Page 43 of The Scarlet Ball

Above us, the thunder rumbled. I refused to retreat, but he was only watching me with that animal regard. No wonder they told us not to look the lords in the eye; I wasn’t sure I could look away if I wanted to.

“All right,” he said at last. He sounded pleased, as if I had given him something good.

“All right?”

“Yes. May I ask you a question?”

“Only if I may decline to answer.”

“Why did you cry when we were dancing?”

I hesitated, and then I remembered that he was not someone who needed a why or a when or a how the way a human would.

“Because my heart is broken.”

“I see. Thank you.”

Somehow I knew he meant it, and I hesitated, my hand on the sill. It was almost numb with cold, but it was his cold. It didn’t hurt at all.

“I saw you, and I knew you would fight,” he murmured. “You fight for your way and your will, and someday, you’ll die fighting.”

“Wouldn’t you?” I asked, and something clicked in my head. “That night at the White Ball, that was you, wasn’t it? You fought them all.”

He grinned, suddenly boyish in his pleasure at being recognized.

“That was me, and I’m for you. They don’t get to hurt you. No one does.” He leaned in closer. His breath was cold too, he’d have to be taught to warm it, and stupid as it was, I was going to let him. He was the storm, and yes, I’d die fighting, but there was time before that.

Sebastian drifted higher and closer until our gazes were level. Barely more than a foot separated us. I couldn’t take my eyes from his, but I was aware of his mouth as well, how good it had felt, how much I had liked it.

I yelped as I was suddenly caught around the waist and hauled backward. Mielle deposited me on my feet behind her, but she was careless enough that I stumbled, falling on my rear.

“How strong are you?” I exclaimed, but she ignored me, turning toward the window and facing Sebastian, who I saw had his foot on the sill.

There was a moment.

Just for a moment, my vision was fogged, or perhaps it cleared. For the space of half a heartbeat, I saw the thing I had seen at the Gracens’ ball, that terrifying formless darkness.

Then I blinked and it was gone, and Mielle was still standing in front of me, Sebastian at the window. He had a look on his face I recognized very well, that of a rich young man balked, and I scrambled to my feet.

“Get back,” Mielle said. Her voice was hard but brittle, fear pushing up through her anger. “Get out. You are not welcome. You are not invited.”

He narrowed his eyes. “You don’t get to talk to me like that.”

He took hold of the window frame, and Mielle tensed but didn’t stand down. I realized that in another moment, she was going to move against him, and I whistled loud and shrill, like I was calling a hunting pack to order. They turned to me, and I drew myself up straight.

“Not her,” I said, pointing to Mielle. “Never her. You understand?”

I could tell he didn’t. So far as any of us knew, the world might have been made for his appetite. He wanted to eat her, possibly for her insolence, possibly because he was merely hungry, but there was something else he wanted more.

Sebastian bowed his head to me, and then, letting go of the windowsill, he fell backward. Even as I knew better, I bounded to the sill, convinced I’d see a broken body on the street. Of course there was nothing there, and above us, lightning flashed like laughter.

Ten

The first week of December ended with the clouds splitting apart and sunlight as clear as crystal spilling through. I have heard that in California the sun shines democratically on the rich and poor alike, but of course it was different in New York. On Mulberry Street, my shared room had only an opening to a narrow air shaft, no windows at all. At Madame Valois’s shop, the work started before dawn in the winter, and it was already dark by the time we emerged into the streets. New York winter days were so short that you’d be forgiven for thinking that the rich stole them from the poor.

Mrs. Howard, despite all her wealth, couldn’t seem to enjoy it. Every day that passed without Ginny home and safe weighed on her, was a bag of bricks she carried from bed to table to salon and back again. She would never show it—it takes iron years before it snaps entire—but the fracture was there. Once I nearly ran into her prowling the halls. I had my shoes off, but so had she, and the only reason I was not caught in my quest for some more of the oranges from dinner was because I saw the light she carried before her in the bend of the hallway.

I darted into the unused music room, leaving it ajar to keep the latch silent, and I watched her pass. Her gray hair was neatly braided, her peignoir trimmed in immaculate charcoal lace, but her mouth worked as if there was something foul in it. I thought she was praying at first and wondered what her God looked like, and then I realized what she was saying.