Chapter Fifteen
FIFTEEN
Performing onstage was amazing.
Eleonore beamed as she accepted a glass of champagne from one of her new fans.
“That was some crazy shit,” the dryad said. “I think the old man in front of me nearly fainted.” She looked to be in her early twenties, with bark-brown skin and hair. Eleonore wouldn’t have necessarily known she was a dryad if she hadn’t popped out of the wood-paneled wall, nearly scaring Eleonore into an inadvertent stabbing. Thankfully she’d restrained herself, since murdering one of her fans would have been unfortunate.
“Thank you,” Eleonore said, bowing her head. “I wasn’t sure it would be experimental enough.”
Her research had emphasized that the point of experimental theatre was to push the boundaries of what was comfortable and acceptable in public. To create a space so far from the ordinary, one could explore both the profane and the sacred, free of traditional limits. But since Eleonore wasn’t using real blood, actively harming herself or anyone else, or engaging in public acts of sex or defecation, she’d feared she hadn’t brought enough of the profane into her performance.
“Oh, believe me, it’s going to be the talk of the town.” The dryad raised a hand. Eleonore hesitantly raised her own, mirroring it as she’d seen Tarzan do in an animated movie earlier that week. The woman smacked their palms together, making Eleonore jolt with surprise. “Please tell me you’re performing again,” the dryad said.
That was what the theatre critic, Cornelius Crabapple, had requested, too. “I don’t know,” Eleonore said, looking toward Ben. “That’s up to the proprietor.”
She hoped he’d let her perform again, though.
She’d been painfully aware of Ben’s presence all night, watching him from behind the curtain. He was obviously not comfortable in large social settings, choosing to linger near the walls, but he’d been beaming with pride.
Most of the time, anyway. Immediately after her performance, he’d looked so distressed she’d had a terrible fear she had disappointed him.
Thankfully, he was now laughing with his sister and their friends, so apparently all was well.
“I want to bring my stepmom next time,” the dryad said, drawing Eleonore’s attention again.
“Do you think she’ll like it?” Eleonore asked. She sipped the champagne, enjoying the play of bubbles over her tongue.
“Not in the least.” The woman grinned. “But I’ll have a hell of a good time.”
Another well-wisher approached. Eleonore wasn’t practiced with casual conversation after so many years, but it was surprisingly easy to fall back into the rhythm of it. People congratulated her; she thanked them. Sometimes they had questions about the performance, the costume, or the fake blood recipe, which she’d been happy to share. The Glimmer Falls High School students Ben had connected her with for lighting and sound—Amy and Caitlin—had been enormously helpful on all accounts. They’d created this batch of fake blood and taught her how to make her own from common household ingredients.
She glanced toward Ben again, nibbling her lower lip. What had he thought about the performance? Had it been interesting and significant enough to give a boost to Gigi’s campaign?
He met her eyes across the room, and Eleonore’s heart sped up. She pressed her fingers to the throbbing pulse in her neck, wondering at the visceral response to nothing but a look. Then Ben started making his way toward her through the crowd, and her stomach dipped in a pleasant yet alarming way.
The werewolf looked especially handsome tonight in gray slacks and a forest-green dress shirt with a silver tie. His thick hair had been brushed and styled by Themmie earlier, and it looked smooth and shiny under the light. Her fingertips itched as she wondered what the strands would feel like gripped in her fists. His cologne wafted toward her as he approached, and she inhaled deeply, seeking the scent of his skin and blood beneath.
Stars, he smelled edible. Her fangs lengthened at the temptation.
Ben waited for a gap between fans. “Hey,” he said when he was finally able to step close.
“Hey,” she replied, tipping her head back to look up at him. She suddenly felt too warm, and anxiety skittered up her spine to burrow into her brain. What if he’d hated the show? What if it hadn’t been daring or original enough?
What if she didn’t smell as good to him as he smelled to her?
He cleared his throat, then pulled his hand from behind his back to reveal a small pot filled with red-and-yellow pansies. “For you,” he said.
Eleonore took the pot. The petals trembled, and she realized she was shaking slightly. “Thank you, but why? You already gave me flowers once.”
His mouth quirked up. “Flowers aren’t a once-in-a-lifetime gift, Eleonore. People give them to each other frequently to say thank you or sorry or congratulations or just because they’re thinking about someone.”
“Oh.” Her face felt even more flushed. “But I don’t have any for you.”
“I wasn’t the one performing,” he said, shrugging. “Besides, men don’t usually get flowers.”
She frowned. “That doesn’t seem fair. Why shouldn’t men deserve flowers as well?” In fact, she felt bad for neglecting this apparent tradition. It was the opening night of his café—he deserved something pretty to congratulate him.
“I agree,” he said. “Maybe that can be your next campaign after revitalizing the Glimmer Falls theatre scene. Equal access to floral arrangements.” He had such a nice smile, the kind that crinkled the skin beside his eyes and creased his cheeks. His face was lived-in, which she liked. It made her want to know the story behind each small line. Made her want to deepen those lines, too, knowing she was the cause of his smiles.
