"The glass slipper fits only if you sever the heel, Baroness," Stanislaw said across the gilded railing of the Grand Conservatory. He stood half-turned, ostensibly watching the orchestra adjust their brass horns below. Janna adjusted her emerald domino mask, leaning her bare forearms on the chilled white marble. "A crude metaphor for a man fond of fine tailoring, Inquisitor. Try: the siphon taps eastward at forty paces. Look behind the potted myrtles." Below them, through the press of satin capes, silver feathers, and heavy perfumes, Irena Rostova stood beside an obelisk of carved malachite. She was dressed as an autumn nymph, rust velvet clinging to her broad shoulders, but her conversation was distinctly unpoetic. She leaned in toward a hulking man wearing the leather mask of an ox—Bojan Varga, the river basin’s most notorious contrabandist. "She is handing him a brass token," Stanislaw noted, his voice flat and low. "The mark of the North Quay tollhouse. My men have checked that warehouse four times and found dry wood." "Because your men look under floorboards instead of studying the pressure lines in the masonry," Janna murmured, tapping her ivory fan against the balustrade. "Three taps means the wind shifts north. Two means hold your position. And if my valet gets us all hanged before the first gavotte, consider my cooperation terminated." Across the mezzanine, Feliks was drowning in silk. Tasked with dropping a false manifest of illicit condenser coils into the coat pocket of Count Malewicz—Irena’s pet investor—Feliks had chosen an ensemble of iridescent violet taffeta, topped by a plum-colored plumed tricorn. The problem was not the disguise; the problem was that Count Malewicz was currently trapped three salons over, while Feliks had been cornered by four dowagers and a clutching poetess. "Master Milosz! It *is* you!" Lady Bronka chirped, catching Feliks by his ruffled sleeve. "Only the exiled bard of the Upper Tarn could wear such exquisite plum! Recite the third canto of *The Dying Swan*! Please!" Feliks froze, eyes darting toward Janna across the vast drop of the ballroom. His panic was a visible tremor through his plumes. He cleared his throat with the force of a dry choke. "The... the swan, she swam," Feliks declared loudly, pitching his voice into a tragic vibrato. "Upon the... rather damp river! Her feathers were white, except when they were not! Oh, woe, the river was wet!" Lady Bronka gasped, clutching her pearls. "So modernist! Such stark economy of phrasing!" "The bird died!" Feliks added frantically, bowing deeply and using the motion to flick the folded parchment into an open reticule hanging from an adjoining table. "Because it ceased living! I must weep into the punch bowl! Excuse me, ladies!" He bolted toward the pillars with the grace of an alarmed pheasant. Janna smothered a laugh behind her fan. "Remind me to double his wage if we survive tonight. Or fire him out of a mortar." "He completed the drop," Stanislaw remarked, though the corner of his mouth ticked upward beneath the curve of his iron half-mask. "Though Malewicz's wife now possesses evidence of high treason instead of the count himself. The scandal will be twice as vicious. I call that an operational improvement." "You are ruthless, Czaja." "I am thorough, Borowicz." He turned fully toward her, offering a gloved palm. "The music begins. Dance with me, or we become an anomaly on the balcony." Janna placed her fingers in his. Even through suede and silk, the grip was firm, anchoring her against the swirl of masks and glittering chandeliers. They descended into the swirl of the floor just as the violins took up a driving, triple-time waltz. The tempo was relentless. Stanislaw pulled her into the promenade, his hand settling against the curve of her waist with decisive authority. He moved not with courtly effrontery, but with the ruthless economy of a swordsman who knew every angle of momentum. "You track her flank," Janna said, taking a shorter stride as he spun her past a pair of laughing revelers. "I’ll watch Varga." "Varga has taken the bait," Stanislaw answered, bringing her flush against his chest to avoid an oncoming couple. His voice dropped into the hollow of her collarbone. "My sergeants are closing the outer arcade. But you are leaning right. Keep your balance on the balls of your feet." "I am mapping the hall, not auditing my posture, Inquisitor." "Do both. An unpoised villainess invites questions." He swung her around in a wide arc. For two beats, the noise of the room faded into the hum of grease paint and candle wax. The rim of his iron mask grazed the edge of her emerald feathers. His dark gaze held hers, steady and clinical, measuring the cartographer beneath the paint. There was no mockery in his posture now—only an acute, terrifying focus that made the skin along her throat prickle with warmth. "You handle yourself too well in high water, Janna," he said softly against her ear, the turn pressing them together until the stiff silver threads of his doublet scraped her bodice. "It makes a man wonder what else you have charted in secret." "Things that would break your balance," she retorted, looking directly into his pupils. Her chin remained lifted, matching his stride beat for beat. "Keep your hands steady. Rostova is moving toward the doors." "She won't reach the street," he said, but his fingers tightened on her waist just a fraction, a quiet, possessive friction that had nothing to do with imperial law. Then the music faltered into a discordant scrape. A few paces away, Zoria Rostova stood frozen beside the refreshment buffet, a spun-sugar confection in one hand and her painted mask dangling from two fingers. Her eyes had caught the flash of gold upon Stanislaw’s left hand as he shifted Janna through the turn—an engraved raptor gripping a broken compass, the unmistakable signet of the High Inquisitor's bloodline. Zoria’s gaze snapped from the ring to Stanislaw’s dark hair, then locked onto Janna’s emerald silk. Her mouth fell slack, the spun sugar snapping between her fingers. "Mother!" Zoria's shriek cut through the chime of crystal glasses. Irena turned from the foyer archway. The matriarch followed the line of her daughter's outstretched hand. She saw Stanislaw Czaja holding the waist of the infamous Baroness Volkov. She saw the familiar, sharp tilt of Janna's head—the mocking, icy composure that did not belong to a terrified exile or a flighty noblewoman, but to the girl she had systematically ruined and cast out. Irena’s mask came off in one brutal jerk of her wrist, her features hardening into pure, venomous fury.

The Unmasking Ball