Chapter 18

Eric’s thoughts were getting harder and harder to read.
He’d started talking, which meant all her previous strategies were suddenly useless.
Now she had to watch his eyes, his tone, his every move—had to think through each question he asked and what lay behind it, in case one wrong answer ended everything.
One morning, Bo Li woke to find a dress on her bed.
New: a pale blue silk dress, trimmed with ruffled lace at the collar, cuffs, and hem, a cream satin ribbon at the waist. Next to it lay layers of petticoats and a bustle.
On top was a postcard. The back showed a pencil sketch of the theater. On the front, in dark red ink, were just two elegant, razor‑neat words:
Wear this.
Years of puzzle games had trained Bo Li well enough to understand.
He wanted her to put on the dress—and go to the theater.
The dress fit perfectly, as if tailored for her. Bust, waist, stomach, arms—everything sat just right.
Bo Li didn’t want to know when he’d taken her measurements.
Outside the hotel, a carriage was already waiting. The fog was so thick that the driver had to lift his lantern just to see her face.
“You must be Miss Clément,” he said. “Been waiting a long time. Come, we’re going to the theater.”
Holding up her skirt, Bo Li climbed in, uneasy.
She had no idea what Eric was doing with all this.
He couldn’t possibly plan to hypnotize her and turn her into some star soprano like in the original, could he?
Bo Li knew her own limits—she could handle musical theater, but opera was another universe entirely.
Anyone who’d seen any version of *The Phantom of the Opera* knew how much he despised empty fame.
If he realized she was a hopeless block of wood, would he just kill her?
Sweat trickled down her spine.
Thankfully, the theater wasn’t for her to sing in.
It was the same theater she’d visited with Boyd—the same show, the same seats, the same box.
Eric never showed.
But she could feel him watching her the entire time.
He was always like this—never appearing head‑on.
Bo Li actually wanted to tell him his proportions were almost inhumanly good—especially the length of his fingers.
In the hotel lobby, there was a piano. When he spread thumb and pinkie, he could easily span a twelfth, maybe a thirteenth.
Most people could barely reach an octave. A tenth already marked a rare talent.
Yet he was filled with shame over his face, his hands, his neck—even his voice.
He wouldn’t let her look at his bare skin, wouldn’t let her praise his voice.
Bo Li was lost.
Face she could understand. But his *voice*?
“…What are we doing here?” she muttered, glancing around, hunting for a topic. “It’s so stuffy.”
Ventilation in theaters was limited in these days. She feared she might suffocate.
No answer.
Eric didn’t seem to be in the box.
The house lights dimmed, leaving only the footlights burning. A spotlight washed over the velvet curtain. Slowly, the curtain rose.
The girl in menswear stepped onto the stage.
She wore a black hat tilted to one side, a black tailcoat over a white shirt, singing a lively popular tune—something called “Nelly Bly.” The only accompaniment was a banjo.
She hadn’t listened carefully last time, too busy dealing with Boyd. Hearing it again, she realized it was a cheerful folk song.
The melody was simple, the rhythm strong. After two verses, Bo Li found herself humming along.
“You like it?”
The low, cold voice sounded behind her.
Every hair on Bo Li’s back stood up. Her heart nearly shot into her throat. “…It—it’s all right. Pretty good.”
“Why.”
*What is this, a music theory oral exam?* she thought wildly.
She wasn’t a conservatory student.
Luckily, before doing musical theater she’d been properly trained; she knew at least some basics.
“Because it’s built on repeating phrases,” she said slowly. “Easy to follow, easy to sing along with…” She couldn’t tell what he felt about the song and hastily added, “Of course, I can appreciate serious opera too. Like the Queen of the Night aria from *The Magic Flute*!”
That was the only one she really knew.
Mostly because that piccolo‑sharp, piercing high note was better than coffee. On a bike ride, it made her feel like she could kick sparks out of the wheels.
Eric made no comment.
But she seemed to have passed.
After the performance ended, his presence vanished.
He’d picked out a dress, a ribbon, petticoats, a bustle, and arranged a carriage—apparently just to make her watch the same show again and hear her thoughts on a simple folk song.
After that, he seemed to fall in love with the routine. Every day a new dress appeared at the head of her bed.
Bo Li never figured out what he was after.
Testing her musical taste?
Cultivating her eye for women’s clothing?
Training her to change faster?
