Chapter 11 #2
“Nothing about Oberon has ever pleased me,” she muttered. “But we’re in the top twenty pairs of the tournament now, aren’t we? There’s something anyone could take pleasure in, even you.”
Even him? Gerard’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t allow himself to be drawn off track. “Haven’t any of your past partners wished to talk strategy?”
“‘Past partners’?” Letting out a snort-laugh, she rolled over to face him, propping her head on the deliciously rounded curve of her left arm. “Darling, I may have watched the tournaments take place many times, but this part is new to me as well. Who could I ever have partnered with until now?”
“Lord Oberon might have volunteered himself,” Gerard suggested through gritted teeth.
“Eww!” She gave a dramatic shudder in response. “Here’s a word of advice for you, High General: Never fight with an untrustworthy partner at your side. It isn’t worth the risk.”
And yet, she’d fought by his side all day long … and Gerard had to admit that even in the fiercest heat of combat today, he’d never suffered a single doubt that she would shield his back in battle, too.
He would have to think more about it later … but for now, he shelved that disturbing realization to dig down deeper, past her bright, superficial facade. “Why not partner with your cousin Katrin, then? She seems a worthy warrior. Wouldn’t you trust her at your back?”
“I would trust Katrin with everything I cherish.” All the humor was suddenly gone from Lorelei’s voice, leaving weariness behind.
“But I never could, because she is my mother’s niece.
If she ever played and won at the Tournament of Leaves, the court would claim it was unjustly earned from royal or family preference. ”
Gerard blinked. “But you don’t think the same will be said of you, now?”
“How could it be?” She gave a careless shrug of her right shoulder, her eyelids drooping as her lips curved.
“Darling, my mother cast me off decades ago. It’s ancient history!
When she gave me up to the mortal realm, she made it clear to all and sundry that I no longer held any place in the family tree.
I have no claim to the line of Efaelen’s succession anymore, nor any position in its court except as an occasional diplomatic visitor of state. ”
Her tone was light; as Gerard listened to her words, he considered that perfect smile. “How old were you at the time?”
“Really, who could bother to remember such inconsequential details?” Laughing scornfully, she waved the question away.
Gerard de Moireul had never gambled in his life. In that moment, though, he would have confidently risked everything on the certainty that Lorelei remembered that detail with vivid and unchanging clarity …
Just as he would never forget the moment when his own life had imploded at eight years old. Then, he had lost everything he knew and everyone he loved and been sent to a school where all of the students and teachers were prepared to loathe him from the start.
How welcoming had the human court of Balravia been to a young, transplanted, and only half-human princess?
Unsettled by the question, he sought for a safer topic on which to goad her.
“So, when it comes to the list of those you trust with your life, from your cousin to your second handmaiden … I presume the Balravian Chancelloress … and your two royal allies in Kitvaria and Nornne … is there a single man you would name?”
“A man?” Her eyes narrowed, a snap of temper finally entering her tone.
“Well, General, let me think a moment. My father tried to murder me when I was a child. Then my first lover, upon my ascension to the throne, chose to celebrate the occasion by slipping me poison on behalf of my dearest cousin, Johann. After that, my second lover sold my closest secrets to the highest political bidders for a tidy profit. When I discovered the truth and cut him loose, he responded by making me the subject of his most famous and most libelous song, which has been applauded across the continent ever since … and, oh, yes, the last time I visited Efaelen, my almost step-brother, Lord Oberon, tried to trick me into drinking a love potion in an attempt to seduce me against my will, after I had refused all of his advances.”
“He did what?” Gerard’s voice lowered to a growl of fury as he took an involuntary step forward.
“Oh, it was a political move, no more. He wanted a queen of his own, you see, even if I was a second-best option in his view.” Her tone was as bright and as brittle as a frozen rose petal.
“I can promise you, I did not leave him heartbroken, no matter what all the songs and stories about me suggest.”
“Did you at least leave any of his bones broken?” The tips of his boots were brushing against the edge of the bed, but he couldn’t bring himself to step back.
The thought of vibrant, incorrigible Lorelei assaulted in such an intimate way, robbed of her free will and all choice over her own body and mind …
“Ha!” The startled laugh she let out in response to his words sounded far more real than her earlier feigned amusement.
“No, although I should have loved to. If he weren’t the son of my mother’s consort, I might have given in to that temptation—but have no fear, I dealt with the problem in my own way.
The court of Efaelen was laughing at him for months afterwards, according to my sources. ”
“And that is why he hates you,” Gerard finished with a sigh. “Of course.” That kind of vicious weakling would always blame his own attempted victims for any acts of self-defense …
And Gerard himself had been shamefully wrong in his own assumptions about that past relationship.
Worse yet, even after his own experience with the lies and smears spread by scandal, he had still been more than willing to believe the worst of her, based on the reputation built and spread over the years.
What other false assumptions had he made about his nemesis?
He lowered himself heavily to the silken floor, crossing his legs and resting his hands on his knees. “I don’t suppose you ever considered trying to publicly prove that first, libelous song incorrect and put forward your own side of the story to the world?”
It had taken him years of work and brutal determination to overcome the damage done to his own reputation by his parents’ actions, but he had managed it in the end. Surely, if Lorelei put the force of her brilliant, unpredictable mind to the matter, she would succeed one day, as well.
“Why on earth would I want to?” Her nostrils flared as she finally pushed herself up into a sitting position, her face drawing into haughty lines.
“Darling, I don’t have to prove myself to anyone—and it’s all the better for my kingdom that everyone else thinks me a shameless flibbertigibbet without brains or any resistance to an attractive set of shoulders.
Unlike some people, I quite like being underestimated by my enemies. ”
And by your friends, too? He thought the question but didn’t ask it, his mind filtering carefully back through everything she’d said—or not said—tonight.
Queen Lorelei might be famous for her glamorous lifestyle and endless public stream of lovers, but it was becoming increasingly clear to him that there were few true friends in her inner circle, and perhaps even fewer who were allowed ever to glimpse much of her inner truth behind that sparkling mask.
He’d always known that a dangerous intelligence lurked behind her carefully crafted demeanor, but he had never before allowed himself to wonder what more vulnerable—or even more compellingly admirable—traits might be hidden there, too.
The thought of finding out felt as dangerous as if he were teetering atop a precipice with no safe landing beyond.
“Well?” she prompted after a long moment of silence. “Isn’t there anything more you need to ask in this serious conversation before we can finally go to sleep?”
“… No.” Gerard let out the word on a heavily expelled breath. “No, that’s all for tonight.”
Earlier, he’d been certain that getting answers to his questions would sort his turbulent emotions neatly back into order.
Now, though, as he stretched out on the plain cloth floor to spend the rest of the night in the haven she’d created for them, he felt even more perilously unsettled than before.