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T oday was the day Helene would fly. As the choreographer watched from the corner of Covent Garden’s stage, a surge of hope rose within her—like a gust of wind beneath her wings, ready to lift her from the shadows and carry her to the stars.

The pianist struck the introduction. With a quick plié, she launched into piqué turns, spinning into the light like the first notes had lit a fuse inside her. Music had a scent and a color, and when it poured into her, she moved. Worries dissolved, and passion burst through her limbs.

She rose into relevé in fifth position and, for the first time, balanced en pointe. Murmurs swelled like waves through the company. This —this was what made her special. Not her face, not her voice, not the softness Celeste so easily wielded, but the power of her body obeying her will.

When she danced, the best of her emerged. No complications, no messy feelings. She would never be the most beautiful. She would never be the most charming. But she could be this. Untouchable. Perfect.

Helene leaped into the allegro. The choreographer couldn’t ignore her now. En pointe, she became more than human—an angel in paradise, an ethereal fairy. Here she was—dancing taller than everyone else, lighter, faster, floating, flying—

“Stop!”

Helene startled and stumbled.

Katherina Fontaine, Covent Garden’s ballet mistress, stared at her, her painted eyebrows meeting above her nose. “Mon Dieu. What was that?”

Helene swallowed. Months and months of rehearsing wilted under the teacher’s pinched expression.

“I adopted the Brugnoli’s act into my variation. I thought it would suit the part.” And make her a prima ballerina.

Foolish Helene. By the glint in Katherina’s eyes, she had more chance of losing her soloist position and becoming a flower girl than rising to stardom.

“I won’t tolerate circus tricks in my class," the ballet mistress pointed her finger at Helene. "Classical ballet has been unchanged since Louis XIV. Who are you to challenge centuries of tradition? A parrot? To repeat that Italian company’s ridiculous moves?”

Gasping, Helene crossed her arms in front of her middle. It was not an imitation! She had changed the Brugnoli's act, stripping the coquettish smiles and burlesque. The Italians danced en pointe to shock. Helene danced to fly.

Her gaze trembled from Katherina to her fellow dancers. They became a mass of heads and faces—a wavering monster. Some regarded her with pity. Others hid sneers underneath manicured hands. A sob tickled her throat. How ugly she was, a plucked bird wearing only its chicken skin and shame.

She raced to the wings, hoping to reach the dressing room before her tears fell.

“Miss Beaumont.” Langley’s voice arrested her movement.

Chin trembling, Helene faced him.

The aloof choreographer studied her. “Are you familiar with the blue fairy solo?”

The jumps and the allegro were easy enough, but the challenging sequence of pirouettes and cha?nés? She struggled with those even when Katherina was not flailing her with her stare.

But she had earned Langley’s attention, hadn’t she? What would she do now? Wilt and sell oranges in the theater pit? No! She would be like Viola in Twelfth Night —even stranded in a foreign land, disguised and under pressure, Viola kept her composure and triumphed.

Gulping, Helene nodded once. Then twice.

Langley crossed his arms. “Excellent. Do it on the tips of your toes.”

Heart speeding, she brushed her slippers in the rosin box and took her mark near stage left, just off center.

If she had to fall, why not do it in style?

***

“Conducting a business transaction on the stage is highly irregular. Don’t you have an office in this place?” William asked as he followed Verón, Covent Garden’s new director, through dimly lit corridors.

“I promise I won’t tax your valuable time, Your Grace.” Verón pointed to the shadows. “But as the theater’s principal investor, you must see the renovations. You will understand my vision then.”

Tallow smoke hovered near the wall sconces. The air clung to his skin, thick with powder, sweat, and perfume. A figure moved in the shadows. Or was it an illicit couple? This was the sort of place he despised. A breeding ground for indulgence and disorder.

Darkness gave way to hazy light. William recognized the stage wings. Beyond the black panels, hushed voices and curling smoke hinted at a performance.

William halted, fixing Verón with a sharp look. He came here to discuss his investments, not join the theatrics.

Verón cursed in French. “I didn’t know there would be rehearsals today. I beg you to wait here, Your Grace. I’ll send everyone away.”

The director disappeared.

Music floated into the shadows. A violin, then a harp—watery and haunting.

The melody tickled his memory. Where had he heard it before? His legs moved forward before he could control them. William parted the silk curtains, and the distant hum of London’s tired day faded. Mist curled at his boots like rising fog on a lake. Trees stretched their gnarled arms toward a painted sky, their shadows flickering in the glow of unseen footlights. His pulse kicked, as if bracing for a storm that had not yet revealed itself.

