They’d taken two steps toward the floor when a large figure garbed in black and ruby appeared, blocking their path.
“How kind of you to fetch my partner for me,” he said, speaking directly to the jester. “I was just about to collect her for our dance.”
Maia was so surprised that she couldn’t speak, and apparently the jester was similarly afflicted, for he merely stared at the man for a moment. She blinked hard, for it almost seemed as if the man’s eyes had glowed red for an instant…but then the impression was gone. Then, without another word, the jester bowed, turned and walked away—almost as if he’d been hypnotized.
“Your majesty,” said the new arrival, offering her an arm. “Shall we?”
She looked up at him, trying to see behind the mask and to read his eyes, to determine whether she recognized him. There was an aura of familiarity about the man, and for the flash of a moment when she took his arm and felt a little jolt of awareness, she wondered if it might be Alexander. It would be just like him to surprise her thus.
But she quickly revised that thought, tucking it away as wishful thinking. She’d forgotten for a moment her added height; this man was too tall to be her fiancé. His eyes were shadowed by the holes in his mask, which was unrelieved black and left only the very bottom of his face exposed. He wore a dark cloak, and beneath it a waistcoat of bloodred and black, with a brilliant red neckcloth that all but obscured his white shirt. A thumbnail-size ruby in the shape of a diamond studded the center of his neckcloth. She realized he was the tall figure who’d attracted her attention when she was dancing.
“Who are you?” she asked, looping up the extra length of the panels of her skirt into her hand.
He steadied her as they reached the floor and instead of turning her to face him, he shifted to come around to the front of her. “The Knave of Diamonds,” he said, lifting her right hand in his gloved one and settling his other one lightly on her waist.
Although the country dances often required a touch at the hip or waist, and arms linking with arms, the position of the waltz was so different, so intimate, because it wasn’t a passing position. And as she rested her gloved fingers on his shoulder, felt his fingers close around hers, and the burning weight of his hand at her waist, Maia felt warm, and a little dizzy.
He hesitated a moment before stepping into the dance, and she allowed him to direct her as they moved forward. The first few steps were stilted, as if he had to discover or learn the rhythm, and even then, they didn’t spin and whirl with the same smooth alacrity as some of the other dancers. For some reason, she liked the fact that he wasn’t so very practiced at the waltz.
Nevertheless, Maia felt as if she floated on a cloud, held steady by the firm grip on her hand and waist. Even with the tall shoes and the unfamiliar three-beat step, she hardly stumbled at all.
She glanced up at him to find her partner looking out over her shoulder, as if scanning the room. This gave her the chance to examine what little of his countenance was exposed by the mask; namely, the shape of his chin and the formation of his mouth. Even his ears and hair were covered by a black tricorn, and the collar of his cloak came up to shadow his neck and the edge of his jaw.
“Hatshepsut, I presume,” he said, glancing down at her as they began their second turn about the floor, still relatively slowly and carefully. “An exceedingly original choice of costume, despite the fact that she dressed as a man on many occasions.” His voice was low, hardly more than discernible to her over the sounds of conversation and music.
“Baring my lower appendages would not have been appropriate, even in the spirit of accurate costuming. But you are correct,” she said, keeping her own tones pitched low in hopes of disguising her identity. Although her partner definitely wasn’t Alexander, she also sensed that he was someone she knew. “I am Hatshepsut. Everyone else thinks that I’m Cleopatra.”
“Fools, all of them. Where is the asp if you are meant to be Cleopatra?”
His comment surprised a little laugh from her, and she saw his lips move, relaxing into fullness from their hard, serious line from a moment ago.
“But of course, no one truly knows what Hatshepsut looks like,” she admitted. “Or if she was anything more than a queen regent.”
“Indeed. But we expect to learn more if the stele from Rosetta is ever translated.”
“One can only hope! Until we can read hieroglyphs, there will be holes and blank spots in our knowledge.”
“I find it remarkable that you are even aware of Hatshepsut’s existence, let alone such details about her questionable reign,” he said after negotiating a particularly tight turn that made her a bit dizzy. “As well as the importance of the Rosetta Stone.”
Emboldened by her continued anonymity…and perhaps by the champagne punch…Maia launched into a candid speech that she would never have imposed on a gentleman under different circumstances. They preferred to talk on their own topics, not that of their partners. “I’ve indulged my fascination with Egyptian history for many years now. It started when I read my brother’s copy of Biblioteca Historica in order to help him with his Greek. Ask me about the Babylonians or the Indians, and I know little about them. But if one reads Herodotus or Diodorus, for example, there is much to be learned about the Egyptians. And now that more antiquities are being shipped back from Egypt, I can actually see them in the Museum. That makes it all the more real.”
