“For a bunch of rich folks, they don’t look very comfortable. Or happy.”
I grunted before I could stop myself and then gave Patricia a very steady look. “They feel the importance of the occasion, my dear. Peace is no laughing matter.”
She glanced at me and seemed to be about to make a sarcastic retort, but for the tenth time that evening, she stopped herself and sighed. It was quickly becoming clear that although she had some amount of acting ability when it came to embracing her role, she was growing impatient with the whole charade. I should have expected as much; after all, one does not become a globe-trotting bounty hunter just to sit in a ballroom and watch the rich mingle with one another.
If she felt boredom, however, it was not because our surroundings were drab. Quite the contrary, it was difficult to not feel impressed at the efforts of the French, despite their natural enmity with my homeland.
The airship had not been originally designed with parties and social events in mind, naturally. It was a former warship, after all, and any available space had been taken up by armaments, supplies, and the other necessities of war. Some evidence of those demands remained; the corners of the ceiling still bore some traces of the original, blocky construction, and some of the other fittings in the room appeared to have been built around fittings from the airship’s former weaponry.
To my amazement, however, the rest of the room had been almost completely transformed. The French had taken out the floor separating two barracks, creating a room much larger than any of the others in the ship. It stretched out into a wide floor, bordered on all sides by tables and chairs, while a magnificent chandelier hung from the ceiling. The walls had been decorated in a manner that reminded me of a golden palace, with the metal hull and support pillars cleverly disguised as marbled columns and grand murals. Even the hatches leading into and out of the rooms had been transformed into grand entryways, with the doors on the second floor leading out onto balconies that overlooked the entire room.
Above us was a massive fresco of the sky that appeared to be moving somehow. As the evening had worn on, I had been shocked to discover that the clouds were not simply traveling lazily across the firmament; they were also changing color as the sun began to move toward the horizon. Somehow, they had replicated the sky as seen from the top of the airship. What other marvels had the French somehow uncovered?
Unfortunately, much as I would have loved to indulge my curiosity in such matters, my attention was rather more occupied by a much less savory subject. Not fifty yards away, Lord Devonshire was chatting with a group of nobles. He had arrived accompanied by Lady Hermiter, under the name Angelica Coalsbury, who had apparently been a business acquaintance. It was a thin veneer, and I wondered absently if my earlier jabs had inspired a last-minute renegotiation of her disguise.
Patricia leaned forward, her boredom slipping away slightly. “You don’t think he would try anything here, do you?”
I kept my own voice quiet as I answered, for once abandoning the ridiculous accent. “No. I might have suspected that he would attempt to bring down the airship itself with both monarchs aboard, but that wouldn’t happen while he is here.” Devonshire turned to speak with another man, an American merchantman I had no information about. “Any assassination attempt would have to wait until both targets are aboard, and apparently, neither is here yet. Right now, I am sure he is only biding his time until his machinations are in place.”
She sighed melodramatically. “So, if he isn’t going to do anything, why are we wasting time watching him? We could just as easily try to find out where his mercenary buddies are hiding onboard.”
“They may not yet be on board.” Hermiter glanced in my direction, and sheer hatred flashed across her expression for less than the space of a heartbeat. Her acting was not much better than Patricia’s, actually. “It would be difficult to disguise a band of armed men on this airship for long. I assume they will arrive once he feels the moment is right.”
Understanding filled Patricia’s expression. “So, he’ll need to send them a message.”
I nodded. “Correct. If we keep a close eye on him, we might be able to identify his messenger. If we can find them, we may stop his plans cold.” The band playing for the ball started another song, and I grimaced. A waltz. I had never liked waltzes.
“Well, you aren’t trying to make me dance, at least.” Patricia slumped back in her seat, looking alarmingly less like an heiress and more like an idle bounty hunter. “Charlotte spent ages trying to teach me the steps, and insisted that I’d have to take a turn or two around the dance floor. Said it was part of the disguise. Can you believe that?”
