Chapter 19
Nineteen
As I let her into Stavros’s quarters, Esmae lets out a little gasp. “Oh, it’s gorgeous.”
Her gaze sweeps over the ballgown I’ve mostly managed to put on myself—because I didn’t want the woman who’s somehow become my friend noticing the lack of godlen mark on my front or the scars on my back. I resist the urge to hug myself against her assessment.
The dress is gorgeous. When I unfurled it from the package a messenger dropped off a few hours ago, I might have gasped myself.
Translucent swaths of sky blue and seafoam green tumble down across an underlayer of paler blue, giving the impression of gleaming water flowing from my collarbone to my toes. Gold embroidery dances along the waistline and in trickles down the skirt like froth on the water.
Even thinner gauze swirls from my shoulders to my forearms, disguising the knobby elbows that a week of noble food hasn’t managed to fill out. Linzi’s white ribbon around my bicep only shows faintly through even in the bright lights of the apartment.
A thin silk cloak streams from the back of the neckline nearly to my feet, ensuring my scars are totally concealed.
He thought of everything.
I think I’d have known that Casimir must have picked out this dress even if it hadn’t arrived with the hair pin I admired in town tucked into the same bundle. I can’t imagine anyone else being that aware of the parts of me I’d prefer to disguise.
To top it off, the overlapping panels of fabric obscure slits that mean I’ll still have access to at least a couple of knives. He might have not just picked it out but had the gown custom-made.
The knowledge sends a bubbly feeling through my chest as if I’ve already downed a couple of glasses of champagne. I’m not sure I like the sensation.
I’m not sure I could possibly belong in this dress. But here I am.
I smile awkwardly and motion toward my lower back. “I don’t know if I’ve gotten the lacing as tight as it should be.” I wasn’t going to ask Stavros to lend a hand before he set off to make his own ball preparations elsewhere.
“Let me see…” Esmae sweeps over in her own gown, a purple one with just a narrow swath of gauze across her otherwise bare shoulders and thick embroidery defining the waistline above the billowing skirt.
It’s probably more in the current court fashion than my own, but I can’t say I give a roach’s ass about that.
Why is the one-eyed mouse here again? Julita mutters as Esmae eases aside the lower part of the cloak to give the ribbons at the small of my back a deft tug.
We already had that argument after Esmae volunteered when I saw her at breakfast this morning. I pointed out that between Julita and me, I still only have one pair of hands.
And it’s a pair of hands that isn’t particularly practiced at the beautifying arts.
My ghostly guest couldn’t deny that, but it hasn’t stopped her from grumbling. I suspect she’s a little offended that Esmae has made more of an effort to be friendly with me than it sounds like she ever did with Julita.
Esmae ushers me over to the mirror mounted on the wall and slips her fingers into my hair. “That pin goes perfectly with the dress too. We could gather your hair all the way up like this. Or keep it more arranged at the back like this.”
“Let’s go with that one,” I say to the second style, and do my best to hold still while she tucks the strands into an intricate arrangement I could never have accomplished on my own.
Before my eyes, I’m transforming into someone even I could mistake for a noble.
Staring at my reflection, my mouth goes a bit dry. A sour flavor lingers on my tongue—I choked down another cup of pipe fleece tea a half hour ago.
I turn away from the mirror toward Esmae. “Can I help you with your hair? I don’t know any complicated styles, but I’ll do my best.”
She smiles back at me. “Thank you. I actually like the way you have yours usually—the broader loops with some of it left loose along your shoulders. That would be perfect with this dress.”
“I think I can manage that.”
It’s a damn sight easier pinning whorls of hair when I can see them right in front of me. I fix the strands in place carefully around the tie of her eye patch, hoping I don’t repay my schoolmate with a hairstyle that’ll tumble apart halfway through the dancing.
“It’s nice, you know,” Esmae says abruptly when I’m about halfway through my work. “I mean… I haven’t really had a friend here before. Not someone I could get ready for the balls with and that sort of thing.”
The admission jabs right through the center of me. I’ve never had a friend like that ever in my entire life, unless you count the kids my sister and I used to ramble around with when I was small enough to wear smocks.
Imagining I could be wrapped up in the warmth of Ewalin’s family wasn’t anything like actually having that company. And I can hardly call my grudging allies “friends” even if they saw my uninvited passenger as one.