She rubbed her chest over her pounding heart. Her mortal, succubus heart, which was beating for a new possibility—one she wasn’t sure she could fully face yet.
“Was it truly okay?” Eleonore asked quietly. “The performance?” It had been a long time since she’d craved someone’s approval, but she craved his.
Ben bit his lip. He had normal canines, not sharp like hers, but his teeth were nice and mostly straight except for a few charmingly snaggled ones she liked the look of. “It was very original,” he said.
Her shoulders relaxed. “Thank goodness. I was worried it wouldn’t be groundbreaking enough.”
At that, Ben chuckled. “Ah, no, it was plenty groundbreaking,” he said. “Glimmer Falls is full of oddities, but I can safely say no one has done precisely that before.”
“And you liked it?” she pressed. The audience clearly had—or at least those who hadn’t seemed to enjoy it had been appropriately dazed and contemplative afterward—but his opinion meant the most.
Why that should be, she didn’t care to analyze at the moment. As a habit she tried not to ruminate on her emotions.
“It was amazing,” Ben said. “Very weird and kind of scary, but that’s what you were going for, right?”
Amazing , he’d said. Pride swelled in her breast. “I wanted to challenge the audience’s perception of beauty, appearances, death, and truth,” she explained, echoing her artist’s statement. “Juxtaposing music and glitter with the bloody reality of killing or being killed reminds us that life is fleeting, and that there’s something raw and ugly underneath even the prettiest of surfaces.”
“Oh,” Ben said, smile dimming. He nudged his glasses up his nose, and light bounced off the metal frame in a starry flash. “You really think everything is ugly underneath?”
She shrugged. “It doesn’t have to be in a bad way. Vampires think blood is beautiful, after all, even when it’s pooled beneath a corpse.”
Ben’s eye twitched at that. He wasn’t used to seeing things from the darker perspective she’d been raised with. The medieval era hadn’t been a gentle one, and she’d been raised in a band of warriors before she’d had to put those lessons into practice as an ensorcelled assassin.
Eleonore wanted him to understand, though, so she cast about for better words to explain why she’d chosen this message and why it wasn’t as dismal as it sounded. “It’s more that…Most people end up in the ground anyway. Pretending otherwise doesn’t change that, and there’s freedom in knowing that and fighting anyway. Choosing to face the truth beneath life, no matter how bloody or strange, is always better than fooling yourself into thinking the sparkles on the surface are what’s real.”
It was something she’d thought about often over the years, not only as someone who had been raised to face the dark and thrive in it, but as someone others viewed a certain way. Eleonore was beautiful—there was no point denying that. She’d inherited her mother’s looks and a bit of her succubus magnetism. Often, the best way to carry out the witch’s orders had been to let Eleonore’s prey assume the pretty surface was the sum of her substance and that they had nothing to fear.
It had bothered her to act vapid and flirtatious. It had bothered her that when people who misjudged or harassed her died, she felt guilty that she hadn’t shown them the truth from the start. Better to face death knowing it was coming than be surprised when something you thought was safe turned out not to be.
And if you were the one dealing the death, it was essential to face what you had done. She hadn’t been able to defy the orders of the Witch in the Woods, but she had been able to control how she viewed her own actions. Lying to herself was even worse than lying to others.
That train of thought was enough to bring her mood down, as always, but this time Eleonore didn’t want to let the anger and sorrow in. She shook her head sharply, dispelling the memories and musings. Tonight was a celebration, and if the performance had pulled an uncomfortable emotion out of her, that was the nature of impactful theatre.
“Enough about the play,” she said, waving away whatever question was hovering on Ben’s lips. “People love the café. How do you think the opening went?”
Ben looked around at the happy guests, and pride washed over his features. “I almost can’t believe it’s real and that so many people showed up.”
“They like this place,” Eleonore said. “And they like you.”
Ben shifted, looking down at his toes. “I don’t know about that,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “They like free food and booze.”
Did he truly not see how people looked at him? They watched him with affection and respect, and he’d barely had a moment alone all night. “They do like you,” Eleonore said firmly. “You are not allowed to be self-deprecating.”
His head popped back up, and his eyebrows rose. “I’m not?”
“No,” she said, crossing her arms. “Tonight is a celebration, and I insist you accept everyone’s praise and appreciate your own hard work making this happen.”
Ben chuckled, biting his lip for another of those rueful, thoughtlessly charming smiles. “Is it the vampire part or the succubus part that likes giving orders?”
“It’s the Eleonore part,” she replied. Then she poked him in the arm. “Now go mingle and let people praise you.”
He hesitated, eyes darting over the crowd. “Will you go with me? Social events aren’t really my thing.”
He wanted her to be his support? That was…nice. She hadn’t had anyone rely on her on the field of battle in a long time. Perhaps this wasn’t a traditional battlefield, but nothing about the situation she’d landed herself in was traditional.
“Yes,” she said. “I will make sure no one accosts you or otherwise jeopardizes your person.”
He chuckled and shook his head, then extended his elbow. “Then let’s go do that horrible activity known as socializing.”
Eleonore looped her hand through his arm, feeling warm and flustered and as if, for the first time in a very long time, something good might be beginning.