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I looked.

I could see the tips of them, just past his lower lip. Long and pale and delicate as a cat’s, curved a little, and gleaming faintly in the red glow. They were beautiful, in a horrible sort of way. I should’ve been terrified. I want that on the record.

“They came down on their own,” he said, low and ashamed. “I am sorry. It happens when I am—when I feel—”

“Show me.”

He whipped his head around. “ What? “

“Show me. I’ve never seen them up close.” I couldn’t believe I was saying it. “I watched you bite Tamsin. From the bushes. I want to see them when I’m not, you know, hiding behind a crate having a panic attack.”

“That is not a request I get.”

“It’s a request you’re getting.”

For a moment I thought he’d refuse. He looked at me as if I’d asked him to hand me his own heart. Then, slowly, as if to a child with a stray dog, he turned toward me, and lifted his lip.

There were two of them, each about as long as my thumbnail and as fine as needles.

“Can I—”

“Yes.”

I put out one finger. I touched the very tip of the left one.

He made a sound like a man being struck.

His whole body flinched, and his eyes shut, and a wave of something went through him that I felt in my own hand. It was sharp and very small and infinitely tender, and I realized, with a lurch, that I was touching the most private part of him. That no one had done that in a thousand years. That he’d let me.

“Sorry,” I whispered.

“Do not be.”

“Does it hurt?”

“No.” He opened his eyes. They were wet. Or the ice was melting on his lashes. “It is very much the opposite.”

I took my hand away. We stood there looking at each other. The kiss had left the ice around us feeling warmer, and the whole arena seemed to be leaning in, listening.

“So,” said Maksim, with the ghost of that dry humor. “The results of your experiment.”

“Inconclusive.”

“Inconclusive.”

“I’m gonna need to run it again.”

His mouth twitched. “I will make myself available.”

“I felt something,” I said. It came out abrupt. “I’m not saying what. I’m not saying it means what you think. But it wasn’t nothing. It was the opposite of nothing. It was so much not-nothing that I don’t have the word.”

“You do not have to name it.”

“I’m not gay.”

“Very well.”

“I’m not saying it as a joke. I mean it. I’ve never been attracted to a guy in my life.” I stared at his mouth. “Just that one. Apparently.”