He flinched at her voice in his ear, half-glancing over his shoulder before realizing that would only bring him face-to-face with her. “What? I don’t…” he began to deny, but grew quickly flustered and couldn’t find the words.
“Don’t what? Fancy the ladies? You mean to tell me not a single one of those exquisite creatures prancing around out there makes you take a second glance?”
Mosscrow stammered a few false starts, ill-prepared to engage one of his main shadowy nemeses so cordially. Their few, brief conversations in the Huntsman’s Lounge didn’t compare to bantering in the open as if they were fast friends.
Despiris crossed her arms. “Fine. Don’t tell me. I shall hazard a guess.” Scanning the dancers, she picked one at random. “There. The blushing blonde in lavender.”
Mosscrow hmphed, either embarrassed to discuss it or not impressed. Then he seemed to rethink the rude reaction. “That is, er, the lady is lovely. Certainly.”
Despiris did not miss the way his eyes cheated sideways, however, completely bypassing the blonde beauty to an elegant figure who lurked along the sidelines opposite his own haunt. Surprise moved through her, for it was a familiar figure she found there, gowned audaciously in the brightest fuchsia ballgown Despiris had ever seen. The woman was like a giant tropical flower, almost blinding to behold. “Why, Lord Mosscrow, you rascal. Lady Verrikose?”
“Sshh,” Mosscrow hissed, as if the noblewoman could possibly hear Despiris’s surprised murmur from all the way across the teeming ballroom.
That confirmed it. The Lord Advisor was sweet on his Shadowhunter partner.
This is turning out to be even more fun than I anticipated. Hiding her grin, Despiris blazed on with her mischief. “Shall we make her jealous?” she asked, taking Lord Mosscrow’s arm and tugging him toward the dance floor.
“What? No – no. What are you… No.”
His protests were comical, and only encouraged her. “Don’t be ridiculous, Lord Mosscrow. It’s just a dance. You do know how to dance, I assume?”
“Of course I… It’s just…”
“It’s just that it’s been far too long since you had a little fun, and you’ve completely forgotten how. But fear not. We will cure you of your curmudgeon affliction in quick succession.”
Still sputtering and faltering in objection, Mosscrow nevertheless could not outright refuse her without labeling himself a great scoundrel, and so, reluctantly, he lumbered after her onto the dance floor.
A flash of gold caught Despiris’s eye near the entrance to the ballroom, and she found the king there, looking back. A twinkle of amusement lit his eyes, and he offered a small grin, enjoying her prank as much as she. No doubt he hadn’t seen the Lord Advisor enjoy himself – much less dance – in a very long time, if ever. Crossing his arms, Isavor settled in to watch.
Beaming, Despiris led Mosscrow into the frolicking mob and poised herself for the next dance just as the first song ended and another began. Crow had no idea what to do with himself, twitching nervously, his hands disappearing into his sleeves rather than seeking their proper placement. A wicked gleam flashing in her eyes, Despiris snatched his shy fingers and wrangled him into place, cinching one robed arm about her waist and erecting the other so she could rest her gloved fingers in his.
He stiffened at the close proximity of their bodies, and while Despiris might once have balked at the idea of interacting so intimately with the gnarly old goat, she’d discovered a new kind of power trip, using her womanly charms to make him unsure of himself.
He didn’t have long to fidget in discomfort, however, for suddenly the dance was underway. Despiris didn’t wait to see if he would rise to the occasion and assume the lead. She was enjoying her sense of control far too much. Sweeping him into the fray, she towed him through the motions, relentless in her zeal.
To Mosscrow’s credit, he knew the dance steps, whether or not he’d ever performed them at a public event. Though he tripped over his robes now and again, for the most part he kept up, determined not to look the absolute fool.
Halfway through the dance, the participants were required to switch partners. Flashing the Lord Advisor an encouraging smile, Despiris spun away, the ballroom a dizzying blur before she coiled to a halt and came face to face with a coolly-rooted, masked figure waiting to receive her. The shocking blue eyes staring through the intricate ebony mask were unmistakable.
