"What do you want?" I asked, pulling my arms close as a young man dashed past to catch a thrown cake. Ferdinand dropped one of my hands but held the other between us.
"You looked lonely," he said. "I didn't want you for anything, I just thought you might like to join us."
"Just give it up, Ferdinand," Gertrude said. "She thinks she's too good for us. Our parties don't interest her."
Everyone froze, watching us closely. I felt like running back to Mr. Lennox, but I knew it would only make Gertrude's point. So instead, I looked her back directly in the eye and frowned. "That's not true."
"You wouldn't even come to welcome Ferdinand into the company," she said. Then to Ferdinand, "It's a lost cause."
"I was injured. Mr. Lennox sent me home," I said, looking to Ferdinand in a hope that he might believe me and not assume, like all the others, that I had merely sneaked off to avoid him.
"It's okay, Nadia," he said. "You hurt your ankle. It wasn't your fault."
Gertrude, obviously still unimpressed, turned her attention to one of her friends. With her went the hostile mood, and everyone slowly began to resume their activities. Ferdinand reached behind a boy and girl failing miserably at a waltz, and fetched a glass of champagne.
"Thirsty?" he asked, holding it out to me.
I shook my head. "No, I'm fine." The condensation of the glass dripped onto my dress. Ferdinand pulled it back and began to sip from it himself. We lapsed into silence.
Our hands still hung joined between us, but I thought for certain he would pull away as soon as he could. My company was not exactly the most captivating. With Mr. Lennox, I had grown into our own language after years sharing the same spaces. Talking was not required. We simply moved through our routines, and should something change, the other seemed to almost sense it and shift to accommodate. Here, though, with a boy my own age and the girls I'd known most of my life, I drew a blank on how to act. With seamless grace they managed to create spectacle and fun with every move. I stood hopelessly mute.
From over my shoulder I heard a commotion, but didn't think anything of it until a cold cascade of water ran down the front and side of my dress. The girls began to laugh as I shrunk away, spinning to see one of the boys sheepishly helping up a waiter. A tray of drinks lay scattered on the ground, their champagne sinking into the carpet and my shoes. Ferdinand glared at the boy as he snatched a napkin from the table and pushed it into my hand. As I dabbed at my bodice, the orchestra began a new song with a lively tune. The girls all began to yell and scramble to find partners, jostling me back and forth between them. Ferdinand, forced away from me by the laughing crowd, tried to grab my hand, but as I reached for him someone's elbow landed on my jaw. Lights flashed in my vision and I stumbled backward.
"Nadia!" Ferdinand appeared at my side, cupping my back and leading me away from the throng. I nodded my head, feeling along my jaw until the pain throbbed in a particular spot. Hopefully it wouldn't bruise, otherwise I would have to wear extra makeup to any performances.
"Come on, let's get somewhere quieter," Ferdinand said.
We walked to a door that stood closed against one of the walls. On the other side was a hallway, too grand to be for servants, but not grand enough to be one that guests normally walked through. The silence it afforded felt like a miracle, and I slumped against the wall with my eyes closed and breathed in the fresh air not tainted with so many bodies.
"I think perhaps mixing the girls with noble boys was not the best idea," I gasped.
Ferdinand snorted, and I cracked an eye open to catch him grinning. I smiled back, resting my forehead in my hand and shaking my head.
"Lennox thinks keeping them isolated is going to help them dance, but instead even the sight of a mustache drives them to hysterics," he said.
"If any of those boys asked Gertrude to marry them, she'd do it in a heartbeat," I said, my smile dying. "They're so lonely."
Ferdinand leaned next to me on the wall, crossing his arms over his chest. "I noticed. The Lennox Company is very cold."
A fierce need to protect Mr. Lennox and his ways heated my stomach. "It gets results. How would we dance these roles if we were thinking of ourselves or some silly boy waiting for us? How can you be Time or Death or Humanity if you are still Nadia or Gertrude?"
Ferdinand's eyebrows drew together. "You can be Nadia and still dance your part to perfection."
"No, I can't," I replied, tightening my jaw and fighting the urge to stomp away from him.
