Chapter 41
Chapter Forty-One
Lorenzo
T he sky above the trees is pitch black. I can barely see the strings of my lute in the faint illumination that seeps from the distant palace lanterns.
I ought to be in my bed. Weariness drags at my bones. I keep missing notes, stumbling over melodies I know.
The problem is that whenever I close my eyes, I see too much. Marclinus’s ladies smearing blood beneath their feet as they dance to my music. The panther lunging among them.
Aurelia’s grief-stricken face when the former Lady Rochelle lay crumpled in front of her.
Then the flush in her cheeks as she embraced Bastien and Raul together, so much like the rosy hue that came over her face as she gazed up at me in her bed.
My fingers trip over the strings again. I grimace at the instrument as if it’s at fault rather than me.
The crunch of footsteps brings my head snapping up. If a few restless nobles are wandering the forest looking to relieve their late-night boredom, I’d rather not become their target.
The forms that emerge from the darkness are more welcome, if not by much in my current state of mind.
Raul comes to a stop a few paces away, carrying a lantern set at a dim glow. Bastien draws up at his side.
The slimmer man’s mouth twists with an uneven smile. “I figured if you weren’t in your chambers, you’d be out here.”
I don’t feel like expending the energy to focus my gift if I don’t have to. Gripping the lute’s neck in one hand, I let my other dart through the air. What do you want?
My gesture must look as brusque as the question sounds in my head, because Bastien winces.
“You’re obviously upset,” he says. “We never had a chance to talk after— I’m sorry, Lore. It shouldn’t have happened that way.”
He isn’t saying it shouldn’t have happened at all. Does he have any idea just how forcefully that moment in the shuttered bedroom sent me ricocheting from one extreme of emotion to another?
I’ve never felt anywhere close to as happy as I did today, with Aurelia’s caresses and eager words repeating in my memory. To know that she wanted me enough to offer up every part of herself, that she trusted me so much she didn’t fear the consequences, that she wanted to dream of another reality where we might have been entwined for the rest of our lives…
Even the awful truth of her situation and who she’d have to marry dwindled to nothing but a faint sting in the midst of that giddy whirlwind.
But I don’t have her even that much. She looked just as eager for my foster brothers’ attentions as she did for mine. Just hours after we tumbled together …
Do I even still have the men I thought of as my closest friends? They noticed my good spirits, I revealed the reason to them with all due respect to the woman involved—and they immediately set out to have her for themselves.
I’m sure I’ve felt this low and lost before. When I first arrived at the palace. When Tarquin marched Pavel to his execution. But it’s been years.
There hasn’t been anything for me to feel this strongly about in all that time. Not until now, when I grasped joy close only to have it wrenched away by the only people I believed I could count on.
My hand clenches around the neck of the lute. I have the sudden, wild impulse to bash it against the nearest tree trunk, as if destroying something else I care about would sate the anguish inside for more than an instant.
Too much rancor has built up inside me for me to hold back my illusionary voice. “It doesn’t matter. To you or to her, obviously. I was being a fool, like you’ve always warned me.”
Raul grimaces and steps forward. “That’s not true. She was very clear about how much she cares about you.”
“Strange way of showing it.”
“Lore.” He lets out a growl of frustration. “You shouldn’t blame her, not at all. It was our fault. When we heard how many secrets you spilled to her and realized she fucked you after she rebuffed our advances—we got suspicious.”
Bastien shoots him a pointed look. “And jealous .”
Raul glowers at him. “I wasn’t alone in that.” He turns back to me. “We found her in the vacant room already trying to put the information you gave her to use. It looked bad. We laid into her, and she told us off—called us idiots for thinking she’d have been with you as some kind of scheme.”
“She told us that she trusted you more than us,” Bastien puts in. “That she’s falling in love with you. ”
“And that she’s falling for us too, even though we’ve been much bigger assholes to her.” Raul swipes his hand over his face. “Hearing her say that—I got caught up. I wanted to test how true it was. It’s not as if you weren’t aware I’ve been pursuing her. I’m the one who suggested we should.”
I can’t deny that fact, even though remembering it sends an uncomfortable lump sinking into my gut. “You didn’t say you’d gotten anywhere.”
“I hadn’t really. I wasn’t going to report all my failures. That’s part of why I couldn’t understand— But it makes sense. You were what she needed the most.”
Bastien swallows audibly. “Barely anything had happened between me and her before that moment. I kissed her the other day and she stopped me. That’s it. But it’s hard not to appreciate her, isn’t it? Seeing how deftly she’s handled everything Tarquin and Marclinus have thrown at her, the fortitude she’s shown through every setback… You know I didn’t set out to care about her.”
