Winterly (Dark Creatures Book 1), стр. 75

“And how do you interpret that particular verse?” She had to know. His smile had implied some dark enjoyment.

“A rose,” he said, “is an earthly thing, beautiful and fragile. The worm signifies death or decay, does it not? Or perhaps a wyrm—a serpent or dragon.” He stroked his pale chin, and in his smile a hint of a dreaded fang; a trick of the light? “The wyrm has secretly corrupted the purity of this unwitting rose, his very own Eve. Perhaps he has stolen every night into her garden, her flower bed, offering a fruitful joy as red as the lushest apple. Yet by morning her joy is tainted when she beholds that crimson warmth of flesh, of lost virtue, as nothing more than her own ignominy writ in blood atop the ivory counterpane.” He raised a finger gently to Emma’s cheek and feathered it down her jaw and neck. “But what is corruption to some is liberty to others.”

Emma’s sinews shifted beneath his finger as she swallowed. “That divergence of creed,” she said, “is what differentiates the wyrm from the man, I think.”

“Perhaps.”

“Where is my sister?” Emma asked, looking promptly away to scan the sea of masked faces, capes, and dark decadence, lest she consider the tapered length of the canines she’d glimpsed. It was very shocking behavior in him to have touched her so familiarly and so publicly.

“Over there,” he replied, gesturing with a single nod to a golden-haired woman in sapphire finery.

Her sister’s mask resembled an exotic bird with iridescent blue plumage. The mask could not, however, disguise Milli’s rapturous smile as she was swept along with the rest of the waltzing horde by a stately man beneath the alarming vizard of some sylvan god with branch-like antlers. Valko, Emma wagered. The couple soon vanished into the throng. If Mr. Black and Mr. Morris were in attendance (and they very likely were), she had no way of recognizing them in the crush of masks and capes.

Next came the familiar emerald skirts of Winterly’s sister, her eyes obscured behind a piece of gold gauze. Victoria glided past in the arms of a dark giant in a mask even more horrific than Winterly’s—a snarling black wolf. Though his hair shone with Macassar oil, it lay in an untamed mane about his shoulders.

Winterly remarked the direction of Emma’s wide gaze. “You do not approve of my brother’s costume?”

“Your brother?” She glanced up at Winterly.

“Gabriel.”

“Oh!” A mask to suit the disposition of the man beneath it. She’d had no idea of their being brothers, though. But that was unsurprising, for they both possessed that same sublime animal beauty. “Different fathers?”

“No,” said he with warmth. The members of his menage were clearly an unwelcome topic just now. “Come, let’s not stand about in this idle manner.” He pulled her into his arms without warning and dexterously waltzed her into the melee.

Though she was half terrified of making a cake of herself and crushing his feet in the process, she was helpless to staunch the full-throated laughter that escaped her as he skillfully maneuvered her over the polished flags. “I ought to warn you that I have never waltzed before, and I cannot promise I shan’t flatten your toes abominably!”

“My dear Miss Rose,” he bent his head to murmur, “I believe you’re hoaxing me. You dance as though you were born to it.” If that was so it only bespoke his own prowess.

He was holding her so closely that it didn’t matter what her two left feet were doing, for they hardly touched the ground. Eyes locked and lips curled, they whirled about the room in gliding rotations. Scandalously, they danced through one dreamy waltz into another. As the tempo of the fourth set took on a lusty note, she felt herself flying about the underworld as the room spun wildly around her. Only Winterly remained in focus.

The wine, the music, and the intoxicating creature in whose gaze she was drowning was so overmastering that she felt lightheaded. Colors flashed past her, indistinct and glaring. Leering masks and sighing candlelight interfused into blurring pageantry so that her fingers tightened in her partner’s hand, lest she floated away entirely.

Winterly must have sensed she needed a moment to catch her breath, for he waltzed her to the fringe of dancers. With one last turn under his arm and one final twirl of her skirts, their dancing concluded beside a waiting footman. The servant was holding a salver of beautiful goblets.

Parched, she reached for a golden goblet. But her wrist was arrested by a brisk grip. Bemusement instantly replaced her laughter as Winterly drew her hand from the salver and peremptorily dismissed his impassive footman with a command to bring a Madeira for the lady instead.

“That wine is no good for you,” was all he answered to her questioning gaze.

“Provoking man!” she retorted, her hackles rising at his impertinence. “I believe I alone ought to be the judge of what is good for me.” He was neither her husband nor her father.

“Perhaps, but in this instance you must trust my judgement.” His hard-featured stare brooked no remonstrance.

She might have argued the point further had not her eyes found themselves latched to a nearby man, dressed outrageously in woman’s garb. His face was powdered and his lips were smeared in lurid rouge. He plucked a similar goblet from another footman’s salver and took a deep draft of whatever was contained within. With a slight narrowing of her eyes, she watched the androgynous stranger lick his lips obscenely before he kissed his hand to her and trotted off with a suggestive wink. She then shifted her gaze back to Lord Winterly. “Just what sort of libation am I being denied?”

“A vintage you would not care for,” was all he replied.

“What if I insist on taking a sample?” She only posed the question to test his answer, for the viscosity of the red substance that had stained the man’s lips a moment before he’d