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The memory swelled in his mind as he stood on the empty stage.
Arms filled with a delicate heap of lace and silk and tulle, the young boy of twelve summers wove through the crowded backstage halls. Entering the glittering dressing room—the scent of perfume and powder suffocating his senses—he was greeted by his mother who snatched the dress from his arms and gave him an affectionate pat on the head, retreating behind the screen to assist the dancer said outfit was for.
He excused himself, navigated his way through the maze of corridors until he reached the main stage where his friend was already waiting. Dark hair tied half-up with a white ribbon, dress made by the careful hands of his mother—crafted to resemble an elegant nightgown. Ottoline bounced on her heels, looking nowhere in particular, hands glued to a spare barre.
"Nervous?" he asked. She jumped at his sudden presence but smiled.
"Of course," she stared at the floor, at her shoes, at the other dancers and staff shuffling about. "Do you think she'll make it?" she asked. Her mother was who she was referring to. The woman had left for the highlands not a fortnight ago, promising to return before the rise of the curtain. But they were minutes away from showtime and there was no sign of her.
"I'm sure she will," Janlenoux tried reassuring her, but his tone was as uncertain as hers. "Regardless, I know you'll do great."
"You're supposed to tell me to break a leg," she teased.
"Ah—right—break a leg."
"Have you ever considered the stage?"
Janlenoux blinks back to the present as Ottoline's voice echoes through the theater, turning to see her stepping towards him.
"I did once," he admits, "but I was too old by then. And—my father." He didn't need to elaborate, she nods and looks out to the empty sea of seats. From the floor to the mezzanine and the nosebleeds. She understands because she suffered the same fate, yet the circumstances were much different.
Janlenoux's father had remained an unranked soldier among the Durendaire Knights for years, and he made sure his children knew just how miserable he was with his lack of success. He forced Janlenoux to pick up a blade, threatened to push his siblings into the fray instead if he refused. To do what he could not—as if his son's accomplishments were his own.
Ottoline's mother had dragged their family name through the mud with all the heresy charges laid against her when she had gone missing the day of her daughter's performance—her father, gone mad by grief and the stress of it all, was then removed by her eldest brother. Ottoline becoming a knight was the only solution for them to potentially regain what they had lost.
"Adelphel would've thrived as a dancer," she muses, "but his father as well—"
"And your brother."
"A common enemy we all share—as cruel as it is to say," she takes his calloused hand in her own. "As if we were never meant to revel in the artistry."
"A shame indeed," he breaths a laugh, brushing a lock of dark hair behind her ear. "What are you doing here, anyway?"
"I come by sometimes."
"To reminisce?"
"To mourn."
He studies the sea of her eyes. She despises it—the steel—as did he. Yet they excel at it for the sake of duty. For pride, albeit not their own. He presses his forehead against hers and closed his eyes, wondering if in another world there exists two people like them, free of war and protocol. Free to skip across the stage without a care in the world. Where their story was anything but a tragedy.
Her fingers brush against his cheek, lips against his for a moment before parting.
"Sometimes I think that if the war ended I could go back," she whispers, as if there was an audience before them, listening, looking back out into that empty crowd. He wraps his arms around her, holding her tightly, kissing her hair.
A soft chuckle escapes her lips as she ponders her own statement. "How delusional, isn’t it?"