by R. Cooper
“I bother with etiquette when it’s actually useful.” The words were stubborn but Flor was close to Clematis again, and looking up. “Right now, I am seeing to the comfort of a guest.”
“You are also a guest,” Clematis pointed out.
“Pfft.” Another obstacle dismissed. “I practically grew up in this place.”
“Yet you’re not marrying the Prince?” Clematis asked what he had never meant to ask, then pressed on when Flor went still. “People thought you would.” He had thought so, even when the Prince had so obviously fallen in love with someone else.
Flor studied him for another moment as though he had heard what Clematis had not said. “I’m not suited to be a consort.”
“You are more suited to run an army,” Clematis agreed.
Flor’s grin was wolfish, but brief. “Pfft. War is a waste.” He paused. “Are you trying to distract me? Perhaps you are the general here, with stratagems and a pretty face.” Clematis had no argument for that, and no believable denial. Flor tipped his head to the side, no less wolfish, even without showing teeth. “What is your name, if you will tell me?”
Flor did not know Clematis and was not likely to recognize his name. Nonetheless, Clematis looked away. “It is a masquerade.”
“You know who I am.” Flor was flirting again, a flirting of a different kind, knowing and teasing, with a dare at the center.
“You chose not to wear a real mask,” Clematis argued, although he would have recognized Flor even with one.
“And you did,” Flor countered, oddly pleased. “Choose, that is. Your lord, whoever he is, gave you one. You still have it on. Did you wear it to hide your identity, or your beauty?”
“They are much the same thing.”
“I do not think so.” Flor shook his head. “I might have stopped because you were exquisite in silver moonlight, but it’s not why I talked to you, or keep talking to you.”
Clematis was not certain what that meant. “Attention brings trouble.”
Flor’s gently combative flirting abruptly ceased. “Is your lord trouble?”
“No.” Clematis frowned. “He means well,” he explained, and Flor thinned his mouth to a hard line. “It’s not his fault that I don’t know how have fun, or how to say what I want. Except that I did, didn’t I? I did say what I wanted.”
“You did.” Flor softened instantly, though he still seemed unhappy. “Is that what you’ll tell him once you’ve left the ball and removed your mask?”
It hurt to swallow with how tight his throat felt. The sudden sting at his eyes did not help. Lord Hyacinth had said nothing about goodbyes, and Clematis hadn’t dreamed this far.
“I will tell him this was perfect,” Clematis answered finally. “That you were… he shouldn’t have made me come here.”
“Why not?” Flor held Clematis’s hand, probably thinking this was a comfort and not torturous.
Clematis could not keep the huskiness from his voice. “Because I won’t ever get it again.”
“Glacé plums and dancing?” Flor still did not understand.
“Dancing with you,” Clematis told him forcefully, admitting his every secret wish.
Flor took a breath, loud in that moment. “Do I know you?”
“It doesn’t matter.” Clematis could not move with the way Flor watched him, the way he continued to whisper.
“Clearly, it does. But we can do this again, with or without masks. Or something else. Sit in a library, if you want. I have never been able to sit still for long, yet I think I would try, if you were comfortable. If you stopped trembling.”
Clematis hadn’t realized he was trembling.
“You wouldn’t,” Clematis insisted. “Not if it was me. Not if the mask was gone and you saw…. What if I was no one? Not anyone properly invited to this event. Not even gentry. What if I was a no one who had lived his life afraid, and rolled in ashes to keep the stares away, to keep their hands—” He did not like to speak of that. Flor knew what he meant, despite the silence. He hissed and bit out a word a prince’s friend should not know. Clematis squeezed his hand. “A nobody who came to one house, one pleasant house with one kind lord and his loving husband who are known for tolerating mad ideas, and wild students, and egalitarian words. In this house, I was given freedom and knowledge and places to hide away in the library, and also in this house, so many rich and privileged students came through to talk and drink and be just as free. And one of them—” Clematis stopped again and closed his eyes. He wanted to drop his head to Flor’s shoulder again, and because this was his dream, he did so. Flor let him, drawing him tighter into his arms. “This is more than I would ever have asked for.”
