As if I would tell her anything. I leaned forward, my feet following the movement as she stepped back. I stood at my full height before her. And I regretted so many things. Everything that had been forced upon me. The things I’d done and would do.
“I’m sorry,” I croaked. “I don’t want to do this.”
“But if you don’t, they’ll kill you. Or expose you. Though, if you ask me, exposure is an empty threat. Why wouldn’t a rebel sing like a bird if their own cause betrayed them? I suppose they know that though, and that’s why you’re here.”
An empty threat. She was right. My stomach bottomed out. Faramond would never turn me in—I knew little about the Red Asters’ plans, but I knew enough. They would simply kill me instead of risking a leak.
“Well, I knew this was coming after the tax ordeal, so let’s make it quick, shall we?” She eyed the knife. “And perhaps less bloody.”
“You’re not going to call for help?” I asked before I could stop myself. Even if I knew I would die, I would try to save myself. Anyone would.
She laughed mirthlessly and moved to a jeweled box on her vanity. After pulling a key from a chain around her neck, she unlocked it. “I accepted this would be my fate long ago.” She turned and met my eyes before downing a blue glass vial. “It took longer than expected for the day to come, but I’m more than ready to end this game. I thought I could do some good for the people but that wasn’t what the Asters really wanted from me. Not from you either, I suspect.”
Definitely not. I swallowed hard. “What did you drink?”
“A fast-acting poison that will make me sleep before stopping my heart.” She sighed and retrieved another object from the box. An envelope. “A suicide note. Technically that’s what just happened, so don’t think of this as blood on your hands, Wing.”
I replaced the knife on my belt with unsteady hands. “You could be lying. It could simply slow your pulse so I believe you’re dead.”
“It could do that.” Her knees gave out but she caught herself on the vanity. “But you’re welcome to stay and make sure.”
I stood there, numb, and watched as she struggled to cross the room to her bed. The longer it took, the worse I felt. She’d taken away the burden of killing her, but I was still responsible in a way. Faramond was responsible. Not me. Pevran had expected her death long enough to have poison and a letter ready. She didn’t even seem upset.
How could she be so… so…
“You should close the wardrobe,” she mumbled as she settled on the mattress.
My body moved to the doors on its own, shutting them silently, feeling numb. “Do you need anything?”
Pevran blinked heavy lids and motioned me forward with a wave of her hand. I inched closer and knelt at the side of her bed. “I spent too long living for other people. Don’t make the same mistake.”
“There’s no way out of the Asters,” I whispered.
“Run,” she said on a labored exhale.
Then her eyes closed. Her chest slowed. A wheeze escaped her throat. Within a few minutes, she was gone.
I sat beside her for as long as I dared and contemplated her life. What had she done for the Asters? Why had she joined the cause? How had she come to change her mind? To expect betrayal?
But no answers would come now, so I stood. The lines in Pevran’s face appeared to have eased with death, the worry carried away with her soul. I released a shallow breath and pulled a blanket up around her shoulders. Faramond had always been an asshole, but this only brought the realization to the front of my mind. I’d become too compliant, too afraid. Rightfully so. My next exhale shook with sorrow for Pevran, for all Asters forced into a similar position. Myself included.
Chapter Fifteen
“You’re as graceful as a bull,” the duchess lamented from inside the Women’s Palace. “Again.”
I paused outside the door as the old woman hummed a song. Dance lessons, if I had to guess, which wouldn’t afford Anais and I a moment to talk. I’d thought about my last interaction with her—thought about it all night, even when Bastian was telling me about a newly proposed law. Faramond would’ve wanted me to pay attention to that conversation and pass the information along, but no matter how hard I tried, my mind wandered between Anais and Pevran instead.
Run.
Pevran’s final warning tore through me like wildfire. Could I run? Where would I go? Bastian would be left vulnerable so I couldn’t leave… But she could. Anais hadn’t yet been introduced to the general nobility, and I doubted that the governors would recognize her after one dinner. Not if she wore common clothes. She would easily blend into any city after growing up on the streets of Port Black. There would be no delicate noble mannerisms for her to overcome.