He sighed. "Let's not fight. You were just knocked in the head and soaked with champagne. I feel bad arguing with you after all that."
"Fine."
Silence grew between us until Ferdinand spoke. "Where did you learn to dance? Sometimes I wonder if you weren't born able to pirouette, since I can't imagine anyone teaching you such grace."
"I took lessons when I was a child," I replied. I could have stopped there, and it would have been a perfectly true and perfectly safe answer to his question. Yet as he watched me, I felt something welling from inside, pushing the rest of the story to the surface. "That was when I was with my family. It was... It was when my mother came to fetch me that the Vigilant Men riots began. I lost her in the panic. Mr. Lennox found me and kept me safe. He's the one who taught me how to really dance. Everything I know comes from him."
"I'm sorry," he said. "Many of my father's friends died in those riots. I can't imagine what you must have gone through, being lost in them."
I shrugged. "It was many years ago. I try to think of the present."
Ferdinand pushed away from the wall and stepped in front of me. He offered his hand and I took it slowly, unsure what he meant to do. Palm-to-palm, he pulled me toward him and rested his other hand on my back. We began to move slowly to what little of the waltz music we could hear through the door. I struggled to keep up, staring at his feet to try and figure out the moves.
Once I had more-or-less the hang of it, I glanced up at his blue eyes staring down at me. "I've told you where I learned to dance, so now it's your turn to share," I said.
"A tutor from age three to seven," he replied promptly. "I was a bloody handful and my mother just wanted something to get the energy out of me. It was only to last until I went to boarding school, but I found I rather enjoyed dancing and I begged her to let me continue. I joined the Rumonin National's school when I was thirteen, and I've been learning there up until now."
"Quite the dance education," I said.
His smile was lopsided. "Still not as good at it as you are."
"You're a gorgeous dancer," I protested. He raised his eyebrow. "Really. I can see why you shot to stardom so fast. There's this energy inside of you. Like that feeling you get when you try not to cry. Your movements are heartfelt."
He tried to laugh it off, but I saw the flustered look in his eyes. Our waltz faltered and we stopped, arms still in position.
"Nadia-" Before Ferdinand could finish, the door flew open behind us. My back was to it, but from Ferdinand's face I could tell it wasn't just a random partygoer stumbling drunkenly past.
Slowly I turned to see Mr. Lennox standing framed by the door. His hand rested on his raven-topped cane and his other still held the doorknob. A tingling burble of panic rested at the base of my spine and I quickly withdrew my hands from Ferdinand and wiped them down my skirt before hiding them behind my back. Mr. Lennox's eyes flicked back and forth between us, his jaw working.
"What are you doing back here, Nadia?" he asked. Though his voice was even and calm, I could feel that hidden undercurrent beneath.
"There was an accident and I brought her here to catch her breath," Ferdinand offered. Mr. Lennox silenced him with a glare, and reached over to take my arm.
"Thank you, but Nadia is not to leave the room without me," Mr. Lennox said. "Unlike you, in order to secure her future she has to be met by the right people, and if I cannot find her then those opportunities will be wasted."
Ferdinand's jaw clenched but he bowed his head as Mr. Lennox drew me to his side. I tried to catch Ferdinand's eye, but he looked at Mr. Lennox instead as we walked back into the party and left him behind.
People crested around us like waves as we walked through their midst to some destination only Mr. Lennox knew. His hand held my elbow tightly, making sure I couldn't get more than a few inches away from his side. We walked in silence, Mr. Lennox's eyes trained straight ahead and mine on his face.
When we finally reached wherever we were going, I only realized it because Mr. Lennox spoke. "Doctor Alkaev, I apologize for that delay. Nadia recently sprained her ankle and I found her resting out in the hallway."
My ankle had been feeling fine for a long while now, but I smiled as if it were true and turned my eyes to meet Doctor Alkaev.
Middle-aged, with round glasses over brown eyes and wearing a simple suit that stood out amongst the vast sea of uniforms, he looked as plain as could be. The corners of his eyes crinkled as he smiled and took my hand to kiss the knuckles. His hands felt calloused in my palms, which struck me as strange for a physician.
