Page 19 of The Drama King (The University Players Duet #1)
fifteen
Vespera
Tears threatened to ruin my carefully applied makeup as I made my way back to the dressing area on unsteady legs. Stephanie looked up as I entered, her expression immediately shifting to concern.
"What happened?" she asked, rising from her position at the tech station. Then her face darkened as she detected the new scent on me. "That bastard. He marked you. Right before your performance."
I nodded, unable to speak as I sank into my chair before the makeup mirror. The woman staring back at me looked shell-shocked, her eyes too bright, her skin flushed with the biological aftermath of an Alpha's claim.
"You look incredible," Stephanie said fiercely, trying to recover some normalcy as she handed me my water bottle. "Like a queen who's been through hell and emerged stronger for it. Use that rage, Ves. Channel it into the performance."
I attempted a smile that didn't quite reach my eyes. "Kate's final monologue. A woman declaring her complete submission to male authority." The bitter irony wasn't lost on either of us - performing those words while carrying the scent of an Alpha who'd just marked me against my will.
"Have you seen them?" I asked, accepting the water bottle with shaking hands.
Stephanie's expression grew grim. "Front row, center section.
All three of them, plus what looks like half the department's donor families.
" She squeezed my shoulder. "But you know what else I saw?
Professor Goldman from NYU is here. And that critic from Theatre Weekly.
This isn't just about breaking you down.
It's about whether you'll rise to the occasion. "
The thought of genuine industry professionals witnessing either my triumph or my destruction added another layer of pressure. But it also sparked something fierce in my chest. I'd come too far to let them win now.
"Robbie's handling the lighting cues," she added, nodding toward the booth where our friend was bent over his equipment. "He's programmed something special for your piece. Says it'll make you look like you're 'walking the line between submission and subversion.'"
The thought of Robbie up in the lighting booth, creating beauty to counter the ugliness I'd faced, steadied me slightly. "I need to thank him after the showcase."
"You can thank him by absolutely destroying this performance," Stephanie said fiercely. "Show those Alpha assholes what real talent looks like when it's not being suppressed by their fragile egos."
A knock at the dressing room door made us both jump.
"Two minutes, Ms. Levine," called the stage manager. "You're third in the lineup."
Third slot. Not opening, not closing. Somewhere in the middle where I could be easily forgotten if I didn't make an impression. Another subtle reminder of my precarious position, though perhaps it would work in my favor. The audience would be warmed up but not yet fatigued.
"You've got this," Stephanie whispered, hugging me quickly. "I'll be in the wings."
As she left for her technical station, I closed my eyes and tried to center myself despite the sandalwood scent still clinging to my skin. The breathing exercises Professor Cruz had taught us barely touched the icy dread pooling in my stomach, but I clung to them anyway.
It wasn't just the showcase itself, though that was stressful enough with industry professionals in attendance.
It was knowing they would be watching, measuring, planning their next move based on how I performed under pressure.
Dorian's scent-marking had been calculated psychological warfare.
A final attempt to throw me off balance before my moment to shine.
I opened my eyes, staring hard at my reflection. "They don't own your talent," I whispered to myself. "They don't own your voice."
The mantra felt hollow after months of systematic intimidation, but I clung to it anyway as I rose and made my way to the wings. Through the sound system, I could hear Professor De Scarzis introducing the evening's program to the packed audience.
"Tonight's Fall Showcase represents the culmination of our first-year students' foundational training," her voice carried across the theater.
"These performances will demonstrate not only technical skill, but the emotional authenticity and professional resilience required for careers in professional theater. "
Professional resilience. If only she knew what that phrase really meant for students like me.
The theater was indeed packed. Faculty, advanced students, and what looked like genuine industry professionals scattered throughout the audience.
Under the harsh stage lights, the first performer was already mid-monologue, a senior Beta delivering Hamlet's "To be or not to be" as a modern podcast recording.
I peered around the curtain, my eyes automatically finding them in the audience.