“You made an exception for me?” I say.
Esmae laughs lightly. “I guess I’ve always been so focused on my studies, I didn’t see the point. But maybe that was silly of me. And… I feel more at ease with you than I usually do with the other students here. It never seems like you’re waiting for an ideal moment to get one up on me.”
I suppose that’s true, even if I am putting on a totally false front about who I am. Her openness leaves me momentarily off-balance.
I offer a little honesty of my own, as much as I can. “I haven’t really had good friends either. I’m grateful you’ve looked out for me.”
Julita makes a faint gagging sound in the back of my head, and I resist the urge to smack her through my new fancy hairdo.
“Anyway,” I add, “there’s nothing wrong with studying. I’ve always believed that the more you can learn, the more you can do.”
Esmae lets out another laugh. “I just want to be able to do enough to impress the palace staff. There’s got to be a position for me there. I don’t have any familial connections to give me a leg up.”
I grimace around a twinge of guilt. “Stavros pushed me awfully hard to make sure I could handle being his assistant.”
“Oh, I didn’t mean—I wasn’t thinking of you specifically. I wouldn’t be looking to land a job as assistant to a professor anyway.”
As I step away from her, she sighs and peers at her reflection approvingly.
“I want to meet all the people coming in and out of court, travel with the royal family when they move around the provincial palaces, see everything I can of the continent. I never ventured more than a few counties over before I came to the college.”
“I’m sure you’ll manage it,” I say. If nothing else, her determination rings through every word.
She closes her eye just for a second and then shoots me a tighter smile over her shoulder. “I’d better. If I end up having to go home, I know my parents are just waiting to arrange a marriage to whichever blustering merchant in the area they most want to appease at that particular moment.”
Ugh. I offer a little shudder in sympathy. “You can definitely do better than that.”
“I’m getting there. Is this what you want for the rest of your life? Work at the college? Even if your family didn’t want to spare you before, now that you’re here it wouldn’t be much trouble to enroll in classes as well. You could aim for anything.”
If only she knew.
I shrug as if the topic isn’t of all that much importance to me. “I’m glad to be where I am now. It’s a good position. But I’m not married to it if a better opportunity comes along.”
The vague answer feels slimy as it slips off my tongue, with all the things I’m hiding.
Esmae doesn’t seem to notice. “I suppose that’s a healthy outlook.”
She brandishes a stick and a couple of containers of powder she was carrying with her. “Now let’s see what a little makeup can do for you.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Is that really necessary when we’re all wearing masks?”
The nobles apparently prefer to cover their faces for a little plausible deniability about whatever hijinks they expect to get up to while they party. I guess that means Alek will fit in better than usual.
Esmae grins. “That’s why we focus on the eyes and the mouth. I’ve never even seen your face powdered. I’m sure we could bring a little more color into it…”
She stands between me and the mirror as she works, patting a cool sponge all over my face and then applying color with brushes of varying sizes.
The cosmetics don’t feel as heavy as I expected, but maybe Esmae just has a light touch.
When she steps back, I stare at myself. Now I look like a noble.
I look like a stranger.
My cheeks have a rosy tint that’s unfamiliar on my sallow skin. A deeper ruddy tone makes my lips look fuller.
But it’s my eyes that stand out the most, kohl frames and shaded lids turning the bright blue irises piercing.
Esmae clicks her tongue. “It’s a shame we’ll have to cover most of that up. Could you line my eye? It’s always hard when I only have the one to see with.”
I can at least offer a steady hand if not one that’s wielded kohl often in the past. “Of course.”
Once she’s satisfied with herself as well, we help each other fasten our simple masks over our upper faces—hers a purple lace that matches her dress, mine a sleek gold imprinted with a subtle lattice pattern that Casimir must have picked out to coordinate with my gown’s embroidery.
It brings out the red in my hair, as he may have counted on as well.
It’s a perfect disguise. I’m going to mingle with Florian’s elite while they drink and cavort—and do my best to be in the right place to overhear secrets spilled with a slip of a tongue.
Even Julita sounds pleased, despite Esmae’s assistance. You’re doing me proud, Ivy. Now let’s get out there and track these scourge sorcerers down.
We only have one flight to ascend to reach the ballroom. It takes up most of the space on the fifth floor, under the building’s broad dome.