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That hope was futile. Linka dropped the sheets and ran over to me, her pointed chin trembling. Spindly hands reached for me, then retreated. “He didn’t, did he? Oh, stars, let me fetch the healer—”
“Stop,” I said, the order unmistakable and causing her to freeze at the door. I released a slow breath, then said, “It wasn’t like that.” Lifting my chin, I met her eyes, then squared my shoulders at the horror sweeping across her face. “It’s not like that. Not at all.”
But there was no relief. There were no whispers for more details. There was nothing but that fear and an evident disgust staring back at me.
Before she could leave, I asked her one last thing. “Please, do not tell a single soul.”
Her back was to me, her hand around the door handle, and she didn’t answer. The door slammed behind her, and I slumped to the unmade bed.
Upon the nightstand, light catching the jewels and snagging my attention, was a familiar sapphire hilted dagger.
Despite the hovering cloud of uncertainty, I smiled at what it meant—at the return of the gift I’d once attempted to use against him.
After a near-silent breakfast—terse with things none of us would say—I checked my rooms, found no sign of Dade, then went in search of my mother who was in the mending room on the second floor.
We needed to talk, and I wouldn’t let it be about livestock, trade, nor the dwindling numbers of both.
With the marriage alliance, we would fix all that and more. And soon.
A commotion outside lured me toward the nearest window in the stairwell. A wagon ambled by the castle gates outside, loaded with crates of produce, two younglings in the back waving gold and red ribbons.
Footsteps ceased above me. “Oh, thank the fucking stars.”
Edwan, holding a mound of ruined material, hurried down the steps to where I stood, his violet eyes watering instantly as he bowed. “I heard you were back, and I’m relieved you’re okay, but please,” he said, swallowing hard, “please tell me you’ll stay.”
I frowned down at the material, bright color shredded, others crinkled and singed. All of it likely repercussions of my mother’s moods. “She’s been that bad?”
He hesitated, then nodded. “I love her,” he rushed out. “The stars know I do, but I haven’t been able to leave her side. My mate is furious. He’s barely seen me in weeks because I’m too afraid to sleep too far away from her.”
I wasn’t sure what to say and how I could help when it was becoming apparent that this disastrous plan would not be for everyone’s benefit. Especially not my mother’s.
Yet I would see it through anyway, so I hugged Edwan tight and made him no promises. Then I watched him go.
Up the stairs, I entered the mending room, wove between the stands of fabric to the large windows that overlooked a small portion of the front courtyard and one of the entrances to the city beyond.
People streamed in and out, more of those ribbons fluttering in the breeze. I watched two vendor carts crawl in behind the gathering masses, followed by horses carting a wagon of ale.
“You said private, Mother.” I closed the drapes upon seeing a group of males laughing and drinking, tankards in the air, and turned to glare at her.
She stuck the handle of a small knife in her mouth, fussing with the beading on a lavender gown I hoped was for her, for I had no desire to wear it. “The ceremony, yes.”
I unclenched my teeth, infusing calm I did not feel into my voice. “What point is there in having a private ceremony when everyone now knows?”
“Our people need faith, to believe this sacrifice is an end to the war. Celebrating grants them that reprieve.”
Reprieve.
“You do not think he’ll stay true to his word?” I asked what she’d already made clear. “He agreed to end the attacks, the bloodshed, only if I marry him.” I made sure those last words registered, hit their mark.
They did, my mother’s hands stilling over a flower made from ribbon. She swallowed, and the hairs upon my arms rose as I watched her busy herself with the baskets of tools by the wall.
“I know,” I said, gentle and careful. “I know this must be hard.”
“Hard,” she said as though I knew nothing, and she would be right in assuming so. “You do not know the meaning.”
“I have spent weeks away from here.” I blinked at my own audacity, the firm tone I’d taken.
Linka appeared in the doorway, a large wad of lavender tulle in her arms, and paused. Her eyes gave away nothing, and she flitted to one of the two long desks, placing the fabric on a cleared space at the end.
I continued. “For countless days and nights, I have endured and survived and hoped to be the salvation you and father said I would be for this family. No, I haven’t provided you with another heir, but I’ve still helped. I’ve made this happen. Do not let my efforts be in vain.”
Linka made a noise, a snort perhaps.
I ignored her, kept my eyes trained on my mother’s back as she drifted to the window, her fingers at her lips. “Do not speak of him.”
“Father?”
Her entire body visibly coiled, and she hissed. “Don’t, and do not stand there and try to make me feel guilty for all you have done while I’ve been here, doing nothing.”
“You’ve been grieving,” I said. “While also keeping this kingdom from the brink of collapse.”
She turned from the window, her hand falling to her orange skirts, the sunlight catching the beading on her matching corset and sending orbs over the white walls. “Have you lain with him?”
Shocked, I stepped back. I could not answer.
She knew. She already knew. As did the female behind her, who pretended to be busy with tidying the desk.
They both knew. But they did not want to know. So I gave them what they wanted, what they needed, even though they were painfully aware it was nothing but a pretty rotten lie and shook my head.
“Right.” My mother’s chin rose. “Because to find yourself actually caring for the savage who destroyed our family would mean the end of the Gracewood line.”
My blood curdled into poison that tainted each breath I tried to keep steady, but I held her gaze. I held it while two warring entities inside me threatened to send me to my knees—guilt for lying about Dade, therefore belittling and reducing all we’d become, and guilt for having done any of it at all.
Linka eyed me pointedly from across the room, and I eyed her back, unflinching. She tilted her nose toward the ceiling and turned away.
Back in my rooms, I found a king perched upon my window, seemingly flummoxed by the sights of the city. “Well, my beautiful swan, I don’t know about you, but I’m begi
I placed the pitcher of freshly squeezed orange juice on the dressing table and poured us each a cupful. “I know.”
“Everyone’s together, their happiness brightening the fragile beauty of this land…”
The word fragile rankled, and I suspected there was more to what he was hedging at. I elected to put us both out of our misery rather than play. “And your thoughts on this are?”
He finally looked at me then, and that burn returned with a vengeance with one slow, deliberate sweep of those eyes. “That she wants us confused.”
I offered him the glass of juice. Though I was inclined to agree, I still asked, “Why would you think that?”
“Because we are,” he said softly, taking the beverage from my hand. “Thank you.”
He drained half, then rose and set it down by the pitcher before collecting me into his arms. “I’ve missed you.”