APIBAGS Chapter 76

The great hall of the Lion Palace fell still.

Every voice in the room died at once.

Her hair, like unspooled silver thread, rippled and swept through the hall as she moved, and the gathered light seemed to fold itself into her—all brightness concentrated in one place; the dress she wore caught every ray and reflected back in brilliant flashes, gold thread and ornament flickering with each step until the room's own lavish colors seemed to pale and withdraw.

The presence of the white woman was so vivid, so sharply singular, that it stole the eye and left it helpless. The banquet hall's elaborate palette—all its crimson and gold and the bright shoulders of the assembled nobility—went to gray beside her.

"…Evangeline Rohanson? The rumors didn't lie. A monster, nothing more, nothing less."

If the word monster named what lay at such a vertiginous remove from human common sense—what no amount of reason could contain or account for—then Evangeline Rohanson was the one who stood at its absolute pinnacle.

Her appearance was wretchedly, oppressively abstract that calling it the work of a god seemed suspect. To say a god had made it with affection, there was a distinct lack of warmth. Rather, it was closer to a sculpture—an artifact that had been crafted by a profane being that had spent a thousand years counterfeiting divine power, rendering even the outermost layer of skin in painstaking detail. That a sculpture should live, breathe, move, and spit out words made its mere existence a blasphemy, an insolence, a symbol of arrogance itself.

The smile too—perfected through hundreds of rehearsals, selected as the most ideal iteration, and deployed. Flawless. Fluid. Precisely because of this, it was impossible to regard her as the same order of thing as the people around her.

Arrogant red eyes swept across the interior of the Lion Palace.

Those whose gaze met hers tucked their tails and held their breath, as if a predator had planted itself right at the tips of their noses. Running short of air, hiccups broke loose here and there. It felt as though their throats would be bitten by sharp teeth at any moment, cutting off their breath completely—every instinct said run.

Evangeline Rohanson greeted her father, Count Rohanson, with a holy knight at her side—their coloring the precise inverse of hers. The whole effect produced a faint, inexplicable wrongness: a shape jammed into the wrong mold. From the outside, she appeared a flawless young noblewoman in every particular, and yet the subtle dissonance persisted.

Even the bow she offered the Crown Prince was faultless—textbook-perfect, each movement pre-programmed, each gesture playing out exactly as imbued—a clockwork doll running down its spring.

"But why would Lady Toten take on the chaperoning for someone like..."

"Her son, perhaps? There's been talk of some kind of story there..."

Kinder Toten stood at Evangeline's side in her role as chaperone and endured the glances and whispers without giving them any acknowledgment.

It was no exaggeration to say that every eye in the hall had converged on this single point. When something that doesn't quite belong appears among a crowd of the same kind, instinct draws the gaze toward it.

The fear of the woman from House Rohanson was not limited to commoners. The Crown Prince was the clearest example—he had gone rigid, straining visibly against being crushed flat by the weight of her presence, clinging to the appearance of composure by his fingernails. He'd received it as a gift and was too terrified to so much as draw it. The Imperial Grandson and his company fared somewhat better.

"Please enjoy the evening."

With the Crown Prince's final words, Evangeline descended from the dais.

It was, technically, a début—though not a formal one. She had attended on the Crown Prince's invitation, using that as a workaround, so there was nothing quite like a formal presentation ceremony. She was not alone in this; a fair number of the other young noblewomen circulating the hall were operating by the same method, several of them wearing the small flower that marked a débutante.

Kinder found herself touching the crystal flower at her own collar—not quite aware she was doing it—as she explained the evening's program to Evangeline.

"The formal festivities will begin after His Imperial Highness the Crown Prince performs the opening dance. Until then, it's customary to circulate and make introductions—exchange greetings with the other guests."

These were things a chaperone should have explained well in advance. But Kinder had spent the last five days entirely at Ryder's side, and there had been no room for any of it.

The thought of her son—gone so pitifully—surfaced without warning, and the tears nearly came with it. She crushed it desperately. Erased it. To honor Ryder's dying wish, she could not let anyone know that the child was gone. She had to remain composed. She had to look as though nothing had happened at all.

When she finished explaining, Kinder glanced toward Gabriel.

"Shall we focus our introductions on the names from Sir Gabriel's list? Is that enough to satisfy what he was hoping for?"

"Yes. That should be sufficient."

When Gabriel had asked Kinder to take on the chaperone role, he had included a list of nobles and prominent figures along with the request—asking that she introduce Evangeline to each of them. As it happened, every person on the list was someone who attended the Grand Temple with some regularity, which meant Kinder already knew them.

They were moving toward the largest cluster of names on the list when a knight appeared at Gabriel's elbow, looking around before approaching.

"Commander! Sir Muzeta says he's found something unusual—and that you specifically need to come and look at it."

"That I need to come personally?"

"He was very insistent that I bring you directly, sir."

