Chapter 8
The next few weeks always follow the same pattern. Our nights are spent tangled up in the sheets, or me bent over the desk or pressed up against the wall. During the day, I rarely see Charles. Aileen was due to return to court today, but so far I haven’t seen her.
I wander the halls of the palace, I haven’t left my room much since we got here—King’s orders.
I am to be entertained and taken care of at all times.
I am bored with it. The hallways are lined with thick carpets, one of the few luxuries in the palace.
I have come to understand that Charles is a simple man, not at all what I imagined him to be.
He will dress up for appropriate occasions, but even then he is never lavish in his style.
He prefers a simple set of trousers and a tunic to the thick velvet cloaks and satin shirts, and he’ll try and be barefoot any chance he gets.
The walls in the palace are decorated with oil paintings, large canvasses in ornate frames, depicting landscapes and far away parts of the kingdom.
Whenever I get the chance, I steal out of my room and discover new paintings, imagining myself walking in the woods or standing on the steep cliffs.
When I close my eyes, I can almost feel the breeze ruffling my hair or the soft crunch of fresh grass underneath my feet.
But while the paintings are a welcome distraction from my monotonous life, my excursions into the maze of the palace are more than just ways to kill time.
The fact that I have been with Charles for nearly eight months now and have nothing to report back to my father stings.
I suspect that things are not as bright as Charles tried to make me believe, but I have no proof to the contrary.
And that isn’t even the worst part, because deep down, I suspect that I haven’t been paying attention because I don’t want to find anything amiss.
I love Charles, and Charles loves me. How am I supposed to help my father take him down?
And yet, here I am, putting together a detailed map of the palace with the hope that something will reveal itself to me.
Something I can report back to my father without endangering me or my husband.
I round a corner and nearly trip over…nothing. The carpet has ended, I have walked too far, and have entered the servants’ quarters. The smell of soap and steam wafts across the hallway, and I can hear voices between swashes of water.
“Can you believe her? Yesterday she asked me to change the sheets again, apparently she spilled sauce all over them!” A familiar voice cackles. I don’t have to see her to know it’s Sara, one of my new maids, talking.
“Sauce? Is that what the fancy lords and ladies are calling it nowadays? We simply used to call it spunk,” someone else answers and the room erupts in laughter.
“You’d think she’d be able to stop it from hitting the sheets three times a day, isn’t she supposed to be his little spunk bucket?” Sara nearly screams, barely able to finish her sentence before her laugh takes over.
Shame slams into me, tears welling up in my eyes.
I won’t cry, I won’t cry, I won’t cry.
I press my hand over my heart, willing it to calm down.
But it’s useless, the panic has already settled in my chest.
I feel like I might throw up, and yet my mouth is utterly dry.
It would be best to turn around, to quickly walk back to my room, and forget this ever happened. But I can’t move, I am frozen in place, listening to every awful thing they have to say about me.
“…Hilde was such a sweet soul. Lord, have mercy on her soul. How we went from a kind, intelligent and gentle Queen to the Queen of Harlots, only the devil knows,” another voice chimes in. It’s Rebekah, the maid who takes care of my hair.
I press my fingers into my ears and turn around to leave.
But it is no use, their voices echo in my mind, a never-ending loop of shame and humiliation.
I start running as fast as I can, maybe if I run quickly enough, my heart will finally split open.
Maybe I will finally be able to bleed to death from the inside out and fall at Charles’s feet. His beautiful harlot Queen.
When Charles returns later, I am lying on the bed, covers drawn over my head, my head hurting from crying. He stops in his tracks when he sees me and walks over to me, gently tugging the sheet away from my face.
“Nichols told me you did not eat dinner tonight, are you not feeling well?” The concern in his voice is my undoing. I raise to my knees and throw myself into his arms, sobbing so hard that my whole body seems to be vibrating.
I tell him everything I heard, everything they said, though I do not mention their names. Charles holds me, nods at the appropriate moments and strokes my hair until my sobbing has died down.
He stills for a moment, his arms around me, his breath warm against my hair. Then his body goes rigid.
Slowly, he lets me go.
I barely have time to register the absence of his touch before he steps away from the bed, one hand dragging through his hair. He turns his back to me, pacing the length of the chamber like a caged animal, boots thudding hard against the floor.
“Vultures,” he mutters. “That’s what they are.”
He stops abruptly and strikes the stone wall with his fist. The sound cracks through the room, sharp and sickening. I gasp, scrambling upright on the bed.
“Charles—”
“They watch,” he goes on, pacing again, faster now.
Blood is dripping down from his hand onto the dark brown carpet.
“They wait. They smile to your face and sharpen their knives behind your back.” His voice rises with every step.
“Court women are the worst of them. They feed on weakness. On beauty. On anything they think they can ruin.”
I swing my legs off the bed and move toward him, heart hammering. “Please,” I say softly. “You’re frightening me.”
He whirls on me, eyes bright and unfocused, something wild flickering there. “That is exactly why I keep you away from them.”
“I can handle words,” I say, reaching for him. “They’re only words. Let me help you—”
He shrugs me off without looking, a sharp movement of his shoulder. I stumble, my foot catching on the rug, and I go down hard on the cold stone floor.
The impact steals the breath from my lungs.
For a heartbeat, I wait—sure he will turn, that he will see me there and rush to help.
He doesn’t.
Instead, his breathing grows harsher, his hands fisting at his sides. “Do you know what they did to her?” he says hoarsely. “How they watched her every day and saw nothing at all. How they praised her smile and never questioned why it trembled.”
My palms press flat against the floor as I struggle to sit up. “Charles…I’m hurt.”
