Page 21

Seven

Considering that he’d only had two weeks to plan a ball that would attract most of the nobles in Staria, Laurent had outdone himself.

The ballroom belonged to the Duke de Mortain, King Adrien’s husband, and Laurent’s hired workers had spent days transforming the severe, muted room into a sparkling flower garden.

It was as though someone had lifted a country fair out of a field and dropped it onto the dance floor, then sprinkled crystals everywhere for good measure.

It was precisely the sort of atmosphere Yves adored, and Charon stood in the servants’ entrance with his arms crossed tight over his chest, taking in the way light from hundreds of candles glimmered over the floor and along the walls.

Most of the courtesans in the Pleasure District were already there, hoping to ensnare a client or two out from under Yves.

Nearly every noble was in attendance as well, save for King Adrien.

Isiodore de Mortain, the king’s consort, stood off to the side, watching the gathered nobles carefully.

As the previous king’s spymaster, he’d no doubt been informed of Sabre’s plan for the ball.

Nearly every servant there was in Sabre’s employ, trained to listen to the attending nobles and report on any suspicious behavior.

Charon doubted anyone would confess to kidnapping, torture, and murder at a party, but the nobility didn’t have a reputation for discretion.

“Would you look at that?” Laurent said. He was standing next to Charon, dressed in ostentatious black velvet with amethysts on his cuffs, and he adjusted them with a wicked smile. “All these people, and here you are without a mask.”

“I don’t need one,” Charon said.

“We can’t have you standing out,” Laurent said, ignoring Charon’s pointed look at his own lack of a mask. “It’s a good thing I thought to have a suit and mask brought in. With a cloak—Yves prefers them, you know. He thinks they look dashing.”

“Won’t he be blindfolded?” Charon noted the swirling capes of the suitors lining up in the center of the dance floor. Even some of the suitors Yves hadn’t chosen were wearing them, and courtesans were eyeing them from the shadows with a calculating hunger.

“The suit’s in the room where I’m keeping Sabre,” Laurent said. “You don’t want to be underdressed.”

“I don’t need to be here,” Charon said. “There are enough people to ensure Yves’ safety.” He didn’t think he could stand an entire ball watching Yves dance with adoring suitors. Some dominants in the crowd may have been masochists, but Charon wasn’t one.

Laurent shot him a hard look, all artifice gone. “Then leave.”

It was a challenge. Charon felt the cold sting of Laurent’s true dominance scraping against his own, daring him to turn around and walk out of the ballroom.

Some gossips said that Laurent had softened since he married Sabre, but the flintlike core that had propelled him through the Pleasure District and into a noble title was still there.

Any other dominant would have backed away or challenged him for the insult of using his dominance so pointedly, but if Laurent’s was like a sword, Charon’s was like stone, and he stared back with an unmovable patience.

The musicians by the balconies started to play, and Charon turned as a pair of curtains opened at the far end of the room.

A line of scantily dressed young men appeared, draped with flowers and vines like tree nymphs in a play, and bearing Yves on their shoulders.

The lights of the ballroom seemed to glow brighter for his presence, and the music slowed in Charon’s ears, going distant.

Yves was grinning, a silver mask over his eyes, hair burning gold in the candlelight.

He was in a sheer silver cloak, tight silver pants, and little else, and he laughed in delight as his entourage set him down in front of the line of suitors.

One of them stepped forward to take his hand, and Yves bowed with a cheeky smile.

He almost stumbled into his dance partner immediately and let out a startled laugh.

“The suit is with Sabre, you said?” Charon stared at Yves as he was guided through the first steps of a quadrille.

Laurent nodded. “You should have time if you hurry.”

Sabre looked up with a grin when Charon opened the door to the small parlor.

Sabre was hardly dressed for the event, with nothing but a slip of fabric to cover his cock and his violet collar, and he was fastening a chain to a conspicuous hook in the wall.

“Oh, Charon. Your suit’s hanging up over the mirror.

You won’t be able to come back for your old things, though, so I’ll bring them by when Laurent and I are done here. ”

Charon raised a brow.

Thankfully, the suit was not to Laurent’s opulent taste.

It was sleek black with a hooded cloak lined with gold, and a black mask that gleamed with glass beads.

