The Mirror Mage

1. The Ball

(Author's Note:  Dedicated to jinnis one of my oldest friends on Wattpad. Her story, Raven's Curse, entry for the ONC 2022, is a paranormal mystery. And I can't wait to see what happens!)

The mirror showed an elegant young man, dressed in the height of fashion. A tailored dark blue coat flattered a trim figure and white lace frothed extravagantly around his wrists. Curls the colour of ripe chestnuts were brushed up from his forehead into the latest style, contrasting with the fashionably pale skin. Everything just as it should be... except for his eyes. Instead of the anticipation of pleasure one would expect to see in a young man attending a ball in his own home, they looked as if he were about to face a firing squad.

Matthews, his valet, stood twitching with anxiety at the door.

"Please, my lord? Her ladyship..."

Lord Lucian Wentworth straightened his shoulders and took a deep breath.

It was time, he couldn't delay any further.

Music rose from the floor below. The dancing must be well underway by now. His mother would be furious.

He paused for a moment at the top of the stairs to gather himself.

Candlelight from the wall sconces blazed in the hall, gleaming off the wooden panels that the servants had spent hours polishing earlier that day, and illuminating the somber portraits of numerous ancestors. The doors to the ballroom were flung wide, allowing him a glimpse of the dancers as they whirled past. Men in dark tailcoats and white silk pantaloons spun elegantly gowned young women around the room. The musicians were playing a waltz. At first considered not quite the thing, the dance had now become all the crack in modern households.

Plastering a smile upon his face, Lucian entered the ballroom.

Before he had gone two steps, someone clapped him heartily on the back.

"There you are, Lucy. For a moment there I thought you'd done a runner!" teased his friend.

Lucian raised an eyebrow. "You can blame my cravat, Charlie. Perfection takes time. You wouldn't want me to appear in deshabille, would you? Not in public?"

The other man laughed and shook his head. "What you need is a drink. And not that stuff your mother has put out for the ladies. Where have you hidden the brandy?"

Lucian smiled despite himself. "In the study, where it usually is! Come with me."

Charles Lambert was a neighbour and one of his oldest friends. He was tall, with broad shoulders and the well-muscled thighs of an athlete, and looked as though he would be more at home on horseback or even a boxing ring, than the dance floor.

Fortified by French brandy, Lucian returned to the ballroom some time later, only to be accosted again, but this time by his mother.

"Where have you been?" she hissed through clenched teeth, a fixed smile on her face.

"With Charlie," he replied as calmly as possible. "We were discussing next week's hunt."

"Oh," she said, relaxing somewhat. Charlie was one of her favourites. "Miss Lawrence has saved the supper dance for you. I suggest you don't make her wait for your company any longer."

"No, mother," agreed Lucian in colourless tones.

He made his way over to where Mary Lawrence sat against the wall with her aunt, fanning herself and watching the dancers. He bowed. She dropped her eyes, and a faint blush stained her cheeks.

"Miss Lawrence? I trust I find you well? May I bring you and your aunt some refreshments?"

Mary was pretty enough, Lucian supposed, if you cared for those old-fashioned looks, but he found her conversation dull and insipid. He never knew what to say to her once they had exchanged the usual pleasantries. However, none of that weighed a brass farthing compared to the fact that she was an heiress. His mother had been pushing them together since Mary made her debut earlier in the Season.
"You have to marry someone, Lucian," she had said. "And the sooner the better. All your friends are settling down. Mary is a biddable girl, quiet and well-mannered. And more importantly, her property marches with our farm at Headings. It's a perfect match."

On his way back with two glasses of lemonade, Lucian caught sight of Jenny Lambert. Her cheeks were flushed with exercise and her eyes bright with laughter as she waltzed. Now, if he really had to get married, he wished he could choose Jenny. As Charlie's youngest sister, they had known each other since childhood, in and out of each other's houses, sometimes friends, sometimes bitter enemies. She had grown into a lively young woman, friendly and generous to a fault. Except, even as the thought entered his head, he knew it would never work.

Apart from incurring his mother's disapproval—for, as the youngest of four children, Jenny had no fortune to speak of—he couldn't do that to her. Not to Charlie's sister. Not when it was Charlie who woke those passionate feelings in his breast, feelings that should have been inspired by Lucian's wife-to-be. Not that Charlie would ever know.

Lucian felt quite faint at the thought. No, Lucian would remain what he had always been, a friend and neighbour. A bit of a dandy perhaps, no longer keen on a rough and tumble, but nevertheless, someone to hunt and ride and drink with... and nothing more. Never anything more.

If he had to marry someone, he supposed Mary would do as well as anyone. After all, most modern marriages were more about property rights than love, he thought cynically. She wouldn't expect passion, would she? And once they had a child, or maybe two, she would have other things to occupy her. Children. He swallowed. Now there was the rub. He could perform the deed, after all, he had done so once before, when his father had arranged for him to visit a brothel to lose his virginity. Lucian still had nightmares about that. The humiliating pressure. He had only been able to perform when he closed his eyes and imagined someone very different beneath him.

In his calmer moments, Lucian knew full well he should not be marrying anyone at all.