“That was not awful,” she offered.

Enrique paused, and she felt her face flaming, something inside her shrinking fast in embarrassment.

“But it could be so much better,” he said.

“How?”

She wanted to know. The next instant, she felt his warm hands sliding up her cheek. Zofia’s eyes were wide open in the dark, not that it let her see any clearer, but it felt important that, for what happened next, her eyes should stay open. She felt the space shift in front of her, the softest gust of warm air against her lips, and then—

Zofia was kissed.

Zofia understood the concept of heat. She knew that it was the result of atoms and molecules colliding, the motion of which generated energy. Warmth—not like a flare, but a slow, rising wave—swept up from her toes to her heart. And yes, there was energy in this … in being kissed and kissing back. She was a participant in the unseen particles spinning in an invisible choreography. Like a dance inside her bones. She leaned forward eagerly into the unexpected warmth of Enrique as her mind registered new sensations: the scratch of his unshaven cheek, his teeth on her lower lip, the wet heat as his mouth opened hers. It was not unpleasant. It was the very opposite, in fact. Enrique held her close, close enough that she could feel her heartbeat on his. And that was when she noticed it—or rather, the absence of it.

Hela’s letter was gone.

16

SÉVERIN

On the night of Carnevale, Séverin stroked the bruised violet bloom of a poisonous larkspur flower and waited.

Almost three years ago, Laila had made a feast of flowers as a special dessert for some prominent guests staying at L’Eden. It was late spring, and the city of Paris seemed like an irritable bride on her wedding day—sulky and sweating at a perceived lack of attention while blooming flowers shone like jewels on the city’s limbs.

Tristan had cleared a space in the gardens, and a Forging artist who specialized in textiles had constructed a silk tent that would keep in the cool air and later stir around the guests as if moved by a mild breeze. On a banquet table absent of any silverware, Laila was nearly finished arranging piles of golden dahlias, crimson roses, cloud-blue hydrangeas, and wreaths of honeysuckles. They looked eerily lifelike. On the rim of a cowslip, a single drop of dew seemed ready to slide down the petal.

And yet, even from where he stood at the head of the banquet table, Séverin could smell the marzipan and vanilla, cocoa and citrus beneath the artfully sculpted flowers. One bloom did not look as though it belonged. It was a long, blue larkspur, each violet petal streaked blue like the sky at twilight.

“You snuck a poisonous flower into the arrangement?” asked Séverin, pointing at it. “I doubt our guests will be brave enough to try it.”

“And what if I told them that it was the sweetest out of all these blooms … that underneath those deadly petals is a thick almond cream with a ripple of spiced plum down the middle?” said Laila, her eyes sparkling with slyness. “Surely such a taste is worth a brush with death, wouldn’t you say? Unless you are not quite as brave as I imagined.”