Chapter Forty-Nine
“ P rincess Rowandine, behind me!” As soon as their heads dip below view, I spin to make out my next threat. Not moments later, King Sturdevant runs toward me, determination set in his jaw. His body presses against mine as he assesses threats around us, dual swords at the ready.
Even at this moment, after the day I’ve had, I can’t help but admire the way his shoulders flex beneath his pressed white shirt and the way he balances his two shimshar without thought.
“What are you doing out here? Haven’t you heard, it’s unsafe! You should be in your rooms until the threat is neutralized.” He takes in my wedding dress, in tatters and covered in blood. “We need to get you to a healer.” His face is stricken at the sight of me.
“I’m fine,” I assure him, trying for a smile. He pulls us away from the main hallway into the corners of the ballroom. I’m not fooling anyone.
Flowers brush against my arm, and for a moment, I worry my vines found their way in here, too. But the roses brushing against me are not my own. The white roses and baby’s breath are scattered throughout the ballroom in tall vases and twine around the archways billowing with bright white bows and pale yellow streamers.
After taking in my dress torn and tattered, covered in blood and now the sword in my hand, he takes a step back. “Rowandine?” Confusion and hurt warring on his features.
“I can't marry you.” Which seems obvious, but I don’t know what words will make this easier.
“I don’t understand.” He looks again at my dress and the mess I’m covered in as if he’s trying to reconcile it with what he knows of me. With the woman who strode down the halls arm in arm with him, quietly laughing at his stories or telling stories of my own. “I thought we held the same views, believed in the same things. We both want a better world, and it can start with Etos.” I don’t know if he’s aware, but even though he’s sheathed his weapons, his hands still hover over his swords like I’m the enemy.
And maybe now I am.
“We do. Want the same things. But it has to start here, in Merula, in Everguard. With me.” Meeting his eyes, I wait, watching his features while this sinks in.
He doesn’t get upset and he doesn’t respond with anger. I see the moment he moves from Sturdevant the man to Sturdevant the ruler, and somewhere within I admire that he’s able to do such a thing. Like a true ruler, his feelings are pushed aside as he simply states, “You can’t undo this.”