“Don’t you?” I whispered. “You’re always going on about his shoulders.”
“Go to the blazes.” He glared at me.
“Sorry,” I murmured.
He sniffed. “All right, so why are you telling me this?”
“Because he’s gone. Part of the treaty was dissolving our marriage so he’d be free to marry someone else. He’s done with me. He’s not coming back. And I know it won’t be the same as you and I having a baby together, but it doesn’t mean we can’t someday. I do want that with you. I guess I just thought it would be in the distant future. A long, long time from now.”
He looked at me in disgust and disbelief. “You can’t think I’m staying here with you, can you? I’m leaving.”
“What?” I took a step back, destabilized. Guillame had always been there for me. Guillame had never left me. Even when I thought he’d left me to Remy, he hadn’t, and he’d had a plan, and he’d come back. I always had Guillame. No matter what I did, Guillame always forgave me.
He got up from the bed, shrugging. “I can’t.”
“Can’t what?”
“Can’t… any of it. I don’t want to touch you again. I don’t want to watch you get… fat growing his spawn.”
“Guillame!”
“Sorry,” he said. He was starting to pace. “I’m very angry. I’ve never been this angry with you before. I don’t understand it. I’m not used to it. But I can’t help it.” His voice wasn’t steady.
I was going to cry again. Blaze everything. “Maybe if you just have some time.”
“Maybe,” he said, nodding, pacing faster.
“I’ll go and leave you alone for a while,” I said, turning to the door. “Except this is my room.” I turned back. “You go. I won’t come near you. Take all the time you need. I’m so sorry. I never meant to hurt you this much.”
“You take me for granted, that’s the thing,” he said. “I’m your lap dog, and you throw me scraps, and you expect me to be happy with them.”
I shook my head, stunned. He’d never spoken to me this way before. “That’s not what I do. I love you. I’ve never told him that I loved him, I’ve only ever said it to you, because you and me, we’re what’s real, and he’s…”
“Why do you keep. Bringing. Him. Up?” Guillame’s face was red. “If we’re real, why is it only in relation to you and him?”
“I… I don’t… I’m sorry.” I was shaking now. I needed to sit down. I stumbled across the room to find a chair in the corner, and I collapsed into it.
“No, you know what, it’s not your fault.”
“It’s not?”
“I never asked you to respect me, did I? No, I just let you do whatever you wanted, and I showed up when you wanted someone killed or you wanted something stolen or when you needed to be rescued from being accused of treason, and I put myself in danger for you, and I left Atlas for you, and I—you know what? Maybe it’s not my fault. Maybe it really is your fault. Maybe you’re just…”
“What?” I said.
“You don’t want me to finish that sentence.” He stopped pacing. He sucked in a breath. “I don’t, uh, I don’t think time’s going to help, Fleur. I can’t. I really can’t. I have to go.”
“That’s what I said. Go. And take whatever time you need, and—”
“I have to leave this country. Get on a boat. Go away from you, as far away from you as I can get.”
“Just because I was with Remy? But I’ve been with Remy before, and it hasn’t made you—”
“I know.” He yelled it. His face twisted. “You’re having his baby, Fleur.”
“No, I’m not. It’s my baby. And even if you and I didn’t make it, it doesn’t mean it couldn’t be yours too if you wanted. We could be together, and—”
“No. It couldn’t be mine. Because it’s not.”
A pause.
I took a deep breath. “You’re angry,” I said softly. “You have every right to be angry. I know you do. Don’t leave, though. Wait. Wait a week. Wait a month. Please, Guillame.”
“It won’t matter,” he said. “It’s like… things have been building up for a long time, maybe since that night when you were supposed to kill him the first time and instead you made that deal to do away with Cedric? Maybe since then. Didn’t I say that you were going to pick him?”
“I didn’t pick him, I just accidentally had sex with him!”
“Accidentally?”
