Dance of Fire

by Yelena Black

  Vanessa cocked her head at Svetya, who was now standing in the middle of the room with her arms crossed. ‘So, you’re saying you could have done better but held back?’

  Svetya bit her bottom lip. ‘That’s exactly what I’m ­saying.’

  There were lots of ways Vanessa could have responded to Svetya. ‘OK then,’ she said finally.

  Vanessa had been comforted by seeing Justin’s name at number three on the boys’ list. To her distress, Ingrid had made the cut too, at number five among the girls. She turned back to her computer, to compose an email to Steffie, Blaine, TJ and – she’d typed Elly too. Her finger hovered over the delete key, not wanting to press it. But of course she had to.

  She scrolled down and began to type.

  Hi guys,

  I’m here in London, safe and sound – at least for now. It’s night-time here, but it’s still light out where you are. I’m rooming with this girl who just compared me to a Christmas pudding – seriously!! – and I’m not entirely sure, but I think she has the hots for Justin. Rooming with her makes me miss you guys even more. Can you believe that I actually miss the dining hall at NYBA? Pathetic.

  On Sunday night, Justin and I saw Zep in a crowd. Justin chased him through the streets, but he ended up getting away. Honestly, I can’t even begin to tell you how freaked out I was. I have no idea why he’s here, what he’s doing, what he wants. After what happened back at school, I swore to myself if I ever saw Zep again I would hurt him for what he did to Elly. What he did to all of us. But now that he’s here, I’m just . . . scared. I think he and the demon might be connected in some way, though I don’t know how.

  And if that isn’t enough, the real shock was that I saw a photo of the Royal Court Ballet Company from a couple of years ago and Margaret was in it! Can you believe that?

  Which brings me to you three. I need to ask a favour.

  I need to find out more about the Royal Court. If you can find any old rosters or recruiting brochures among Josef’s things or in the library, that would be great.

  Margaret is alive. I’m sure of it. She might even be here, in London. I’m going to win this competition and get to the bottom of this, and I don’t care what I have to do or who I have to step on to find her.

  Vanessa was surprised by the intensity of the words she’d just typed. When had she become so determined? So ruthless? She felt that familiar heat in her head, but this time it wasn’t because of the demon.

  Love, Ness, she wrote, then clicked send and closed her ­laptop, noticing a small brown gift box that she hadn’t seen earlier.

  She glanced at Svetya, who was busy fixing her hair, then picked up the box and turned it over in her hands. The contents shifted.

  Wondering if Ingrid or some other dancer had left it for her as a warning, she eased the lid off with a pen.

  Inside was a glossy photograph of Lincoln Center at night, the spray from its fountain glittering in the lights. A postcard. Beneath the picture, the caption read: The New York Ballet and The Metropolitan Opera House, New York, New York.

  Vanessa traced the card with her finger, imagining herself strolling there with Steffie, TJ and Blaine, laughing, their faces pink from the cold. She flipped the postcard over.

  Scrawled on the back in blue ink, the colour of Justin’s eyes, was: Thought you might need a taste of home. Congratulations! xx Justin

  Vanessa could almost hear him speak the words aloud as she read them. Beneath the postcard was a Hershey’s chocolate bar, a can of Diet Coke and a straw. She smiled to herself and popped open the can. She rarely drank soda, but she could make an exception tonight.

  Stripping the paper from the straw, she slipped it into the can and took a sip, letting the fizz tickle her tongue. It reminded her of the past, of summer, Vanessa sipping on a Coke while her mother gardened and her father grilled burgers in the back yard, Margaret lounging in a lawn chair by the sprinkler, her long legs glistening with sunscreen. How had Justin known this was exactly what she’d needed?

  Vanessa stared out the window into the London dusk. Outside, the lights from downstairs stretched over the snowy front lawn in long yellow bars.

  Someone was standing in the snow.

  At first she thought it was a trick of the light – just the shadow of a passer-by on the lawn – but as she stared into the dusk, the figure didn’t move. Someone was there, staring back at her.

  It was a young man, his body little more than a silhouette. Was he actually looking at her, or just facing the building? Vanessa pressed her hand to the glass. To her surprise, the boy lowered himself into a slight bow, gesturing to the white sprawl of the park. He looked back at her once, then strolled away into the dusk.

