Chapter 19
Tessa was no stranger to finery: jewels, poofy skirts, tight corsets, and, since moving to Aeres, the finest furs and thick, cozy cloaks. But she’d never worn a dress like this.
It was purple. Not lavender, not lilac, not a subtle shade of bluebell, but the deep, rich purple of the Sel banners and cloaks.
Tiny seed pearls, golden beads, and stiff jet lozenges were stitched to the bodice and all around its deeply flared skirts in the shape of serpents.
Snakes writhed all up and down the length of the clinging, fluted dress that went all the way up her throat, but wasn’t modest in the slightest thanks to the way it hugged her every curve.
Fat gold teardrops adorned her ears, and her red hair had been twisted up and piled on her head in an intricate style strung with more pearls and gold beads.
When she looked in the mirror, a stranger looked back. Only her eyes, wide, and blue, and frightened, were her own.
The door clicked softly behind her, and she turned to find that all the maids had gone, but that she wasn’t alone.
She could tell immediately that the young man standing just inside the room was not a slave.
The high-necked purple tunic and its sewn-on jewels, the spotless breeches, and the spit-shined boots marked him as a figure of importance.
This, then, was the prince the emperor meant for her to marry. The second son.
He took three hesitant steps closer, and then halted again, arms folded at the small of his back.
He observed her without animus or lust. His eyes were large, and bluer than the other Sels’, soft like cornflowers, framed by long, pale lashes.
He wore his white hair tied back and up, a knot high on the back of his head, several delicate gold bands securing loose strands back from his face.
His lips were the soft pink of the inside of a conch shell.
Heart fluttering with nerves, Tessa waited for him to offer some sort of greeting. When he didn’t, she gripped her skirts best she could—where they were too tight at her hips—and bobbed a curtsy.
When she straightened, he cleared his throat, wet his lips, and said, “Lady Tessa Drake?” It was a question, rather than the direct greeting she’d expected.
He was nervous, she realized. Obviously not in the same way that she was, but nervous all the same. He shifted his weight from foot to foot, then froze, as though caught. The sight eased her own tension a fraction.
“Yes,” she said. “And you are the prince…?”
His eyes widened a fraction, and he ducked his head and slashed out an arm in the stiff sort of bow she’d seen mounted men give her father, once upon a time. “Yes. Prince Lucius, son of the Immortal Emperor Unchallenged, Romanus Tyrsbane.”
They stood regarding one another in stiff silence. Lucius tucked his arm behind his back once more, and his throat bobbed. The fading daylight caught a faint sheen on his temple and cheekbone; he was sweating.
Had he stormed into the room, cruel and commanding, laying down edicts, Tessa knew that—though it shamed her—she would have gone meek as a lamb.
She’d been brave in Aeres, and on the march; she grew a little braver every day.
But without an army of friends at her back, without weapons or familiar landmarks, she knew that bravery would get her killed… or worse.
But seeing him like this, not much older than Rune and without any of Rune’s swagger, and charm, and bravado, her fear quieted to a manageable level. Manners, she thought, would serve her well in this moment.
She gestured to the sofa and its accompanying chairs, all arranged around a low gold-inlay table. “Shall we take a seat?”
Her jerked, startled. “Y-yes. Yes, let’s sit.”
Tessa took one of the chairs, so she didn’t have to sit touching him on the sofa, though it took a bit of work to bend her waist in the tight dress.
Lucius hesitated a long moment, glancing from seat to seat. He started to ease down onto the sofa, and then sprang back upright. “Wine?” His brows jumped. “That is—I meant to say—would you care for some wine?”
She’d never wanted some more in her life. “Wine would be lovely.”
He tripped over the edge of the rug in his haste to walk to the sideboard; muttered something low and frantic under his breath in his mother tongue that Tessa thought must be a curse, based on context.
She watched as he selected two jeweled goblets and picked a decanter from the array lined up in a tidy row.
A red wine, ruby-colored and gleaming through the cut-crystal sides of the square-bottomed decanter.
His hand trembled as he poured, and Tessa had the chance to note how differently he was built from her husband.