If Anais ran—if I helped her run—this nightmare would be over. She would be safe, Bastian wouldn’t be engaged to a potential threat, and I would no longer need to fight wanting her with every breath.
Stepping into the doorway, I leaned on the frame. Anais took the steps of a popular Eradristian dance while the duchess circled her like a vulture, eyeing every movement. She made each step at the right time, kept her shoulders straight, head up, but there was no life to her dance. Instead of it being the lively, flirtatious dance it was meant to be, it was flat and mechanical. The distress it put on the duchess’ face made me chuckle.
Somehow, the older woman heard it and rounded on me. The surprise on her face quickly gave way to pursed lips. “You find this funny, Lord Tufaro? Need I remind you how well you danced?”
“Ah,” I said, forcing back another laugh. She’d made me learn how to dance even though I would never have the opportunity to use the skill. The prince would dance—the Wing would watch and protect. “I improved due to your careful instruction, duchess.”
“A lot of good my teachings are doing her.”
My gaze flicked to Anais. She stood in the middle of the room, arms crossed self-consciously. “In her defense, it is difficult without a partner.”
The duchess stood straighter and clapped once. “Wonderful!”
I pushed off the doorframe. “That wasn’t an offer.”
“It sounded like one to me.” She motioned me forward with a sweep of her arm.
“I’m not sure that’s appropriate.” A hand on her hip. Our bodies pressed together. The way I knew she would follow me across the dance floor, giving me far too much trust. I hated the idea. And I wanted it desperately.
“Appropriate,” she scoffed. “The prince asking you to sneak over here and check on her isn’t appropriate either. Why doesn’t he come himself—and don’t give me any nonsense about the king wanting him to avoid attention. You pull the same amount that he does.”
I’d asked myself the same thing multiple times. King Edric didn’t want to call attention to Lady Karina’s presence before she was ready to be seen by the court, but Bastian could see Anais in the Women’s Palace with a chaperone. He was busy, but not so busy that he couldn’t take breakfast with her. Not that I could complain. Watching Bastian court her wasn’t high on my list of things to do.
“As I’m sure you’ve heard, Governor Pevran passed away last night,” I said as emotionlessly as possible. Bastian had been pulled from his bed hours earlier for an emergency meeting about the situation and I hadn’t seen him since. The rumors had spread, however, claiming everything from a bloodbath to natural causes. “Besides, unlike His Highness, I am able to get here unseen.”
“Yes, yes. A shadow, you are,” the duchess mumbled. “Now, dance with the lady before I’m forced to present this to your prince at the engagement ball.”
Engagement ball? I hadn’t realized they were having one. It was a royal tradition though, so I should’ve expected it. A ball to celebrate the bride or groom with the nobility before the official announcement to the kingdom. Anais was going to need to master harder dances than this.
“Perhaps,” Anais spoke up, “we could ask one of the servants to dance with me instead.”
The duchess grabbed my elbow and practically dragged me inside. “You think any of them know how to dance? Are you trying to make yourself worse?”
Logically, the suggestion of dancing with a servant instead of me should’ve been a relief. A way out of tempting myself unnecessarily. But it wasn’t. I wasn’t a jealous man—I’d accepted that I wouldn’t have what normal people did—but the idea of her so close to someone else had me pursing my lips. She’ll be close to Bastian one day, closer than dancing, I reminded myself. A mistake. All it did was send me striding up to her.
I took Anais’ hand and her small gasp went straight through me. She looked toward the duchess with wide eyes, almost as if she were hoping for a reprieve. When we’d last seen each other, things had ended with a tense truce, but with the duchess here, I couldn’t ask what happened to make her so nervous. Though, perhaps it was the same thing that happened to me; common sense returned.
“Relax,” I whispered, looking down at our hands. Hers was small in mine, flawless where mine was scarred and calloused. “It’s just a dance.”
