When the General asks her to dance, Miss Alina Starkov cannot help but laugh, though she knows her laugh is not at all ladylike, the twist of her mouth too honest and too sour for the taste of the ton. “And what would the King’s right hand - and the most notorious rake in Ravka, I might add - possibly want with an orphan girl from the provinces?” she asks, surprised when he takes her hand in a firm grip despite her protests, the heat of his skin - or, quite possibly, her own - palpable even though her gloves.

“Do you think yourself so unimportant, Miss Starkov?” the General asks, in a voice low enough that she moves closer to hear, into the waiting circle of his arms; close enough for him to murmur his next words against her ear, indecently close: “Rest assured that I believe there is far more to you than meets the eye, and I mean to uncover each and every one of your secrets, sweet girl.”

(Well, this was predictable.)