The Artist’s Masquerade

by Antonia Aquilante

  Cathal knew next to nothing about the palace’s art compared to Amory, but he did know the history and architecture of the palace, and the south gallery was an area rich in both. They ended up strolling the gallery discussing those topics, and Cathal finally saw what Amory and Etan had been saying about Flavia. Her conversation was intelligent and really quite witty. He found himself enjoying the time, enjoying her, very much. But he was more confused the longer they spoke, because Flavia would often draw back when she said something particularly insightful or sharply humorous or a bit candid. It was odd.

  He found himself reluctant to leave when Amory finally joined them. He had to return to Philip and his duties, but he didn’t want to, didn’t want to leave her, this intriguing woman.

  But with that thought, he had to go.

  Chapter 6

  FLAVIAN WAS beginning to feel as if the entire situation was getting out of hand. He hadn’t planned on spending even one night in Tournai dressed as Lady Flavia, and there he was, weeks later, still pretending to be her. And every day, he wondered if it would be the day someone discovered who he really was.

  He tried to go unnoticed, to stay out of sight, but it wasn’t always possible. Velia insisted he accompany her as a real companion would, so he had to attend court social events. And it became increasingly difficult to fade into the background while at them. Prince Amory, who seemed too kind to be quite real, often tried to include him in conversations, even turning the conversation to art since he knew Flavian enjoyed it. Not to mention that Prince Amory had taken to showing him some of the palace’s art collection.

  And then there was Cathal.

  Cathal, who had spent time with him when Prince Amory was delayed and showed every evidence of enjoying that time. Cathal, who tried to dance with him. Cathal, who watched him when he didn’t think Flavian was looking. Cathal, who hardly smiled but was proper and courtly and charming when he wanted to be. Cathal, who was tall and strong and so very handsome.

  Cathal, who didn’t know Flavian was a man.

  Flavian kept reminding himself of that very important fact. It acted like a douse of cold water as nothing else did, not even the reminder that Cathal was betrothed to Velia, which should have made Flavian stop thinking about Cathal, should have made him stop wanting to know Cathal. He didn’t understand his own fascination with the man, couldn’t fathom his attraction to someone who was most definitely not for him. Could never be for him. Would never want him, because Flavian was a man, and there was not a whisper around court about Cathal ever being attracted to men. Flavian hated to admit it but he had listened for it. He listened to all the whispers about Cathal, his actions, his likes and dislikes, his former lovers.

  But he needed to stop. He couldn’t keep doing it. Flavian was going to leave the palace and never see Cathal again, and Cathal was going to marry Velia. If he couldn’t put aside his inconvenient and ridiculous attraction, then Flavian needed to stay away from Cathal until it faded, or until Flavian could escape the palace, whichever happened first.

  “You’ve been spending a lot of time with Lord Cathal.” Velia said it idly, as a casual statement not a question, almost as if she didn’t care what his response would be, but Flavian’s every sense went on alert.

  Still, he answered her calmly, in the same off hand manner. “Not really.”

  “I saw you with him in the garden at the party that first day.”

  “He came upon me when I was wandering around the garden and insisted he escort me back to the party.”

  “And didn’t he show you one of the palace galleries?”

  “Oh, well, Prince Amory had offered to show me the paintings, but he was delayed. Lord Cathal was kind enough to entertain me until the prince arrived.” He kept his head down over his sketchbook, but the lines he drew at the moment were likely to be erased later as he was barely paying attention to what he was doing.

  A quick glance showed him that Velia was looking at him. He hardly needed to look—he could feel her gaze on him. He wished she were focusing on the embroidery in her hands. “It is kind of him, and of Prince Amory, to pay so much attention to my companion.”

  He shot her a look through narrowed eyes, his own discomfort at the possible direction the conversation could take momentarily pushed aside by annoyance.

  “Well, that’s what they think you are,” Velia said.

  True. He was Velia’s companion to everyone in Tournai, but it chafed—he wasn’t Velia’s impoverished companion. He was something else entirely, and he shouldn’t be in the palace playing the role. He should be somewhere else, starting a life as an artist. But he just nodded.

