Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Shock carried me back to my room, where, deaf to Gertrude’s nerve-shredding complaints, I dropped like a log onto the bed and let sleep sink its hooks into me.
She woke me up in the late afternoon, telling me there was someone at the door.
I grudgingly got up and faced two new maids assigned to help me get ready for tonight. With brief curtseys they introduced themselves as Johanna and Birgitta and quickly got to work, unpacking my things and arranging them, what I would have done for Gertrude.
It felt strange, watching them tend to me. I had wanted Gertrude to do all the work, so she could experience a fraction of the duress she’d subjected me to. I found fault with a lot of their methods, but it wasn’t like I could push them aside and do it myself.
As they were hanging the dresses in the closet, I spotted one I didn’t recognize. A dazzling ball gown with short, puffy sleeves in a vivid shade of sky blue, one of my absolute favorite colors. It was among the many Gertrude never let either of us wear, claiming that it washed her out.
Once they moved on, I rushed to examine it and found a note pinned discreetly to its bodice. The writing was a broad, looping script:
Wear this tonight.
I somehow I doubted it was from the king, as he saw no color apart from gold. Heinrich? He was nice, but I didn’t think he would take such initiative, or have such bold taste. That left only Roderick.
No matter the situation, I was not denying such an agreeable request, or the unprecedented opportunity to wear something so lovely.
I quickly let Birgitta help me put it on, before Johanna unbraided and arranged my hair into shiny waves that fell past my shoulders, with the sections at my temples pulled back by a clasp.
Soon, the captain came to escort me to the ballroom and I barely had the focus to explore the new spaces with my eyes. All the wonder in my new situation had been sucked out by Wilhelm’s crazy demands.
How was I going to indulge him this time, and for however long he wanted me to do this? It’s not like I had a little bell to summon Roderick, or however one contacted faeries!
We arrived at double doors that smothered the sounds of music and chatter coming from the inside. The captain opened them, and bracing myself, I gripped handfuls of my glimmering, bell-shaped skirt and glided inside.
I was greeted by the glitz and glamor I had always wanted to attend; a ballroom full of gleaming instruments and elegant musicians, glittering gowns and bejeweled attendees, among a sea of crystal glasses brimming with bubbling wine.
For a brief moment, I allowed myself to be in awe of the winter-themed decorations hanging from the walls, enhancing the white-and-silver theme of the tables and the trees placed in the corners of the room.
Heinrich emerged from a group of young men to meet me. He was in a cream coat and tails with a golden chain linking one shoulder to the other, and his hair fluffed up and like flames in the bright light of the chandeliers.
Hand extended to me, he smiled softly. “Glad you agreed to join us, Gertrude. Let me introduce you to my friends.”
Four in particular stood out as the men bowed to me. Two were dark haired and classically handsome and looked related, one had curly blond hair and massive side-burns, and the last was a paler blond with a square head and the thinnest lips I’d ever seen.
In order, he introduced them as the Lords Franz, Florian, Gustav and Johan, sons of the higher nobility in the kingdom. I assumed they would become fixtures of my new life as Gertrude.
“Why the long face, Your Highness?” Florian greeted.
“Did someone die?” Johan asked with a smirk.
I searched the room until I spotted Wilhelm, standing with a nobleman and his two daughters. “No, but I might if this arrangement doesn’t go well.”
They all laughed, thinking I was making a joke about our engagement.
Gustav guffawed the loudest, elbowing Heinrich then offering me a glass. “He’s not so bad once you get to know him.”
I took the glass and immediately downed the bubbly wine, barely noticing how it tasted. “I’m less talking about the prince and more about the king.”
“Oh? Why is that?” Florian asked. I could tell the difference between him and Franz only by the cleft in his chin and the lighter shade of his brown eyes. He reminded me of Reinold.
“Haven’t they heard why I’m here?” I asked Heinrich.
He shrugged, avoiding my gaze. “They’re aware of the debt.”
I took another offered glass from Gustav. “Are they aware that our marriage wasn’t enough to repay it, and that I wasn’t warned?”
“So, it’s true?” Franz’s eyes shone with eager curiosity. “You can really turn things into gold?”