The Shadowmaster’s eyes.
Despiris’s heart skipped a beat, her breath catching in her throat.
The dance sequence delegated that the ladies were to swish their skirts in flirty half-circles around the gentlemen, playing coy before joining together again. Despiris used the brief interlude to stop and stare, caught utterly off-guard.
Mockingly, Clevwrith pressed his gloved wrists together and raised them toward her, as if offering or daring her to shackle him then and there.
Quickly regaining her wits, Despiris tore a long strip of lace trim from her sleeve and bound his proffered wrists, tying them off with practiced deftness.
The instant the knot was tight, Clevwrith raised his hands over her head, snaring her in his embrace and sweeping her back into the dance.
It took a scant few steps for Despiris to recognize that they no longer followed the same routine as everyone else, but rather an alternate sequence that struck a keenly sentimental note. It was the dance Clevwrith had taught her on the city rooftops as her final lesson before graduating from Shadeling to Shadhi.
Despite the contradictory pattern, Clevwrith led her expertly between couples, spinning through gaps and slipping behind backs without brushing even a single billowing skirt along the way.
Then, suddenly, everyone was switching partners again, and he was handing her off to another gentleman.
As it had been his plan all along, Clevwrith made the transition back to the original dance without missing a beat. But Despiris was less prepared to toggle seamlessly between the two, faltering slightly as she found herself thrust back into the first number. Thankfully, the young lord was accustomed to leading, catching her up in his momentum and reminding her swiftly what her feet were supposed to be doing.
Recovering quickly, Despiris fell back into the proper steps, letting the new fellow lead as her gaze darted about the dance floor to track Clevwrith. He was dizzily switching partners, intercepting lady after lady to make his way toward the nearest exit.
There is no way you can catch him, Despiris thought to herself.
But she had to try.
Suddenly she was manipulating the dance likewise, cutting in and trading off as fluidly as she could manage, ruffling only a few feathers and leaving a scant few ladies stranded along the way.
By the time she reached the edge of the ballroom, Clevwrith was already across the dark balcony outside and hopping the rail to make his escape. She rushed to peer over the balustrade, not above hiking up her skirts to clamber over after him…
But he had already dropped to the ground and was sprinting away into the labyrinth of hedges, and she knew her small window of opportunity had closed.
With tangible disappointment, she resigned herself to leaving her dress intact, drawing herself back into a civilized stance on the proper side of the railing.
Clevwrith, you scoundrel. She had no doubt he’d recalled her strained relationship with dresses, and had taken advantage of her ballgown impediment just so he could make a casual appearance, utterly unchallenged.
It was that infuriating sense of arrogance that extinguished any flickering morsels of doubt, and reignited her hunger to best him.
Don’t worry, Clevwrith, she thought, staring into the lushly-silhouetted gardens after his vanished form. I haven’t forgotten our little game. Circumstances might have called for a brief interlude, but the arena clamored once again for action.
19
Shattered Mirrors, Torn Lace
“And who can guess at the soul of one whose face we don’t even know?”
*
/> There was a side of the Shadowmaster that no one ever saw. Granted, most saw no sides of the reclusive figure at all. But for someone with such a villainous reputation, known solely for his rampant trickery, many might be surprised to learn that he enjoyed his quiet time. That he could sit in the stillness and silence and brood as introspectively as any man. That he could get hung up on sentiment more than most men.
Yes, the Master of the Shadows had a sentimental side.
Rare though they might be, there were moments he preferred to disconnect from the action, foregoing the thrills and chills for a deeper euphoria. He would swallow the bittersweet pill of nostalgia, and stare down the lovely demons that awaited him there.
Today, those demons bore the face of Despiris.
He sat in his crowded memories of her, realizing how full of her his life had been, fondly remembering moments shared and all the little things that had simply, quietly passed.
Because that’s what things do. They pass.
Just like the magic of a moment spent in this very chamber when he had first hazarded kissing Despiris, and the image of that precious, intimate embrace had reflected like a multi-dimensional explosion in the hundred mirrors surrounding them.
