Princess Nymeria's Arc

Chapter 17 of 32

Inside, the ballroom glowed with candlelight. Pale stone arches rose over a floor of polished tile. Nymeria stepped through the doors and stopped. A hundred faces turned toward her. Men in coats and princes in fine collars watched her cross the room. She smoothed her black skirt and reminded herself why she came. Somewhere in this crowd stood a heart that might love her without her charm. She just had no way to know whose. "Come on," Lyra said, tugging her arm. The elf grinned. "If we're going to suffer, we suffer dancing." She pulled Nymeria into a spin. They moved through one song, laughing, and for a moment the crowd fell away. Then Lyra spotted the long table of food along the wall. She bowed low, mocking a courtly gesture. "Duty calls. I answer to cake." She left Nymeria at the floor's edge and made for the plates. A man stepped forward at once. He bowed and asked to dance. Nymeria took his hand. He held her stiffly and stared at her face the whole song. He said nothing. When it ended he bowed and drifted off. Another man took his place before she could breathe. He asked the same question in the same flat voice. He too said nothing, only watched her with wide, glazed eyes. Song after song, the men came. Each one duller than the last. Each one struck silent, gripping her hand, unable to speak a full sentence. She tried to ask them questions. She asked one his name. He only smiled and swayed. She asked another what he loved. He blinked as if the words meant nothing. They did not want her. They wanted the pull of the charm. She could feel it working on them, though she never meant to loose it. Her chest tightened. This was the very thing she feared. She had come to find a person who saw her, not the magic. Instead she held a line of empty men who could not even talk. Hope drained out of her with each turn of the floor. She pulled her hand from the latest suitor and stepped back. "I need air," she said. She left him standing there and crossed to the food table. Lyra looked up, cheek full. "Told you," the elf said. "Drooling. All charm, no wit." "They can't speak," Nymeria said. Her voice shook. "Not one of them. The charm takes their words. I'll never find truth this way." Nymeria was vulnerable it is why she had no control over her charm like she usually did, she needed to calm herself. Lyra set down her plate. She studied her friend, and the joke fell from her face. "Then stop looking at the men who can't fight it," she said. "Look for the one who can." Nymeria went still. Lyra was right. Every man on that floor had failed the same way. The only worth finding was the one her charm could not touch. She turned from the crowd and scanned the room for a face that was not staring. She needed to find him. Now she knew what she was looking for.