Dorian sat between Corvus and Oakley, his posture relaxed but attentive, one arm stretched along the back of Oakley's seat in casual dominance.
Even from a distance, I could see the interest in his expression as he watched the stage.
But something else caught my attention. The way his gaze kept drifting toward the wings where I was hidden, as if he could sense my presence from across the theater. When he finally located me in the shadows, his smile was pure Alpha, a silent reminder of the scent he'd left on my skin.
My pulse skittered as I imagined those ice-blue eyes fixed on me with that same intensity. Would I freeze? Would my voice abandon me at the crucial moment? The thought sent a fresh wave of panic through my system.
"Ms. Levine?" The stage manager appeared beside me. "You're on deck."
I nodded, moving into position as the current performer reached his climactic moment.
The audience applauded politely as he exited, and a tech crew member quickly reset the minimal staging for my piece.
A single spotlight would follow me, creating an intimate circle of light against the darkened stage.
"Good luck," the senior whispered as he passed me.
Then the stage manager was giving me the signal, and I was walking into the blinding lights, my heartbeat thundering in my ears. For a terrible moment, I thought I might actually faint. The faces in the audience blurred, the script I'd rehearsed for weeks vanishing from my mind.
But then something strange happened. As I took my position center stage, the panic didn't recede so much as transform.
It crystallized into something sharper, clearer.
A heightened awareness that made every sense more acute.
I could feel the collective gaze of the audience, smell the lingering sandalwood that clung to my skin, hear my own breathing amplified by the theater's perfect acoustics.
And suddenly, I understood exactly how to play this. Not as Kate's genuine submission, but as a performance within a performance - a woman saying what she must to survive in a world that demands her subjugation, each word carefully calibrated, each gesture a masterclass in subtext.
I lifted my head, meeting the audience's gaze directly, and began with quiet intensity.
"Fie, fie, unknit that threat'ning unkind brow, and dart not scornful glances from those eyes to wound thy lord, thy king, thy governor."
My voice carried a subtle edge, as if each word cost me something precious. I moved across the stage with deliberate grace, my body language suggesting both compliance and coiled resistance.
"It blots thy beauty as frosts do bite the meads, confounds thy fame as whirlwinds shake fair buds, and in no sense is meet or amiable."
The theater fell silent as I continued, my delivery walking a razor's edge between sincerity and irony. Each line became a question rather than a statement, challenging the audience to consider whether Kate truly believed these words or was simply playing the game required of her.
"A woman moved is like a fountain troubled - muddy, ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty." I paused, letting the ugliness of the comparison hang in the air. "And while it is so, none so dry or thirsty will deign to sip or touch one drop of it."
In the front row, I caught a glimpse of Dorian's face, and what I saw there stopped my heart.
Gone was the calculated cruelty, the predatory amusement.
Instead, his expression showed something I'd never seen before - recognition.
As if he suddenly understood that I was performing for him specifically, turning his attempt at dominance into my own commentary on power.
"Thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper, thy head, thy sovereign." The words should have been declarations, but I delivered them as a list of chains, each title another bar in a cage. "One that cares for thee and for thy maintenance; commits his body to painful labor both by sea and land."
I moved downstage, closer to the audience, my voice growing stronger but never losing that undercurrent of barely contained rage.
"Such duty as the subject owes the prince, even such a woman oweth to her husband.
" Here I smiled, but it was sharp as broken glass.
"And when she is froward, peevish, sullen, sour, and not obedient to his honest will - what is she but a foul contending rebel and graceless traitor to her loving lord? "
The questions hung in the air like accusations. Against whom, the audience couldn't quite tell.
"I am ashamed that women are so simple to offer war where they should kneel for peace." My voice cracked slightly on 'ashamed,' genuine emotion bleeding through the performance. "Or seek for rule, supremacy, and sway, when they are bound to serve, love, and obey."
Robbie's lighting shifted subtly, creating shadows that made me appear to fracture into multiple selves - the woman speaking, the woman listening, the woman judging.