***
Miranda was having trouble keeping up with the man in red. The crowd always parted for him but then it closed around her, and she was struggling against a sea of clowns, ghosts, devils, knights, lords, ladies, fairies, mermaids, and monsters. More than once she thought the mob would carry her away.
They’d left the Blue Room and passed through one similarly decked in green, and now he lead her on into a room of deep violet. Everywhere there was drinking and dancing and food and absolutely everyone wore a mask. The throbbing beat of the music unsettled Miranda, and she felt it was somehow pushing her back with every step she took.
A harlequin detached from the crowd and stood in her way. “Posso aiutarti?” he said. “Quale e il suo nome? Di dove sei?”
She tried to walk around him but several more masked men blocked her.
“She doesn’t understand you, Arlechinno,” said a man with a beaked mask and a loud voice.
“I was only trying to be polite,” said the harlequin. “Are you alone at the party, little dolcezza? Do you need a chaperone?”
“Move,” said Miranda, and the crowd burst into giggles.
“She’s not your type,” said a man in a bright red mask with a crocodile’s snout. “She wants Fanfarone. All women want Fanfarone.”
“Not Columbina!” said a voice in the crowd.
“Or Isabella!”
“Or me!”
More laughter. Miranda was ready to make a break for it when the man in red stepped into the knot of partygoers and scattered them. “Away, away,” he said. “This one is my guest.”
The masked men left in a hurry. The stranger nodded at Miranda. “Excuse them, please,” he said. “They are used to indulging themselves.”
“You left me behind,” she said.
“You did not keep up.”
“It’s not easy to run in this dress you know.”
“I know,” said the man. “You never did tell me if you liked it.”
“The costume?”
“Yes,” said the man. “I picked it out just for your, Miranda. I picked everyone’s costumes and I put a lot of thought into them. The only rules at my party are that you must come in costume and that you must keep your mask on at all times.”
“Wait a minute,” Miranda said. He was turning away, but she touched his sleeve to stop him. “Who are you? How do you know my name?”
“I told you: I’m someone you know.”
“But who?” She peered into the eyes behind his mask. He stood up straight and raised his voice to be heard over the din of the crowd:
“’He was tall and gaunt, and shrouded from head to foot in the habiliments of the grave. His vesture was dabbled in blood — and his broad brow, with all the features of the face, was besprinkled with the scarlet horror.’”
He looked at her, as if waiting. Miranda shook her head. “I don’t understand?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” said the man. “I am the Red Death.”
***
Richard had expected a struggle. In fact, he’d been looking forward to it. To his surprise, Dido threw her arms around him instead. He felt her nipples through the thin fabric of her costume.
“Finally,” she said. “What took you so long?”
“I just got here?” said Richard.
“But I’ve been looking for you all night,” she said. She kissed him under his mask and bit his lower lip. “It feels like I’ve been waiting for you forever. But it’s fine now, so long as you’re with me, and we’ll be together always. We will be together, won’t we?”
She smelled like fear and he heard her heartbeat accelerate, but he knew it was not him she was afraid of.
“You don’t have to answer,” she said. “Just love me. Please, love me.”
He squeezed her ass with both hands. This time when she tried to kiss him he pushed her away. This seemed to excite her, and when she tried yet again he put a hand on her throat and forced her to her knees. She moaned and rolled her eyes, sucking his fingers into her mouth.
I cannot possibly be this lucky, he thought.
She tugged down the straps of her dress, squeezing her tits and shaking them. “Does this please you?” she said.
He growled.
“I only want to please you,” she said, running fingers around her erect nipples. “I would do anything for you, my hero, my champion, my lover. Tell me what you want and it’s all yours.”
Definitely nuts, he thought. She licked one of her own nipples and winked at him. “You know I’m a queen, but tonight I’ll be your slave.”
He touched his mask, as if to remind himself it was there. Hers hid her eyes. For a second he wanted to turn and leave, to run away in fact, and go back and find Miranda and then leave this house altogether. But he remembered what the man in red told him about having a night to do what he wanted. All his life he never got to do what he wanted. He felt hunger gnawing inside, and he grabbed Dido by her hair. She moaned again.
“I want everything,” he said.
***
The Red Death bowed, sweeping his cape back. Miranda frowned.
“The Red Death?” she said. “You mean like the Poe story?”
“Very much so,” said the Red Death. “You recognize the motif, don’t you? You’ll find it all here: the colored rooms, the costumed guests, and the great black clock that tolls the hours. And me, of course.”
“It’s a strange idea for a party,” she said. “And you still haven’t told me anything. Who are you really? How did I get here? Where is my husband?”
“So many questions,” said the Red Death. “Why don’t you forget about all of that and enjoy yourself for a little while? You’re my guest, and I’d like for you to exercise your liberty as long as you’re here. Tonight I want you to do anything you want as long as it pleases you. I would like that very much.”
“What I really want right now is to find Richard and leave,” she said. She expected a rejoinder, but when she looked up the Red Death was gone. She turned around and around, but he’d vanished into the crowd.
“Oh hell,” she said.
Miranda looked up the stairs, and then back the way they’d come. She could not see anything in either direction through the wall of people. Well, she thought, Richard is probably looking for me too, so maybe I should just wait in one spot. She found an empty corner of a couch along the wall of the Violet Room and sat down. It was almost a minute before he realized what was going on around her.
She looked at the couple next to her on the couch and did a double take when she saw that the woman, who was naked except for a grass skirt, a lei, and a feathered mask, was giving a blowjob to a turbaned man whose silver mask covered his entire face. Her lips slid over his naked cock and her tongue lolled out of her mouth, licking around and around the head, but her eyes were on Miranda, watching her. When the woman saw Miranda watching back she winked.
A foot down the long couch was another couple, an angel with black wings bobbing her head up and down on a pharaoh’s cock, and next to them a woman naked except for a mask over her eyes was on all fours between two men. The couch was a line of masked couples and trios in various states of undress and various states of intimacy.
Miranda realized she was staring, but did not look away. The music in the room was creeping into her again, and she noticed that the group’s movements were all in time to the beat. And then she realized that someone had sat down next to her and had a hand on her leg.