Where Rune was broad-shouldered and deep-chested, his legs sturdy, his jaw strong, Prince Lucius was slim and willowy. His sleeves fell back to reveal narrow wrists; the tall shafts of his boots encased calves almost as slender as her own.
Whatever he was, this prince was no warrior. He reminded her of Oliver before Aeretoll: the boy who’d become a scholar because his body couldn’t stand up to the rigors of battle.
She found him rather pathetic.
He turned, and she schooled her features, and accepted the goblet once he’d crossed the rug, without tripping this time, and offered it to her. Then he sat down in the center of the sofa, at least five feet between them.
Tessa reasoned that if the Sels wanted to kill her, she’d already be dead, and poison wouldn’t be the preferred method. She sipped her wine; it was rich, fruity, and went straight to her head in a pleasant way.
Lucius sipped his own, lips red in the aftermath, and cleared his throat again.
“Lady Tessa,” he said, tone formal. “I hope that you find your…” He lifted a gesture to the room around them.
“Accommodations comfortable.” His accent was lighter than that of the guards and maids who’d spoken to her. Pleasant, even.
Tessa took another sip, stalling to think.
What would Amelia say? Something outlandish that would only get her hurt, most likely.
But Tessa was no longer the girl who’d traveled north with Oliver back in the winter, and so her response belonged not to that former version of herself, but this new one, and it might not be outlandish, but it wasn’t as polite as it should have been.
“The chamber is lovely,” she said. “The mattress is soft. I did enjoy the copper bath. But being held captive behind a locked door by people who killed my father and brother isn’t my idea of a country holiday.”
His brows scaled his forehead in surprise—and then he grimaced. He sat forward to set his goblet on the table, and then dropped his face into his hands, groaning.
It was the last reaction Tessa had expected.
Her first instinct was to sit forward and rest a hand on his shoulder, just as she would do with Rune, or with Ollie. She caught herself before she could do so, folding her hands together tightly in her lap.
Lucius lifted his head and sat back, shoulders slumped, posture decidedly less than princely. “I knew this was a terrible idea,” he muttered, mostly to himself, it sounded like. “I told him.”
Curiosity overrode the last dwindling embers of her fear. “Told who?”
“My father.” He threw up his hands. “Who else?” When his gaze swung to meet hers, it was wide and half-panicked.
“Your father is…frightening,” she said, again erring on the honest side.
Lucius dropped his hands to his thighs with a smack.
“He is, yes.” He regarded the table a long moment, chewing at his wine-stained lower lip, and then returned his attention to her.
“I did not ask for this. I don’t want it.
But Father is the emperor.” His head tilted: there’s nothing anyone can do.
“When you say this,” Tessa ventured, “what exactly do you mean by that?”
She thought she knew. Julianna had spoken excitedly to her while she helped her bathe, about what an honor it would be for her to meet Prince Lucius, and to be “given” to him by his father.
Her heart had fallen into her stomach, and her teeth had chattered until Julianna got up to fetch more hot water to add to the bath.
She wanted Lucius to say it, though.
His throat bobbed again, a violent movement, before he said, “My father wants me to wed you, and to have children with you.”
She’d deduced as much, but to have it put so bluntly left her shaken. “Why?” she blurted, before she could think of a more careful question. “As punishment? As…” She trailed off, suppressing a wince.
But Lucius shook his head, unoffended. “No, nothing like that. My father is…powerful.”
An understatement.
He continued, gaze going glassy and withdrawn, “There are many mages in Seles, but none so powerful as my father. He has studied, and practiced, and no one can compete with him.” He glanced toward her, a slow and haunted slide.
“You can imagine his disappointment, then, when my brother and I proved useless with magic.”
“You don’t have any?”
“None.”
Tessa dampened her dry lips, but her tongue was dry, too. She sipped her wine. “Why are you telling me this?”
“We are to be married.” His voice was detached, faint; a recitation of rehearsed lines. “I would like to be honest with you.”
Tessa swallowed with difficulty. “But I’m already married.” And not sleeping with you besides.
“You were married beneath the Northern gods of Aeretoll.” His voice grew even fainter. “My father does not view it as a legitimate marriage, and therefore null and void.”
Her pulse skipped. “He can’t do that.”
“He can.” His eyes locked with hers, and his were haunted. “He can do anything he likes.”