Downing the drink and gesturing for Gustav to get me another, I felt my distress winding down and my tongue loosening. “I managed it once, but there’s no saying if the feat can be repeated.”
“Why’s that?” Heinrich asked, sounding a little nervous.
“Have you considered that it tired me out?” I snapped.
They laughed again, oddly finding my outburst humorous.
“I’m sure everything will be fine,” Heinrich said to me. “If you did it before, then you can do it again. But I’ll try to convince him to let you off for tonight.”
“Tonight?” I exclaimed. “He wanted me to do it again tonight?”
Heinrich ducked his head between his shoulders, as if to dodge my distress. “Yes, but—”
“No buts!” I cut him off, tears gathering at the corners of my eyes as my restraint fell with my inhibitions. “I can’t do it tonight, or tomorrow, or next week. This was supposed to be a one time miracle, and then we’d wed!”
Heinrich looked as distressed as I did. “I know that’s what we let you think, and I truly apologize, but either you do it to pay us back, or there will be no wedding.”
“And there is nothing you can say to convince him to spare me?” I asked, feeling defeated.
“No, there isn’t,” he admitted, eyes at his feet.
So, he was as helpless as I was.
“Don’t look now,” Florian said, leaning close to Heinrich. “But Herr Spitzohren is here.”
Herr Spitzohren? There was a lord with the surname Pointy Ears?
I followed the direction of their gazes and couldn’t gauge which of the guests they were speaking about.
“Where’d he go?” Heinrich asked.
“I don’t know,” said Florian. “He was just there!”
Shaking off the distraction, I placed my latest empty glass on a passing server’s tray and cleared my throat at Heinrich. “Since you can’t help me beyond sparing me from your father tonight, the least you can do is make tonight feel like an engagement party.”
“What do you mean?”
I gestured out to the middle of the ballroom. “Asking me to dance would be a good start.”
“Right.” He shook his hands out, as if they had gone numb, then held them out to me. “Let’s go?”
Hand in his, in rhythm with the music currently playing, he led me among the dancing pairs.
As if they had been waiting for him to join, the musicians shifted to a waltz I recognized from Gertrude’s dance lessons.
I’d never danced with anyone outside of group folk dances during holidays, but I tried to remember each move she was coached through, and squeezed his hand for support, for comfort, for anything.
He didn’t squeeze back.
Heinrich’s arm came loosely around my waist as the rest of the dancers formed a circle around us, and waited for their prince’s first move. He started spinning us around the floor, the dance itself forcing us close, our chests nearly touching, but his eyes avoided my own.
My distress made him uncomfortable. I made him uncomfortable.
Needless to say, his cold indulgence of my request had upset me further.
The longer the dance went, the more my dislike of the situation amplified my weepy worry. My lips wobbled, but I tried my best not to cry—until he stomped on my foot.
“Ow!” I yelped, hopping onto one foot, toes throbbing in the shoe’s tight confines.
The couple behind me slammed into my back, knocking us into the pair before us, and soon the dance had been interrupted in the most awkward way.
Heinrich let me go, making no move to apologize. “Excuse me, I need to…”
He ran off, back to his friends and downed the two glasses Florian was holding.
“Well, I was about to ask if I could cut in,” said a voice that made my heart jump. “But it seems he’s left you all to me.”
I spilled out of the line, allowing the dancers to continue their earlier pace, and whirled around to face Roderick.
Dressed in a cobalt-blue coat over burnt-brown clothes and knee-high, bronze boots, he was the most striking man I’d ever seen up close, his silvery-blue eyes the brightest thing in the room.
“You better be invisible to anyone but me,” I hissed at him.
He smoothed his hands down his coat, long, elegant fingers tapping in a light, playful beat. “Yes, I have made the effort to be the best dressed man here tonight just for your viewing pleasure.”
My eyes darted around only to find that the people mingling around the edges of the room were, in fact, watching us. Watching him. “Then you’re not worried everyone can see you?”
“Why should I be? I was invited.”
“You were?” I repeated, feeling stupider by the moment.
He gave a mock-grave nod. “As all members of the nobility were.”