Devonshire forgotten, I looked back at Patricia in surprise. “She said that, did she?”
A sudden mixture of horror and suspicion played out on Patricia’s face. “She couldn’t have been serious, Hector. Anyone watching would be able to tell we weren’t real nobles by the end of the first stanza.”
“Not all high-mannered folk dance well, Patricia, and she was right. Balls are for dancing.” Glancing at the band, I tried to measure out the pace of the music. The steps for this song seemed a bit too complex. Perhaps the next one would be better. When I looked back at Patricia, she had a mulish look on her face and her arms crossed. “Especially for us, my dear. Or do you think that people about to wed would not take the chance to dance?”
She opened her mouth to protest and then stopped. Then she grunted and looked away in frustration. I half-hid my smile as I looked back at the band and thought back to the dancing lessons my mother had given me while still at home. The Kingsley’s might not be a noble family, she had said, but they would be a well-rounded one, and her patient determination might yet pay off now.
Sensing that the waltz was coming to a close, I stood and straightened my clothes. When I was sure that all was arranged, I turned and held out my hand to Patricia. “Ms. Bingham, might I have this dance?”
She glared bloody murder at me and then pushed her chair back with a huff. “Fine, but don’t blame me if I step all over your feet, you ninny.” Fortunately, she kept her complaints low as she took my hand, but it was still hard not to chuckle as we made our way toward the floor.
I glanced at Devonshire again, and this time caught him watching me. The nobleman was watching me with a caution that I hadn’t expected. Perhaps I was not able to foil his plans yet, but I was clearly keeping him off balance. That alone would have put a smile on my face; Patricia’s continued grousing only made the anticipation all the sweeter.
When the waltz finished, I led Patricia to take her place for the start of the next song. She was still clearly nervous, but at the very least, she wasn’t grumbling under her breath. I held my breath and waited for the music to start, hoping that it would not be too difficult.
What followed was perhaps the most uncomfortable failure in my history. The instant the band began to play, I belatedly realized that I was in trouble. It was a waltz again, this time a horrendously complicated thing with a rather difficult, sedate rhythm to follow. A look at Patricia’s rapidly darkening expression only confirmed my fears, but there was no graceful way to abandon the dance without signaling something odd to everyone in the room.
Without other options, we were forced to proceed. It was not a performance which my mother would have approved. Between Patricia’s obvious boredom and unfortunately misplaced steps and my overstrained attempts to keep us in time with the music, it was a wonder no one interrupted us to see which of us had been concussed. As if to pour salt in the wound, the song seemed to take forever, stretching out far longer than I would have expected.
Simply put, it was agony.
By the time the song finished, Patricia’s face was red with both embarrassment and resentment, and I could hardly blame her. I did not quite understand why I had ever thought it was a good idea to begin with, and it was clear from the look Patricia was giving me she intended to explain in excruciating detail why it had not been my best decision of the day.
Then I stopped for a moment, looking toward the band. I saw a very familiar looking broad-brimmed hat standing close by. The stranger from outside my room was standing there, grinning, and one of the band members appeared to be pocketing something. A dark suspicion gathered as I watched him. “Ms. Bingham, do you know that man?”
“Know who, my dear Baron?” I glanced at her, wary of the heavy use of my false title, and then back at the band. In that short space of time, he had vanished completely. Perhaps he had used the crowd for cover. When I looked back at Patricia, she arched an impatient eyebrow at me. “Are we imagining things now?”
Obviously, she felt I was trying to distract her from what had just happened. All the same, I felt compelled to continue. “There was a man near the band. I met him outside my room. I was just wondering—”
“If you’d excuse me, Monsieur Krongesetz?”
The unexpected question caught me completely off guard. I turned to find Capitaine Chatelain, a broad grin on his face. “Capitaine?”
“Indeed.” He turned sharply to Patricia and bowed. “Ms. Bingham, might I have the next dance? Or do you intend to deny all the men here your company in favor of your…betrothed?”