Scenery and gaslight. He knew this, and yet—the blue haze, the eerie stillness—it tugged on something deep in him.

Movement flashed to his right. Glimpses of fair skin, of rounded shoulders. An impish profile.

She floated closer, a ripple in still water wearing white tulle. His pulse stumbled. Her feet—God above—her feet defied nature. He had seen ballerinas before. But this—this was something else. She was not dancing on the stage. She danced above it.

Then, the bluish light illuminated her profile.

His heart hammered against his ribs. It was her.

The sprite. He knew that face. By God, he knew those lips.

Impossible. She could not be the sprite who haunted his dreams. Just a dancer. A Covent Garden ballerina.

It had to be a stage trick. He was overtired. His mind was playing games with him. Yet, why couldn’t he breathe?

He was not prone to fancy. But how could he deny what was before him?

Oblivious to his turmoil, she danced. Not quite an angel—no, she was too playful, too sensual to be divine. She moved like mist caught in moonlight. Her arms curved overhead, her fingertips grazing nothing, reaching for everything.

He was dreaming. There was no other explanation.

She pirouetted once. Then again. Faster. A blur of white and weightlessness. Each spin brought her closer.

His pulse pounded in his throat, and he flexed empty hands.

Any moment now, he would wake. He always did, just before he touched her. She was fickle that way, abandoning him when he craved her the most.

No. This time, he refused to touch her. She would leave, and he would wake in his bed—drenched in sweat, alone.

And yet… his hands lifted of their own volition.

Even knowing she would vanish, even dreading the cold sheets, he reached for her.

It was not in him to let her fall.

She spun again—so close now, her warmth teased his skin. The scent of rosemary invaded his lungs.

William spread his fingers, waiting to touch thin air and empty promises.

She turned one last time, wisps of hair whipping against her face—and collided with him.

Contact. Heat. Flesh. Breath.

Real.

A small, startled inhale—hers, not his. He had stopped breathing.

Her waist fit against his palms, impossibly solid, the layers of silk and muslin doing nothing to dull the heat. Her ribs rose and fell beneath his hands, her breath ghosting against his jaw.

William steadied her, his fingers flexing into the fabric of her gown, anchoring her—or himself.

She did not fade.

She smiled.

Not wide or knowing, but soft—a flicker of warmth that struck him like a blow to the gut. A dream should not smile at him. A dream should not look at him like that.

His breath locked in his chest, his heartbeat hammering. This was against reason, against everything he understood to be true.

Her breathless sigh shook him harder than a gale ever could. Nothing, not war, not politics, not the most cunning adversary, had ever unmade him like this. He was a man who governed his instincts, who dictated the terms of every engagement. And yet, in the space of a single heartbeat, she had unraveled him.

“Dreams do not breathe,” he whispered.

And yet—God help him.

She did.

***

She had been flying—spinning as if her feet had found a tripod on clouds—when a man caught her waist, his hands warm and solid on her hips. Helene's breathing came in short bursts, still reeling, yet the stranger grounded her. His strength seeped into her, and she had the absurd notion that he would never let her fall.

Helene held her position, searching the mirror for their reflection. They were beautiful together: he, a dark-haired Apollo with shoulders broad enough to lift her to the ceiling; she, rendered delicate by his height and patrician features.

If she lifted her leg in attitude derrière , would he know how to shift his hands to just below her ribcage?

"You," he breathed.

Startled by the intensity of his voice, her gaze traveled from the intricate knot of his neckcloth past his imperious chin and finally landed on his eyes.

They called to her—stormy blue eyes, now caressing her face as if he had waited a lifetime to meet her again. Her heartbeat faltered. His gaze held her captive, not in the way a dance partner would, but as if seeing past her ballerina skin.

Something stirred in her chest—a melody—strings and the whisper of a flute. The seconds expanded, measured not by the clock, but by how much of the stranger's warmth she absorbed.

"I'm sorry," she smiled breathlessly. "You must believe me. I'm not in the habit of pirouetting into strangers."

He stiffened, as if her voice had snapped him out of a dream, and his fingers tightened at her waist. His eyes shifted from stormy blue to pale, piercing gray, like the sky before a lightning strike. Whatever emotion churned there, she couldn’t name it. But it made her light-headed—like leaning too far over the edge of a cliff, knowing you should step back… and wanting, foolishly, to fall.

"You should be more mindful of your surroundings."