She let out a quick breath as she situated her other hand on my shoulder. “That’s impossible around you.”
“Do I scare you now?” I asked, one brow lifted. In the garden, she’d denied being afraid and, more than anything, I didn’t want that to change.
She looked down to study her feet. “You told me you scare everyone.”
But not her. I placed my free hand on her hip, fingers wrapping around to her lower back, and tugged her closer. “Do I scare you though?”
She chewed her bottom lip instead of answering. I’d had stab wounds feel better than her response.
“Don’t look at your feet,” the duchess scolded. “You know the steps. Let him lead.”
“Easy for you to say,” Anais mumbled.
Duchess Fransabelle began her off-tune humming again and I moved, pulling Anais with me. It had been years since I’d danced. My last opportunity had been just before the duchess left court, when she made me participate in one of Bastian’s final lessons, but it came back naturally as I spun through the room. She missed steps and stumbled along, but I kept her up, kept her moving. I wouldn’t let her fall. Not here, dancing, and not to the Asters’ scheming.
Because she would eventually. Faramond was playing a song Anais couldn’t hear with steps she hadn’t learned, but one day, she would be expected to perform the rebel’s dance with precision.
On our second lap around the room, Anais’ muscles relaxed slightly. I felt her give over control of our steps. Felt her decide to follow. But the small sliver of trust was overshadowed by her reaction to my previous question.
“What have I done to change your mind?” I asked quietly enough so Fransabelle couldn’t hear. I’d discovered her secret, but no one had stormed into the Women’s Palace to arrest her. No one else knew—not even Bastian—as I had promised. At least, until I sorted through what was going on.
She glanced down at our feet, earning a tap of the duchess’ cane on the marble floor. “I’m not… scared of you,” she said, leveling her gaze at the silver wing pinned to my chest.
She was. I could see it in the way she blushed, hear it in the hesitation of her reply. Maybe she wasn’t as afraid of me as everyone else, but it was there. Lingering.
“I don’t blame you for it,” I said. “But, you should know, I haven’t said anything.”
“Not yet.”
My grip on her hip tightened slightly. “I don’t want to see you die, Anais.”
“Don’t call me that,” she hissed, body tensing beneath my hands. “Weren’t you the one to tell me someone was always listening?”
“Less talking, more dancing,” the duchess snapped.
I gave Karina a stiff smile and spoke without moving my lips. “We need to talk privately.”
“Again?”
Always. “I’ll find you.”
The duchess slapped my arm with the end of her cane, but through the bracer, it barely registered. “Stop distracting her.”
“I’m giving her suggestions, duchess,” I lied.
“Leave the teaching to me and dance. From the beginning.” She began humming again.
We moved in silence then, running through the steps three times. My eyes were glued to Anais’ face. Each time she did something wrong, she pursed her lips, and when she didn’t stumble over the more complicated steps, the corners of her lips twitched in the threat of a smile. I was hyperaware of where our skin met, of the heat of her hip through her gown. It took constant conscious thought not to pull her flush against me. If I slid my hand from her hip to her lower back, I knew I would find bare skin where the dark red fabric swooped down to showcase the rows of beads. It was fucking torture being this close to her, her scent of wildflowers beckoning. And, if the redness of her cheeks was any indication, she felt the same way.
“Enough,” Fransabelle said when the song ended. “All this humming has dried my throat.”
“I’ll order tea,” Anais said, quickly pulling away from me and hurrying toward one of the side doors.
I turned to face Fransabelle. “She isn’t so bad.”
“Hmm.” The duchess narrowed her eyes. “I’m an old woman, Saer, but I’m not senile.”
I lowered my brows. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“You know exactly what I mean,” she said, and turned her back to me. “Have the tea brought to the terrace. This might be one of our last decent days before winter settles in.”
My heart thumped heavily as I realized she saw the connection between Anais and me. “I should go.”
“Indeed.”
