The idea of calling on someone was incredibly foreign to Wyll, but when he really thought about it, hadn’t his life been a cacophony of foreign things? Selling his soul to Mizora for the safety of his city was incredibly foreign. As was being kicked out of the only home he had ever known as a result. Growing a pair of devil horns has altered himself in a way that he could barely even fathom. And then, of course, there was the loss of everything he’d ever known to come here, of all places.

His life had been one struggle after another, and yet, as he selected a bouquet of flowers from a local shop, he couldn’t quite bring himself to regret it.

After he was finished with his short talk with Edwina last night, he couldn’t get her out of his mind. He’d watched her on the dance floor, chatting shyly with several different men, but he couldn’t help but notice that she hadn’t been nearly as lively with them as she had been with him. It was like, ever since then, maybe she felt the same strange connection to him that he felt toward her. And Wyll knew, there was only one way to find out.

Granted, he had no idea how to do it. He’d heard of people calling others when he lived in Baldur’s Gate, but he’d been kicked from his home far before he was of age to actually start the process himself. Regardless, in theory, all he knew was that you got a woman something they might like (and Edwina, with her sunny disposition, surely must love flowers. After all, what woman did not?) and arrive at their house during the proper calling hours. And he’d asked one of the servants what those proper hours were, which felt like a great plan to him - after all, though there had not been a woman other than Daphne living in Hastings house for what felt like millennia, the servants knew that they always must be prepared.

So that left Wyll with a plan and determination, and now all he needed was courage. He certainly had it when he started out, but the closer he got to the Sharma household, felt the cowardice seeping into his bones. Sure, he’d had a chance encounter, and sure, she’d agreed to dance with him the next night, but was five minutes of interaction enough to be sure that she would be a good subject of his desires?

But, he thought as he felt his footsteps slow, that had never stopped him before. If he could walk into Avernus, or if he could put aside his adversity and become the Blade of Frontiers, surely he could talk to a woman.

As he walked up the steps of the Sharma house and into the front hall, however, he saw that he was not her only suitor for the day. Far from it, in fact. The Sharma’s house was quite modest in comparison to a lot of the other homes in the ton (although, he couldn’t help but notice that it was quite larger than most of the homes in Baldur’s Gate. Even the Sharma house was only slightly smaller than his father’s), but despite the obvious promise of a lower dowry, there was still barely enough space to enter the drawing room. He managed to slip in behind some mildly drowsy-looking man who didn’t even seem to notice the man moving behind him. Wyll couldn’t help his slight surprise. Of course, Edwina was a gorgeous woman - gorgeous enough for even him to be here when he should have been trying to find out how to get back home - and her dance card had been full at the last ball, but there were significantly more men in attendance than that. Granted, he couldn’t blame them too much. After all, he was here without having danced with her either. But if all the men were here, was no one else calling in town?

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“Ahh, Basset!” said a familiar voice to his side, and he turned to see Anthony Bridgerton squeezing his way through the crowd. Wyll bobbed his head down in the best interpretation of a bow that he could get in this crowded environment, and Anthony did the same as he squeezed through an impossibly small space to get to his side. “Fancy seeing you here as well. Is it too much for me to hope that you’re here for Miss Kate instead?”

Wyll shook his head. “Miss Edwina, I’m afraid, as must be a vast majority of the town.”

“It’s been like this since calling hours started,” Anthony explained. “I thought I was I was going to be early, but there was already one blunderbuss reciting her a terrible poem. Although,” he said, wincing as they listened to the person at the front of the room, also reciting a terrible poem, “I have to admit that you missed the better of the two.”

“And not one of them is here for this Miss Kate?” Wyll asked, scanning the room. He didn’t see another woman around Edwina’s age, although there were two women standing near the back of the room, and one looked far too young to be Edwina’s mother.

“No, but honestly, can you blame them? Horrible shrew of a woman,” Anthony said with a frown.

“I can’t say we’ve met, but is it who I think it is?” Wyll nodded his head in the older woman’s direction.

“You’ve guessed correctly,” Anthony said with a scowl.

“Is there any particular reason why she seems to be glaring in this exact direction?”

“Most likely because she’s taken to being a direct pain in my side. Edwina has said that she will only marry a man if her sister approves of him, and her sister is such a biddy that I doubt there’s a man in the ton who can please her.”

Wyll nodded - based on the way she scanned the crowd, he could have guessed as much. “That doesn’t particularly answer the question as to why she’s looking our way, though,” he said.

Anthony shrugged. “Some women think reformed rakes make the best husbands. Miss Kate, however, seems to have a difference of opinion on the definition of ‘reformed,’ however.”

Wyll looked closer at Kate - she did indeed seem to be focused solely on Anthony, which seemed suspicious in a room where half of the men were likely to be reformed rakes. Hell, if his history in this world was anything like what his cousin’s was supposed to be like, then he would be counted amongst them. “Care to explain why your definition disagrees with her.”

Anthony shrugged, then lowered his voice so that only Wyll could hear above the noise of the crowd. “She wants someone for her sister who will marry for love. But if you look around, that is a ridiculous notion indeed! She’s the diamond of the season after all, so long as you discount Shadowheart, which most sensible men have. No one here wants to marry her for love - they want to marry her because she has a pleasing face, a wifely demeanor, and an already pristine place in society. That’s a greater foundation than most marriages, I would recon, but her sister wants the impossible. And, well,” he said with a shy shrug of his shoulder, “she might have accidentally heard me say as much to a few friends outside the club.”

Wyll nodded - while he didn’t agree with Anthony’s sentiments, he certainly could understand why Kate would continue to glare specifically at him. And, by extension, Wyll.

“It’s of no matter, though,” Anthony said, drawing Wyll’s attention back to him. “By the end of the season, Edwina will be on my arm, and her sister will have no say in the matter. It will just be simpler if I can find a way to get Miss Kate to not abhor me by that time.”

“I assume you’ve got a plan for that?” Wyll asked. After all, he was invested in the outcome now, too - Kate had already seen him talking friendly with Anthony, so if she hated him, it would most likely make sense for her to hate himself by extension.

“Oh yes, a very clever one!” he said. “And I might need some help to pull it off, if you’re willing.”

Wyll turned his focus back to Kate, whose eyes met his as he looked. Her eyebrows lifted for a second, as though questioning why he was there, and then her eyes turned back to a glare. “It seems I’m in a similar boat to you,” Wyll answered, “so I’m all ears.”