  “I was just wondering if he’d said anything to you, or if you’d overheard anything….”

  “About what?” he asked. Velia was clever and observant, but she could not know that Flavian was attracted to Cathal. He had just admitted it to himself after all, and he would not be letting anyone know, certainly not Velia or Cathal. Nothing could come of the ill-advised attraction for any number of reasons, beginning with Cathal not being interested in men and ending with Velia being Flavian’s friend.

  “Oh, just, you know.” She waved a hand eloquently.

  “I don’t. I’m sorry.”

  Velia hesitated. “It’s probably nothing.”

  “What is probably nothing?” His anxiety didn’t leave room for a lot of patience with Velia’s uncharacteristic reticence, but he did keep his tone even.

  “I just feel as if something isn’t right with Lord Cathal.”

  “Oh? Like what?” Relief flooded him. It couldn’t be Flavian’s own attraction, then, because that wouldn’t affect Cathal.

  “I don’t know. It’s just a feeling, an instinct maybe.” Velia shrugged, as if tossing aside how imprecise she was being. “You will tell me what he says to you, though. I’d hate to go into this marriage not knowing everything I need to know. Especially if something is wrong.”

  “Of course I will.” He would never keep something from his friend about her upcoming marriage. Velia was his oldest friend. Their mothers were extremely distant relations but very close friends, so their children had grown up seeing each other often. Despite Velia being a few years younger than Flavian, they had gravitated toward each other as children, forming a close friendship that continued as they grew up. “But I doubt he would say anything to me. We don’t have long, heartfelt conversations. We aren’t friends.”

  “Nevertheless, thank you.” She turned back to her embroidery then. “I have no illusions about my marriage. I know there aren’t feelings on either side, and there aren’t likely to be, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t know what’s going on around me.”

  She began stitching again, apparently finished since he’d agreed to her request, so Flavian turned back to his sketchbook. He didn’t see the drawing he stared at for a moment. A niggle of guilt was making itself known, but what he felt was just a one-sided attraction to an infuriating man that Flavian was certain would fade soon enough. Cathal was far too stiffly proper to appeal to Flavian for long. No, there was no reason to tell Velia.

  He blinked and focused again on the drawing. With a little sound of disgust, he began correcting and erasing. He refused to let the ridiculous situation affect his work too. If nothing else, he would come out of his unwanted stay at the palace with some beautiful art.

  CATHAL HAD no idea what he was doing. He had duties; he had responsibilities. And none of it was helped by an inexplicable attraction to an incomprehensible woman. A woman who was not his betrothed.

  But he couldn’t forget her or his fascination with her. No matter what he did, he couldn’t get her out of his head. Her face, her cerulean eyes, her sharp wit. In fact, it seemed to grow every time he saw her, and he saw her far too often, because she accompanied Velia nearly everywhere.

  Cathal strode into the office he shared with Etan and pulled up short, shocked from his own thoughts by the utter misery on his brother’s face. Etan slumped in the chair be
hind his desk, staring at nothing. He showed no sign of noticing the door opening or Cathal’s admittedly loud entrance. Cold fear for his brother pushed his own worries aside.

  “Etan?”

  Etan raised his gaze to Cathal’s, and Cathal barely stifled a gasp at the pain and defeat he saw in his brother’s eyes. When he spoke, his voice was dull. “Cathal.”

  “What is it? What’s happened?” And who would he have to hurt to make Etan happy again? Because he would, for his younger brother, he would.

  “Tristan is marrying.” A spasm of pain rippled over Etan’s face before he looked down at the desk again.

  “Oh, Etan.” Cathal wasn’t sure what he should do and was more than a little confused as well. After a moment of hesitation, he pulled a chair close to his brother’s desk and sat.

