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“Ha. I suppose so, according to your ancestor who killed my ancestor’s husband. But I don’t need Prince Troilus’s arts of seduction. I need Firstblood Troilos’s power.”

She commenced the dance, proceeding around him with graceful sweeps of her feet. He followed her lead, circling with her, their hands touching and bodies half-turned toward one another.

“Hear the music in your mind.” She began to count the beats under her breath. “One, two, three, four…”

“I doubt mages of Chera do the Widow’s Weave after dusk rites. When was the last time you danced?”

“More recently than you.” She spun in place and motioned for him to do the same.

“Fair enough.” He mimicked her, then brought his opposite palm to hers, and they repeated the steps in the other direction. “How long has Rixor been sitting on your throne?”

“Ten years,” she spat.

A decade was plenty of time for a grudge to turn into madness. Troi knew that from experience. “How old are you?”

“Your sleep has rusted your manners. It’s uncouth to ask a lady her age.” She danced backward, leaving his palm cold, and beckoned to him.

He pursued her. “I am one hundred forty years old. I promise that no matter your age, you will seem like a spring maiden to me.”

“I was a twenty-four-year-old widow when Rixor stripped me of my power. Now I will teach him never to underestimate a thirty-four-year-old mage.”

“He would be a fool to do so. It is not the spring maidens but the autumn matriarchs a man should watch out for. And don’t let me start on the winter crones. They’re the most terrifying of all.”

Amusement glinted in her gaze as she positioned them for another turn. This time she placed his hand on her waist.

She hadn’t eaten well in the last ten years. He cupped her slim waist, circling with her again, while she held her hand in front of her face as if wielding a fan in a gesture of mock modesty.

He was beginning to understand the story this dance told. It too was a chase, and he could learn to push her boundaries.

She looked him up and down. “How can you be one hundred forty? You look like you were younger than me at your transformation.”

“I was thirty, then I spent ten years as a Hesperine before my hundred-year slumber.”

A frown creased her brow. “That’s not what the legends say.”

“Do tell me the stories of my ‘curse.’ Are they very terrible?”

“Tragic, gruesome, and unfit for the ears of delicate ladies.”

“Well, we have established you are no delicate lady. Go on.”

“The tales say the women of your line were secretly heretics, worshipers of Hespera who practiced her dark arts, but you wanted nothing to do with the forbidden goddess. When your father died and you inherited your principality, you held a coronation feast at Summer Solstice. You invited a representative from each of the Mage Orders but refused to set a place for a sorceress of Hespera to attend in disguise.”

They turned in place once more, and she guided his other hand to her waist. He held her a little tighter this time.

She extended her hand, palm toward his chest, nearly touching.

“In revenge, the sorceress turned you into a Hesperine, dooming you to serve Hespera for all eternity. The guests fled in terror—there are conflicted reports on how many you ate before they escaped—but the mage of Anthros in attendance bravely fought you. Although you proved too powerful for him to slay, he banished you into a one-hundred-year sleep that would drain your power. He swore that his successors would come for you and…” She paused.

“Oh, do tell me what torture they’ve been dreaming up all these years. It had better be worthy of my fearsome reputation.”

“They plan to sacrifice you to Anthros on the Summer Solstice.” She gave him a push.

It was his turn to dance away from her. “One of those ostentatious affairs at the Temple of Anthros? Immolation on the altar?”

She danced just out of reach in a teasing circle. “Oh yes. All the pomp and circumstance.”

“Fucking war mages.”

She let out another laugh. “So, what really happened?”

“The legend is far more interesting.”

“What people believe and what actually happened are both useful to know. But I prefer knowing the truth. It’s usually more dangerous than tales.”

Her circling brought her closer and closer.

She tapped her waist to show him what to do next.

He gripped her again, just a little closer than the dance called for.

He felt no reaction in her poised body, but her aura betrayed that his touch excited her.

Despite her masterful court face, she was transparent to his Hesperine senses.

He wanted explanations for her maddening emotions. It would be wise to indulge his curiosity about her, he reasoned. The more he knew, the better armed he would be against any betrayal. “Will you tell me the truth of how you became a mage of Chera?”

She paused to adjust the position of his arms for the next phase of the dance, and he thought she might not reply. But when they began moving again, she spoke.

“My magical ability manifested when I was a young girl. Of course, this meant I would be required to enter a temple. But I was my parents’ only heir, destined to marry a suitable man to rule Aligera.

Unwilling to give me up to the Orders, we hid my magic from everyone.

My parents took the secret to their graves.

Even my husband died without ever knowing. ”

“Your grief runs in my veins.”

She gave him a curious look.

“That’s a Hesperine saying,” he hastened to explain. He supposed he had absorbed more impractical Hesperine principles than he’d thought. “It’s how we offer condolences.”

“Thank you, then.”

“So, you were left ruling Aligera on your own as a young widow? My, how men must have circled like vultures.”

She turned her back to him, and he did as she instructed, dancing after her, close enough to touch.

“I could have held my throne against all contenders,” she declared, “if Rixor had not betrayed me.”

“He somehow found out about your magic?”

The dance brought them face-to-face now.

Hurt welled up in her, but she continued matter-of-factly.

“Yes. He revealed my ability to Kaion, our cousin in the Order of Anthros. Thick as thieves, those two. Kaion had me impressed into service to Chera, earning him accolades for apprehending a wayward sorceress. And Rixor, next in line, inherited everything that is rightfully mine.”

One hundred years later, the Pavones inside and outside the temples were up to the same tricks. He hated to admit how much he and Celandine had in common. “Will this Kaion be at the feast?”

“Do you really think I would drag you right out of your bed and into the clutches of a fire mage, who can wield your opposing element against you in your vulnerable state?”

“Of course you would. That’s why you need a Hesperine, isn’t it?

To disguise not only your appearance but your magic.

Rixor and Kaion know your face, but worse still, the mage knows your aura.

It is no trivial thing to hide your innate magical ability.

There is not a mage in all the Orders who would help a rebel sorceress against the Anthrians. So you need a heretic.”

They were spinning closer again. He could feel the dance reaching its climax. This time when he grasped her waist, she took his free hand in a punishing grip.

“Will you run back to the safety of your bed now, Hesperine?” she challenged. “Or do you want your own revenge?”

He pulled her closer. “You should have told me about Kaion right away.”

Her scent filled with that primal mix of fear and desire again. “And if I had, what would you have done?”

“I would have agreed to your plan even more eagerly,” he told her. “I want vengeance on the mages of Anthros as much as I do on Rixor’s line. I will destroy them both.”

She looked into his eyes, her mouth close enough to kiss. “Then you are precisely the heretic I need.”