“You have a higher opinion of me than you should,” Flor told him gruffly. “I lose my temper a lot. Which you will see if you stay to know me better.”
Clematis shook his head. “You are often frustrated by injustice, but you have never lost your temper.”
Flor gave a start, then settled a hand on Clematis’s waist. “Most people call me a brat and hate me for having David’s ear.”
“You help him so much.” Clematis could not think once Flor began to rub gentle circles into his hip and curled his other arm to allow Clematis closer. “He gets lost in the theoretical, sometimes, but you bring him back to the practical.” Flor gave another start for that. Clematis tried to explain. “Tu will—would have—helped him be a great king, but you help him stay a good man.”
Flor exhaled roughly and held Clematis that much tighter. “Am I allowed to guess how you know me?”
“It won’t matter after tonight.” That was true, even if it hurt.
Flor only snorted. “If you believe that, you don’t know me as well as you think you do.”
Clematis raised his head to object, but then could not speak.
Their faces were inches apart. The curve of Flor’s mouth tempted him in a way that was new and thrilling. Clematis had never been tempted, but when he looked up and found Flor watching him, he realized Flor would allow a kiss. That was what made it so exciting.
“I’ve thought about what it would be like to kiss you,” Clematis admitted quietly. “If I would I like it,” he added, because he needed Flor to understand that. “But I’m nervous.”
“Because of your lord?”
Clematis held still for a moment, startled and then thoughtful. “No. My lord is not my lover, if that what bothers you so much, Flor de Maga.” He thought he was right in that guess when Flor sighed but did not deny it or offer an apology. “My lord sent me here to give me a chance to find a lover.” His face burned even in the cool air. “He is the one who put this on the list of things I was to try, if I wanted.”
Flor’s voice was rough. “You’re to kiss someone?”
“You,” Clematis corrected, almost shocked at himself, except that Flor’s arms were warm and Flor’s lips fell open at the single word. “His husband argued that it was too much pressure, but I agreed to add it to the list because I did not believe it would happen.”
Flor closed his mouth but did not take his arm from Clematis’s waist.
“So,” Flor said at last, “I am like a sugared plum, or a dance, or a glass of wine?” He put a hand to Clematis’s face, perhaps feeling the heat of his blush. “I don’t understand why I’m a treat for one night only… but I find I don’t like the idea of denying you anything, either. You do not smile enough,” Flor explained, brushing his thumb over the apple of Clematis’s cheek. “I would like to see you happy.” His voice and touch were so soft. “I can see why someone would make you such a list.” His thumb came to rest at the corner of Clematis’s lips. “Will you do it? I will not say no.”
Clematis fell toward him as if pushed, bending his head to press his mouth to Flor’s before pulling back. His skin was stinging and hot. He pulled in a breath when Flor licked his lips, and watched him, and waited, and then Clematis returned, slow and curious.
He tilted his head and put a hand to Flor’s cheek. He l
et his eyes close. He didn’t know much beyond putting their lips together, but that was thrilling in itself. He was scared and tender and protective, although how he could ever protect Flor, he did not understand. Flor granted him short, tentative kisses that merged into longer, softer ones, and smiled against Clematis’s mouth when Clematis huffed in frustration. Clematis could not name the reason for his frustration, only that it was there.
Flor curved a hand over the back of Clematis’s neck, but did not direct him. Perhaps that was the reason.
“You may be pushy now,” Clematis told him at last, breathless and altogether too hot with no obvious cause.
Flor tightened his arm to pull Clematis to his chest and placed a kiss beneath Clematis’s chin when Clematis shivered for it but did not protest. He touched Clematis’s buzzing lips with the tips of two fingers and then kissed that spot while Clematis slowly burned from the inside out. Clematis’s hands were in Flor’s hair. He could not apologize, since Flor was busy kissing him again, purposeful and determined, as if Clematis’s sighs of longing gave him the greatest pleasure.