I do. And there’s no mistaking the affection running through his voice as he speaks about her now.
Bastien isn’t much for big emotional declarations. Him saying he appreciates and cares about her might as well be an announcement of utter devotion.
Can I really tell him that I’m more worthy of her?
I focus on Raul. “What about you? Is it all about having a tumble and being able to say you won her?”
His flinch answers my question before he even speaks. His voice comes out rough. “No. I’ve never craved anyone the way I want her, but it’s not just— When I thought I didn’t have any chance at all— She’s an amazing woman. She should have so much more than that prick Marclinus would think to offer her, in every way.”
We agree on that much .
I exhale slowly, the tension in my chest loosening but not leaving. Where do we go from here?
None of us can have her, not really. Maybe the worst part of this whole mess is how wrong that feels.
Even if I never got to touch Aurelia again, I’d rather see her in Bastien’s or Raul’s arms than Marclinus’s.
Bastien takes in my stance and must judge that my temper has dwindled enough. He beckons to me. “This isn’t something we can fully hash out without taking Aurelia into account. We made too many assumptions behind her back already. I doubt she’s sleeping well after what happened tonight. Let’s go to her, sort the rest out—and offer her whatever comfort we can, if she’ll accept it.”
A gleam lights in Raul’s eyes that makes me want to punch him. I’m pretty sure Bastien, at least, means “comfort” in its least provocative sense.
“It sounds like we all owe her some apologies too,” I say. “Rather than immediately trying to sweep her up in some new seduction attempt.”
Raul’s jaw ticks, but his expression turns chagrinned. “I can keep my dick in my pants.”
“You haven’t offered much proof of that claim so far.”
Bastien sighs the way he always does when we squabble and waves us toward the palace more insistently. “Come on, before the sun’s rising again.”
It wouldn’t be wise to march up to Aurelia’s bedroom door and demand entrance in the middle of the night. We slip through the palace halls to the unused bedroom that’s been our usual entry point, then weave through the narrow, stuffy passages to the one that ends at her chambers.
Raul moves to the front of our procession. After a brief pause by the hidden doorway, he nods. “There’s no one else inside. She’s lying on the bed. I can’t tell if she’s asleep.” His forehead furrows. “Something about the room feels… strange.”
My pulse stutters. “Is she all right?”
Bastien nudges us forward with renewed urgency. “We’re here now. Let’s see for ourselves.”
The moment Raul eases open the hinged panel in the wall, a current of cooler air wafts into the stillness of the passage. Cooler and tainted with an odd sour smell like food that’s gone off.
My nose wrinkles reflexively. Raul steps into the room with a mutter under his breath. “What the fuck…”
The curtains have been left open, letting in the faint glow of the outer lanterns and the night breeze. It isn’t enough to wash away the fetid odor that seems to linger in the space.
In the dimness, my eyes pick out splotches on the floorboards and the rug where Aurelia and I came together so passionately this morning. Stains? And farther across the room, near her wardrobe?—
Raul flicks a hasty glance toward Aurelia’s form tucked beneath the covers. When she doesn’t stir at our arrival, he strides over to the heaps of ragged cloth on the floor.
Bastien and I trail behind him. I notice more blotchy stains everywhere I look.
Raul bends over the heap and sucks in a sharp breath. He holds up the skirt of what’s obviously a gown—or used to be. It’s sliced and ripped into tatters—and mashed with shreds of muck that give off more of the putrid stink.
Bastien’s face tightens. “What happened here?” he asks in a harsh whisper.
Raul sounds as if he’s struggling to keep his voice low. “All her dresses.” He paws through the heap. “Totally ruined.” He glances up at us with narrowed eyes. “Didn’t Fausta tear one of her gowns before? ”
I swallow hard. “None of this mess was here this morning.”
Sometime between now and then, a destructive force swept through Aurelia’s chamber, through her things. When? Was she already grappling with this new assault when we found her in the other room? When she had to dance to the tune Tarquin ordered me to play?
I drift back toward the bed, seeking out Aurelia’s shape. The bedspread looks unmarred—but it’s a different color than the one we lay on this morning, isn’t it? Blue rather than green.
It’s a huge bed, befitting her station, and she’s curled tight beneath the covers—knees drawn up, head ducked low so only her forehead and the splay of her hair across the pillow show. She isn’t a small woman, but right now, in the middle of the expanse of the mattress, she looks outright tiny.
My stomach twists. Every day, she endures more trials than even we know about. She takes them on her shoulders without complaint.
Because she’s so completely alone in this place that she doesn’t feel she can turn to anyone.
