Elias now looked utterly bewildered. At first, Dora thought he might refuse and accuse her of playing a trick on him again. But as this second dance came to a close, he turned them both off of the floor, and he humoured her request by heading for the side table, where the punch sat out.
As Elias made his way back with a glass of punch, Dora waited patiently, considering the situation. She wasn’t sure just what to expect, or even when to expect it—but surely enough, just as the Lord Sorcier had come within a few steps of her, another gentleman jarred his elbow by mistake. Elias whirled with such sudden violence that several people nearby gasped and staggered back; as he did, the punch splashed forward, spilling all across the front of Dora’s dress.
Elias had raised his arm against the other man—to do what, Dora wasn’t sure—but he caught himself just in time and froze in place with his hand partially extended. His pulse hammered against his throat, and Dora thought for a moment that there was a strange fear in his golden eyes. Elias took a deep breath and drew himself up. “Be careful where you’re moving,” he hissed at the man next to him.
“Oh, Dora!” Vanessa had already hurried over, aghast. “Oh no, your dress!”
Elias turned back to look at Dora. As he saw the red stain on her dress, a flicker of consternation crossed his face. But Dora only smiled at him. “Thank you very much, Lord Sorcier,” she told him. “I am much relieved.”
Vanessa gave her a curious look—but Dora’s cousin was used to far stranger things from her. “Dora?” she murmured. “What on earth is going on?”
“Nothing awful,” Dora assured her. “But please stay back from me. I would hate to stain you too.” She nodded towards Elias and began to nudge her way through the crowd. “Excuse me,” she said. “Pardon me. Can anyone tell me where I might wash up?”
Chapter 4
Dora spent some time in the washroom scrubbing at her dress, but it became clear in a hurry that the tools available to her were insufficient for saving the muslin. This caused a faint disappointment in her. She was pleased to be alive and unharmed, of course, but the dress had been very pretty, and it was the first one she had ever owned that had been tailored to fit her properly.
Rather than return to the party in her obviously ruined gown, Dora slipped her way out one of the side doors, into a back garden. She was sure that Auntie Frances would be upset with her for failing to dance with Albert, but she couldn’t imagine that the man’s kindness extended so far as to walk onto the dance floor with a woman covered in punch.
There was a very lovely fountain in the middle of the garden—it looked like a blossoming flower, capped with a very fine pineapple. Dora settled herself onto a bench to watch it, musing on the near future. Lady Carroway had wanted to speak with her, but that also seemed unlikely in her current state. Perhaps that was for the best, if she wanted to avoid pinning down poor Albert at the altar. But then, Dora had hoped to use the conversation to extol Vanessa’s virtues instead.
She frowned vaguely at the fountain in front of her. That is a lot of water, she thought. Enough to soak my dress properly. Perhaps I could scrub out the worst before the party is through.
Dora got to her feet and wriggled the dress over her head. Only a moment after she’d dunked the whole thing in the fountain, however, she heard a man’s voice utter a foul swear word behind her.
“What are you doing, you mad little twit?”
Dora glanced behind her and saw the Lord Sorcier standing just behind the bench she’d just vacated. His finery was every bit as pristine and untouched as it had been at the beginning of the evening, except that he had now loosened his neckcloth a bit. His golden eyes raked her up and down, clearly aghast.
“I would have thought the situation was self-evident,” Dora told him calmly. “Does a man of your formidable knowledge really require the concept of laundry to be explained to him?”
Elias pinched at the bridge of his nose with his fingers, sucking in a breath. “My dear Miss Ettings,” he said slowly. “You are standing in a viscount’s back garden in your unmentionables, washing your dress in a fountain. Have you truly no concept of the strangeness of your situation?”
Dora paused, looking down at her dress where it soaked beneath her hands. Oh, she thought. He’s probably correct.
“No wonder your cousin is so desperate,” Elias muttered. “If you keep behaving in this way, you’ll be ruined within the week.”
Dora turned towards him fully at that, concerned. “What about my cousin?” she asked. “Is something wrong with her?”
Elias knitted his brow. “Please put your dress back on, Miss Ettings,” he said. “I am not unused to the female figure, but I would prefer not to be caught in a scandal that might tarnish Albert’s mother. I am sure that I would never hear the end of it.”
Dora sighed and pulled the dress back out of the fountain, squeezing the water from it where she could. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the Lord Sorcier pull a finely-polished wooden wand from his jacket. He flicked it once, and the dress jerked itself from her hands, rolling itself into a tight ball. Pink- and red-tinged water dripped from its folds onto the grass. When it had straightened again in her hands, Dora saw that the dress was now both perfectly dry and devoid of all colour. There was
