Wicked As You Wish (A Hundred Names for Magic #1) - Rin Chupeco Page 0,101

I don’t want my college credits expiring by the time we make it back.”

A faint expression of annoyance crossed Cole’s face. “What does that have to do with me?”

“I don’t particularly trust you, Nottingham,” Zoe told him bluntly. “If you’re here to help like you claim to be, then prove me wrong.”

For a moment, the boy looked like he wanted to argue, but then shrugged. “As you wish.”

22

In Which Ken Picks the Wrong Girl to Dance With

The town center had been cleared to accommodate the ongoing celebrations. Paved with thick cobblestones and lined with thousands of petals of contrasting colors, this seemed, at least to Ken, to be a place of some significance. Several baskets hung suspended from nearby trees, ropes affixed to their edges. One tug would send fresh cascades of scattering petals tumbling down on revelers and onlookers alike.

But it was the butterflies that really stole the show. Hundreds illuminated the air, clustering every few feet. They cast a gentle glow around the plaza, winking in and out as if on command. All the villagers took this in stride, like there was nothing extraordinary shining right above their heads.

A large statue stood at the heart of the small clearing, a white marble figure wearing a crown of roses on her brow. She was one-handed, as far as Ken could tell, with one wrist ending in a stump. Carved roses and lilies, magnificently detailed, shielded most of her body from view. The faint, sweet scent of flowers clung to the air.

A large crowd had gathered around the small fires kept burning around the statue, cheering the dancers on. There were two different kinds of dances taking place at once. The first was headed up by the male village elders and was meant to be the main performance. The men wore colorful shirts, large hats, and heavy decorative staffs that they pointed toward the heavens as they chanted, whirling and dancing around with feet that moved like they were thirty years younger.

Following them was a masquerade of color; the dancers were completely hidden by costumes constructed from barks and leaves, all boasting lion-like manes over their chests and thick ruffs on their arms and legs. They waved strange-scented leaves in their right hands, contributing to the smell of incense in the air, and wielded simpler wooden staffs on the left.

But it was the second dance that was taking up most of Ken’s attention; girls were dressed in colored wraps, their wrists and ankles adorned in wrist sleeves made of pillow-like fur. They stepped lightly among the butterflies and around the bonfires as they moved in rhythm to the sonorous beats of drums and clapsticks. Freshly picked flowers were gathered in their arms—carnations and calla lilies and gardenias and pale roses. Every now and then, a few of the girls would dance into the crowd and tuck flowers behind the ears of fortunate bystanders.

A doe-eyed, raven-haired girl with a full-lipped mouth smiled sweetly at Ken, inserting a red carnation behind his ear. It was a daunting task, because four other girls had previously tucked four other flowers in the exact same place. Despite his half-hearted protestations, she pulled him, smiling, into the center of the plaza, where a new dance began. The girl laughed whenever he stepped out of turn, gently guiding him through most of the routine until he didn’t fare as poorly as when he had first started out.

“You’re a quick learner, milord,” she said, after maneuvering through slightly more intricate steps that Ken accomplished with only minimal awkwardness.

“I’ve been told,” Ken said blandly, then caught her up in his arms, paying no heed to the music and spinning her around, the steady beat of drums and the piping of flutes drowning out her laughter.

“Are you staying long, milord?”

“Name’s Kensington. Not milord.”

“Kensington.” Her voice was like velvet, soft and husky. “An unusual name.”

“It’s got gardens Mum’s mad about,” Ken said. “And the Royal Albert Hall.”

“Royal Albert Hall?”

“It’s nothing.” Ken spun her again, and as the song ended, dipped her low enough that the brunette’s long hair grazed the ground, her smiling face beneath his own, only inches away. “You dance in a style I am not accustomed to, Kensington,” she whispered, and then kissed him. Ken was initially surprised, and then enthusiastic, and then a shade nervous. None of the other girls he’d danced with so far had been so forward, and the innkeeper’s comment about the girls finding husbands that night was rattling around in his head like