Clematis was someone else. Someone relaxed even as his blood simmered. Someone languid and pliant. A sweetheart to be plundered by a man who adored him.
With both hands now at Clematis’s waist, Flor kissed him again, though Clematis had stopped counting the number.
“Oh,” Flor whispered, drawing away for a breath, to stay close and wait until Clematis slowly woke from his dream to look at him. Flor seemed to forget whatever he had been about to say and stared at Clematis in slightly frowning wonder. “I have seen those eyes before. I’ve seen you before.”
Clematis’s blood became ice.
He was out of Flor’s arms and fleeing the balcony in moments. He put his hands to his face as he ran, trying not to hear the gasps of shock or see the outraged glares that followed him as he dashed to a servant’s corridor.
He was not due back for hours, but when alarmed servants directed him outside to the lines of waiting carriages, he did not wait for Lord Hyacinth’s coachman to be called. He ran until he found the coach and threw himself inside.
Adam discovered him not long afterward, where he was curled beneath the windows so no one might see him. When Clematis signed to him that he wished to go home, please, immediately, Adam looked upon him kindly and didn’t question it.
IN THE MORNING, Clematis was in the library, going over old accounting ledgers to learn how to use them. Lord Walter was with him, tactfully silent as he gazed out a window. Clematis had not told their Lordships everything, but he had not had to. Notes had arrived with the dawn, messengers from Lord Hyacinth’s friends spreading gossip about the masked ball. Some of it had been about the Prince—who had been polite and kind to everyone, but taken no clear favorites yet—and some had been about the odd behavior of Flor de Maga.
“Searching the rooms high and low for some exquisite creature dressed as a dragonfly,” Lord Hyacinth had delighted in relaying the words until Clematis had ducked his head and been unable to look at him. “You should have let him find you,” Lord Hyacinth had added, but softer, and with a suggestion. “You still could.”
“For what purpose?” Clematis had asked, equally soft, and Lord Walter had shushed his husband and that had been that—for the time being.
Clematis knew Lord Hyacinth, and the matter would not be settled until he thought Clematis was happy.
Clematis was, in a way. He had gotten more than he had ever dreamed, could even have gone further if he had not been so foolish. But it was one thing to be the mysterious man once kissed by Flor de Maga on a dark balcony. It was another to be found out as a mere servant, perhaps remembered as the odd one who hid behind curtains or rolled in ashes and kept his face turned away. He cringed from the thought. Flor would have been kind, but Clematis did not want his pity.
“Well, well,” Lord Walter abruptly spoke, “it appears we are to have visitors. And a royal one at that. You would think Prince David would be too busy searching for someone to marry to pay us a call, and yet there is his banner atop that carriage.”
If Clematis hadn’t been at the window a moment later, heart loud in his ears and his hands shaking, he might have commented on the lack of surprise in Lord Walter’s voice. Instead, one glance to the flag depicting Prince David’s unicorn rampant and he mumbled, “Forgive me,” before bolting for the kitchens.
Cook’s assistants and a maid asked after him, concerned, but didn’t attempt to stop him as he headed for the scullery. They knew him too well.
Clematis caught his breath there, beneath the drying herbs, the steam curling his hair, watched only by Kate, the scullery maid, who rushed out again with her apron full of beetroot. She knew him well, and nodded toward the full ashbin. She never teased the way some did.
Clematis was safe in Lord Hyacinth’s house, but sometimes he still needed to hide himself and not be seen.
The Prince should not be here. Yet he was. It was too much to hope that Flor wasn’t with him. This was exactly what Clematis wanted, to be left alone and to be found in equal measures. He had not slept a wink, reliving every single moment from the night before. He wanted more, which he could not have. Lord Hyacinth should not have encouraged him to use his voice. Now what was he to do with it in the cold light of day?
Kate had shut the door behind her. Clematis went to the ashbin, filled to the brim with ash and cinders, and went through the other door to dump it in the ash pile for her. It left his hands covered, and he hesitated before running one through his hair to dull the shiny brown.