Under other circumstances, I felt confident that Patricia would have turned the man down immediately. As it was, however, her embarrassment had not quite faded, and her anger was still very much present. “My apologies, Capitaine. I would love to join you for the dance, but I have never done well with your European waltzes. Mother always said I should stick to conversation.”
“Perhaps, my lady, you simply need a more experienced partner.” He leered at her in a fairly disgusting manner, and I felt heat under my collar. Curious, as the ballroom had been pleasantly cool before. “I promise I will not let you down. Only allow me one chance to prove it to you.”
Patricia gave me a considering look, and then she nodded to herself. “I suppose I shall have to give it a try.” She patted me on the arm. “Wait here for me, dearest. I shall be right back.”
With that, the triumphant French officer swept her back to the dance floor, leaving me on the edges fuming. I could scarcely keep my hands from clenching, and my humor was not improved when I caught sight of Lord Devonshire across the room. He appeared to be chuckling to himself, and Hermiter was grinning openly at me. Apparently, they had not been blind to my humiliation, and saw no reason to hide their happiness at it.
I looked away, before they could tempt me into some unwise maneuver. Better to look for the man with the mustache than to watch Patricia twirl around the floor with some idiot. Yet frustratingly, there was no sign of the former, and a corresponding abundance of the latter on display.
“That must be frustrating.”
For the second time, I found myself taken aback by someone appearing at my elbow. I barely restrained the urge to jump and looked to my left to find myself standing next to perhaps the most dangerous person in the room.
She stood slightly taller than me, the top of her head well above my own. Her natural height might have been shorter, but from the knees down, her legs took on the appearance of an eagle’s claws. Wings sprouted from her back, though at the moment they were folded with grave dignity behind her. Her skin was darker than mine, though her accent suggested her origin was in Portugal rather than something more distant, and her dark hair contrasted greatly with her sky-blue eyes. Though it had obvious alterations for her Change, she wore the dress uniform of the Sky Legion of Portugal, and a sword rode at her hip.
It was difficult not to take a step back. Harpies were legendary for their ferocity, even among others afflicted by the Change. During the New War, many of them had won entire victories in the air by themselves, and they apparently had a deadly temper. Still, I doubted that retreating from such a woman would guarantee safety, and a German Baron would need to at least appear to be brave at any rate. “I do not know what you mean, Lady…”
The harpy arched an eyebrow at me and smirked. “Lady? Not quite. My name is Arabelle Soares, Coronel of the Sky Legion.” She looked me up and down before returning her gaze to the dance floor. “I’m also as German as you are, unless I miss my guess. Are you a spy?”
A moment of panic struck through me, but I fought it down. Haughty words would probably not suit the occasion; perhaps a more befuddled tone would work. “I do not know what you mean, Coronel.”
Arabelle laughed, a curiously birdlike sound. “Of course you don’t. Never could understand why you cloak and dagger sorts could not give up when you were caught.” She shrugged. “You don’t seem to be a threat, so I won’t push you on it. Still, I don’t envy your situation there with the lady. Can’t be easy watching her flounce off.”
Still moderately off balance, I decided to abandon at least some of my pretension. “It is frustrating, I will admit.” I grimaced as Patricia and the wretched Capitaine twirled by on another circuit of the floor. “Still, I hope I have not…confused things too badly with her.”
She snorted. “I wouldn’t think so, not unless that wasn’t your first slip.” The harpy tapped the hilt of her blade, her eyes scanning the room. “She’ll forgive you, just as soon as she feels you’ve paid for it.”
I watched the Coronel for a moment longer. She was an obviously experienced warrior; the medals on her uniform told me as much, even if I hadn’t spotted the subtle scars along her eyebrow, jaw, and hairline. For a moment, I felt a swelling of empathy; she could not feel any more comfortable here than I or Patricia. Perhaps I could provide some distracting conversation at least. “Do you expect trouble, Coronel?”