  “His father is dying, and he wants Tristan to marry, wants him settled before, especially since Tristan is his heir, his oldest son. I guess he wants Tristan to have an heir as well. He’s picked out the lady, and Tristan is going to marry her. I don’t think he even thought of refusing. Maybe he didn’t want to refuse,” Etan mused. “I don’t know anymore.”

  “But, I thought—if you don’t mind my saying—I thought you and he….”

  Etan laughed, but there was little humor in the sound. “I thought so too, or I thought we would be. Someday. We’ve formed a friendship, but I hadn’t said anything. I was waiting.”

  “For what?” he asked, despite a reluctance to pry.

  “I wasn’t sure, but sometimes, the way Tristan looked at Amory or talked about him—I wondered if Tristan loved him. I didn’t want to say anything until I knew that Tristan wasn’t in love with Amory anymore.” Etan let out a long breath. Cathal had wondered himself about Tristan’s feelings for Amory, but Amory was most assuredly in love with Philip and devoted to him alone. “Now I won’t have a chance to see if we could have… I thought we’d have time. I haven’t even kissed him. Now I never will. I wish I’d kissed him, just once. I wish I had.”

  The last was said fiercely, but Etan seemed to deflate back into his chair after, the moment of fight gone again into grief. And it was grief, Cathal could see that. He knew what their father would say, both at the expression of emotion and at the object of it, but he pushed that aside and reached out to grip his brother’s hand. “You love him.”

  Shock flashed briefly over Etan’s face before sadness settled over it again. “I guess I do. I hadn’t realized it before.”

  Cathal regretted saying it. Perhaps it would’ve been better for Etan never to realize the strength of his feelings for the man he couldn’t have. “I’m sorry.”

  Etan shook his head, a sharp, dismissive movement. “Nothing for you to be sorry about. I’m sorry.”

  “For what?”

  “For bothering you with this. I shouldn’t have.”

  “You’re my brother, Etan. Of course you should come to me when you need to. It isn’t a bother.” He hoped he had never made his family think it would be.

  “I know that, Cathal, I do, but I shouldn’t make you listen to this. Even if there isn’t anyone else. I can’t exactly talk to Amory about his friend.”

  Etan’s words left Cathal bewildered. “What do you mean, this in particular?”

  Etan shifted in his chair and looked away. “Well, with the way you reacted to Philip marrying Amory, I didn’t think I should mention me and Tristan to you.”

  Oh. Well. He hadn’t expected Etan to say that. “Etan….”

  “No, Cathal, it’s fine. I shouldn’t have said anything. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, and I certainly don’t want to make you hate me. I couldn’t bear that.”

  Cathal felt Etan’s words like a physical blow. He never meant for his own worries, his own confusion, to make his brother think he would hate him for his own desires. What could he say to make it better? He could tell Etan about his own feelings, his own attraction to some men, even his confusion about Flavia, but something in him still shied away from sharing that when he hadn’t managed to reconcile any of it to himself yet. But he had to say something.

  He still held Etan’s hand, and he squeezed it. “I could never hate you. Never.”

  “Really?” The hope, quickly masked, in Etan’s eyes was heartbreaking.

  “Really. And as for Philip marrying Amory… it wasn’t what you’re thinking. It was about duty. Philip is the crown prince. His first duty is to marry and produce an heir for the kingdom. As is mine. And he has the extra responsibility of ensuring that his marriage benefits Tournai as well. A marriage to a man wouldn’t do that. It seemed that he was shirking those most important duties by marrying Amory.”

  “That’s what it was?” Etan asked. And Cathal remembered how angry his younger brother had been when Cathal walked out of the palace upon Philip’s announcement of his betrothal, and then tried to walk back in with barely a word not long after. Cathal hadn’t just harmed Philip’s trust in him but Etan’s as well. And that made him unbearably sad.

  “Yes. We’d been raised to those duties—Philip and I. I couldn’t understand how he could just throw that responsibility to family and country away.” It hadn’t been quite that simple, of course. He did feel that way, but it was more—because he and Philip had been raised to the same duties, or nearly the same, and Cathal had pushed aside any thought of attraction to another man, let alone a life with another man, long ago. A life with a man wasn’t an option for him, and there was Philip turning everything on its head.

