Versailles, 1787 — The Hall of Mirrors
The candles had burned low by the time the music stopped.
Dozens of chandeliers hung like frozen constellations above the dancers, their flames casting fractured light on silks and powdered wigs, crimson masks and jewelled fans. Perfume clung to the air like a lie—sweet, sharp, and suffocating.
No one noticed the blood.
Not at first.
The body lay just beyond the velvet rope, where the footmen never looked and the courtiers never strayed. Slumped against the gilded panelling of the Hall of Mirrors, half-hidden by draped red curtains, the young man looked almost asleep. His mask—enamelled white, lined with gold leaf—had slipped askew, revealing a pale cheek and wide, empty eyes.
He had died without a sound.
Outside, laughter spilt into the marble corridors like wine from an overfilled glass. The masquerade continued.
Inside, the mirrors reflected his final moment again and again and again.
Until a whisper broke the stillness.
"Don't look too long," came a voice—a woman's, barely audible over the rustle of silk. "It has a way of looking back."
A gloved hand reached down and plucked something from the dead man's lapel: a ribbon, deep red, folded into a perfect fleur-de-lis.
The woman tucked it into her sleeve and vanished before the guards arrived.
When they did, they would not know who he was. Not yet. Only that he had danced with the Queen earlier that evening, and that the last person seen speaking to him was a penniless countess with eyes like flint and a reputation for trouble.
But by then, it would be too late.
The waltz had begun.
And knives, once drawn, do not sheathe easily.