Realization started to seep into my stunned mind. “Are you some sort of faerie prince?”
“Baron, actually.” Roderick bowed to me. “Lord von Ravenstock, a pleasure to meet your acquaintance, Your Highness.”
“You’re Herr Spitzohren,” I realized out loud.
“They’re still calling me that?” He rolled his mesmerizing eyes, then extended his hand to me.
At a loss, I set my hand in his and he kissed it. Not the ring like Heinrich had, but the back of my hand itself. My skin tingled where his warm lips had touched.
He straightened, casting a pointed glance around our surroundings. “So, are you going to honor me with that dance?”
“I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but it’s not funny.”
“I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He curled his forefinger lazily, beckoning me closer. “Come, let’s talk while we waltz.”
Realizing that standing around was drawing even more attention to us, I let him pull me close to him as he smoothly inserted us into the circle of dancers. Without one misstep, he led me in perfect timing to the very middle, spinning us over and over in place.
It was amazing, the difference between the cold, stilted endeavor with Heinrich, that of two people who could probably never get close, and this warm, lively celebration of music and movement.
It was as if we had practiced together for ages.
Even more. As if we knew each other’s next move by instinct.
But at one point, even breathless and giddy with the perfection of our dance, my mind still demanded answers. “How is a faerie like yourself a member of this country’s nobility?”
His eyes crinkled at my panted question, a mixture of amusement and reluctance. “Faerie itself is right across the ocean. Surely you’ve heard about some of us crossing the sea and intermarrying with the people of the Northland Kingdoms.”
“Yes, but the stories always cited peasant encounters, not like this. Not like you.”
“You’ll find that there aren’t many like me.” It might have sounded arrogant, if he didn’t sound too pleased with that fact. “I’m one of the few whose parents were both elites and wed to each other. It made my treatment slightly better than the average faerie in human lands.”
“And how are faeries treated in human lands?”
His lips thinned with displeasure. “Not charitably. The luckiest are only warded off by iron. Most are excluded from society. The unluckiest are even hunted.”
“Hunted!”
Roderick nodded. “I’ve had plenty of men at parties such as this joking about how, if I didn’t behave, my head would end up on an iron spike.”
I gasped and my feet lost their timing. “That’s barbaric.”
He smoothly righted me, his eyes flashing. “That’s the fear people like me inspire.”
I supposed I couldn’t blame people for fearing the fey. They were known to be fond of toying with humans, and not above ruining their lives. We were warned from infancy not to trust any, and how to ward them off our property and ourselves.
Yet, here I was, having made a deal with one. Dancing with one. Confiding in and sympathizing with him, not to mention enjoying myself like I never had.
Still, I had so many questions. Since he seemed willing to give me answers now, I asked the next one. “You said faeries here are excluded from society. Why would you even want to be a part of it?”
He raised his thick, silver brows at me. “Because we are citizens of these lands, just like everyone else. Why wouldn’t we want to have the same rights, respect and opportunities as our human counterparts?”
“Couldn’t you just make the leap back to Faerie and enjoy your full rights there?”
“We have been here for generations, and would not be welcome there without proving ourselves worthy of rejoining Faerie society. We must prove that our human side hasn’t ‘tainted’ us through tests and tasks, some of which can get quite brutal, or even fatal.”
“You mean like the tasks I’m currently expected to do?”
He slowed our spins to frowned down at me. “What do you mean?”
“The coins weren’t enough for the king. He now wants me to keep going until I pay back the entire debt, probably with a hefty interest.” I looked up, neck craned to make up for the height gap between us, imploring. “You can help me, can’t you?”
His frown turned contemplative. “That depends on how many times I’ll be expected to pull the same trick. It almost drained me the first time.”
“Then have me do it!” I suggested, eager all of the sudden. “Give me the power to turn things into gold.”
“That won’t be a simple task either,” His eyes swirled with an uncanny light before he warned, “And then there would be the subject of payment.”
“What will it be this time? Two kisses?”
He shook his head. “For an enchantment of that caliber, I’d need something far more precious to you.”
“And what would that be?” I asked, swallowing down a lump of dread.
His lips parted into a devilish grin. “Your firstborn with the prince.”