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“What’s the point? Once something is done it’s done, and I find my time is far better spent altering the course of future events than it is worrying about those that have already passed.”
“And how will you be altering the course of future events tonight?”
“By proving that the Rival Theater wasn’t a fluke and that this”—she flicked the black diamond dangling from her ear—“is not a parlor trick.”
“About that—Lady Meraland will settle down when she discovers she can’t rile you.”
She shot him a withering look. “Everyone is so concerned about my fragile feelings where that social blossom is concerned. So let me say first that nothing I do tonight is because that petty creature will no doubt insist on calling me Black Diamond until she’s on her death bed. Second, my dear prince, it appears that, despite rumored manifold experience, you truly don’t understand women.”
He snorted. “I understand you.”
“I hardly count. Now, what can you tell me about Countess Duval that I don’t already know?”
“You know she owns most of The Musicale House?”
“So I’ve been told. I’ve also been told I’m being set up for dramatic failure, since I’ve revived the popularity of the Rival Theater.”
“You don’t seem worried, on that count. You didn’t even bring your guitar.”
As if she could have carried a guitar on horseback. Certainly not with her current, oversized case for it. Besides: “Everyone knows the guitar is my preferred instrument after the Rival and your nameday celebration. Whatever Duval has contrived for tonight, she’ll have been sure to make that affinity irrelevant.”
“And what are you going to do?”
“Make her irrelevant.” At least in terms of the woman being any future threat. It was just a shame she was going to have to do it by making the woman’s establishment more popular than ever.
The Musicale House was tucked into the artsy section of the main strip of Veralna Hightown, the buildings all crammed in like trees grown too close together. But where trees would intertwine and grow with one another, would take interesting shapes to make the best of what was available to them, the buildings simply pressed against one another, too close and without their neighbor’s consent, mirroring the actions of the humans that had created them.
Like humans, the buildings dressed up their flaws. The Musicale House’s outer walls were a flawless white, the doors arched and imposing, the walls adorned with musical notes and instruments painted by some now-forgotten hand deemed inconsequential to the final product. She heard absolute silence on the other side of those doors, a sure sign the establishment’s owners had paid for soundproofing spells both to ensure the privacy of their guests, and to ensure that none who had not paid the entrance fee in money and prestige could partake of even the slightest note of what went on inside.
It made her teeth clench, this world of exclusivity and excess, and yet…she needed it. This was where power lay. Financial, hierarchical, magical—it all rested within the bounds of this glittering facade, and she could not do without it. She would not be made to do without it. She understood too well what it was to be powerless, to be subject to this world. Trailing along its outskirts was already an infinite improvement, but she did not intend to trail for long.
Someday—somehow—she would become untouchable. And once she was, she would keep that promise of vengeance she’d made to herself when she’d still been a starved, nameless thing, enduring for a dream of something better.
They dismounted, and in retrospect it was a good thing Numair had come after all, because when a woman came up to take the reins of the horses, Clare didn’t think she would have been able to hand Kialla’s over had Numair not been comfortable doing so. He gently rubbed Kialla’s forehead, murmuring an admonishment to, “Behave, little miss,” that was followed by a spark of soft magic. Kialla tossed her head and allowed herself to be led off, while Clare watched her go with clenched fists and worry knotting in her stomach.
“She’ll be fine,” Numair said, his words as gentle as the touch he’d given the horse. “I promise.”
She nodded, unbuttoning her coat. Well, it was technically his coat, but she had no intention of reminding him of the fact. He probably had a dozen of them and wouldn’t notice this one was missing. It was too fine to return, with its clever spellwork for repelling the elements, and if it fit her more loosely than it did him, it yet fit her well enough.
She finished with the buttons and Numair’s gaze traveled over her newly revealed outfit, taking in Chalen’s careful work. Neutrally, he asked, “What are you wearing?”
She gave him a smile of pure rapture and answered, “Pants.”
They were nothing like the fitted breeches—riding or otherwise—that were not considered elegant enough for female formal wear. These came up high, to the indent of her waist. Across her abdomen the material was heavy and elaborately embroidered—so much so that Chalen had either taken it from a piece already done, or there truly was something of magic in their sewing—giving it the same look as the corseted waist of a dress. While corsets themselves had, thank Ferrian, fallen out of favor, the look of them had not.
This replicated the fashionable aspects without physically constraining her movement. It dipped into a slight V between her hips, and here the heavy fabric gave way to one light and delicate, flowing loose almost like skirts but with just enough form to accentuate, before tapering into fitted cuffs at the ankles.
“And a shirt,” she added, as if the question he’d asked was meant to be answered in the most literal of terms. Where the pants were the same red as Battle Armor, the shirt—carefully tucked into the waistband of the pants, that it might billow out above like something vaguely pirate-like, were it not for the fine material and elegant embellishments—was black, as were her satin slippers.
“I’m wearing pants and a shirt. You’re wearing something else entirely.” He shook his head, and he sounded half-annoyed when he said, “You look like a damn storybook fantasy. Chalen isn’t going to stop sewing for the next decade. You’ve likely robbed me of my tailor.”
“I doubt that. They seem to have a special fondness for you.”
“They liked my business, certainly, but I’d wager that’s as far as it goes. Now they’ve plenty other business to keep them going, I imagine I’ll fall by the wayside.”
“Everyone is not destined to think of you the way the court does,” she said softly. Perhaps Chalen’s like of Numair was an indulgent one—a kind that overlooked the faults he so heavily displayed and reinforced for the benefit of his public appearance—but that didn’t mean they didn’t like him. It didn’t mean they weren’t grateful to him.
But it was easy enough to see, by the twist of Numair’s lips and the set of his shoulders, that trying to convince him of it would get her nowhere. Maybe it was easier for him, at this stage, to think that no one ever could truly like him.
