The Bloodshade Encounters & The Songspinner (Shadeborn Book 2) by K.C. Finn Read Free Book Online Page B

enough hubris for one day.”
    Lemarick could hardly think straight with the rush of possibilities that struck his mind all at once. There were so many new avenues of magic for him to explore, yet so many things he needed to master and understand before he could explore them. He needed to experience music, rhythm, movement, pitch, tone and so much more. The chiming of a clock broke Lemarick from his vivid aspirations. As he checked his silver pocketwatch, however, the giddy mirth in his stomach was quickly replaced by what felt like a lump of lead.
    “I ought to head back,” he sighed. “I promised Mother I’d return after lunch for my training.”
    Ed made a loud scoffing sound.
    “Would it really be so awful if you got on her bad side for once?” he asked.
    Lemarick gave him a look that silenced all doubt, leaving the trio mute in the quiet, vast foyer for several awkward moments. No-one would be so bold as to broach the subject of Mother Novel in full. Her wrath was known throughout entire generations of the shadeborn, and Lemarick himself was a walking miracle to have lived with her for so many years and still be in her favour. Lemarick knew that his friends wanted him to walk away from Mother and devise his own path. After what he’d seen that afternoon, he was starting to wish it were possible to do just that. Ugarte fumbled with the folds of her dress, clearing her throat to break the tension.
    “Well, are you free any of the evenings this week?” she suggested.
    Lemarick nodded gingerly.
    “Tomorrow, I think,” he answered.
    “Aha!” Ed said, delving into his jacket and producing a slip of fine green vellum. “Then come to the opera and see my instruments play! Tomorrow is opening night!”
    In all other circumstances before that moment, Lemarick Novel would have politely declined such a frivolous invitation. The pursuit of power had always been so important that the pursuit of art had never before entered his thinking. Now, he took the emerald ticket and drank in its details with a vigour he had never known.
    “I do believe I shall,” he replied with the ghost of a grin.

The Reunion
     
    The Populaire was well-named, for on opening night its seats were packed with hundreds of Paris’s most esteemed clientele. Lemarick’s ticket directed him to a private box where he found Ugarte waiting, along with some wealthy-looking gentlemen who were casting her frequent leering glances. The Spanish beauty was evidently grateful to seat Lemarick between herself and the gathered businessmen, affording him a spectacular view of the stage and the pit that contained the musician-less orchestra below. The top of Ed’s sandy hair was visible where he stood waiting for the opera to begin.
    The performance was Carmen, a tale set in Seville and, at the first sign of the traditional Spaniard music, Ugarte began to ease at Lemarick’s side. Lemarick, on the other hand, was growing more inspired by the moment. He had never experienced music to this degree: the lights, colours and motions of the theatre awoke in him a new zest for artistry that he never would have guessed that he possessed. He felt as though he wanted to be involved in the goings-on of the stage, imagining himself as the director, the performers and as the conductor in Edvard’s place.
    That was until the ballet began. It was traditional, Ugarte informed him, for an opera to have a ballet, but the arrival of this sudden change in pace brought with it the harem of dancing girls that he had seen the day before. Nearest to his side of the stage, Lemarick spotted the mysterious girl he had danced with, her unmistakeable dark locks setting her apart from the fairer-haired girls in the troupe. He craned his neck hard to see her face, but the height of the theatre box prevented him from more than the sight of the top of her head as she spun and pranced in time to Edvard’s notes.
    *
    The opera was lengthy, but Lemarick savoured every moment. After the