  Vanessa sat back, unsure what to do. She stared at the open box on her desk, the sweet postcard.

  Justin.

  A ripple of excitement travelled up her skin as she reached for her coat.

  ‘Where are you going?’ Svetya said. ‘We’re not supposed to meet them for another thirty minutes.’

  ‘I have an errand to run,’ Vanessa said, pulling on her boots. ‘I’ll meet you all at the restaurant.’ Before Svetya could ask any more questions, she was out in the hall.

  The first thing Vanessa thought was that the lawn was so quiet she could hear birds rustling in the trees. The second thing she thought was, Man, it’s cold.

  Pulling up her collar, she ventured off the path and across the lawn, to where she had last seen the boy. The snow was ankle deep. Where did he go? And then she saw it. A message written in the snow just a few feet away:

  Step into me

  Leading out of the words was a trail of footsteps.

  Vanessa shivered. The phrasing reminded her of the demon. But that was silly; Justin was just trying to be romantic and cute. Should she turn back? They couldn’t be together right now because of the demon, and she couldn’t risk kissing him, but couldn’t she enjoy one moment of fun?

  She lowered her foot into the first print, then stretched her other leg to reach the next. Justin’s steps led through a thicket of naked trees, ice crackling beneath her feet like strange music. The bridges and lamp posts of the park were frosted with snow. She eased down a short hill, her feet sliding, her toes numb from the cold.

  At the slippery peak of a footbridge, the prints stopped.

  She searched the snow on the bridge, first in front, then behind, but there were no other footsteps. Where had he gone?

  Confused, she looked up. Beyond the bridge, the park was a pristine white, the stars in the sky like spilled glitter. She looked down again and saw a figure on the path below the bridge, his hair blowing in the wind, his eyes the colour of metal.

  Her smile fled.

  She was wrong – it wasn’t Justin beckoning to her. Even though it was freezing, the boy stood with his jacket open, the tails of his scarf loose by his sides. The wind seemed to whistle his name.

  Zeppelin Gray.

  At his feet a second message had been written in the snow:

  Give me a second chance

  Vanessa’s throat tightened with anger. How could he even ask for such a thing?

  She kicked away the snow in front of her. It was his footprints she’d been walking in, not Justin’s. She’d been tricked. A chill ran up her spine, and it wasn’t because of the cold – the last time she’d been with Zep, he had delivered her to Josef.

  Zep was a killer. He wasn’t to be trusted. And she was sure he was here because the demon was here in London.

  So why was he asking her for a second chance?

  Vanessa looked up from the snow, but Zep had already backed into the shadows and vanished.

  She was alone.

  Chapter Nine

  After Vanessa had followed Zep into the park, she’d run back to the White Lodge, arriving just as her roommate and the others were leaving.

  ‘Where were you?’ Justin had asked. ‘You look as if you’ve seen a ghost.’

  She hadn’t known what to say; she’
d known only how happy she was to see him. ‘Thank you,’ she’d said, trying to push the strange encounter out of her mind. ‘For the gift. It was . . . ­perfect.’

  Justin had smiled easily, but he didn’t take her hand. ‘Any time.’

  Together the four of them had walked to Barre None, ­complaining that it was the only place nearby. ‘I would give anything to be closer to the centre of London,’ Geo said.

  ‘I would give anything for you to go away,’ Svetya said.

  Inside, Justin picked out a table in the back corner, and they each took a seat.

  Vanessa had just finished ordering when she felt someone tap her shoulder. She whipped around, and there was Pauline with one of the boys from her school.

  ‘Congratulations!’ Pauline said, leaning down to kiss ­Vanessa on one cheek, then the other. ‘For making the first cut! All of you!’ She waved, and Justin and Geo waved back, but Svetya suddenly seemed fascinated by her menu.

  ‘Congratulations to you too,’ Vanessa said. ‘You’re in first place!’

  ‘For now,’ Pauline said, brushing some of her hair behind her ears. Again, Vanessa noticed the interesting pattern of freckles beneath Pauline’s left eye, and decided it only made her more beautiful. ‘Oh, how rude of me.’ Pauline turned to the boy at her side. ‘This is Jacques. We are going to be ­dancing the partner round together.’

