“I will tell you about the lady I loved."The girls settled together on the entrance steps, not even breathing, for fear it would rustle the rosebushes about them and mask Mr. Keeper's words. Mr. Keeper stood unmoving on the dance floor."Once upon a time," he said. His voice dripped in silk strands. "There was a High King, who wanted more than anything to kill the Captain General who incited a rebellion against him. It consumed him. The desire to kill the Captain General filled him to his core, and he spent every breath, every step, thinking of ways to murder the Captain General."But he was old, and time passed, as it always does."Mr. Keeper paused. Bramble cast a slightly bemused glance at Azalea, her eyebrow arched."So," Mr. Keeper continued, "he took an oath. He filled a wine flute to the brim with blood. And he swore, on that blood, to kill the Wentworth General, and that he would not die until he did."And then, he drank it."The end."There was a very ugly, naked silence after that. The girls' mouths gaped in perfect Os."Sorry?" said Delphinium. "I missed the part about the lady?""Ah," said Mr. Keeper. "The blood. It was hers.”