Chapter 299: Bella's Performance
Rodolphus waved a hand.
The servants still clearing up froze, set their platters and glasses back on the long table, and withdrew without a sound.
The house-elves were faster. They vanished before the servants had even reached the door, gone without stirring the air.
The ballroom doors closed.
Bella stood at the center of the hall, wine glass still in hand.
Her gaze settled on Regulus. She didn't speak right away.
She tilted her head back and drained the last mouthful, spun the glass once in her fingers, then set it on the edge of the nearest table.
She began to circle him. Heels on stone. Click. Click. Unhurried, each step landing before the echo of the last had fully died.
Then she laughed. Not the fervor she'd spread across a hundred faces during the speech. That performance was over.