It wasn’t to Charon’s taste either, or even Sabre’s.

It looked like something Yves would like.

Charon wondered if he should simply take the suit and toss it into the bin.

Laurent’s well-meaning meddling was starting to wear thin.

“Don’t,” Sabre said. “You’re thinking of going back. Try it, just for a night.”

“You think you’re helping,” Charon said.

“Maybe.” Sabre didn’t even have the grace to look sheepish.

Charon ran his hand over the cloak. “You and Laurent think that Yves’ flirting means something it doesn’t. If his intentions were true, he would have said something. Instead, he’s dancing with his chosen suitors tonight. None of them are me, and they shouldn’t be.”

“Why?” Sabre asked. “I know you don’t speak of what happened in Arktos?—”

“And it’s good that you know better than to ask.” Charon’s dominance must have been burdensome, because Sabre made a soft sound and sank into a chair. “You can tell Laurent to stop trying.”

Sabre looked down at his hands, cowed. Charon knew he had likely ruined what was supposed to be a lovely night for Sabre and Laurent, but his iron control was cracking. The sensible thing would be to leave the suit and return to the House of Onyx.

He thought of Yves, masked and sightless, reaching for him in the middle of a ballroom draped with flowers, and he took the suit down from the mirror.

It fit him perfectly, and when he looked at himself, he saw a stranger—tattoos covered, the hood of his cloak shading his masked face just enough to obscure the shape of his jaw. He took a step back, and his cloak swirled around his legs.

“There’s a space in the ballroom waiting for you, if you want it,” Sabre said. Charon left the parlor without a word.

When he returned to the ballroom, Yves was dancing with Raul.

It was a country dance, with a ribbon wrapped around the dancers’ hands to link them together, and Charon felt a pang in his chest as he realized that Yves had found a way to dance with Raul without touching.

Since Yves couldn’t see, he had to rely on tugs of the ribbon to move, but Raul kept forgetting to lead and sent them stumbling over the dance floor.

Yves laughed. “You have to lead, Raul!”

“Hey!” One of the other suitors turned to Laurent. “He’s not supposed to know who we are.”

Raul blushed pink, but Yves pulled his ribbon, sending them in another direction. They passed close to the dancers ringing the open circle in the ballroom, and Charon moved forward.

“Don’t listen,” he heard Yves say. “I’m glad you came.”

“So am I,” Raul said, and they whirled away.

Charon caught a glimmer of yellow—Oleander stood to the side, glaring at them both, hands shoved in their pockets. The music died, and Yves’ laugh rang out like the tinkle of breaking glass. He led Raul back to the line of suitors, and Lord Marteau smiled smugly as he took a step forward.

Laurent cleared his throat and raised a hand, and the musicians stilled.

The dancers and onlookers turned to look, and even Lord Marteau paused, brows knit in confusion.

Laurent smiled, head tilted. Charon could imagine what he’d been like as a courtesan—his elegant charm hiding a dominance sharp enough to kill, his strange violet hair and eyes a novelty in the Pleasure District.

The ballroom was arrested by his presence, and when he turned to Charon, he realized with a cold rush of unfamiliar terror what Laurent intended.

Laurent pressed a finger to his lips, then extended a hand to Charon. An invitation.

Charon took a step into the circle. Yves’ lips were slightly parted, his hand still extended for his next partner, clearly confused by the sudden silence.

Charon could feel the eyes of the ballroom turned his way as he crossed the distance between them.

Lord Marteau moved as though to intercept Charon, but Laurent shook his head, and Charon stepped around him.

Yves turned to him like a sunflower following the light, and Charon thought of Nikos kissing Aster behind the tea shop in Axon.

The boy he’d been had only wanted something good and bright to hold onto in the crumbling, lonely chasm his life had become.

Charon found, as he stood before Yves under the eyes of half of Duciel, that he still wanted that.

One good thing. A candle easily snuffed out, too delicate for hands that had been trained to hurt.

But maybe he could have this, just once. Just for a night. A dance.

Charon took Yves’ hand, and the music swelled, drawing them close like a great wave pushing them into the center of everything, bright and beautiful.

A calloused hand enclosed his, and Yves felt something shift inside him.