“I wasn’t thinking. If I’d been thinking—”
“Spare me,” he snapped.
“Listen, if you could just—”
“It’s been building, little things building up, over time. And I’ve been ignoring them, but this? I can’t ignore this.”
“You know, you wanted me to be growing his ‘spawn.’ That was the plan, wasn’t it? To take Dumonte? You made me lie with him so that this exact thing would happen. If it had happened then, would you have left me?”
“No, because there was another aspect to that plan, remember? You were supposed to kill him. But you didn’t kill him. You were never going to kill him.”
“You said you were glad I didn’t.” My voice wavered. “But now you blame me for everything.”
“Why wouldn’t I? You made your choices. You did this. I loved you, and now I can hardly stand to look at you.” His voice shook too.
I gaped at him, and I was hurt. I couldn’t believe he’d just said that to me. This break that was happening between us, it was devastating. This wasn’t supposed to happen. I couldn’t lose him. Not Guillame. “You’re not making sense. You can’t get this angry out of nowhere—”
“Apparently, I can.” His nostrils flared.
“Please, don’t leave me, Guillame. What do I do without you?”
“I don’t know. You should have thought about that before you let him have his way with you.”
“I told you, I wasn’t thinking. It just—”
“Happened, yes, I heard you the fifteen thousand other times you said it.”
I let out a noisy breath. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I thought about you after it was over. I felt so guilty. I don’t know why I couldn’t think about you before it happened, why I didn’t stop it. I never wanted to make you feel like this. Do you believe me?”
He stared at me for several long minutes, and then it seemed as if everything drained out of him. Defeated, he sank back down on the bed. He hung his head again. “It doesn’t matter. I can’t, do you understand? I can’t be here anymore.”
“I don’t accept that.” I shook my head.
“That doesn’t matter either.” He was quiet.
A lump was rising in my throat. “No. Don’t say that.”
“I can’t,” he said again, and this time he was pleading with me, but for what, I didn’t know.
Tears were starting to stream down my face. “Please.”
He got up from the bed, and he looked like he was going to start crying too. He grabbed me and pulled me against him, burying his face in my hair. “I can’t. I’m sorry.” Then he tore away from me and left the room.
I wanted to go after him. I wanted to argue with him until he changed his mind. But I was crying too hard, and I ended up in a ball on the floor, unable to stop the sobs from wracking my body.
Someone appeared in the doorway. I looked up through my tears and saw it was Marguerite.
She knelt down and wrapped her arms around me.
I clung to her. “Marguerite,” I whispered. “I missed you.”
“What’s wrong, Your Majesty?”
“Call me Fleur,” I said.
“Shh, let it out.” She patted my back.
I did. I cried in her arms for a long time. When I pulled away, I scrubbed at my eyes. “Marguerite?”
“Yes?”
“How do you feel about babies?”
GUILLAME
When Guillame was sailing over the waters leading to the Flainge Pass, he told himself that he was going to g
o and seek Atlas out. The man had all but told him that he still had feelings for him, and Guillame could use a little consolation at the moment.
But when he cleared the pass and closed in on the Dumonte port, he stopped there, even though he knew that he wouldn’t find Atlas there. The ship he’d taken belonged to Islaigne. It was crewed by knights from Fleur’s country, and they wanted to go home.
He told them to go. That he’d see to his own transport from here on out.
They didn’t argue, and he watched the ship sail off as the sun hung heavy in the afternoon sky. He stood on the docks for a long time after that, ostensibly watching the ship, but actually lost in thought.
He knew now that he wasn’t going to find Atlas. He was here to seek out Remy.
But what was he going to do when he found the king of Dumonte? Was he here for revenge? And if so, what kind of satisfaction did he think he could have?
Maybe he was here to seduce Remy. Maybe that was it.
He smirked, jamming his hands into his pockets. He couldn’t imagine Remy would ever swing in that direction. Remy was not only firmly in the camp of wanting women, he was obsessed with Fleur. What man invades a country to lie with a woman? Only Remy Toussaint.
