“If you wanted to be alone, you should have made sure no one else was up here first.” The stranger laughed, his dark eyes crinkling at the corners.
“Ugh!” I pushed past him, all too aware of the heat coming off that powerful body, marching toward the stairwell door. I grabbed the handle and yanked but… nothing happened. I jiggled it again and again, trying desperately to pull the door open but… it wouldn’t move. Shit.Shit, shit, shit. It must have locked behind me. I looked down and sure enough, there was a lone brick beside the door, meant to prop it open while occupants used the rooftop. I hadn’t noticed it in my flustered state.Merde.
“Having trouble?” The annoying stranger grinned. So, this was amusing to him. Nice. Very nice. He was such an ass.
“It’s locked.” I ground my teeth, admitting that we were stuck out here. Together. Truthfully, I wasn’t fearful of being alone on the rooftop with him. If he was going to attack me, he could have done so when I didn’t know he was here. No. He didn’t have nefarious intentions. But nonetheless, I needed to go. My friends would be looking for me… Seff might be worried… if he cared atall. I just wanted to forget about this whole rooftop encounter. To pretend it never happened.
“Are you sure it’s locked? It can be a bit sticky. Here, let me try.” He swooped in beside me, graceful as a cat. Against my better judgement, I breathed him in. His scent was like freshly baked bread and some kind of herb I couldn’t quite place—probably something they used in the kitchens below. His body beside mine was so warm against the chill night air. I had to resist the urge to press into him to take some of that heat for myself. I especially had to tamp down the irrational urge to place my hands on that very warm, very solid looking chest—to run them through those thick tendrils of hair…
Get it together, Seraphina.I stepped out of his heat to let him try the door. He muttered something under his breath, in a language I didn’t understand, and gave the door one last pull. It opened.
“See. Just need a bit more upper body strength.” He held the door open for me, making an obvious show of flexing his biceps. He had definitely noticed me staring. Humiliating. I rolled my eyes and pushed past him into the stairwell.
“Wait!” he called after me. “I didn’t get your name!”
I was already gone.
THE LUTESSE CITY OPERA
Twelve Hours Earlier
Iwas always late for rehearsal. Regardless of how organized I tried to be, or how much extra time I gave myself to get my shit together, I still wound up late. I would miss the electric street tram by three seconds or lose my keys as I was on my way out the door. Today I had forgotten my pointe shoes and had to run back inside to find them. Unfortunately, since they weren’t in my bag, this meant I had no idea where they were. Madame Giselle was going to flay me alive.
I couldn’t find those damned shoes anywhere. As I tossed tights, demi pointe shoes and leotards over my shoulder, my frantic rummaging alerted my roommate to my plight. I had thirty seconds before the street tram rumbled by without me. I was going to miss it.
“Your shoes are on the kitchen island, Seraphina! God, you would forget your own head if it wasn’t attached to your neck!”
Carlotta, my best friend and roommate, was still in bed at 10:30, and she was angry enough that she was using my fullname. Sleeping at this time seemed luxurious to me, but the dance chorus always had an earlier call time. Carlotta was the prima donna, the first lady of the Lutesse City Opera, and did not typically roll into rehearsals until after noon.
If I moved through life as a hurricane, Carlotta was a light spring breeze. Without any effort, she was never late, never broke a sweat and was always perfect. She was the type of person who never even got dirt under her perfectly manicured fingernails. I might have envied her for it if I didn’t benefit so much from her perfection.
And I did benefit from it. When she was by my side, Carlotta and I ran our city. Lutesse, the cultural capital of the continent of Ereba, was enigmatic: a city of artists, writers, music and fashion. And even after Scion’s War, while theocracy and authoritarianism spread throughout the rest of the continent like wildfire, it felt like we were living in a bubble. Lutesse was the creative centre of the world and living here was exhilarating. Much of my life had been spent in fear and mourning, beginning when my mother died and continuing when I lost my father in the war. But it had been almost six years since he died, and three years since the war ended. So here I was, moving on, attempting to embrace life—to embrace joy.
Any time we weren’t in rehearsals for the opera, Carlotta and I spent exploring the streets of beautiful Lutesse. We frequented the cafes, bistros and nightclubs. We embraced the latest fashions, testing out new hairstyles and spending any extra money we managed to save on sparkling dresses and high-heeled shoes. We partied like there was no tomorrow: dancing, drinking champagne and absinthe, and having flings with young men we’d never see again. We lived as young women had never dared to before. We were a new generation, ready to taste everything life had to offer.
Today, life had to offer a strict rehearsal schedule, and I was dangerously close to missing it. I grabbed my pointe shoes, shouted my thanks to Carlotta and sprinted out the door, into a torrential spring downpour. Shit.
“Seraphina, you are late.”Madame Giselle would indeed flay me alive as I tried, and failed, to slide into rehearsal without her notice. She may have been a tiny middle-aged woman with greying hair and a severe face, but the head choreographer of the Lutesse City Opera was not to be crossed. She scared everyone, whether they were in the dance chorus or not.
“Push-ups.” With that command, spoken in her throaty Lutessian accent, I was punished—relegated to push-ups until I collapsed while everyone else continued their warm-up. I would also be expected to atone for my lateness by completing that warm-up. There were no exceptions from Madame Giselle.
“What the hell happened to you, Seraphina? You look like a drowned rat.” My friend Maren approached me side-stage after I’d caught up on the warm-up exercises. Indeed, my dark curls, soaked from the rainy commute, were attempting to spring free from my bun. The sharp liner I drew in the corners of my amber eyes was running down my cheeks, and my pale pink bodysuit was dampened with sweat under my arms and between my breasts. I was a mess. Maren, however, did not have to point that out.
“I was almost on time… until it started pissing cats and dogs.” I pouted, knowing Maren wasn’t surprised by my lateness or my disheveled appearance.
Maren laughed. She was a ballerina too, though she would go on to be a much better one than I could ever be. She had a typicaldancer’s body, with long limbs, small waist, no breasts to speak of and a perfect swan neck.
I must have looked almost vulgar dancing beside her. I was several inches shorter than Maren’s impressive 5 foot 8 frame. My legs were not long or perfect, nor was my neck. I had good feet, but I was curvier than most dancers, with hips, breasts and muscular thighs that could not be hidden by any traditional ballet costume. What I lacked in my natural physique, I made up for in pure grit. No one in the chorus worked harder than me, and tardiness aside, Madame Giselle rewarded hard work.
Today was going to be hard work indeed. It was just two days before the opening night of the opera season, where we would be showcasing the best of the Lutesse City Opera at the opening gala. There was also a well-substantiated rumour going around the cast that a new owner had purchased the Opera Company. Everyone from Madame Giselle to the art director, to the stage manager, to the conductor, was on edge. The new owner would be coming to see the gala, to judge the financial and cultural merits of their new purchase.
This explained Madame Giselle’s particularly foul mood. “Girls! You turn your heads on AND-four,notfour! Do it again. We stop and start from the beginning every time one of you makes a mistake. You can thank each other when your feet are bleeding.”
I relished the movement, even when it hurt. It was freeing to be there, dancing with the other girls in the chorus line.
When I danced, I was able to take my mind off anything that bothered me. I could just be. I had never belonged anywhere until I found a place in the Lutesse City Opera. It was the closest thing I had to a family. So, I danced until my feet bled, and then I danced some more. Everything would be perfect for the Gala. I would make sure of it.
Carlottabreezed into the increasingly sweaty theatre when we were about an hour into rehearsals.
