Nagusami laughed at his expression and then did a slight curtsey. "Come dance with me, Seto," she urged.
"But…I…"
"Oh, let one of my friends hold the flowers. Come dance."
He merely stared at her, looking at her with a comic sort of horror all over his face.
"Remember, you're a commoner for today. You can throw all your dignity to the winds!"
"I don't know how to dance," he mumbled.
"Don't worry," she assured him as she led him out into the middle of it all. "All you have to do is let the music tell you what to do."
"There's no words."
"Silly," she laughed, but not unkindly, "you don't listen with your ears when you dance. You listen with your heart."
It was a little slow starting, but Seto caught on quickly. He found he actually enjoyed the exhilaration of the perfect unison in well-executed motion. His hands felt awkward in hers at first, but they soon found just the right way to fit together. It wasn't a slow ballroom dance, but a lively tune that caught him up and made him part of it all. The pace kept it from becoming uncomfortable, too, because the music did not demand that they stand close together and just sway. That was the last thing he wanted to get stuck doing. He watched her laughing face as the world spun by, saw how her reddish-brown hair flowed and her green eyes laughed.
Their dance was suddenly interrupted as the puppy they had newly named Jounouchi came racing through the crowd chasing a small lizard. The dog darted right in front of Seto's feet, tripping him. Mokuba and Adina arrived just in time to see the elder Kaiba fall in a rather undignified manner straight into the center fountain. He gave a shout (the water was cold), and started up, but Adina hugged barking Jounouchi to her with a bemused expression that informed Seto he would not be able to do anything to it. A voice in the back of his head chuckled as Nagusami helped him from the water. The fountain's just data, eh?
He didn't remember clearly what this "data" was, but a feeling of annoyance flooded through him at being teased by his own sub consciousness. Oh, shut up, he told it.
Seto wanted to go back to the castle after that, but Nagusami insisted that the bright sun would dry him off in no time. She even helped him wring out his trench coat.
The rest of the day went like the dance: in a whirl of exhilaration and color, where everything was new and exciting. Seto found that it was almost easier to be a normal person, and lot more pleasant when he wasn't extremely uptight. Nagusami's two friends had mysteriously slipped away during the dance, leaving the two to wander the festival as a couple. And to his slight shock, Seto found he didn't mind. She brought a new light to everything, always looking at things like he did, but with a twist.