The blazes of it was that Remy was successful.
Guillame kicked a stone off of the docks. He didn’t want to think anymore.
He turned to the docks, to the taverns there. He could go and find a drink. He was reminded of his time after he’d turned Fleur over to Remy, before he’d gone to look for the jewel, drowning himself in drink.
But this time, it didn’t seem appealing.
So, he left the docks and he began walking along the banks of the river. He was heading in the direction of the castle, but he wouldn’t get there quickly, not on foot. Since he didn’t have a plan, there was no reason to arrive quickly, however.
He walked until dusk.
The sun sank low in the horizon, and the river was a bright ribbon of reflection, and shadows descended on the red clay landscape of Dumonte.
Ahead of him, he saw a figure. It was a woman, but she was wearing trousers like the ones that Fleur always wore, billowy around her legs.
It made his insides tighten painfully, and he stopped moving.
The woman was gathering up rocks and putting them into her pockets.
It wasn’t Fleur. Fleur was far away in Islaigne, and he would likely never see her again. He didn’t want to see her again. Besides, the woman was taller than Fleur. Her hair was the wrong color.
He moved closer, and he recognized her.
Coralie.
He stopped short again, and his insides tightened again, but this time in a different sort of horrific pain. The last time he’d seen Coralie, it had been in her bed, the morning after she’d drugged him and forced him to have sex with her.
For weeks, he’d thought he might never be able to enjoy the act again, because it made him think about what she’d done to him. It made him terrified and panicked. She had made him helpless. She had stripped away his agency, turned him into what he’d been as a child with his father—a victim.
He wanted to back away. He had no desire to speak to her.
But he wasn’t quick enough, and she saw him.
“Guillame?” she said. “Is that you? What are you doing here?”
His mouth was dry. He didn’t say anything at all. He took a step backward.
“I didn’t think anyone would find me down here, at this part of the river. No one walks all the way down here,” she said.
“Well, I’m going,” he managed in a tight voice. “I’ll leave you to your rock gathering.”
“All right,” she said, nodding too quickly, her tone too bright.
Wait, why was she gathering rocks and putting them in her pockets? People did that when they were… He sighed. “Are you trying to drown yourself?”
“No,” she said, lifting her chin defiantly.
“Well, I don’t care if you are,” he said. “After what you did to me, you deserve to suffer. You’re a really horrible person, Coralie.” He turned, putting his back to her, and he began to climb up over the banks of the river, trying to get away from her.
“Wait,” she called after him.
He ignored her.
“You being here, maybe it’s a sign,” she said. “Maybe I should tell you before I do it. Maybe you’ll care. Maybe you’ll want…”
He moved more quickly, trying to put distance between them.
“I’m pregnant!” she called after him.
He paused. He turned to look at her.
“It’s yours.”
Guillame was stunned at the wave of emotion that went through him. Maybe it was because of what had happened with Fleur. Maybe it was simply an unavoidable thing, something primal. But it all crashed into him. A greedy sort of want for whatever it was that Coralie was keeping safe in her belly—which still looked flat to him—and a fierce feeling of protectiveness.
He scrambled back down the bank, stopping only a few feet from her. “Are you lying to me?”
“I swear,” she said. “I have a tea that I can brew. I’ve done it before.” She grimaced. “I could have rid myself of it and lived on, but I don’t want to live anymore. I feel like it would be easier just to end it all.”
“You were married to Qureste. What’s to say it’s not his?”
“He was always too drunk to bed me,” she said. “He was only ever with me a handful of times and that was toward the beginning of the marriage. If you think I would pass a child off as yours that wasn’t—”
“You would absolutely do that,” he said.
