Page 84 of The Duke
The Wroth bastard passed by at last. Celine continued to greet the guests with an ease and charm that seemed totally unaffected. Kate attempted to match her. Royce stayed as well, keeping an unobtrusive gaze on the ballroom, with one arm inside her coat, where Kate suspected shedidhave a weapon.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
With the long task of receiving guests completed, Kate looked forward to finding a drink and hopefully never having to make conversation with a debutante again. Not so for Celine. For Celine, it seemed it had only been the beginning.
She entered the ballroom like a charming, exquisitely mannered typhoon, resuming conversations that had begun in the reception line and greeting brand-new acquaintances with disarming warmth. She enquired after children, made sensible comments about the cost of bread, and encouraged—then expertly de-escalated—a game of double entendre with the playwright Mr. Sheridan, whose job it was to be entertaining. It had been about ten minutes, and they were barely past the doorway.
Celine’s dance card was full.
Only Kate knew her well enough to see the fevered edge behind her energy, like a child trying to taste every sweet in the shop before Nanny came to pull her out by the ear. Propriety no longer required Kate stay by her. A number of matrons were politely jostling to take her off Kate’s hands. But still she stuck by Celine like the lovelorn swain she was, with no sign Celine either was aware of or appreciated her presence.
As Celine was leaving one conversation, but before she had started the next, Kate got a hand around her upper arm, and then they were in a quiet, out-of-the-way spot beside a tall potted fern. Finally, the pressure in her seemed to ease; she had Celine to herself. Now there was no one else to take Celine’s focus away. Now Celine would have to acknowledge her.
Celine politely disengaged her arm at the earliest opportunity and made to return to the floor.
Kate frowned and said, more angrily than she meant to, “Slow down. You have the rest of your life to enjoy it. This is your world now.”
Celine shivered and looked up. Kate realised she was crowding Celine against the wall, bullying her. And still Celine’s eyes met Kate’s only for a moment, then her dark lashes swept down. “It is wonderful. Just like a dream.”
She felt a thrum of foreboding at the echo of the Wroth bastard’s phrase.Will it melt away at first light, as though it were a dream?She wanted to take Celine’s face in her hands, here in front of everyone, and make Celine look her in the eye. She wanted to shake her.
Instead, she looked down and saw she had taken some of the fantastical material of Celine’s dress between her fingers. Subtly, she used her hold to pull Celine closer.
“It is yours,” she repeated, low, “and it is real.”
“Yes,” Celine said, turning her face away. “Mine for the taking.”
She didn’t know if Celine meant it as a reprimand, but she felt the shameful sting of the words.Mine for the taking.She let go of Celine’s dress. And still all she could think of was picking Celine up and carrying her away.
“Lord Seaton is beckoning me over for the minuet,” Celine said, and ducked out under her arm. “Please excuse me.”
“But Celine, I—”
Celine glanced over her shoulder and half smiled. “You should dance with one of them,” Celine said. “It would only be sporting.”
She had no idea who Celine meant.
But before Kate could ask her, or think of a way to keep her, Celine made her graceful escape. She walked away from Kate with a sway that sent her skirts into motion and made her body and soul seem in absolute agreement. As she moved farther into the room, she seemed to draw more and more of the light to herself.
It was this effect that made Kate understand for the first timewhat the material of Celine’s dress could do. She saw more than one person turn unconsciously towards Celine and then start as though coming to, gaping. By the time Celine entered the dance floor, almost half the room must have been watching her.
Or maybe it was Kate’s intense awareness of her that made it feel that way.
Celine stopped suddenly and turned a half circle. It seemed that no matter what Kate said, Celine couldn’t believe this world was hers. She stood at the centre of it and took everything in like the memory was going to have to last her a lifetime. She stood at the centre of the world andshone.
Ten thousand lights was not exaggeration.
And beneath them all stood Celine in a gown whose shoulders and low neckline were stitched with diamonds, and whose full skirts were scattered with petals of mirrors and silver, ten thousand of them, glittering bright. It had been sewn with an artistry Kate had no power to comprehend in this moment. All her intellect, her entire being was bent to the single task of taking Celine in.
She looked like every cracked mirror had been made whole in her person.
She looked like she was made of light.
“Go after her,” Royce muttered. She had sauntered over from somewhere, drink in hand. Kate didn’t spare her a glance.
From the other side of the room, Lord Burnley had begun to make his way towards Celine, not content to wait any longer. The violence Kate had felt on first seeing him was nothing to what she felt now, watching him claim what was hers.
Go after her, her heart said.
