask who you are?"
And it hit Jane all at once. ’That’s clearly not in the script, yet he pretended to be hurting in the head so well it convinced me...’ She felt a bit thrown off. Then she remembered: Elijah was supposed to have a condition, a brain injury, and Ronan had only been acting it out.
Then she gathered herself and climbed back into Rose, the poise sliding into place like it had never left. "You do not know me?" A touch of wounded vanity came into it. "I am quite renowned, I’ll have you know."
Ronan only looked at her, blank.
Woody came in as Alphonse, delighted. "My, my. What a curious creature you are, Elijah. Mistress De Vere is a celebrated player the breadth of Europe, and you’ve truly never heard the name?"
"Player?" He looked between them, confused in character, then back at Jane. "Is she... a woman who plays men? Or some kind of eSports player?"
Woody laughed. "I’ve not the faintest notion what you’re saying, my boy." He gestured to himself. "Mistress De Vere performs under my banner. The Alphonse Company of Comedians."
"Just so." Jane lifted her chin, wholly Rose now, a performer basking in her own name. "Rose De Vere. My name is known the continent over. The great comedian."
He frowned. "Comedians? Like stand-up comedians? People who get up and make a crowd laugh?"
Jane’s mouth curved, sly, playing Rose’s amusement to the hilt. "At times we make them laugh, yes. But mostly, we make them weep."
A laugh slipped out of him. "A comedian who makes people cry. That’s a new one."
Her brow drew down, Rose taking offense. "Have you no notion what a comedian is, Elijah?"
Ronan spread his hands, laying it out plain, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "A comedian’s a comedian. Someone who gets up in front of people and makes them laugh. Tells jokes, does bits. That’s the whole thing."
Woody shook his head, amused. "I’d not have taken you for so narrow, my boy. A comedian is a comedian. A player. A performer." He turned a hand over. "An actor."
That landed, and Elijah’s face cleared.
"Ah. You mean actors." He worked it through. "You’ve got a different word for it. You’re performers. Actors." His gaze moved around the cabin, over the old wood and the older clothes. "Why does this ship look so old? What is this?" Unease crept in. "Is this a movie set?"
As the scene played on, it was plain Ronan was winning the room. His acting pulled every one of them in, until even Woody, a veteran of decades, came away deeply shaken by how good the young actor was.
AN:Back in the 1700s, "comedian" just meant an actor — any kind of stage performer, not someone telling jokes. That came later. So when they call Rose a comedian, they just mean she’s an actress.