She let out a shaky breath. “Well, I’m not doing it now. I… you don’t know what it’s like at court now. Everyone’s grim, and the king is always in a temper. He’s divorced Queen Fleur, and all the fiefs have brought their eligible daughters to court, but he doesn’t even look at them. He’s amassing his army, planning to leave and invade Rzymn. He’s in a foul mood, so everyone’s in a foul mood. And I… I don’t have anything to live for anymore.”
“You’re a widow,” said Guillame. “It wouldn’t be a scandal if you were pregnant. You can pass it off as Qureste’s. Why drown yourself?”
“Maybe I hate myself,” she said, glowering at him. “Besides, those rumors about the duel, they did their work. No one will think this baby is Qureste’s. They’ll all know. And there are other rumors, too, that I forced you and that you hated me for it.”
“Well, those are true,” he said.
“Would you… ever consider marrying me?”
He snorted.
“I didn’t think so,” she said.
“I started those rumors for Fleur,” he muttered. “I did so much for her.”
“Yes, where is she?” said Coralie. “Has she come back as well?”
“No,” said Guillame. “It’s only me. I’m alone.”
“Why aren’t you with her? Did the two of you have a fight?”
“More than a fight,” said Guillame. “I don’t want to talk about it.” He sucked in a breath, looking her over. “All right, well, I suppose you could have bedded any man in the kingdom and you’d blame it on whoever happened to be walking by when you were trying to commit suicide.”
“No.” She put her hands on her hips.
“But let’s just assume it is my child,” he said. “If so, I can’t have you drowning yourself. Or drinking tea, for that matter. You are not useful to me if you get rid of the baby, do you understand?”
“I’m not going to do that,” she said. “I never wanted to use the tea the other times I did it either, but I… circumstances never go my way, Guillame. Not like they do for you.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He spread his hands. “Do I look like the sort of man that fortune favors? Trust me, I’m not. But what I am, Coralie, is the sort of man who’s clever enough to bend fortune to my own will. I always used my skills to serve Fleur, never for myself, but maybe t
hat’s going to change.”
“What do you mean?”
“How far are you along?”
“Two months,” she said.
“Right, of course.” He rubbed his chin. Was he going to have to grow a beard now that he was back in Dumonte? Focus, Guillame, he thought. “Well, that’s not great. But you’re simply going to have a very premature babe, that’s all. If we play it right, he won’t suspect.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You want Remy, right?” He raised his eyebrows. “Anyone with eyes wants Remy, don’t they?”
“I…”
“If it is my child, maybe I want the best for him,” said Guillame.
“Or her,” said Coralie quietly.
“Or her,” he agreed. “Sure, you and I could get married, but what do I really have to offer a child? No title. No money. No station in life. But the child of the king, well…” He raised his eyebrows.
She let out a disbelieving laugh. “You’ll never pull that off.”
“Of course I will. Don’t doubt me.” He gave her a tight-lipped smile. “But you must do everything I say, starting with removing all the rocks from your pockets.”
* * *
Guillame banged his fist against the glass of the window. Coralie had told him that Remy had moved from the chambers he used to sleep in, the ones in the tower, where he’d kept Fleur. He could have taken over Cedric’s old chambers, but he hadn’t used those either. So, he was back in the rooms he’d used when he was a prince, and they were on the first floor.
Guillame was at his window now, banging insistently.
It was the middle of the night, but he expected that Remy would wake up and come to investigate. He just had to make enough noise.
Abruptly, there was movement at the window.
Remy pushed up the glass.
“Your Majesty!” said Guillame.
“Dubois?” Remy was confused. “What are you doing here?”
“Can I come in?”
Remy let out a disbelieving laugh and then moved away from the window. “By all means,” came his sardonic voice.
Guillame scrambled through the window, dropping down to the floor below. He brushed himself off.
Remy had lit a lamp. The covers of his bed were askew. He had been sleeping. He was wearing only a pair of trousers. No shirt. The lamp gleamed against his sculpted arms and chest.
Throne Shaker (The Clash and the Heat Book 3) Page 7