I watched her shuffle from the room, through the doors to the small porch. Did she know we’d kissed? No, that was impossible. My visiting Anais in her rooms was another story. Anais returned from ordering tea and glanced between me and the terrace.
Without thinking, I closed the distance between us before she ran straight to the duchess’ side. Lifting her hand, it appeared to anyone watching that I was telling her to have a pleasant afternoon. “Make an excuse to return to your rooms.”
“Wh—”
I spun on my heel and left. Or appeared to leave. Instead of heading for the gate, I circled back around and slipped through the servants’ door. Unlike the governors building, it wasn’t the middle of the night so the chances of being caught were so much higher. As soon as I saw a door into a main hall, I took it and navigated the same halls I’d found while searching for the library. A maid hummed somewhere nearby. Fuck. I ducked into the first room I came upon.
Blue tiles covered the floor and walls of a bathing chamber. In the middle of the room hung a delicate chandelier with two dozen unlit candles, and below it, a large bath set into the floor. A lounge sat on the other side of it with a bushy plant placed at each end.
Footsteps moved at a brisk pace in the hallway and I plastered myself to the wall, waiting to hear the click of gemstones that would tell me it was Anais and not a servant. When I heard the soft sound, I opened the door and grabbed Anais’ arm, tugging her into the bathing room with me.
“Shh,” I warned quietly in her ear as I pushed the door shut. “Your lady’s maid must’ve told Fransabelle that I was here the other night.”
Anais pulled her arm free. “Don’t do that.”
“What?”
“You can’t just go around pulling people into rooms.” She placed her hands on my chest and pushed me back a step. Only, once there was space between us, she didn’t remove them. “It’s not polite to sneak up on a lady.”
I smirked and curled my hands around her wrists, holding her against me. “It isn’t polite to invade a man’s private sanctuary either, yet you continued to visit the garden despite my warnings.”
“That’s different.” Her chest rose and fell with quickened breaths, drawing my attention.
“Is it?” I leaned forward, reaching behind her to click the lock into place, and inhaled her intoxicating scent. A quiverin
g breath left her, breaking my thin strand of control. My tongue flicked out, tracing the curve of her ear.
Her fingers curled into my shirt. “Saer.”
It wasn’t a warning, but a plea. I backed her against the door and lifted her chin with my finger. “I didn’t ask you here for this,” I said in a hoarse voice.
“I know.” Back arched, her breasts skimming my chest. “If you aren’t planning to turn me in and you don’t want to kiss me—”
A low growl left my throat as I pressed my mouth to hers. She tasted like strawberries and all things forbidden as I slipped my tongue past her lips. Her hands wrapped around the back of my neck, locking me in place. As if I would stop. I wasn’t sure I could’ve at the moment. Not unless she told me to.
I gripped her waist, shifting her against me, letting her feel the effect she had on me. A small moan escaped her and I snapped. My kisses became rougher, more demanding, and she met them with equal enthusiasm. My thigh pressed between her legs. Her heat soaked through all the material separating us and I gripped the fabric of her dress at both hips.
My lips moved from Anais’ mouth to her neck. She tilted her head to give me better access and trailed her hands down my chest. Slowly, with more patience than I felt, I gathered her skirt a little higher. With each handful I lifted, I expected her to stop me, but, instead, she shifted her hips, allowing the fabric to move easier. And, in the process pressed her core against my leg.
When my fingertips grazed her bare thigh, my body shuttered. “Fuck.”
“Please,” she moaned, grinding against me.
I eased my leg away and her soft whine filled my ears. “Shh.” I took her bottom lip gently between my teeth and tugged. “Anyone could be in the hall.”
Letting her gown drop, I led her farther into the room, around the bath and away from the door. Her pupils were blown wide as she looked up at me. The desire in her gaze made my pants uncomfortably tight. She reached for my belt and, with one pull, had it undone.
“Anais,” I breathed. This time she didn’t correct me. She only slid her hand inside my pants and released my hard length. “Shit.”
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