He gave me a blank look, and so I mimicked the look of his tongue pulsing beneath his closed lips.
“Ohhh,” he said with a grin, and then he bared his teeth, wiggling his canines with his tongue. “I’m gettin’ my fangs, Blondie.”
“Eeesh.” The sight of it took me aback. I’d never known how the vampires got their fangs, and here was the explanation right in front of me. The canine teeth became loose and fell out; then shiny new fangs grew in their place—we’d been administered regular doses of vampire blood since arrival, and it looked like this was one of the side effects for the boys. “Crazy. Wonder if the tooth fairy will come for you?”
We shared a smile that froze as we realized Dagursson stood at our shoulders. “It is my turn to dance with Acari Drew.”
Yas gave my hand a quick squeeze, then with a respectful bow of his head, stepped back to let Dagursson cut in.
I tried to clear my face of expression, because I had a big picture of what happened to Acari who displayed revulsion in the face of vampire greatness. But instead of thinking about the ritual of the dance, I was concentrating too hard on looking calm, steeling myself for the moment his skin would touch mine, and so when Dagursson took one big side step, I didn’t think; I just instinctively mirrored his action.
His beady eyes narrowed to slits. “No, Acari Drew. This is the time at which a man bows to his partner. I step like so”—he swept his hand, repeating the elegant side step—“and you curtsy.”
I did my best curtsy, feeling like a total moron. Dagursson made an indistinguishable mmph sound, which I assumed wasn’t complimentary.
He stepped closer and took me in his arms, and the proximity so freaked me out, I had to look away. To my surprise he praised me. “Very prettily done, Acari. Partners do not gaze into each other’s eyes. A lady should tilt her chin up”—he pinched my chin between his bony finger and thumb to adjust my head—“up, up, up. Look over my shoulder.”
He scowled at my hand resting on his upper arm. “That is all wrong. Your fingers are like little sausages. Extend them.” I stretched my fingers out as long as they could go, listening to him drone on, “You are small. Compactly made. You must try to elongate your body as much as possible.”
Jerk. He made me sound like a minifridge, when really I was just petite, thankyouverymuch.
The song was ending, and a new one was beginning; I braced myself for whatever saccharine musical history we were to be subjected to next. I needed to hear only a few notes before I knew. God help me. It was “Edelweiss.”
I bit my tongue not to laugh. And then with the effort of not laughing, I needed to laugh even more. I thought I must’ve been turning purple from the effort.
To make matters worse, Dagursson began to sing under his breath to the music, but rather than the lyrics, he chanted, “Onnne, twooo, threeee…onnne, twooo, threeee…back, side, together…forward, side, together…”
I tried to focus, but I was only aware of the feel of his cold skin, one hand holding mine, the other a gentle touch on my back. He was close enough to smell, too, and it was a strange, blank scent, like paper, or powder.
He knew my thoughts were elsewhere and scolded me. “You must empty your mind, Acari Drew. The Viennese waltz is the most classic, the most elegant of dances, but you must feel it, not think it.”
But rather than take his advice, I considered the creature holding me. Despite his hollow-cheeked and generally cadaverous looks, his movements were graceful and smooth. It blew my mind to think he’d been alive when society had danced its first waltz—had already been alive for hundreds of years when ladies were donning tall white wigs for the first time and pasting black beauty marks on their white-powdered faces.
My mind was whirring away, and I was on autopilot.
But Dagursson was getting his groove on. “Now you will turn and open your body,” he was saying, and then he spun me.
I was so not prepared to spin.
I tripped. And I was unable to stop the words that burst from my lips. Two crisp, clear pops of sound. “Oh shit.”
Dagursson turned to ice and froze me with him, holding me apart as I balanced precariously on one foot. His hand at my back was firm now, the only thing preventing me from tumbling to the floor. But his other hand darted out, and a long, razor-sharp fingernail slashed my lip.
I swallowed my gasp, then licked my lower lip, tasting blood.
“A reminder, Acari Drew, to speak like a lady.”
He pushed me away from him, and I stumbled a few clumsy steps backward, miraculously managing to stay on my feet. “You must master your change step if you ever wish to dance proficiently.” Dagursson stared for a moment at my split lip. “Attend to that. We cannot allow facial scarring.”
And with one last clap of those freaky Crypt Keeper hands, he dismissed class.
Yasuo and I bolted for the exit, and I burst ahead of him, gulping the cold, fresh air. Only then did I realize that my thundering heart felt ready to bruise the inside of my chest.
Yas caught up to me, uncertain what to say. “That was…”
“Yeah.” I shivered. “Weird.”
We headed a ways down the quad path, and although I was eager to put the whole episode behind me, Yasuo was still clearly uncomfortable.