“Poor horse,” said Bram.
“Poor Shirin,” Oliver added.
“Oh, I’m not so sure. Wouldn’t she be better off with a man who didn’t throw himself off a cliff without checking that his love was actually dead?”
“A cautionary tale for us all,” Oliver sputtered with a laugh.
“It sounds familiar… the fake death.”
“A tale as old as time, but you’re probably thinking of Aegeus throwing himself into the sea when Theseus’ ship returned with black sails instead of white.”
“Yes. Just what a young man needs after slaying a minotaur… the guilt of his father’s death because he forgot to switch his sails.”
Oliver laughed in the grass, holding onto his stomach. “How have we not yet destroyed the planet when we are fundamentally stupid?”
“There’s still time,” Bram quipped, rolling his head to the side to admire Oliver’s beloved features. “There’s still time.”
3
A Camel that Thinks He’s a Lion
“Every year, it gets worse,” Bram complained.
Armando Rose laughed as they waltzed around Lady Bertram’s excessively gaudy ballroom. “Do you suppose there are any birds in London Zoo with their feathers intact?”
Bram marvelled at the feather-headed women spinning by. “All plucked bald, I should think.”
Armando was his favourite human being if he didn’t count Oliver, and he couldn’t count Oliver; he was a water jinn. He had met Armando during his first season, when Bram had been too tall and awkward to attract anyone with fewer than five decades to his name. He had been called a filly, his pelvis and teeth discussed as if he were a brood mare. Despite his somewhat long face, he was not a horse.
What he adored the most about Armando was that he had never set out to be anything other than friendly. He didn’t fawn, he didn’t try to impress Bram, yet he was unfailingly polite, much like his ostentatious uncle—the only other man Bram voluntarily danced with. Armando also found balls as tedious as Bram did, though he did his best to dance with the wallflowers and young ladies of the house, and didn’t seem to mind dancing with Bram, despite his giraffe-like form.
“This is my third season, and the men are no taller this year than they were the last,” Bram said, with a put-upon sigh. “I am convinced, in fact, that some are getting shorter.”
“Why does that matter?”
“Oh, it matters not a jot to me, I assure you. But there is not a man in Mayfair who wants a giant for a wife.”
Armando snorted. “You are not a giant.”
“I am a good deal taller than half the men here.”
“But surely that is good, since you don’t want to get married.”
“I don’t wish to live with my parents forever either,” Bram reminded him. “Perhaps I shall join the circus, or an acting troupe.”
“Can you act?” Armando asked, his lips twitching.
“I put on the performance of my life every time I come to one of these balls.”
It was only half a joke, and Armando only half laughed. He knew better than to engage Bram when he became maudlin. Instead, he said, “Lord Bertram is hovering in the corner hoping to be mistaken for his own butler again.”
“With a family like his, I suspect a butler’s life sounds like paradise.”
“I suppose I ought to dance with his gruesome daughters.”
Bram laughed. “You are a horror.”
“One of them told me she had a collection of snake skins. What sort of hobby is that for a young lady?”
“Do you forget about your young ward?”
“Ah, yes, those two must never meet,” Armando declared. “Miserable marriages have been forged on less than a mutual interest in reptiles between ward and would-be intended. Even if it would be best for Cecilia, I have no desire to be drawn into a wretched marriage.”
“Nor I.”
“Uncle Uriel is holding court again,” said Armando, nodding towards the back of the ballroom where a pale, smiling face framed by copper hair bobbed above the greying heads of Mayfair’s matrons. His raucous laughter floated above the music, along with the titters of his audience.
“I heard Lady Adonis blustering about how she would berate him for wearing his hair so long,” Bram told his friend. “I’d wager every one of them intended to admonish him before being suddenly diverted by his excessive charm.”
“That would not surprise me in the slightest.” Armando lifted Bram gently, spinning him around. “Oh dear, Lord Vernon is giving me the evil eye.”
“He’s harmless,” Bram insisted.
“I am not so sure of that,” Armando said, lowering his voice. “Uriel has seen him conspiring with your father twice now.”
“Conspiring?” Bram gave his friend an exasperated look. “They do business together.”