Returning to the scullery, he froze.
Flor waited for him.
An odd sight, Flor de Maga in a scullery. He was restless, already, and seemed to fill the room with sparks. The steam left his skin and clothing damp, made his cheeks darker. Without a mask, his eyes were black and bright at the same time, and they held Clematis in place and made him forget to look down until it was too late.
Clematis stumbled all the way into the room. The outside door closed behind him.
They were alone.
Flor was dressed in a pink coat, his cravat a waterfall of white. Clematis wore an old shirt with a brown waistcoat. He did not know the knots a gentleman might use and left his cravat carelessly undone the majority of the time. Somehow, this seemed the most painful thing about looking at Flor now.
Clematis wiped a hand across his cheek, but he had used the ash on his hair, so it likely did little. He was poor and common, and as dirty and dull as dishwater. He was Clematis of the Cinders, and that was as it should be. But the lump in his throat would not let him speak.
Flor’s gaze never left him. “I thought it was you.”
Clematis twitched. He had been so careful never to be alone with Flor for long in this place, never to let Flor see him, or speak with him.
“You did not,” Clematis denied, giving everything away once again. “You didn’t know me. I didn’t want you to.”
Flor frowned; a sight Clematis had missed last night. “I didn’t at first,” Flor admitted, uncharacteristically cautious. “But you knew me. And you mentioned a house like this one, and a married lord who would give you his invitation to a masked ball, and a mask to go with it. You knew Tu, and David, and I… remembered you.” Flor studied Clematis again, from his simple shoes and breeches to his unflattering waistcoat and the streak of ash across his face. Then he met Clematis’s eyes. “I remembered you, and how Hyacinth spoke of you. I know your name, but I would like to hear you tell me. Please?”
“Clematis.” Clematis revealed it in a whisper and wished for so many things when Flor sighed and thanked him for it. He dropped his head to stare at his gray, dusty fingers. “I will help manage the estate someday,” he said, with a small amount of pride. “I will not be kept.”
“Kept?” Flor demanded, outraged. “Who said anything about that?”
Clematis dared to look up. “If you are not here to offer to put me under your protection, then are you her
e to mock me? That does not sound like you. Neither sounds like you, but I would understand the first if you… if you enjoyed kissing me.”
“You have such faith in me.” Flor’s expression was wondering, then pleased, then determined. He put his shoulders back, lifted his chin, and gave Clematis a sideways, rueful smile. “I must say this first, before I forget—I will not always be a treat. I am difficult, even David would say so—though he will use the word stubborn. But I suppose you know that. You have a head start on knowing me, but I aim to remedy that. I will need to discover your faults, if only to be fair. See how they might align with mine, if we are as suited as I feel we could be. But that is the point of courting, after all. If you find it agreeable. Also, since you mentioned it,” his voice went a little deeper, “yes, I very much enjoyed kissing you.”
Clematis dropped the ashbin, ruining his shoes. “Courting?” No one opened the door behind Flor to laugh at Clematis or drag him away to box his ears for getting ideas. Flor continued to regard him with hopeful bravery. “Courting! Flor, I am servant!” Flor should not have needed the reminder, no matter how egalitarian. “You are expected to marry well,” Clematis added. “You could have had the Prince himself.”
His objections were growing fainter. He looked up, again, to watch Flor approach him. Flor took Clematis’s hand, unconcerned with the ash now also staining his fingers.
“Oh,” Clematis realized, flushing hotter than could be explained by the steam, “you are Flor de Maga, and you will do as you please. Protocol be damned.”
“Not entirely,” Flor corrected gently, sending Clematis’s thoughts whirling, or perhaps that was the way Flor held his hand. Flor lowered his head to study Clematis’s fingers, exploring the writer’s callus with a tiny smile on his face. He looked up again quite suddenly. “I will not do as I please if you do not want me to. In this matter, I mean. I am often forceful. But I have been up all night thinking about how you ran from me, and, while there might be other reasons for that, I would never, ever have it be because I had frightened you or pushed you too far.”