Gabriel looked at Evangeline with an expression that said he'd rather not leave. Under any other circumstances, he would have stayed. But the man summoning him was Sir Muzeta, the Crown Prince's personal guard.

"Lady Rohanson." He was careful about it. "Would it be all right if I stepped away briefly?"

To Kinder, he looked exactly like someone waiting outside a door for the owner to let him in.

"Yes. Please do."

"I'll return before the first dance begins."

Gabriel received her permission, and then—with the precise gravity of someone handling something rare—pressed his lips to the white-gloved tips of Evangeline's fingers. A holy knight pledging his return to something profane—and then moving briskly toward the Crown Prince's guard. Evangeline watched him go, and as soon as he disappeared, turned to Kinder as though she'd been waiting for exactly that moment.

"Lady Toten. May I ask one more thing of you?"

"Of course. Whatever you need."

Evangeline's fierce expression softened a fraction at that unconditional compliance. Kinder understood, watching the comparatively mild reaction arrive immediately in response to submission, why a distinguished holy knight had been reduced to playing page-boy for the Rohanson young lady. The privilege of being placed on the favored side of her discriminations was something Kinder realized she would readily embrace.

"Do you remember what I said to you?"

"Which time?"

When would that be? The day Evangeline first came to the Toten estate? That had been such a shock that everything she'd said was still carved into Kinder's memory with perfect clarity. She nodded, and Evangeline continued.

"I would very much like to speak with my grandfather. Would you help me arrange it?"

It was true that Evangeline had raised the subject of the Duke of Hosaquin—but hadn't that been a convenient fiction, a way of manufacturing an excuse?

"Duke Hosaquin?"

"Yes. We're blood, and to be on such strained terms feels like such a waste."

The words landed with such brazen ease that Kinder's arms went cold—she rubbed them absently. This, despite owing the woman a debt she could never fully repay.

Kinder had watched with her own eyes as Ryder's body came back to life. And she had understood—the way she'd understood with Ryder too—that the person looking out from behind those red eyes was not the Evangeline Rohanson who had died. That the contents inside that dead hide were something other than before. Which was precisely why watching it perform the role of family so effortlessly made her skin crawl.

And yet she could not refuse.

"Duke Hosaquin has a well-known reputation for having cut ties with the late Countess. He may not agree to speak at any length—he may not speak at all. But if it's what you wish, I'll try."

"That's enough."

Kinder kept one eye on Duke Hosaquin as she worked out the timing, and in the meantime turned her attention to Gabriel's list. The largest gathering of the names he'd given her was just over—

She made her decision and moved.

People tensed at their approach, eyes going sharp—then softened immediately when they recognized Kinder, anticipation warming their faces.

"Lady Toten! It's been so long since we've seen you out! How is Ryder doing? You've never breathed a word about this arrangement—have you been acquainted with Lady Rohanson for some time? You must introduce us!"

"I would have told everyone sooner, but Sir Gabriel asked it of me quite suddenly. Allow me to introduce you—Lady Rohanson."

The admiring looks, the restrained excitement, the carefully managed caution—among all these, the people whose names appeared on Gabriel's list alone showed a distinctly different kind of reaction.

"I'm delighted to meet you. Evangeline Rohanson."

The voice arrived like something heard on the border of sleep. Viscount and Viscountess Uvalla. Lady Taphoni. The merchant Glacia Lake. The four names from the list stared at Evangeline as though still suspended in that half-dreaming state.

"You're all looking at me so intently. I'm almost embarrassed."

Evangeline curved the line of her eyes—no warmth in it—and the room understood. There was a scramble of apologies, and then the flattery began to flow in earnest. Whatever they might say about her elsewhere, no one was going to risk her displeasure to her face—not many, at any rate.

Conversation moved smoothly despite having no particular subject. Half a dozen people devoting their full energy to producing material for a single audience had something theatrical about it. When the topics began to thin, Evangeline spoke up.

"Lady Toten. Wasn't there someone you mentioned you'd like to introduce me to—someone in particular?"

Time to move on. Kinder read it clearly and joined in without missing a beat.

"You're right, I'd completely lost track of it in all the conversation. I do apologize for pulling away so abruptly—please enjoy the rest of your evening."

Those left behind watched the white hem recede and exhaled in a collective sigh.

"Have I been dreaming?"

The four from the list—who had been drifting through their days for weeks, strangely blank and without energy—seemed suddenly, improbably, vivid. Present in a way they hadn't been.

"Lady Taphoni—you've seemed so distracted lately. It's good to see you looking more yourself."

"Distracted? Was I really?"

"Last week you spilled your tea—all of it—and didn't react at all. It was boiling—"

"...Me?"

Lady Taphoni looked genuinely startled, pressing a hand over her mouth as though the news concerned someone else entirely. There were faint burn scars on the back of her hand.

Round after round they circulated, Kinder managing the introductions, until after five passes Evangeline called a pause.

"Shall we rest for a moment? Your public esteem is something else, Lady Toten. At this rate, you'll have no stamina left before the night is out."