Page 23 of A Dance of Water

CHOCOLATE AND RIBBONS

LUELLA

The palace was undergoing the most magnificent of transformations.

Luella nearly floated down the halls, awestruck by the resplendent, icy beauty that had befallen Serpentis. Well, she would have floated, if not for her gripping fear of running into two particular individuals she had, so far, successfully avoided all day…

She had skipped breakfast under the guise of sleeping too late, skipped lunch because she was napping—not a lie, she was tired and had not gotten much rest last night—and skipped dinner because she had pretended to be ill, yelling to Graves who stood on the other side of her bedroom door that she would be taking dinner in her room. The raven shifter had not refuted her claim; though, if the lingering sound of his footsteps outside her door had been any indication, he had not believed her.

She wasn’t fooling anyone, she knew, least of all herself.

Luella was not ill, she just didn’t want to run into the King—Vale, her mind hissed.

Or Az…

So, she did not float down the halls but carefully watched where she was going as servants flitted about, stringing up long banners made of soft blue and wrapping the many chandeliers hanging overhead with icy swaths of fabric. The candles hadalready been enchanted to burn blue, and the flames cast each room in a frozen hue.

What once was an admittedly beautiful and free castle, ripe with greenery and perfectly cut stone walls and polished marble floors, was now a wintry, frost-bitten escape.

The servants turned away from her as she walked by, and her steps grew slow as she could not help but stop and take it all in. If the most innocuous of hallways had been turned to such frigid beauty, she wondered what the main part of the palace looked like…

But Luella would not be venturing there.

"Watch yourself," a passing servant mumbled, carrying a large rolled-up rug.

Her brows crinkled, but she stepped aside, curious that he would be so bold as to speak to her. She had wondered if the Kin?—

She had wondered ifValehad made an order for those within the palace to ignore her very presence, with how no one except for her maids and captors spoke to her.

Her back pressed against the stone walls, her shoulders brushing a blue, shimmering tapestry that had been hung, silken folds that cascaded down and bathed the halls in icy light. She watched as the male servant, a large and peculiarly kind-faced serpent shifter with slitted eyes, nearly jogged down to the end of the hall, rolling out the rug with a flourishing crinkle as he laid the thick rug down. Now, even the floors were covered with blue.

She pressed a hand to her lips. The Solstice—it seemed more important than they had let on during their breakfast yesterday morning. Luella had been groggy and out of sorts, but she still had sensed a bit of trepidation lingering about. She just did not understandwhy.

She continued to walk down the less-traveled halls, taking in the blue decor and icy sheen of it all. The rain was a soft trickle today, but the clouds had been thick and white when she awoke, less so of the dark and stormy kind and more of a promise of wintry precipitation.

The soft drizzle soothed something within her, and she found herself lulled into a sense of safety as she strolled. Only to round the corner and bump into a large chest.

A sound of protest fell from Luella’s lips, and her hands came up to brace against a cool chest as she attempted to stop herself from falling backward.

"Well, isn’t this a surprise?"

She looked up, fingertips digging into a silken shirt as her neck craned. Glittering silver rings in pale ears, sculpted cheekbones, and an almost daintily perfect jawline. Half-lidded, reddened eyes took her in, hands coming up to grasp firmly at her waist. His long fingers bunched the material of her gown, and rich bergamot made her head swim.

Now that she was not so arrested by the transformation of the castle, she could feel the call inside her—a song of want and fire.

The vampire before her radiated chilled elegance, and he stared down at Luella with the slightest of ticks in his jaw.

"I thought you were not feeling well, pet?" Bastian brushed a cool palm against the skin of her forehead, sweeping back a few strands of her white hair. Her breath hitched; it took everything inside her not to fall into him and allow her traitorous eyelids to flutter shut. "I was just coming to check on you."

She hummed, managing a quiet, "I feel better now," under the weight of his stare.

An elegant, dark brow lifted. "Is that so? Then, I have another gift for you."

"W-what is it?"

The vampire did not answer her. "Did you enjoy my last gift?"

The chocolate bark was still untouched—but she had inhaled its scent before bed last night and stared up at the ceiling, wondering where Az slept his first night above ground.

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