Such a fleeting moment of bliss. The instant before the kiss, she hadn’t any idea of his intentions, and the instant after...she hadn’t understood. She’d looked up at him – startled, bemused, embarrassed…
And his heart had withered, the warmth glowing within him going instantly cold.
Nevertheless, he had cherished this chamber for capturing that single moment, which he liked to imagine immortalized somewhere in the memory of reflections, echoing or shimmering or rippling into the infinite dimension of mirrors. If he stared long enough into the endless glass kaleidoscope, he’d sometimes thought he’d caught a glimpse of the two of them, locked in that moment forever.
Alas, no longer could the looking-glass maze conjure the memory he held so dear. All the mirrors were shattered, now – struck down by the first gargoyle sent out to hunt the spies. Clevwrith had used the mirrors as an escape tactic, luring the beast to this chamber where a multitude of reflections would throw him off the scent. It had worked, but the beast hadn’t let confusion thwart him for long, opting to strike at anything that looked like his prey, not discriminating between reflection or real being. Thus the chase had ravaged the room, leaving it a glittering shambles.
Now Clevwrith could salvage little of the magic he once imagined immortalized in the chamber. All he could do was kneel amidst the shards, struggling to reform the memory from a million pieces. They never seemed to fit back together quite right, never fully recapturing the moment.
As if the moment itself had been destroyed.
He crouched there now in the semi-darkness, his broken reflection gleaming all around him from a moonlit gap in the street above – another modification courtesy of the raging gargoyle. In one hand he clutched a torn piece of lace, holding it under his nose to breathe in the familiar scent of Despiris. How he’d missed that scent – the scent of rain-drenched roses. His eyes fell shut in memory, and perhaps a tinge of regret. He never would have dreamed, looking forward to this moment in time, that this would be all he had left of her to hold onto. That his vivacious, faithful partner could ever be reduced to a mere scrap of lace clutched like a delicate lifeline in his fingers.
His fist tightened around the scrap, his head bowing over it slightly as if in prayer. He realized he didn’t want to open his eyes. As long as they were closed, he could ignore his thousand solitary reflections. Because though they projected in great abundance, giving the illusion of company, he was keenly aware they were all his. Only his.
And they were all broken.
20
Fuchsia Foibles
“Lady Verrikose of Rovanda has just demonstrated a valuable skill. Some might call it scandalous, sacrilegious. But we are here tonight to propose the idea that it is, in fact, exquisite.” – The Lord Advisor’s first introduction of the resident beastress to his council of associates.
*
Crow would not go as far as to say he’d let Despiris fan the flames of his little infatuation with Lady Verrikose, but he would be lying if he said he hadn’t grudgingly acknowledged the spark, just because she had brought it up. Throughout the evening, he’d allowed himself to steal a glance now and then in the noblewoman’s direction, inevitably drawn to her radiant repose, trying to work up the courage – and the safely casual phrasing – to ask her to dance.
He’d never quite gotten there, but thanks to his steady surveillance, he’d noticed that she spent a troubling portion of the festive occasion drinking. She was never far from the cocktail table, never far from the bottom of her bubbly glass. She danced with no one, conversed with no one, and Mosscrow did not miss when, pressing her gloved fingers to her temple to mute an obvious headache, she slipped from the ballroom and forsook the occasion outright.
Frowning, he went after her, trailing her to the Huntsman’s Lounge. He hesitated, fingers on the door handle, debating whether to bother her. But something was amiss, and whether it was his obsessive need to know all that went on inside the palace walls or a kernel of true concern for the woman, he found himself unable to leave it alone.
He pushed his way into the lounge. Lady Verrikose’s fuchsia bulk was perched on a high-backed stool at a tall ebony table, pouring a bottle of something much stronger than her pretty peach party drink into a glass.
Suddenly strangely upset, Crow strode across the chamber and snatched the bottle from her hand. Still sober enough to maintain her composure, at least, Lady Verrikose straightened from her dejected hunch, her dark eyes burning slowly up to glare at him.