  Jacques gave them a tiny nod.

  ‘Here,’ Justin said, scooting his chair closer to Vanessa. ‘Why don’t you sit with us? We just ordered.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Jacques said, taking a seat. ‘We would love to.’

  ‘Thrilling,’ Svetya muttered under her breath.

  Everyone made small talk, and Vanessa felt a sudden warmth as Justin gave her knee a squeeze. ‘Hi,’ he mouthed to her.

  ‘I can’t believe they take your head shot down immediately after you’re cut,’ Pauline said, resting an elbow on the table. ‘What is the rush? They could wait a few days.’

  ‘No, it is better this way,’ said Svetya. She pursed her lips. ‘They are losers.’

  Geo shook his head. ‘It wasn’t our talent that got us our ranking,’ he said, staring into his drink. ‘It was the mistakes of the others.’

  ‘I agree,’ Pauline said. ‘That one dancer from the British team didn’t even make it through his first few steps without stumbling.’

  ‘Some girls in the hallway were saying the main stage is cursed,’ Jacques said.

  Svetya crossed her arms. ‘It is not cursed. They just didn’t dance well.’

  ‘I felt something,’ said Geo, pushing his hair away from his eyes. ‘It was very odd. I walked out on to the stage and took my position. The floor felt fine then, but when I started dancing, it suddenly felt strange.’

  Beside him, Sveyta let out a laugh. ‘It is your legs. They are too long for your body.’

  Justin laughed, then turned to the others. ‘Well, at least there are fewer of us now,’ he said.

  ‘Oui,’ Pauline said, batting her long lashes. ‘And it is exciting to see our names in a press release!’

  ‘Press? Where?’ Svetya said.

  Pauline pulled out her iPhone and showed them all.

  ‘Ingrid’s still in the competition,’ Vanessa said softly. ‘She bumped into me after I finished my solo and said she was going to destroy me.’

  Jacques laughed. ‘Really?’ he said. ‘She said that?’ No one else seemed to find it funny.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ Justin asked.

  Vanessa fidgeted with the tablecloth. ‘I’m telling you now.’

  ‘Don’t let it bother you,’ Geo said. ‘Last year she told me she was going to put out my eyes with a fork and sell them on the black market.’

  ‘That’s frightening,’ Pauline said, putting her phone away. ‘But she wouldn’t really do something like that. She meant it like a metaphor, I’m sure. You know,’ she went on gently, ‘my grandmother had a saying: “Enemies can be turned into friends through generosity.” Perhaps with a little bit of kindness, Ingrid will surprise you. In the meantime, all you can do is be careful.’

  ‘Or stop dancing so well,’ Justin said.

  ‘Maybe it’s the demon,’ Jacques said with a grin.

  Vanessa could feel Justin’s muscles tighten beside her. ‘Excuse me?’ he said.

  ‘What?’ Jacques said, shrugging. ‘You’ve never heard of the dancing demon?’ He said it like it was a joke, something he’d made up on the spot.

  ‘No,’ Justin said. ‘I haven’t.’

  ‘It’s an old legend,’ Jacques explained. ‘Many dancers, especially those in our grandparents’ generation, believed that if you danced a very demanding ancient choreography, you would conjure a demon. It sounds silly, but people used to take it very seriously. To her dying day, there were certain ballets my grandmother would never watch because she was certain they were derived from old demonic rituals. Crazy, right?’

  Vanessa forced herself to laugh. ‘Yeah.’

  While the others joked about dancing demons and stuffed themselves as a reward for making it to the next round, Vanessa noticed an older woman clearing dishes by the bar. She had long greying hair and wore a flowing skirt that swished about her ankles, with an oversize sweater that hung loose around her thin frame. Vanessa wondered how long she’d worked here. Two years? Longer? Maybe she had seen ­Margaret come through Barre None, just like Vanessa and her friends.

  Vanessa wiped her mouth with a napkin and stood up. ‘I – excuse me.’

  She made her way through the restaurant towards the ­bathroom. Then, looking over her shoulder to make sure no one from her table was watching, she turned and walked over to the woman in the long skirt.

  Vanessa watched as the woman ran a rag around the rim of a glass.

  ‘You pay at the front,’ the woman said, barely looking up.