If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.
“Trouble?” Arabelle blinked and looked back at me. “Not particularly, no. Why?”
“You do not seem at ease.” I gestured to the room. “I doubt there is anyone here who would challenge you.”
She watched me a moment longer and then looked away with a soft laugh. “Oh, if only you knew, little spy. If only you knew.”
I was about to ask her what she meant, but at that moment, there was some commotion at the far end of the hall. The song the band was playing faltered all of a sudden, with both the dance and the music falling to pieces as a growing murmur swept through the attendees. Sudden anxiety drove me to look for Devonshire, but the man was still standing where I had last seen him. His eyes met mine for a moment, full of hatred and some other emotion I could hardly identify, and then he looked away. My gaze followed his, and for a moment my breath caught.
The Emperor of France had arrived.
At first glance, there was nothing special about him. He was tall, though not the imposing giant that his most devoted partisans claimed. The thickening of the torso which afflicted his cousin had not caught him with the arrival of middle age, and his golden hair showed no signs of grey. Like his cousin, he wore a simple uniform, styled after a gendarme in the Grand Armee, yet with a dark waistcoat and breeches beneath the shining blue overcoat. A sword, surely unneeded, hung at his waist. Yet what captured my attention, more than anything else, were his eyes. Bright, calculating, and imperious, they seemed to catch the light as he glanced around the ballroom.
Then he stopped, and for one heart-stopping moment, I thought his gaze had come to rest on me. After the minutest of hesitations, the Emperor gave a slight nod and continued to look around the rest of the room. By the time the announcer had finished the extensive list of titles, the crowd was already stirring again with excitement and surprise.
I turned to find Coronel Soares with her hand on her sword. She did not look surprised, and her eyes were locked on the Emperor. It dawned on me that it likely had not been me who had caught the French conqueror’s attention. “You know him.”
“After a fashion.” She smiled slightly, a mere twist of the lips. “I did try to kill him once.”
“You—” I restrained myself and lowered my voice. “You were there? With Corporal Gedge?”
“I was.” She shrugged uncomfortably, but her eyes never left the Emperor. Her hand was wrapped in what could have been a casual manner around the hilt of her sword, but one look at her eyes told me it was anything but a coincidence. “In fact, I was the one who managed to make it onto the bridge. Gedge and the others bought me time while I crossed swords with him.”
Then she smiled. “Nearly got him too, but he’s a tough little snake. We’re lucky he’s the only one of his kind; wouldn’t want to think of how dangerous a group of them would be.”
Despite myself, I glanced at Devonshire again. “Yes, you’re right.” Then I frowned. “I wonder why he would allow you to be invited to the negotiations, then. I can understand why the British would want you close, but it seems like he would have forbidden your presence.”
Soares blinked again, and she broke off her study of the Emperor to look at me. “Actually, I am not here on behalf of the British. It was the French who invited me.”
“The French?” I looked around to make sure no one else had heard. All the same, I tried to keep my voice low. “You nearly killed their Emperor, and they invited you to a peace negotiation?”
She nodded grimly. “Not the first time, either. They get together more often than this, you know, to renegotiate things and maintain the Armistice. Every time, I get a letter to invite me.” Her smile looked all too much like a snarl. “It’s like he expects that one day I’ll decline out of fear, but I won’t give him the satisfaction. I’m no coward, whatever he thinks.”
Looking at her now, only a fool would have believed her capable of cowardice. The wings upon her back had unfurled slightly, and while they had not spread, she looked very capable of springing into the air and renewing her long-past duel with the Emperor. I looked back to Napoleon II, and found him once again watching her from across the room, even as a dignitary of some sort introduced themselves. There was a tension there, and I could feel it singing in the room even while the diplomats chattered.
We were quite overdue for a distraction, so I latched onto the only thing I could think of. “Fascinating. Is that the blade that wounded him, then?”