His opaque, half‑answers kept her heart pounding day after day, full of fear of what might come next.
Her heart hammering, the fine weave of her dresses, the cramped, stifling box.
If not for the fact that he never appeared to her face, that his voice made cold sweat break out along her spine, that she never knew if she’d answer his questions correctly—it almost felt like a date.
More than once, Bo Li thought about running.
Then she’d look at the heavy backpack and go silent again—she couldn’t carry it.
Of course, no one ever died just because they couldn’t carry a pack.
If she truly made up her mind, she could leave.
She just…couldn’t.
Why?
Most pressingly, perhaps, her improved nutrition had come back to bite her. Her last period, which had stopped abruptly, had started again.
With a vengeance.
Thank god for the pads in her pack.
After changing, she poured herself a cup of hot tea. Looking at the dress laid out on the bed, she suddenly felt an urge to go on strike and stay in.
Maybe because she hadn’t come down to the carriage, the door to her room suddenly opened.
Eric stepped in.
She’d lit the gas lamp by the bed. With a small gesture of his hand, it went out.
No wonder Tricky Terry had called his magic sorcery. She still didn’t know how he’d burned that card.
He’d been gone for a few days, and he seemed taller somehow. Just sitting there, his shadow felt like it could crush the air out of her lungs.
He rarely stared straight at her.
But maybe because she’d disobeyed him today, the look he gave her was ice‑cold and direct, almost blatant.
A chill rose from Bo Li’s stomach to the top of her head. “…I’m not feeling well today. Can I take a day off and go tomorrow?”
She only dared “strike” because she thought she’d been doing well lately—answering all his questions, even spinning stories to entertain him.
…He wouldn’t kill her for asking for one day off. Right?
Eric didn’t answer.
Whatever he was thinking, darkness slowly swallowed the eye sockets of the white mask, making his gaze look even colder.
“Please,” Bo Li said. “Just one day. I’ll go with you tomorrow.”
She took a moment to check in with her own body—hot, sticky, uncomfortable, but not incapacitated. She could force herself to “work” while sick.
She’d just started to sit up when Eric’s hand came down on her shin.
He never touched anything but her neck.
Bo Li’s heart lurched, dropping into ice. “…Haven’t we been getting along lately? You buy me clothes, take me to shows… I’ve answered everything you’ve asked…” He wouldn’t break her leg over a day off, would he?
“Do you remember,” she said, heart racing as she tried to sound calm, “how I talked about building a circus? After all these shows, I already have an idea in my head… I haven’t even told you yet how I’d build *our* circus…”
His eyes were so cold it made her shiver.
She had never seen such naked killing intent in his gaze.
Her throat tightened. She could almost taste the acid of adrenaline. “Please…don’t kill me…”
At last he spoke. “Who said I was going to kill you?”
Bo Li’s words caught in her throat.
His hand rested on her shin. His voice was flat. “You’re injured. Who did it.”
He didn’t frame it as a question. He was sure.
The problem was…
She wasn’t injured.
“Huh?” she blurted.
“I smell a lot of blood,” he said.
Bo Li blinked, then realized. Heat surged into her ears.
Even now, many places still treated menstruation as taboo—dirty, unclean, not to be spoken of.
He was smarter than anyone she’d ever met, but he’d never been near women. Of course he didn’t know.
Still, the whole situation was…bizarre.
Just thinking about it made her scalp prickle.
She wasn’t ashamed of a normal bodily function. What made her shudder was *who* he was.
He was her watcher.
The one who might kill her any moment.
The greatest unknown—and greatest threat—in her life.
And on another level, he was also her protector.
Until he chose to end her life, no one else could touch her.
The more she thought, the stiffer she became. She could feel her own blood rushing faster.
She did the only thing she could—cut cleanly through it. “I don’t know what you call it… Women bleed a few days every month. Anyway—thank you for worrying. I’m not hurt.”
Silence fell hard.
Keeping her expression steady, Bo Li sipped her tea.
It struck her as strange. Art hardly ever mentioned this. But if the main character was male, every embarrassing nocturnal incident would be painstakingly described.
As if *that* were the start of romance, while periods were a shameful secret never to be named.
With that thought, she calmed completely.
“I know a lot of people blame this for women being ‘hysterical,’” she said. “But please believe me—this is normal. I’m not sick. I’m not injured.”
Maybe because he’d never been around women, he didn’t react like other men—no disgust, no squeamishness.