no taste, and where she should have opted for modern views of the city, she instead placed pedestrian compositions of bread and cheeses.
Four girls gathered around Nina, all of them in prim dresses, gloves on their hands. Nina had taken off her gloves because the business of manipulating objects with her talent was more difficult with them on.
Nina made the fan floating before her spin in slow concentric circles. It resembled a bird in its movements, rather than an inanimate object, and one of the girls squealed in delight at the sight of it. Nina reached out and the fan stopped, sliding into her hand. Nina smiled at the girls.
“How odd!” one of the girls said. “How interesting!”
“Fascinating,” Luc chimed in.
He was standing next to her, looking keen. He’d danced two dances with Nina. Yet Nina had not failed to notice that he had filled out his dance card with many other names not five minutes after his arrival.
“That’s probably enough,” Luc told her, leaning down to whisper in her ear. “People are staring at you.”
He was right. Two women were giving her an icy look, their fans pressed against their skirts. One of them spoke to the other, staring at Nina all the while. The girls smiled at Nina and stepped back, retreating, returning to the shadow of their mothers.
This party was on the smaller side and everyone was well acquainted, which left Nina in a bit of a cumbersome situation. Luc had been solicitous, taking her to and from the refreshment room, introducing her to several people, yet she felt a stranger. And now she’d made a grievous mistake.
“What is wrong?” she asked.
“It’s not done,” was his reply.
“But they asked me to,” Nina protested.
“Yes. Best not make tongues wag, shall we?”
A man laughed loudly and she looked at him. He was glancing in their direction and she wondered if he was laughing at her or if it was a mere coincidence.
“Don’t be upset, I say this for your sake. You don’t want those old hens to be talking about you,” Luc said.
“If they are old hens, then what does it matter?” she said, pushing back. She was tired of everyone judging her harshly.
“You are a lady, not a member of a circus troupe.” His voice had a splinter of steel in it.
Nina looked down at her fingers. Luc handed her back her gloves and she clutched them but did not put them on. The fan dangled from a cord around her wrist.
“Nina, don’t be upset.”
She ran her hand along the mother-of-pearl handle of the fan. She had wanted to have fun, and the evening was souring.
Luc pressed a finger against her chin and tilted it up. He smiled at her and his eyes were soft, whatever slight unpleasantness had passed between them nothing but lightning streaking the sky, a moment there and then gone.
He was quick to forget, she thought. If ever they did quarrel in the morning, all would be amended by the evening.
“You look beautiful tonight. Did I say that already?” he told her.
She had woven hairpins that resembled orange blossoms into her black hair. Her dress was saffron taffeta with a ruched and pleated waistband, pretty and sunny and modish.
“Yes,” she said.
“Did I tell you I want to touch you?” he said. The timbre of his voice made her drop a glove.
He picked it up and handed it back to her, and Nina gripped it tight.
Luc lifted his head and smiled. He was amused. She guessed he’d wanted to make her blush, and he had accomplished it. Yet a second later, he was distracted.
“What is it?” she asked.
“I see Guillem is here. I must talk business with him. Ah, my luck.”
“Talk to him, then.” Luc hesitated and Nina chuckled. “I’ll be fine. It’s a party, Luc. We are supposed to chat with other people.”
“Perhaps we can dance again later. I’ve not bothered penciling anyone after the faster dances. Or, there’s always a walk in the maze,” he told her. “You’ll be well? On your own?”
“Yes, go,” she said, shooing him away.
She saw him walking through the crowd of revelers, greeting a man with an expansive chuckle. Two ladies, who stood next to the man, smiled and held their fans in their left hands, half-hiding their faces and looking at Luc. Luc was exaggerated in his charms, taking their hands and bowing low. Nina was not filled with cleaving jealousy. He had not spoken of courtship. She thought he might, and she did not know if