Soares didn’t answer for a moment. Then her wings relaxed, and she leaned back, her hand still locked on the hilt. “Indeed, it is. You have a good eye.”
I shook my head. “Everyone has heard the stories of how the boarding party cut their way through with Distillation-forged weapons.” Then I leaned closer. “Might I see it?”
She considered me for a moment and then unbuckled it to hold it out to me. “Don’t draw it, of course. The gendarmes have already told me I could keep it, but I doubt they want this blade bare in the presence of their leader again.”
“Of course.” I murmured as I looked over the sheathed weapon. It was a thinner blade than Damocles, with a longer handle and a duelist’s cupped guard for the wielder. The sheath was heavy with brass, likely to limit exposure to the Distillation inside, but even so I could still feel the pulse of the crystal inside it. “Is it double-edged?”
“It is.” There was pride in her voice, and she grinned like a proud mother as I turned it over to examine the carving along the sheath. “Sharpest thing I ever wielded, and I’ve never needed to take a whetstone to it since the day I picked it up. You’ll never see a finer blade.”
“Perhaps.” I allowed myself a smile as I passed it back to her. “I’ve recently acquired a similar blade of my own. Not quite as finely made, but it has its own appeal.” Then I hesitated. “How do you control it?”
Soares paused. “What do you mean?”
“I find the sword hard to resist at times, like it has a life all its own.” Trying with some difficulty to ignore how utterly insane it sounded, I forged ahead. “I only wondered how someone as experienced as yourself manages to master that feeling.”
The harpy looked at me, a slight frown creasing her features. “An interesting question, little spy.”
Before she could speak further, I heard a loud groan from behind me. I turned to find Patricia standing there, her hands on her hips. “Another soldier, Echtor? How many of them do you have to get to know in one day?” She turned slightly to her former dancing partner, the Capitaine, and sighed. “It’s like he missed his chance at heroism in the New War and wants to make up for it. Thank you for the dance, Capitaine.”
“Think nothing of it.” For once, Chatelain’s disagreeable expression was not directed at me. Instead, he was glaring at Soares, his distaste for her presence obvious. Soares, for her part, seemed amused by his dislike, and met his gaze without a hint of discomfort. Abruptly, he spun and turned away. “If you’ll excuse me.”
I watched him stride away, inwardly fuming at his continued lack of decorum, and then turned back to Soares. “Coronel Soares, this is my fiancée, Ms. Bingham of America. Ms. Bingham, this is Coronel Soares.”
“Charmed.” Soares bowed low, her clawed feet moving delicately across the floor. Patricia answered with a slightly awkward curtsey and then turned back to me.
“So, have you been enjoying yourself? The Emperor is here!”
“So he is, my dear.” I nodded to myself and looked back to find Devonshire glaring at us. He was clearly unhappy with my choice of companions, and it occurred to me he might worry that a warrior who had already wounded one dragon might very well be able to kill another. Then I turned back to the two women. “Coronel Soares, would you care to join us? I’m sure Amy would love to get to know you.”
Two hours later, I was forced to admit that it was not always a good thing to be proved right. Patricia and Arabelle had taken to one another like kindred spirits, and before long, I had to start giving my ‘fiancée’ pointed looks in order to remind her to keep her disguise. My attempts only had moderate effect, however, as the conversation inevitably turned to something that both women could use as common ground.
Patricia leaned back and gave Soares a surprised look. “I’m surprised you would even give the Themson a chance. That whole factory should be melted down and turned into barrels. None of their guns shoot straight.”
“Ah, but they do have considerable power.” Soares grinned and toyed with the drink she had been nursing for the past twenty minutes. “At the distances I typically find my opponents, that power can be far more valuable than accuracy. I would think your bodyguard would have informed you of such things.”
I barely resisted the urge to roll my eyes. The threadbare excuse that Patricia had given for her interest in firearms was an old bodyguard of the family who had spent pieces of his free time teaching an heiress the art of trick shooting. It was not the most distinguished or reliable cover, and I half suspected that Soares did not believe it any more than she did my supposed German lineage, but it was unlikely that I would ever have been able to convince her to leave off talking about one of her passions for the entire trip.
