As they walked closer to the village hall, Tasia let her hopes rise even higher. This was her chance for a brand-new start. After the events that led to Cindy marrying Prince Charming instead of Prince Frank, Tasia had been sent away in disgrace. Vigorously opposed to her landing somewhere too close, Cindy had used her new connections to uncover some far-flung relatives living in another country. Stavros and Anthi already had two daughters, so Tasia had been surprised at their willingness to house another person. Some of Pagona’s remarks upon her arrival the day before led her to believe a significant sum of money had helped the process along. Regardless, sheintended to make good use of their kindness. No more betrayals for her.
A still-hot breeze tugged at the loose strands of Tasia’s hasty hair style as they moved through the growing dusk. Music spilled out through the open windows and doors of the hall as they approached. Lady Saveria had a thing about being fashionably late, but Tasia wasn’t sure what that looked like in the country. It seemed to her that the party had been in full swing for a while.
A few overheated people laughingly stumbled out the door closest to them, fanning faces and flapping tops. They greeted Mother Anthi with smiles that grew tight when they saw her companion.
“Be a good girl and take this to the refreshment room, dear.” Mother Anthi added her trays to Tasia’s load almost before she had a chance to register what had been said.
Saving the treats from falling to the forest floor in an unceremonious heap occupied Tasia long enough for the older woman to disappear inside with her friends, who had cooled down suspiciously fast. Tasia brushed off the small hurt resulting from Anthi’s failure to introduce her and slapped a confident smile on her face. Then she squared her shoulders and marched inside.
Entering the space felt a little like running into a wall of heat and sound. The music tugged at Tasia, enticing her to dance as she looked around the room for somewhere to set her load. Her initial scan of the room told her that, by and large, all the men were stocky and the women were similarly muscled and curvy. A few of the men were noticeably taller than Tasia, but she could look the rest in the eye. Her willowy height did allow her to spy the refreshment table on the far opposite side of the hall.
As she began the careful dance of maneuvering through the crowd, she idly wondered if short-and-dark was standard for all of Bavenpier or specific to this village nestled in the trees. Shewas taller than her mother and sisters, but she had never felt tall in Diomland. A gasp sounded from her right, but when she peered that way, no one was looking at her and she couldn’t tell what had elicited that reaction.
To reach the refreshments, she had to wind her way through the crowd of folks watching the dancers, then past two other rooms that opened off the main hall via wide arches. The first room appeared to be housing the youngest villagers. Two adults stood near the doorway and redirected any child who wandered too close. At least one toddler had already succumbed to sleep, curled up on a pillow in the corner. Another enterprising youngster waited until the gatekeepers were distracted, then made a mad dash for the exit. He slammed into Tasia’s knees. A disaster of dessert proportions was only averted because the crush of people meant that Tasia barely tipped before bumping into the person behind her.
“Beg pardon—” she began. Her apologetic smile died on her lips when the man she had stumbled into made a moue of disgust and pointedly wiped at his vest.
Sensing a losing battle, Tasia faced forward and continued toward her goal. She overheard the small boy being scolded as she left.
The middle room housed a good number of stout chairs and sofas that were populated by elderly folks. Here, her progress stalled thanks to the many slow-moving observers meandering in and out of the space. The room’s occupants used the numerous handfans for more than creating air movement. Several times, Tasia saw an old woman hold up her fan to cover her face while she talked to her neighbor and nodded toward the stranger.
Comments “whispered” at volumes that accommodated listeners with failing ears made their way to Tasia.
“A real beanstalk, that one.”
“What was Stavros thinking, lettingthatinto his home?”
“Hair like a candle. Unnatural!”
In Diomland, Tasia had never let meanspirited comments bother her. She knew some of the nobles in their social tier were just like that. Not all of them were, and she had plenty of friends. Or friendly acquaintances. None of them had remained very friendly after the royal scandal, of course.
Finally, she made it to the room reserved for refreshments. When she moved to set her increasingly heavy load in an empty spot, a pinched-nose matron with the earliest hint of silver at her temples stopped her with an imperious look.
“What do we have here?” the woman asked with a shallow veneer of polite interest.
More than ready to relinquish the goodies, Tasia smiled as naturally as she could. “These are the honey treats that Anthi made this morning.”
A flicker of something danced across the other woman’s face. “Ah. Very good. You can put those here.” She directed Tasia to set them exactly where she had been aiming the first time.
A pack of youth deemed too old for the baby room (and totally uninterested in the dance floor) used the disturbance her presence was causing to swarm the tables. They stuffed quite a few pockets before the nearest adults realized what they were doing and shooed them away.
Relieved of her physical burden, Tasia switched to friend-finding mode. “My name is Tasia—”
“That’s nice.” The self-appointed snack sentinel dismissed her with a blink and turned to talk with someone else.
“Right,” Tasia said under her breath. She took a long breath in through her nose. No one else grabbing refreshments would make eye contact with her, so she decided to try her luck elsewhere.
As she wandered away from the space, a small haven by a potted plant was vacated by a middle-aged woman accepting a dance from a man in a red vest. Tasia slipped into the nook so she could get her bearings and plan her next step.
To her left, a man in a dark jacket was invading the space of someone in a brown dress. Very soon after, the woman showed her displeasure at his leaning by flouncing off with a huff. The man shrugged it off and straightened. When he shoved his hands in his pockets, something fell to the floor.
Tasia looked down as the man turned and stooped to grab the item. She saw him catch sight of her feminine shoes, then begin the journey from her toes to her face. This gave her time to take in his open jacket and too-tight white shirt tucked over a little extra belly. The man was smiling as he began introducing himself at about the level of her knees.
“Heeey, Joseph Fusco II is looking to dance and—” He stopped abruptly when he got to her face—slightly above his—and realized that she wasn’t whoever he thought she was.
Tasia raised both eyebrows, leaving space for him to finish the sentence.
“—I forgot that I promised this one to someone else.”
