Page 55

I turn to Vane.

“Mr. Vane,” I say, “I wondered if in your collection you have ever encountered a complete copy of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, the Venetian edition of 1499. It seems incredible how it manage to elude even the most persistent bibliophiles.”

He lifts his gaze from the cards.

“A rare title, and well chosen, Viscount,” he shuffles them. “Mutilated copies abound... but a pristine specimen is a whim that one pays for dearly.” He curls his thin lips. “The last one I saw was in Paris, guarded with the stubbornness of a reliquary. Not impossible to obtain... if one moves in the right circles.”

Lord Dorian leans in.

“A treatise that dances between allegory and temptation,” he says, “the fall of man told as if it were a divine whim and knowledge that becomes sweeter precisely because it is forbidden.”

He hints at a smile, masking provocation as courtesy. “It does not surprise me that someone like you, Viscount, feels its pull.”

Someone like me? What the hell is he implying?

“What a predictable observation,” I retort. “One might almost believe you’ve confused the plot with your own biography.”

Vane clears his throat.

“A sharp interpretation, though reduced to its most theatrical side,” he comments. “That text does not speak only of falling... but of transformation. It invites one to read fragility as strength, sin as an inevitable passage. That is what makes it so disturbing.”

He lets the first Jack of Hearts fall.

“A curious start,” Julian observes.

Lord Dorian plays the King of Hearts, accompanying it with a slow movement. The tips of his fingers just barely brush my hand.

That spot burns as if branded by glowing embers.

He truly wishes for me to break them.

“Do you want that book?” he whispers faintly, his voice intended for me alone.

“I want nothing from you,” I reply, pulling my hand away.

Vane places the Ten of Hearts.

“Let us see how patient you are.”

Julian echoes him, laying the Jack of Hearts on the table, his gaze fixed not on the cards, but on each of us.

Lord Dorian shifts a centimeter, perhaps less. He tilts his head in my direction. His lower lip twitches slightly.

“Do not look at the rank,” his voice brushes my ear more than the actual distance should allow. “Look at the hands.”

“I have no need for your advice.”

I choose the Six of Clubs. I lay it down with a gesture that seems simple, but in the final fraction of a second, the card grazes his thumb for an instant.

I know he is watching me.

Julian signals a valet, who quickly brings him a glass of cognac.

“They move as if every card were a weapon,” he says, addressing Mr. Vane.

Edmund responds with the Nine of Clubs. “And yet, they are only cards.”

Dorian grabs the Five of Clubs and pushes it forward. “Only if you look without understanding.”