“Oh, Willkers did mention that, but he always said range before power. If you can hit a target before they see you, how good their gun is doesn’t really matter.”
“On a target range, certainly, but when you are in close quarters on an airship…”
I sighed and continued to watch the room around me. Fortunately, Soares’ intimidating profile made certain that our table was only approached by the occasional timid waiter; other couples appeared to be giving us a wide berth. That freed me from the concern that some listening ear would pick up on the bloodthirstiness underlying Patricia’s debate and allowed me to assume the attitude of a man bored with more feminine subjects.
My attention wandered around the room as I searched for people displaying a bit too much interest in us, or people who were congregating around Devonshire. I still did not know the specifics of his plans, but I had no doubt that there would be multiple layers. I had been caught too many times by his machinations to treat him with any sort of casual contempt, and I wanted to be sure to catch hold of his attempts to disrupt the peace talks before they were on the edge of fruition.
Unfortunately, the man seemed preternaturally aware of my observation, and it did not concern him. Devonshire’s main occupation during the ball was to introduce the various dignitaries to Hermiter, and make some idle chitchat. He did not make rounds, however; most of the people who talked with him approached him, not the other way around.
The one exception appeared to be Capitaine Chatelain. The Frenchman had been sitting at a table when a waiter had passed him a message. Mere moments later, the Capitaine and the crime lord were in close conversation, with the Capitaine occasionally giving an angry nod of agreement with whatever Devonshire was saying. At least that confirmed who had been feeding disagreeable rumors to the Frenchman, though it was still such an obvious ploy that it irritated me. I did not expect the officer to be anything but a distraction; he would never endanger his Emperor by plotting with Devonshire, though given who now shared my table, he wasn’t likely to trust me either.
Aside from that, I tried to keep tabs on the various gendarmes and other officers patrolling the room. If I knew what kinds of patterns they kept, I would be able to tell easily if one of them had been bribed or replaced, which was a possible vector for Devonshire to sneak his compatriots aboard, they would likely not be quite in lock-step with the others. So far, none of them appeared to be doing anything aside from performing the usual duties of bored sentries at a gala, which was both reassuring and disappointing. I was sure that Devonshire would rely on at least one cat’s paw aboard the embassy, and if it was not a soldier, it must be one of the other servants.
My gaze occasionally wandered to where the Emperor had taken up his seat. The man was singularly intimidating, with a regal bearing tempered by a wild kind of charisma that I had not quite expected. Most stories of the man had painted him as a kind of ogre, and my father’s opinion had been decidedly biased towards the view that he was as much a tyrant as the first Napoleon.
Seeing him in the flesh, however, made a mockery of those portrayals. Despite the dignity of his initial entrance, he appeared more than willing to rub elbows with those who could not possibly be of his station. No one asked him to dance, and he did not approach anyone either; rumor had it he was a confirmed bachelor after some romantic entanglement in his youth, one that had turned his heart cold. Yet if he did not twirl about the dance floor, he still gathered people around his table. I watched him speak with ambassador after ambassador, apparently engaging them in a story or telling some kind of joke. More than one attendee stepped away from his table with a face beaming with awe or flush from laughter, and for a moment, I wondered if he would even receive an Englishman or a German prince in such a fashion.
Then, on occasion, his eyes would wander back to our table. Each time, his face would grow stiff, and before he would turn back to his conversation, it was as if a mask had slipped. I thought I saw a curious isolation there, or was it a nameless kind of fear? Whatever emotion lurked there, I quickly became convinced that the Emperor was a skilled actor. We could not trust that the emotions and friendship he extended to those around him were genuine, any more than the comradery that Devonshire had once extended to me. I had been taken in by such a display once; I would not be so foolish as to let myself be deceived again.
