The air itself seed to brighten in her presence. Her gown, the color of fresh sage, flowed like liquid silk, embroidered with silver threads that mimicked the branching veins of healing herbs. At her throat, the sigil of House Vaelis glimred—a serpent coiled around a blossoming rose, the mark of a lineage renowned for turning poison into redy.
“She ca in the end,” Varras murmured, his earlier intensity montarily forgotten.
Lady Celine clasped her hands together, her voice hushed with reverence. “The Fla-Tongued Healer! The best dicus House Vaelis has produced in a century!” She leaned closer to Towan, as if sharing a sacred secret. “They say she once nded a shattered spine with nothing but a whisper and a touch of starlight.”
Towan’s grip on his glass tightened.
(Selene? What’s she doing here? I thought she was with Lytharos and Elliot… Wait. She’s a noble too?)
The realization struck him like a blow. Of course she was noble. That effortless grace, the way her gloved fingers moved with precision that bordered on artistry—it wasn’t just skill. It was breeding.
Selene’s gaze swept the room, cool and assessing, until—
Their eyes t.
A flicker of recognition. A barely-there hitch in her step.
Then, as if rembering where she was, she smoothed her expression into polite detachnt and turned to greet a cluster of admirers.
“I can’t believe she’s here!” Celine breathed, oblivious to Towan’s turmoil. “They say she refuses every invitation unless the cause is worthy.”
Varras’s lip curled. “How… noble of her.”
“Then this is the perfect chance to get an autograph,” Towan declared, already stepping back from the group with the forced cheer of a man dodging an arrow.
Lady Celine’s hand darted out, her fingers brushing his sleeve. “—Wait!” Her eyes sparkled with sudden intrigue. “May I know your na?”
The question, innocent as it was, hooked into him like a fishbone.
“My na? I’m Towan,” he answered—and instantly regretted it.
Shit.
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringent.
Nobles always gave their house nas when asked directly. It was as fundantal as breathing. His lapse hung in the air like the sharp, sour note of a missed chord.
Lady Celine blinked. “Just… Towan?”
A beat too late, he tacked on: “Of… the Hound.”
(The Hound?What in the seven hells was that supposed to an?)
Ser Varras’s smirk deepened. “How… quaint.”
But Celine, ever the romantic, gasped. “Oh! Like the Drunken Hound! Are you—?”
Towan didn’t wait to hear the rest. He lted into the crowd, his pulse hamring against his ribs. Behind him, he caught fragnts of Varras’s dry murmur: “—clearly a man of mystery.”
The ballroom blurred around him—a whirl of jewel-toned gowns and clinking glasses—as he beelined for Selene.
(Idiot. You might as well have worn a sign: ‘TAVERN BOY HERE.’)
The crowd around Selene parted like water before a blade—not from force, but from sothing far more potent: respect. A flick of her wrist, a glance, and nobles stepped aside without a word, their curiosity stifled by the unspoken weight of House Vaelis’s influence.
By the ti the last admirer drifted away, Towan was already there.
“Selene.”
She turned, her erald eyes sharpening the mont they landed on him. No greeting. No pretense. Just a hissed whisper:
“Boy. Where have you been? Eryndar’s turned half the countryside upside down looking for you. Weren’t you supposed to be at his dojo?”
Towan stiffened. The accusation in her voice was a live wire. “Well… things happened, and—”
“Things happened?” Selene’s gloved fingers twitched, as if resisting the urge to strangle him. “And what, pray tell, are you doing here?”
Her gaze dropped to his suit—the suit—and her breath hitched. The color drained from her face.
“Where,” she whispered, “did you get that?”
The question wasn’t curious. It was dread.
Towan frowned. “From a box in Leon’s stuff. Why?”
Selene’s lips pressed into a thin line, her silence louder than any denial. Around them, the ballroom’s murmurs sharpened into pointed whispers.
“Who is this boy?” A nobleman’s voice cut through the air, dripping with disdain. “Since when does Lady Selene entertain commoners?”
“That’s no commoner,” another countered, squinting at Towan’s sleeves. “Look at the embroidery—must be so fallen house’s remnants.”
Selene’s fingers twitched. She leaned in, her voice a blade wrapped in silk. “Hear out. It’s no good for us to be seen together.” Her eyes flicked toward the Governor’s dais. “Let give you an autograph—play along, then disappear into the crowd. We’ll talk later.”
Towan nodded, the motion stiff. “All right.”
He pulled a scrap of paper and a pen from his pocket—Leon’s old field pen, nicked from the storage room—and offered it to her. Selene took it, her gloved fingers brushing his for half a heartbeat too long.
“For your… collection,” she said loudly, signing with a flourish. The nobles nearest them relaxed slightly, their curiosity waning. Just another admirer, then.
But as she handed it back, her thumb pressed against the paper—a hidden fold, a note tucked inside.
et in the east garden when the clock strikes midnight.
Towan pocketed it without a word. Selene lted into the crowd, her gown shimring like mist under the chandeliers.
Behind him, a familiar laugh cut through the murmur of the ballroom—bright, deliberate, and laced with amusent.
"Enjoying the party, 'Lord Hound'?"
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