For the millionth time since waking up in Sang, I wished for a laptop and a fast Internet connection. It was painful, not being able to access information immediately in a private manner. I wanted to know more about Paris, about Paradis, about Lenoir, and mostly about Vale. I chuckled at the ceiling, picturing what a wild brigand’s Facebook page would look like. And then I thought about how in another world, there would be fewer places where my best friend could be hidden. Technology made things more transparent, but magic only obscured things further.
I dreamed of dancing in a grand ballroom, a huge, bell-shaped dress swirling around me. But I couldn’t see the dark figure who held me in the cage of his arms.
* * *
After sleeping in and enjoying a good scrubbing at my ewer the next morning, I sauntered into the theater to find an enormous chandelier hovering a few feet off the ground.
“I kind of thought you guys were joking about this.”
Charline tapped her pen against her notebook, which was her polite way of showing annoyance, now that I was a star. Just a few hours ago, as I’d drunk my blood and smiled at an innocent and still-sleepy Blaise, they’d delivered my finished poster to my room. It was like the gorgeous love child of Mucha and Lautrec, with “La Demitasse” emblazoned across the top on a banner and an overly stylized version of me doing the can-can with impossibly bent legs and, of course, the dreaded cup on my hat.
It was possibly the only thing more ridiculous than the giant chandelier, which had been cleverly fashioned to include plenty of places for me to sit, swing, dangle, and contort. And Charline had already handed me a sheet of paper covered in her tiny, perfect script, outlining exactly what I was expected to do. I folded it up and tucked it into my corset.
“Can I go now?”
Her face screwed up, and she went red all over. “Of course you cannot go! We have a new show to rehearse! The entire theater is sold out, including the boxes. This poster is being pasted on every wall in the city. They say princes from all over the world will be flying in on their private dirigibles. We’re planning a masked ball. You must be perfect.”
“I’m always perfect. And Lenoir is expecting me.”
She rolled her eyes. “Lenoir can wait. Now, on the chandelier and into position.”
I glared at her and lifted my lip to show a fang.
“If you please, Mademoiselle Demitasse,” she added, although it pained her.
I stared longingly at the door, where Auguste waited, hat in hand. All too easily, I could imagine Lenoir waiting in his attic, mixing his paints, pouring our absinthe, watching the sunlight move across my empty chair while his cats stared disdainfully at the door. My own distress bothered me more than his anger. He couldn’t ruin me now, even if he didn’t finish the painting. But I wanted him to finish it, wanted to spend those swooning, magical, timeless hours under the spell of his brush and the dark scrutiny of his cloudy eyes. Whether it was the fellow feeling of the only other Bludman in the city or the pull of a knowing and charismatic older man, I felt the distance between us like a slender string pulling me from afar.
“S’il vous plaît, Demitasse.” Charline waited, arm out invitingly, skin the warning red of a stop sign. “I’ll call out your marks.”
I sighed. “Of course. But only once through. And then I must go to Lenoir.”
“Of course,” she answered with a cold smile. “But first, you earn it.”
* * *
When I finally reached Lenoir’s doorstep, I knocked with trepidation, hoping the bruises on my arms and legs would fade before the master could paint them. Practice had taken longer than I’d hoped, and my anxiousness to finish had meant that I’d made foolish mistakes. New equipment always meant new sore spots, and Lenoir’s low-necked gown would show dark blooms that most Sangish clothes covered up. I didn’t want him to see me any less than perfect.
After a few moments of silence, I knocked again, but still he didn’t come. I stepped back and looked up, but the windows were all covered with gauzy curtains, blocking my view. One of the curtains quivered, and a Siamese cat’s face appeared, glaring at me like the judgment of God. With a grunt of frustration, I dropped the knocker and pounded on the door with my bare fist.
No footsteps in the hall. No open door.
I wiped away a blud-tinged tear and let Auguste help me back into the conveyance, where I flopped in a heap of dejection and loss that seemed utterly useless and stupid even as I was crushed under it. It was like having vampire PMS.
That night, after the performance, I drank so hungrily from my suitor that I was afraid he might stop breathing. Clumsily plundering his sleeping body, I accidentally popped off one of the buttons on his pants and wasn’t sure if I’d put all his effects back where I’d found them. I ended up just stuffing all his papers down the front of his vest and getting drunk on the subpar bloodwine he’d brought as I kept vigil by his unconscious body. I didn’t leave until he murmured in his sleep and reached for me. Exhausted, bruised, and frustrated, I crawled around the screen to the bed in the elephant’s belly and pulled the thick covers over my head. I fell asleep there to the tune of his snores, feeling utterly lost and a million miles from home and still hungry.