After he descended the stairs, Pasha turned and bowed to the tsar and tsarina, who were sitting in a balcony above the rest of the ballroom, not unlike a box at the opera, well separated from the ordinary people. Yuliana hurried to Pasha’s side, her movements somehow graceful and graceless at the same time, and he kissed her hand. And then half the guests abandoned their current conversations and rushed to give their birthday wishes to the tsesarevich, no longer caring whether their masks fell and their true identities were revealed. In fact, many of them purposely ripped their masks off their faces, the better for the tsesarevich to recognize them and take note of their show of loyalty.
If only they knew that Pasha was likely not keeping track.
Nikolai let his shroud fade away, and he appeared once more against the backdrop of the curtains. Renata quickly found him.
“I was beginning to wonder whether the tsesarevich would come to his own birthday ball,” she said, watching the queue of people lined up for the possibility of a few words from Pasha. “But it’s a shame that he hates it.”
“Hates what?”
“Being the tsesarevich.”
“How do you mean?”
Renata shrugged, as if the observation were obvious. Then again, she was disarmingly good at seeing through to the truth of people. Most of the time. “He winced when the majordomo announced him.”
Nikolai also watched Pasha. Now that he had come down from the steps and was able to interact with the guests one on one, Pasha’s smile had grown more relaxed. “No, you’re wrong. He doesn’t hate the position itself. He hates the formality of it. But he has great respect for the tsardom and the people of the empire. He only wishes it came with less pomp and ceremony.”
As if to emphasize Nikolai’s point, Pasha tossed back his head in laughter in response to something the pirate, Renata’s former dance partner, was saying. The pirate beamed.
“Ah, all right, I see what you mean,” Renata said. “It’s a pity, though, that he won’t get to enjoy the costume aspects of his own masquerade.”
Nikolai nodded. Pasha would also lament that his other goal for the ball—meeting Vika—had not yet come to fruition. It was already half past nine. Would she make an appearance at all?
Nikolai absentmindedly pressed his hand to the spot where his scar lay beneath his cravat. The wands didn’t burn; because he’d built the Masquerade and Imagination Boxes, it was currently Vika’s move. He half hoped she would appear and cast something stunning. He half feared she would, too. He’d even considered wearing Galina’s knife tonight, but then left it behind when he realized it would be confiscated at the door. No one could have weaponry at the tsesarevich’s ball.
“Do you think she’ll come?” Renata asked, her eyes on the placement of Nikolai’s hand on his scar.
He dropped it down to his side. “I don’t know.”
She wrinkled her forehead, studying him. “Do you want her to come?”
Nikolai charmed his face to smooth out the emotion so Renata couldn’t read him. “I don’t know that, either.”
But it didn’t matter what he wanted or how he felt, for in the same heartbeat as Nikolai uttered those words, Vika appeared in the entry.
A hush blew through the ballroom until even the couple bowing to Pasha rose to see the cause of the quiet. Pasha turned. All eyes were on the girl on the stairs.
Her ordinarily red hair was pale blue tonight, and the black streak had been transformed to silver, like a sliver of mercury. On her face, she wore a mask made of birch wood, rough white with flecks of gray. But it was the gown that had triggered the silence, for it was unlike anything the guests had ever seen. The bodice appeared to be carved from white ice, reflecting the light from the chandeliers on its polished surface, and yet it hugged the curves of her frame and moved with her as if made of water. The skirt was similarly frosty, an endless eddy of snowflakes, like a blizzard erupting from the ice above. Even the air seemed to chill around her. This was not from Nikolai’s Masquerade Box. This was far beyond his tailoring and imagination.
She was a diamond in a quarry full of quartz.
Even the majordomo stood agog. It was a good minute before he gathered himself and inquired the girl’s masquerade name. And that of her chaperone, a lady dressed in a rich brown dress that, from Nikolai’s vantage point, seemed to be made of actual chocolate, and that would usually have elicited awe and admiration had it not been upstaged by Vika’s gown.
“Madame Chocolat . . . and Lady Snow,” the majordomo yelled, and it was arguable whether he had announced the tsesarevich or Vika with more reverence.
“Good gracious.” Renata trembled beside Nikolai. “No wonder you feared her the first time you saw her.”
But fear no longer described how Nikolai felt. As soon as Vika floated into the ballroom, he’d felt her pull. She was the sun, and he was a mere rock, drawn in by her gravity. He needed to be closer, to feel her magic, to touch . . . her. He trembled at the thought. And he took a step in her direction.
Renata reached out and placed her hand on his shoulder. “Be careful. . . .”
And then she let go. For even she knew there was only so much one could do to protect a winter moth drawn to an icy flame.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE