Lucie breathed … and waited … and wondered if perhaps she shouldsaysomething to signal that the demonstration was complete.
And then the garden erupted into applause. It rose up from every table, and beneath it Lucie heard exclamations, laughter, heard someone saying “Quitemarvelous!” in a voice of pure, unguarded wonder, and her whole body went light.
She was floating. She was quite certain her feet were still on the ground, but the rest of her had gone weightless, lifted by the applause and the warmth and the golden light of her own making, and by the fact that she had done it. She haddoneit. Nothing had gone wrong, and the High Lady was smiling—the High Lady wassmiling—and her mother’s face?—
Lucie found her mother, and Mrs Fields had both hands pressed to her mouth. Above them her eyes were bright, and she was not trying to hide it. She was simply looking at her daughter with her heart in her face.
Lucie dropped into a small curtsy—trying and utterly failing to contain the smile that was stretchingfarbeyond what was considered dignified—and then she turned. She walked calmly across the grass and across the courtyard, back through the kitchen door, out of sight of the garden, and the moment she was through?—
She squealed.
And flung herself at Kazrian.
Up onto her toes, both arms thrown around his neck, the whole of her hurled against him in a tight embrace. “I did it!” she said into his shoulder. “I did it, I did it, I actually did it!”
For one long, frozen moment he did not move at all. And in that moment, some small and belated portion of Lucie’s mind caught up with the rest of her and registered, with dawning horror, precisely what she had done. What in all the stars—she hadthrownherself at him, bodily, arms and all?—
But before she could pull back, before mortification could complete its work, his arms came up around her. Enfolding her, drawing her closer, his hands spreading warm across her back, and it was so unspeakably right, the way she fit against him, the way her cheek found the place beneath his jaw as though it had been shaped to rest there, that she could not for the life of her bring herself to pull away.
“Of course you did,” he murmured. “I never doubted it for a moment.”
She closed her eyes. She did not know how long they stood there—seconds, perhaps, or a small eternity—but her breath slowed against him, and she was aware of nothing except the warmth of him and the steady rise and fall of his chest, and she thought, with a clarity that had no business being so calm:If the world would be so kind as to disappear entirely, I should like to stay exactly here.
“Lucie, that was absolutely—oh!”
They rapidly disentangled from one another and stepped apart. Rosavyn stood just inside the doorway, one hand still on the frame, having clearly swept in on a wave of triumph and run straight into the sight of the two of them. Her mouth hung open on the abandoned end of her sentence.
And Lucie’s mind emptied of everything except a single, dawning horror. How could she have been sofoolish? Embracing him—allowing him to wrap his arms around her—and now someone hadseenthem?—
“Well,” Rosavyn said loudly. “I was going to say that the demonstration was a triumph. I find I still mean it. I shall simply mean it from over here.” She took an exaggerated step backward, over the threshold, and pointed vaguely behind herself. “Whilst attending to a great many extremely urgent matters that require my immediate attention in the garden.”
“Rosavyn—” Lucie began, her thoughts scrambling wildly through every possible explanation, every plausible account of what Rosavyn hadjust witnessed that might render it something other than exactly what it was.
“There are guests,” Rosavyn announced, already retreating, “who are simply desperate to know the difference between the elderflower meringue and the lavender, and since I went to the great effort of memorizing it all this morning, I am the perfect person to answer their questions.”
Then she spun around and was gone.
No no no no?—
“Lucie, I am so sorry. But?—”
“What if she?—”
“No, it is fine,” Kazrian said. “Do not be concerned about her seeing. She was—well … already aware.”
Lucie’s gaze swung back to Kazrian. “Aware of what?”
“Aware of …” His eyes moved over her face, and the look in them was so open, so utterly unguarded. His mouth curved into a quiet, helpless sort of smile. “How I feel about you. How I have always felt about you.”
“She …” Lucie blinked. “What?”
“Lucie?” Rosavyn’s voice again, from just beyond the doorway, and then Rosavyn herself, stepping back through it and very obviouslynotlooking at either Lucie or Kazrian.“Yes, apologies, it is me again. Grandmother would like you outside among the guests. They have already begun perusing the confections on display and she wishes you to be there to receive their questions and their compliments, of which I gather there are a considerable number already.”
“Right, yes,” Lucie said, and it sounded more like a breath than actual words.
“She also said the pixies will see to arranging the individual items from the showpiece onto plates to be served shortly.” Rosavyn paused, still looking at a point somewhere on the ceiling rather than at either of them. “Kazrian, you are needed as well. The framework and everything still attached to it must be moved back inside.”
“Ah, yes, of course.” He moved past Lucie, casting a look of apology back over his shoulder as he went. Then he was through the door and gone.