Maybe she would have reached out to me if I hadn’t stormed off on her this evening. We should have been here offering her comfort from the start, not skulking around stewing in wounded emotions.
How selfish would it be for me to resent her taking whatever joy she can find with my foster brothers as well as with me? Did I really think that with all the menaces she’s faced in the place, I could be a sanctuary for her all on my own?
A pang in my heart draws me closer. Without thinking, simply propelled by the need to be there for her, I peel back the covers enough to slide under them and tuck myself carefully around her huddled body .
Despite my gentleness, Aurelia stirs. Her initial flinch sends a jab of guilt through my chest, but she relaxes a second later, turning her head toward me. Her voice sounds far too thin. “Lorenzo?”
“I’m sorry.” The apology spills out of my mind in a rush. I hug her deeper into my embrace, bowing my head next to hers. “I’m sorry I got angry. You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I should have told you… We should have talked about it first.”
“This whole situation is a mess. None of us knows what we’re doing. But I’m glad—I’m glad you have more than just me. You should have all the adoration you can get from people who see how wonderful you are.”
I’ve let the illusion project far enough that my foster brothers will hear it too. They’ve come around the other side of the bed.
Bastien perches on the mattress and reaches over to stroke his fingers over Aurelia’s hair. He bows his head. “I have to apologize too. For making the accusations at all—for getting jealous when I had no justification. I keep getting things wrong with you. We’ve had to be so wary for so long…”
“I know,” she says softly.
Raul shifts his weight from one foot to the other, looking as if he’s afraid to get any closer. His hands have clenched at his sides. “None of this is right. None of what they’ve done to you—to Lady Rochelle—what happened to your room— If I’ve pushed at you too much in any direction, I’m sorry. I promised you better than that.”
Aurelia shifts around in my arms. She clasps Bastien’s hand and peers at Raul through the darkness. “I could have stopped things sooner if I’d wanted to. It’s not all on you.”
He holds her gaze. “What do you need from us? How can we make tomorrow and the next day better instead of worse? Who the fuck do I need to kill so you don’t have to worry about finding your room in ruins again? Just say the word.”
A quaver runs through Aurelia’s next words. “I’d rather there was less killing instead of more. I don’t think I’m going to get that, though.”
Bastien squeezes her hand, but none of us knows what to say. We can’t stand between the emperor’s guards and whoever he directs them to murder without getting murdered ourselves.
I hug her tighter for a few aching thuds of my heart. Then I sit up, leaving my hand on her shoulder as I turn to my foster brothers. “We should at least make sure no one can disturb her for the rest of the night. Let her get as much sleep as possible—she needs it.”
Bastien glances around and gets up. “Come on—we can push one of the trunks in front of the door. No one else will be coming in uninvited.”
I leap up to help him shove the trunk into position. Raul paces beside the bed, the muscles in his shoulders flexing. “We can wait here in case anyone tries. Make that bitch wish she never?—”
“No.” Aurelia’s voice clears with growing alertness.
She raises her head from the pillow, concern etched on her weary face. “You shouldn’t stay. If anyone realizes you were in here with me at night— It means a lot that you want to protect me. But I’ll feel better if I know you’re all safe from sanction too.”
With all the burdens she’s carrying, she’s still as worried about us as herself. My throat constricts. “Aurelia…”
She shakes her head. “I won’t be able to sleep if I know you could get caught. You need your rest too, so we can all face the next day stronger.”
So we can help her if we do have the opportunity. My body balks, but I incline my head in understanding.
“We can’t just leave when—” Raul starts.
Bastien prods his arm. “What were you just saying about pushing? She’s told us very directly what she wants.”
The larger man lets out a huff, but his stance deflates with resignation. He pauses by the bed once more. “We’ll be watching over you, Shepherdess.”
“And if you need to get away in a rush…” Bastien eases past him and points out the spot on the wall just behind the side table that triggers the hidden door. “Press it two times quickly and then once hard until it opens.”
Aurelia watches him, her expression unreadable in the dimness. “Thank you.”
I can’t shake the feeling that there should be more I can do, more I can offer, but I have no idea what that would be. As Bastien and Raul step into the passage, I hesitate.
Aurelia catches my eyes and offers a gentle smile as if she knows what I’m thinking. As if I need reassurance more than she does.
My heart skips a beat. “I love you,” I say just for her—knowing it doesn’t make a difference, needing her to hear it anyway—and follow my foster brothers into the wall.
As we creep through the passages back to our own chambers, a gnawing uncertainty follows at my heels. Would a braver man have insisted on being there for her no matter what she said?