“You assisted your brother with his Greek?” Was there a note of humor in the knave’s voice?
“I didn’t like it any better than he did, but I was determined…” Maia’s voice trailed off as she realized how she’d been babbling. She bit her lower lip and swallowed. One of the things that had put off some of her early suitors had been her tendency to lecture and overexplain. Not that the knave was a suitor, of course, but she well knew that gentlemen did not like women who talked. Alexander was an exception, and he had indulged her interest in Egyptology by taking her to the British Museum on two different occasions.
Of course, he didn’t have the foggiest idea who Hatshepsut or even Rameses III were, but that didn’t bother Maia.
“Very interesting.” The knave seemed to stop whatever else was about to come out of his mouth and clamped his lips together.
As she looked up at him, Maia realized suddenly that when one was confronted by a masked individual, one’s attention tended to focus on the parts that were exposed—in this case, his mouth. And she found those lips to be more fascinating than they really should be, tracing their shape with her eyes, memorizing them. Wondering what it would be like to kiss them, for they seemed soft and full and very mobile.
“Careful,” he said suddenly, his hands tightening on her, and Maia realized she’d become somewhat dizzy. The room had a bit more spin than the dance steps warranted, and she clutched the top of his arm, her face warm beneath her own mask, her heart suddenly slamming in her chest.
Oh. Maia blinked and focused on something over his shoulder—anything to turn her mind from the sudden, unexpected thoughts about his mouth. She couldn’t remember feeling this odd before.
“How many glasses of champagne punch, Hatshepsut?”
Her attention flew back to him and his gaze fixed on hers, shadowed and dark behind small round eyeholes. His intense regard knocked the breath out of her as if she’d been punched. Or perhaps it was the champagne punch that made her feel breathless and warm and loose.
“I’m not tipsy,” she retorted, forgetting to keep her voice low.
Those lips quirked into something that might have been an almost-smile, and he replied, “Naturally. Perhaps some air would be in order?”
She suspected that he didn’t believe her; and in all fairness, she wasn’t certain whether to believe herself. She was feeling rather odd, in a pleasant, tingly sort of way. “Perhaps it would be best, though I am loath to cut short my rare opportunity to waltz.”
Without another word, he drew her from the dance floor, managing them through the other swirling partners. Oddly enough, once removed from the smooth rhythm of the waltz, Maia felt even warmer and lighter in the head, and she actually bumped against him in mortifying clumsiness. He tightened his arm and led her away from the crowd, where she was able to draw in cooler, cleaner air devoid of attar of roses—which seemed to once again be this Season’s favored scent, as well as every other of the last years since she’d been out.
Maia’s heart hadn’t ceased its heavy pounding, and in fact seemed to increase as the Knave of Diamonds directed them away from the loud, close ballroom. Toward an alcove down one of the corridors, near which an open window offered a waft of breeze.
Perhaps it was because there was no other competition for her attention, for she was away from the music filling her ears, the mishmash of the smells associated with such a crush, and the need to concentrate on the unfamiliar dance steps…that Maia found herself overly aware of the strong arm to which she found herself clinging.
Literally clinging.
How many glasses of champagne punch had she had? There’d been one before the court jester…or perhaps two? And then another—
“I do hope you aren’t about to cast up your accounts on my waistcoat, your majesty,” he said, easing her away from him a bit, even as he steadied her step. Those high-soled shoes were rather an inconvenience.
“I beg your pardon?” she demanded, suddenly indignant. “Of course I shouldn’t do such a thing.”
No, indeed not. She simply would not allow it to happen, no matter how odd she felt. And she did feel a bit odd.
She blinked hard, realizing that she, the very proper Miss Maia Woodmore, was using the Knave of Diamonds to keep the floor from tilting and, quite possibly, her knees from buckling.
Pulling away from the knave, she found that she was able to stand on her own, even on the platformlike shoes that put her face just…a bit…below…his.
Maia looked up from the brocade waistcoat and the ruby-studded, bloodred neckcloth that was much too close to her face, willing herself to focus on the matter at hand—which was…well, she wasn’t certain. They hadn’t been conversing, exactly, had they?