Crow plunked the bottle down on the tabletop. “Enough,” he said, surprising himself with his willingness to confront the formidable woman. Where was this confidence when he’d wanted to ask her to dance? “Forgive me, my lady – you are allowed a drink, of course. But don’t think I didn’t notice you have spent the evening playing the tune of ‘The Bottomless Flute’, and now this? What has you in such a state? I cannot stand by and watch you defile that…exquisite mind of yours without standing in the way of complete obliteration.”
She arched a dark brow at his choice of words. “My ‘exquisite’ mind?”
Perhaps he should not have been so free with his admiration. But, well, what did he care if she knew his opinion of her gifts? She was an extraordinary woman. “Don’t be coy. You’re more than aware of your excellence. Any other day you would feed off the compliment as if it was your due.”
“My ‘due’ is currently being held hostage in your maggoty fists, Lord Mosscrow. Kindly unhand it.”
His frown deepened. “I’m curious. What happens when a beastress becomes too intoxicated to make good choices, and fumbles her way into the mind of a dangerous beast?”
“Well, I’m sure it’s nothing worse than what happens when a perfectly sober one fools herself into thinking she is as excellent at her craft as others think she is.” Snatching the bottle back from him, she sloshed a generous swig of amber liquid into her glass and downed it.
Mosscrow stared at her, wondering who it was he saw before him and what she had done with Lady Verrikose. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“It means,” the beastress explained tersely, pouring herself another splash, “that I’ve no interest, at present, preserving this ‘exquisite’ mind, because the only thing it’s good for is courting ‘exquisite’ disaster. And anyway, I’ve been forbidden from accessing its exquisiteness, so, pray tell, Lord Mosscrow, what is the point? Better to remove temptation, and obliterate my mental faculties into a drunken stupor that cannot even begin to clutch at their born purpose.”
Bemused, Mosscrow almost didn’t notice when she reached for the bottle a third time, but snapped out of his struggle to decipher her words just in time to intervene again. Pointedly, he corked the bottle, earning a frown of indignation from the noblewoman. “For
bidden? By whom?”
“Does it matter? It was not unwarranted. And aside from the reasons I have already stated, I do intend to intoxicate myself so I don’t have to dwell on the incident that led to this.” She pushed her glass across the table so he could fill it, if he insisted on manning the bottle.
“What incident?”
“Please, Lord Mosscrow – I’ve already endured enough humiliation. Kindly allow me to wallow in peace, that I might seek the throes of blissful ignorance with as much dignity as a raging drunk might aspire to.”
He thought about it, for a moment – gave her request due consideration. But he couldn’t leave her like this. “No. I cannot stand by and watch you defile yourself without explanation.”
She rolled her eyes, already displaying considerably less dignity than usual. “Then allow me to explain,” she said, gesturing to the chair across from her, “and defile myself at the same time.” Her gesture of invitation turned into nudging the glass toward him once more.
Sighing, Lord Mosscrow relented. Accepting the chair, he poured her another splash, taking care that it was less generous than her own self-prescribed rations. With a great sense of entitlement, Lady Verrikose reclaimed the glass. Rather than downing it straightaway this time, however, she clutched it in her fuchsia fingers, staring down into the tiny looking-glass of liquor. She seemed to get lost in it, slipping away into its mesmerizing sepia depths.
For a long moment Lord Mosscrow thought she wasn’t going to open up to him after all. But it would seem she’d had just enough liquor to loosen her proud tongue.
“I pushed him too hard,” she said blankly.
“Who?”
“Shangar. Ophelious softened the beasts from stone into clay. Do you know what happens when you push clay too hard, Lord Mosscrow?” She ran a gloved finger absently around the rim of her glass. “It gives. Bends without question to your will. And if you are not careful, if you are dizzy from the spin of the pottery wheel and impatient for the end result, you might not notice it has deformed until it’s too late.”
Game of Towers and Treachery (The Shadow's Apprentice Book 2) Page 16
