Page 9 of A Chill in the Flame
“There have been so many signs to leave, Firi. This place is practically covered in omens telling us not to be here.” She might have gone on speaking had the couple in front of them not stopped just shy of the dance floor. The masked woman hiked up her skirt and bent at the waist to reveal that she was wearing nothing beneath. The woman’s hair was an unnatural shade of red, with lips to match. Her silver mask covered a bit more of her face than several of the other partygoers, perhaps to protect the anonymity of someone who liked a particular brand of wanton exhibitionism in her sex life. The man untied his britches and spit into his palm before lubricating his exposed manhood and sliding into her. The woman’s groan of shock and pleasure joined the chorus of moans, of the wet suctions and dribbles of intercourse, of the thrusts and slaps of flesh.
“I’ll grant you that this is not meant to be a party attended by family members.” Ophir grimaced.
“Because this would be a romantic date night for a couple?” Caris’s question was rife with incredulity.
Ophir lifted one shoulder. “If the couple was interesting…”
“It’s hard to believe we were raised by the same parents,” Caris said as she lifted a hand to shield her eyes. “Hurry up and find me a drink so I can meet your stupid quota and leave.”
“That’s the spirit.” Ophir grinned. “Forbidden things always taste better with alcohol.”
“Wait! Are you going to leave me?” Caris demanded.
“Just to get drinks. Plus, I won’t leave you alone. Someone wants to talk to you! Be friendly.” She gestured to a tall, fae gentleman in a reflective black mask of polished metal that obscured the top half of his face as well as his hair, ending in the pointed ears of an onyx wolf. He brushed past the attendants and the sweaty bodies of partygoers as his sights remained fixed on the sisters.
“Firi!” Caris said her sister’s name with the angry squeak of a frightened mouse. “You are not going to leave me alone with a stranger. I don’t want a drink anymore. Stay here.”
“Play it cool. He doesn’t know who we are,” she assured her sister. “We’re just two pretty girls at a party. Ask him to fetch us a few flutes of sparkling white wine.”
The man crossed the remaining space between them. His teeth glinted in the light with a sinful delight as he reached for Caris. He swept up her hand and planted a kiss on her fingers. Even through his mask, it was clear he was fae. His large irises glistened in shades of a brown so rich it was nearly crimson. “My, what a lovely flower you are. It’s rare I see such innocence in a home like this.” Rather than dropping her hand entirely, he replaced the space of his palm with a glass of champagne. “Come, won’t you have a drink with me?”
Caris took an uncomfortable step backward before bumping into the bare chest of a bystander. She gestured her apology, and Ophir could practically see the years of conditioned politeness not to scream and run churning through her sister. The bodies of masked guests pushed into her, preventing any clean escape as they shuffled in the space beyond.
“I’m afraid we must be going,” Caris said.
The man tsked and used a swooping gesture to plant his hand on her lower back, guiding Caris deeper into the party, leaving Ophir to stand on the edge of the dance floor alone. Something changed in her the moment she saw the strange man touching her sister. She’d wanted him to fetch them drinks, no more. She moved to follow them, but the spaces between bodies closed, creating a wall between Ophir and the disappearing shape of her sister’s pink dress.
She struggled to find a gap between partygoers to lock eyes with her sister. Though obscured through the pearly veil, Caris’s energy reverberated one word:no.
Ophir fought to keep up with them, but the strange man only had eyes for Caris. With a hop and a light shove, she wound between partygoers and wrapped her fingers around the man’s forearm. Ophir cleared her throat. “I’m sorry, but she isn’t interested—”
He cut her off with curt, firm authority. “It’s rude to refuse a drink with the host, my lady. Has no one told you that?”
This was his party.
“You’re Lord Berinth,” Ophir said through the lump in her throat.
“Guilty as charged, my lady, though I do suggest you keep that gem to yourself.” He tapped his mask. “The point of a masquerade is for us to enjoy life’s pleasures without the consequences of identity.” He lifted his champagne glass to his lips in a toast, and Caris politely sipped at the flute he had pressed into her hand, making a bitter face as she drank the liquid. Perhaps this wasn’t a high-quality champagne. Bernith motioned to a lithe man in a black jaguar mask as he approached. “Aemon, there you are. Please meet the two most beautiful guests of the evening. Get this charming young lady a drink while I chat with the lovely damsel, would you?”
Aemon took Ophir by the arm before she could protest. He guided her between the bodies of the partygoers, weaving through the crowd toward the polished bar where the drinks were being served. She attempted to shoot an apologetic lookCaris’s way but couldn’t see her sister amidst the throng.
“Excuse me,” Ophir said to the man, “but I really don’t want to be apart from my sister.”
“Have a drink,” he replied dismissively.
The stranger called Aemon quickly snatched a flute from a tray and pressed it into her hand with spectacular grace. Between his posture and his thin, hard muscles, the point of his canines and feline ears of his mask, she couldn’t help but feel as though the man might shape-shift into a predatory jungle cat at any moment. Ophir accepted a glass of the bubbly champagne and began sipping at it just to give herself something to do with her hands as she scanned the packed room for signs of pink. Unfortunately, the nervous energy meant she was consuming the liquor rather quickly. He was telling her all about his hunting hounds and the exciting blood sport of foxing when she realized she could no longer see Caris.
“Thanks for the drink, but—”
“Sisters, you say?” He flashed a too-white smile. “How daring your proclivities must be to attend this soirée with a sibling.”
She nearly gagged. “That’s a horrifying thing to say. She’s family. We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into.”
“Suit yourself,” he said with a shrug. Aemon snatched another flute from atop a tray as a servant passed by and switched it out for the empty one in her hands. “Beautiful people shouldn’t be restrained by such conventions.”
Ophir drank from the flute before replying, “Beauty has no correlation to morality.”
The host gestured as if to indicate that he didn’t believe her, but that, as he seemed to count himself among the beautiful, he would not be taking her input to heart.
