He looked as if he wanted to keep arguing. It was actually impressive the way he held on to his scowl as they went down flight after flight of steps to the great dining hall of Slaughterwood Castle.
“Can you at least try to smile?” she asked.
He flashed his teeth.
“That looks predatory.”
“I am predatory. So is everyone else here,” he whispered.
At the door, knights in full armor greeted them by uncrossing a pair of lances, and once again, Evangeline felt as if she were entering an old tale.
A small forest must have been killed to build this dining room. The arched ceilings were at least five stories high, and Evangeline immediately saw why.
There was a trebuchet just beyond the entry, massive and rather horrible. The dining hall had clearly been built around the enormous weapon—in fact, the whole manor might have been.
Jacks appeared unimpressed by the structure, barely sparing it a look as they stepped deeper into the hall.
Aside from the trebuchet, everything else was tasteful. The walls were covered in panels of aged stained glass that glittered under sprawling chandeliers shaped like branches of jeweled flowers. Then there were the actual flowers. Garlands of gold and white blooms had been strung from wall to wall, filling the air with their sweet perfume as some of the petals drifted down like snow, covering the shoulders of guests who had started pouring into the seemingly endless room.
LaLa had yet to arrive, but the hall was buzzing with gentlemen wearing embroidered doublets and ladies with tiaras in their hair, baubles in their ears, and sparkling gems at their wrists and throats. So many gems. Any one of them could have been a missing arch stone. But thus far, Evangeline didn’t feel any magic pulsing from the people she brushed past. She’d have liked to talk to some of them, but they all made a point of not looking her way.
This party was not going at all how she’d imagined. In her head, she’d pictured an event infused with the magic of the mirth stone, full of joy and smiles. But it seemed the only smiles were for Jacks.
Passing guests nodded at him, remarked on the new brilliant color of his hair, or waved and said, “Good evening, Lord Jacks.”
There were no greetings for Evangeline. The servants carrying platters of meats and trays of heavy goblets were treated with more regard than she was.
“It’s because you’re not from a Great House,” Jacks said quietly. “You could be the queen and they still wouldn’t like you.”
“They all seem to like you,” she whispered.
Just then, a pair of girls drifted closer. One wet her lips before smiling at Jacks, and the other was even bolder. Evangeline watched her meet Jacks’s eyes before brazenly bringing a goblet of wine to her breasts and tracing the low cut of her dark plum gown with the rim.
“Are you controlling them?” Evangeline asked.
“Don’t need to.” Jacks winked at the pair.
They giggled in response.
Evangeline decided she didn’t like the sound of giggling.
She pulled her arm free of Jacks’s. The room was feeling hot and stuffy and far from magical. “Maybe we should visit the veranda to look for the stones,” she said.
But Jacks was no longer paying attention to her.
His eyes were on the door where another young woman had just walked in. An extremely beautiful girl dressed in a tight, low-cut raven-black gown and long black gloves that contrasted with the moonlight-colored hair that spilled down her back in a long shimmering curtain.
“Do you know her?” Evangeline asked.
“She looks familiar,” Jacks said quietly, eyes still fixed on the young woman as she glided into the hall and took a pewter goblet of wine.
Evangeline had no reason to dislike this girl and her moonlight hair. Yet she felt something twist inside her as she watched Jacks’s eyes follow the young woman. She moved through the crowd toward a pair of well-dressed young men, who appeared more than happy to engage her in flirtations.
Thankfully, she wasn’t wearing a necklace or a bracelet that Evangeline could see. Though even if she had worn ropes of jewels around her throat, Evangeline would have put off talking to her.
She cast her eyes about the great firelit hall to continue her search. She mostly looked at the women and the rocks around their throats. But there were also quite a few men with gemmed buttons on their doublets and jeweled medallions around their necks. Some of the medallions even had impressions of shields, though unfortunately none of the shields had flames like the one on Evangeline’s sheet of clues.
Across the room, a young man smiled when he caught her spying.