About halfway through Patricia’s vivid description of her favorite rifle, I noticed some sort of commotion taking place near the entrance to the ballroom. It was over before long, but I caught sight of Hermiter stepping away and looking quite satisfied with herself. My suspicions were suitably raised, of course, when the announcer stood up to call attention to himself again.
When the band had wound down their current number, the functionary spoke into the sound projection system set to amplify his words. “In honor of our Emperor, and in celebration of our continuing peace, we will now enjoy some entertainment.” He beamed for a second as polite applause spread through his audience. “Our local gendarmes will be more than happy to delight us with an exhibition of their skill, demonstrated by taking to the skies and testing themselves against one another. Those interested in viewing such a spectacle should collect on the aft viewing platform.”
As the announcer stepped away from his device, I turned back to Soares. “They are going to put on some sort of tournament?”
An expression of mild distaste had grown on the harpy’s face. “Indeed. I assume they are going to perform some air jousting.” After glancing at me and Patricia, she smirked. “It is a harmless game, really, compared to real aerial combat, but I am told it is very popular in the courtiers around the Emperor.”
My mind raced. The jousts would be an ideal way to entice the Emperor into a compromising position, then. He would be exposed on the viewing platform, and assassins might be able to find their mark when they couldn’t in a crowded ballroom. Devonshire might even try to arrange for an ‘accident’ to claim the Emperor, if the machines involved were dangerous enough.
As if to confirm my suspicions, Devonshire smiled at me and started moving towards the aft viewing platform. Hermiter joined him, still grinning herself, and I stood before I realized I had made my decision. “I do not believe I have ever seen this ‘air jousting’ before. Perhaps it would merit some attention.”
Patricia caught the tone in my voice and she glanced to where Devonshire was now retreating. She nodded. “I’d love to see it too, my dear.” Then she looked at Soares. “Would you care to join us, Coronel? You may not have an appreciation for the finer things in life, but maybe you would enjoy watching a few Frenchmen get knocked off their mounts.”
Soares twittered softly, in obvious amusement. “That’s a sight I’ve already had plenty of opportunity to see, Ms. Bingham.” She gave Patricia a wry grin. “And don’t think that I’ve surrendered to your brutish assumptions about weaponry. We are only taking a truce.”
Patricia laughed as well and waved goodbye to her. Then she settled herself back on my arm as we moved towards the viewing platform. She glanced up at me once. “I haven’t forgotten about the dance, by the way.”
I winced despite myself. Her face might have been quite pleasant, but her voice carried a kind of quiet threat that I definitely did not enjoy hearing. “My apologies, Ms. Bingham. I was in error. It won’t happen again.”
She snorted to herself and subtly elbowed me in the ribs. “It will, but I might not let you off so easy next time. Remember it.”
Rubbing my side—quite cleverly making it look as if I was giving her arm an affectionate pat—I smiled at her. “I will. After all, it was all quite…memorable.”
The remark convinced her to abandon some of her mask of sweetness. Her glare could have started fires. “I haven’t exactly spent a whole lot of time prancing around rooms lately. Did you really expect anything different?”
I chuckled softly to myself. “No, but now the other gentlemen won’t dare ask you to dance for fear of you treading on their fancy boots.” She gathered herself for the kind of blistering avalanche of insults that no heiress could have managed, and I patted her arm genuinely this time. “Which means I’ll keep you all to myself. A wise strategy, I would say, for a man hiding his treasure in plain sight.”
“For a general aiming to get himself shot.” Her voice was an intriguing blend of frustration and bashfulness. I noted a hint of a blush had crept into her cheeks. “I may not dance, but I can shoot, you know.”
“I remember, my dear.” Her blush deepened, and I tried to hide a grin. It was interesting to find that as long as punches weren’t involved, I might be able to score the occasional point off of her in our conversational duels now. Though, to be honest, the way she held my arm and leaned close to me might have given me a bit more boldness than I would otherwise have entertained.