  “He wasn’t. Philip loves this country, and he loves our family.”

  “I know.” He did, but that hadn’t stopped him from going along with Father and believing that Philip was tossing aside important responsibilities. He’d had to, if he wasn’t to examine the rationale for his own life too closely.

  But he was doing that anyway.

  “But he loves Amory too.” Etan squeezed Cathal’s hand in return. “Cathal, duty isn’t everything. It can’t be everything.”

  “Duty, responsibility to Tournai and the royal family, is important.”

  “It is.” Etan’s eyes were earnest, imploring even. “But it isn’t everything, even for people like us. You saw Philip before he met Amory. The weight of duty and responsibility without anything, anyone, that was his alone—without anyone who would love him for him—it would have drowned him. Sooner or later it would have been all he was.”

  Cathal would have had to be blind not to see it, and he’d tried to give Philip his support, both in governing and in friendship, but he hadn’t been able to see how much Philip was still being dragged down. And how much the man needed something else.

  “I worry about you, Cathal,” Etan said, and Cathal wondered when they had begun talking about him. “You’re so bound by your duty, by being what Father needs you to be. I’m afraid you’ll only be that soon. I don’t want that for you.”

  Cathal tried to speak, but no words would come out past the emotion clogging his throat. He’d had no idea that Etan was so concerned for him, and he wanted to dismiss those concerns, but somehow he just couldn’t get the words out.

  Because was it so far from the truth? Philip was heading in that direction before he met Amory. Cathal’s own father was ruled by his duty to country and family. It was his life. Philip’s father hadn’t been like that—oh, he had been devoted to Tournai, but there had been more to Uncle Jeton, including a devotion to his wife and children. But then, Philip’s parents’ marriage had been a love match. Cathal’s parents’ marriage had been arranged, as his own was.

  Would he turn into Father? Strict, rigid, caring only for duty and family responsibility and propriety? That was a bleak thought. But with startling clarity, he realized he was halfway there. The way he acted, the way he thought, the way he’d pushed himself into the exact parameters Father had set out for a proper heir. The way he had acceded to Father’s decision that he marry Velia even though he didn’t know her at all. And even though now that he knew her somewhat, he was
more interested in Flavia.

  He looked up at Etan, who was watching him with concern. Cathal supposed he had been quiet for a long time. But there was so much he had to figure out, and he had no idea where to start. He did know one thing. “Etan. I don’t want that either.”

  IT WAS one thing to tell Etan that Cathal didn’t want to turn into their father, to have nothing in his life except a rigid sense of duty and responsibility. It was quite another to do something about it, to figure out what needed to be done. He couldn’t turn his back on his duties, especially not his betrothal, whether he’d chosen it or not, because it was important to Tournai. No, he couldn’t turn his back even if he wanted to—and he didn’t want to shirk his duties. That wasn’t the person he was, the person he had been raised to be.

  Nor was he the type of person who went back on a promise. He was betrothed, though he hadn’t chosen the woman or the betrothal, and the betrothal was a promise. He couldn’t let himself break that promise, no matter how intriguing and attractive a person Flavia seemed to be. But he couldn’t forget about Flavia.

  And so he had no idea what to do, except to keep doing what he had to.

  Father had reminded him again to spend more time with Velia, and it seemed to be something he should do. Perhaps if he got to know her more, he would find out who she really was behind the face she showed the world. Perhaps they would like each other, and their marriage could be a friendly one, at least.

  With that in mind, Cathal knocked on the door to Velia’s suite one afternoon. He’d see if she wanted to walk in the garden or even ride in the countryside. She might enjoy the views from the cliffs or perhaps the colorful scenes along the river.

  But it was Flavia who opened the door. Her eyes went wide. Surprise seemed to freeze her even as it did him. He shouldn’t have been surprised. Flavia shared a suite with Velia, so there was every chance Flavia would answer the door. Probably more chance that Flavia would answer the door.