  ‘Actually, I wanted to ask you a question,’ Vanessa said. She took a tentative step forward. ‘Have you worked here for a long time?’

  The woman sighed. ‘Long enough,’ she said in an accent that fell somewhere between Cockney and upper class. ‘I own this place.’

  Vanessa hadn’t seen that coming.

  ‘You can call me Coppelia,’ the woman said, smiling warmly. Even though her face was weathered with age, ­Vanessa could tell that she had once been quite beautiful. She wore almost no make-up, with only the slightest hint of red on her lips, and her grey hair was tangled with strands of white, ­falling nearly to her waist. ‘It’s not my name,’ the woman continued, ‘but I’ve been called nothing else for twenty years.’

  Vanessa shook her hand, which was damp from the rag. ‘I’m Vanessa.’ She looked up at the wall of photographs, her gaze resting finally on Margaret’s face. ‘I just wanted to ask you about one of the dancers.’

  ‘That could take all night, dear. There are hundreds of them, and my memory isn’t what it was.’ She blinked, and studied Vanessa as though she were a painting. ‘Not like when I was your age, running around the Royal School of Ballet.’

  ‘You were a dancer?’ Vanessa asked. Nothing about the woman’s wild hair, long Bohemian skirt or the baubles she wore around her neck made her look like a ballerina. And yet, as ­Vanessa ­studied her, she noticed the way she held her chin up and her shoulders square: her dancer’s posture had never left her.

  Coppelia put her hands on her hips. ‘Well, don’t sound so startled, dear.’ She stacked a handful of glasses on the shelf behind her, then began to wipe down the countertop. ‘I was in the London Ballet for years,’ she said. ‘Until I was twenty-five. And I would have had a few more ahead of me, if it hadn’t been for La Sylphide.’ She frowned, as if the memory still bothered her. ‘Halfway through rehearsals, I stumbled on a landing and fractured my ankle. That was the end of that.’

  Vanessa thought back to all the times she’d faltered in a spin or rolled an ankle landing from a leap. ‘What did you do?’

  ‘I went to physical therapy and tried to get my rhythm ba
ck, but my ankle was never the same. Even now, it still hurts when I stand on tiptoe.’ Coppelia glanced at a photograph on the wall behind her, where a young woman stood at centre stage, her taut body pointed in a brisk pirouette. That was her, Vanessa realised.

  ‘After I stopped dancing, I took over my father’s restaurant.’ Coppelia ran her hands along the wooden bar. ‘You should have seen it before,’ she said with a chuckle. ‘It used to be called Right Said Fred, like the old Bernard Cribbins song, but I changed that and everything else, made the place my own.’ She motioned to the ballet paraphernalia on the walls. ‘If I can’t dance any more, I can at least surround myself with the things I love.’ She swept her hands forward to indicate ­Vanessa. ‘Including all the young dancers who come here. You remind me of better days.’

  Vanessa pointed to the photograph of the Royal Court ­Ballet Company. ‘This girl,’ she said, ‘her name is Margaret Adler. Do you know anything about her?’

  Coppelia squinted at the photograph. ‘No,’ she said. ‘Not Margaret, I’m sure of that.’ She stroked her chin. ‘She called herself Margot.’

  Margot? Vanessa’s mind raced. In Margaret’s bedroom back home, she’d hung a poster over her bed of Dame Margot ­Fonteyn balancing in a beautiful arabesque, a white tutu fanning out from her hips. Margaret had always adored her more than any other ballerina. ‘Oh, right,’ she said. ‘That was her stage name.’

  Coppelia studied Vanessa, a curious look on her face. ‘Your friends . . .’ she said.

  ‘What? No, we’re not friends,’ Vanessa said, and then ­realised the woman wasn’t talking about Margaret.

  Justin and Geo were waving to her from across the room. Geo dodged around a few tables and was suddenly right beside her.

  ‘Ready to go?’ he asked. ‘Svetya was hoping you had fallen into the toilet, and sent me to flush you away.’

  Vanessa turned her back to the photograph. ‘I’m sure she did.’

  ‘Don’t worry though,’ Geo said. ‘She’s just jealous of you.’

  Justin and the others were standing by the cash register, putting on their coats and scarves.