"Enchanted, Miss Surikov," he said, his voice soft and musky like fresh honey. "Your dancing tonight has ruined me for any other ballerina. Perfection has already been obtained, and ballet should belong to you from now on."
I laughed uncertainly. "Thank you, Doctor."
"Lennox has told me so much about you," Doctor Alkaev continued. "Your dancing was a product of the Vigilant Men riots?"
"I- I suppose."
"Such an interesting story," he said. "I'm quite glad to see such strength come from that time of, well, weakness."
I inclined my head.
Mr. Lennox spoke. "We're here to see if we might secure funds from the Crown. Unfortunately, the normal patrons of the arts are not very impressed with anything straying from their classical fairy tales, so I must convince the king that my vision is where ballet will be headed in the future."
"The nobles are not always so concerned with the future," Doctor Alkaev said. "Sometimes they must be shown."
"How are things in our neighbor Lenostakaya?" Mr. Lennox said, apparently abruptly changing the topic.
"Not much different from here in Rumonin," the doctor said. "We are, perhaps, too quiet."
"Lenostakaya's king has been on the throne over a decade longer than Rumonin's," Mr. Lennox said. "It is to be expected that his subjects would be quieter."
Doctor Alkaev took a glass of a wine from a passing waiter and seamlessly began to walk toward an empty area by one of the tall windows. Mr. Lennox and I followed.
"Rumonin has become the kingdom everyone is looking to," Doctor Alkaev said as we settled into place by the panes of glass that leaked cold in. "You are on the world's stage, and the Lenostakaya and Prest people are simply waiting to see what Rumonin will do."
Mr. Lennox waved one hand through the air. "The people are too frightened to do anything," he said. "The king's army keeps them hidden away in basements and dark shadows. Without something to spur them on, the Rumoni people will only ever be complainers."
"Which is precisely why I went to all that trouble to move here, Lennox. I know that with the right sort of leadership, the Rumoni could start the kingdoms back onto the path toward joining together and becoming an empire once again. This kingdom is the largest of the three, and whichever way it leans the other two will swiftly follow."
"The Lenostakaya people are too content," Mr. Lennox said. "King Gregor's food houses will buy his people's loyalties, Alkaev."
"They are content, that is true. Full stomachs are incentive enough to hide in the corner and keep out of it, but they still lack money. King Gregor may feed them well, but he lives between three palaces, each more splendid than the last."
"What are your plans for Rumonin?" Mr. Lennox asked.
Doctor Alkaev glanced around at the crowd that seemed suddenly closer around us. They were all in their own conversations, laughing and clasping each other on the back, but the doctor narrowed his eyes at the sight of a small group of navy uniformed men lounging just a few windows down from us. When they saw him looking, the oldest one inclined his head and raised a wine glass with a somber face.
"I won't speak of my plans here," Doctor Alkaev said. "The walls are much too close for my tastes. I'll only say that you might want to think of being flexible when the time comes. State funding for your ballet isn't the only option to raise you to prominence."
With that, Doctor Alkaev shook Mr. Lennox's hand, kissed both my cheeks, and disappeared into the milling crowd. The men in navy uniforms pushed off from the wall and followed him.
"I think perhaps it is time to head home, Nadia," Mr. Lennox said, leading me toward the exit. He snapped his fingers at the corps, who fell in behind us reluctantly. As they shouted their goodbyes, I cast around for Ferdinand but did not see him. No one seemed concerned that he was not with us as we wrapped up in our furs and piled into three carriages. I supposed he had his own ways to reach his lodgings, wherever they were. Just as the snow began to fall hard enough to reduce the sight of the palace to nothing more than a yellow glow, I noticed the figure of Doctor Alkaev slinking out of the front door and down the road into the darkness.
His conversation with Mr. Lennox seemed to suggest an unrest in the city, and even though I did not know exactly what they were talking of, my bones still chilled with the thought. I had lived through one unrest and it had left me without a family. Something was coming, and I dreaded what it might be.