He let go of her, their contact tearing like a violin string.

A sudden chill replaced the warmth of his hands, and she stumbled back a step.

How could she have mistaken him for a dancer? With his expensive clothing and the diamond studs closing his cuffs, he had to belong to the West End world—an aristocrat.

A door banged, and somewhere, a glass shattered.

The heat of his touch faded from her waist, but the chill of his gaze… that would stay longer. She suddenly understood what she had glimpsed in his eyes.

The stranger had stared at her as if he knew her intimately—as if they had been lifelong enemies.

***

William pushed her away. The beast within his chest snarled, clawing at his ribs, wanting out. His hands curled into fists at his sides—he had to hold them there. Had to stop himself from reaching for her. From dragging her back. His heart pounded. Impossible.

That impish nose and those pouting lips, always teetering between a cry and a kiss—he knew those lips. The thought struck him like the blast of a howitzer. He had to taste her, feel the texture of her skin, inhale her scent—anything to convince himself she was real.

A shudder coursed through him, his pulse drumming.

The theater director cleared his throat. William became aware of the strangers surrounding him, of the veiled whispers. What was he doing? The Duke of Albemarle didn't pick dancers on the stage.

The chain pulsed inside his pocket. The links. He couldn't break the links. Locking every muscle of a mutinous body, William forced himself to pay attention to Verón.

While he stared at the dandified French director, all his senses were attuned to her. She peered at him from the fringe of tittering limbs and tulle skirts, her pose alert.

Verón spoke. Muffled, the words came from underwater.

What did it say about him that he was so drawn to a figure from his dreams?

William gritted his teeth. "Proceed."

"You couldn't have chosen a better moment to invest in the theater, Your Grace," Verón said. "My plan includes several actions aimed at improving publicity. I will transform Covent Garden into the most fashionable venue in town."

"I expect the ledgers. Tomorrow." William spoke in bursts.

Focus. He had invested here for a reason, and it was not for profit. The committee had applauded his idea of extending their influence to the theater. Now, he doubted the rationality of coming here.

"What about the program for the season? The nation is at war. Covent Garden should reflect the gravity of the times. Patriotic plays will bolster the spirit, remind the people of what's at stake," William said.

Verón smiled nervously. "But such matters are not the theater's bread and butter, Your Grace. You will beggar your investment. Guests cross our arches and give us their shillings to transport them to a realm of dryads and fairies. To escape the humbug of their everyday lives."

Fairies? William stole a glance at the ballerina. Gaslight haloed her figure, lending her an ethereal quality as she danced alone, as if rehearsing something. William restrained the impulse to brush his eyes. Those arms lifted in an arc, those feet. That smile.

"Your Grace?" The director's voice could not pierce the fog clouding William's brain. "Don't you think evading reality for a few moments is necessary? That passion should have an outlet in the arts?"

His chest constricted. Why couldn't he breathe? With Titan's effort, he kept still when everything in him wanted to pursue her. It could not be her. The sprite was a dream. Not real. His mind played tricks on him. This girl was just a dancer.

William took a measured breath. "Inciting society's passions is dangerous. My financial support stands as long as the performances have no revolutionary themes. England is shaken enough by Napoleon and civil unrest to condone reformist-themed entertainment."

Verón nodded repeatedly. "Of course, upon my honor, we won't recreate the Carmagnole. Mr. Langley has already written a new ballet. We are about to choose the principals."

She danced several feet away, but her essence lingered. The scent of rosemary had glazed his lungs, but there was more, the ghost of lilacs crushed underfoot on a moonlit path or the hush of rain evaporating from warm stone. The smell of his dreams.

Could this be a ploy by his enemies—a means to unnerve him? Nonsense. No one, absolutely no one, knew the content of his dreams.

William gripped the chain in his pocket hard enough to bend the gold. "I trust this production will not carry disruptive ideas."

"It has nothing to do with war." Verón gestured animatedly. "Inspired by Walter Scott's writing, it tells the tale of a Scottish Laird who is haunted by a sylph, a fleeting spirit of the forest. He is about to marry another, but he's entranced by the creature."

The words echoed in his mind, setting off a storm. "I see. When the English must meet the demands of war and empire, Sir Walter Scott is hymning the wild romanticism of the Highlander. And how will you call this new ballet?"

Verón smiled. “La Sylphide.”

All the hairs on William's body lifted.

His gaze returned to the ballerina.

She had given the being who haunted his dreams a face.

And now it had a name. La Sylphide.