“They adored her,” he goes on, voice cracking, then tightening. “They paraded her like a jewel. Let her shine just enough to blind them to the truth.” His jaw clenches. “She was fading, and no one thought it worth mentioning. No one came to me.”
He lets out a short, hollow laugh. “They wanted her perfect. Beautiful. Untouchable.” His gaze finally drops, unfocused, burning. “They never cared whether she was well. And I trusted them to.”
The room seems to tilt.
“Hilde deserved better,” he says, staring somewhere past me. “And I will not make the same mistake again.”
I curl my fingers into the carpet, trying to ground myself as realization hits: This anger is not about the maids, and it is not about me. It is about a woman already dead, and a fear that has never loosened its grip.
I cannot stay on the floor.
The pain blooms along my side as I push myself upright, sharp enough to steal my breath, but I welcome it. It keeps me here. I take a step toward him, then another, my limp impossible to hide now.
Charles does not seem to notice.
His eyes are unfocused, fixed on something far beyond the walls of the chamber, far beyond me. He is breathing too fast, his hands opening and closing at his sides like he is bracing for another blow that never comes.
“Charles,” I say softly.
No response.
So I close the distance and wrap my arms around him.
At first, he stiffens—surprised, almost startled by the contact—but then his strength gives way all at once. I guide him down with me, slow and careful, until we are on the floor together. He sinks as though the weight of him has finally become too much to bear.
I settle behind him, easing his head into my lap. His hair is damp with sweat, curls sticking to his temples. I run my fingers through it again and again, soothing, grounding, counting his breaths until they begin to slow.
There is a long stretch of silence, broken only by the sound of the fire and his uneven breathing.
“I’m here,” I murmur. “You’re not alone.”
His shoulders rise and fall beneath my hands. Gradually, the tension leaves him, spilling out onto the stone floor.
“I am not her,” I say quietly, when I feel him listening again. “I am not fragile and soft mannered.”
My fingers trace slow patterns at his scalp. “I can withstand a little storm. And when you keep me away from everything…when you shut me out…” I swallow. “That hurts more than any whisper ever could.”
He exhales, long and heavy.
“I want to stand beside you,” I continue. “Not behind closed doors. Not hidden away. I need to see the court, to understand it. To be part of it.”
For a moment, I think he will refuse. I feel the hesitation in the way his jaw tightens, the way his hand curls into the fabric of my skirt.
Then he nods, once.
“Very well,” he says, voice low and raw. “But if it turns on you—if it harms you—I will end it. Immediately.”
“I understand.”
“There will be conditions.”
“I know.”
I shift slightly, the movement making him glance up at me at last. “I want my former ladies returned,” I add. “The ones who traveled with us. And I need Aileen. At my side. I need someone who understands this place.”
His gaze searches my face, measuring. Then he nods again.
“You shall have them.”
He reaches for me then, hands sliding to my waist, to the ties of my gown. His touch is reverent now, possessive in its care. “You give me peace,” he murmurs, pressing his forehead briefly to my stomach before rising. “Even when the world claws at me.”
His fingers begin their familiar work, unfastening, undressing.
“You are mine,” he whispers, as if it is a promise. “And I will keep you safe.”
I let him believe that this is what safety feels like.
* * *
Aileen returns without announcement.
I am in the solar when she is shown in, standing by the window with a book I have not been reading for some time. When I hear her name, I turn too quickly, my breath catching with sudden, foolish joy.
“Aileen.”
She curtsies perfectly, as she would for any other noble-born.
“My Queen,” she says, her voice smooth and carefully measured. “I trust you are well.”
The words land like cold water.
I cross the room in three quick steps and take her hands without thinking. They are warm, familiar—and yet she stiffens, just slightly, before schooling herself into stillness.
“I am so glad you’re back,” I say. “I missed you terribly.”
Her smile is polite. Almost kind. “I am pleased to be of service once more.”
Of service.
The rest of the morning passes in a blur of small courtesies.
Aileen answers my questions neatly, without elaboration.
She asks after my health, my comfort, the King—always the King—with impeccable manners and no warmth beneath them.
She never once asks how I have been, truly.
Never once meets my eyes for longer than is proper.
By midday, my chest aches with it.
When I finally manage to catch her alone, I do not waste the chance.
I take her wrist gently and pull her into a narrow alcove between two pillars, half-hidden by a tapestry depicting some long-dead saint. The noise of the court dulls to a distant murmur.
“Aileen,” I say quietly. “What is this?”
Her spine goes rigid.
“What are you talking about, Your Majesty?” she says and tries to pull away.
I do not let her. “Stop this at once. Why are you so cold?” I ask roughly, unspilled tears clogging my vision.
“You sent me away,” she spits out. “I thought you were my friend, but the second we returned to the palace, you sent me away without so much as a goodbye!”
I stare at her. “What?”
“You asked for space,” she continues, eyes fixed somewhere over my shoulder. “Time alone with your husband. I was told you no longer required my presence.”
The world tilts.
“No,” I say at once. “I never said that. I never wanted that.” My grip on her arm tightens. “They sent all my maids away. All of them. I didn’t even know where you were.”
She finally looks at me then, something raw flickering across her face before she can hide it again. “They told me it came from you.”
A cold understanding settles between us.
I tell her everything—about the new maids, about the rules, the quiet tightening of the court around me. About how alone I have felt, and how deeply it cut to lose her without explanation.
When I finish, Aileen exhales shakily and presses a hand to her mouth.
“I thought you had discarded me,” she admits. “Like everyone else does, eventually.”
“Never,” I say fiercely. “Not you.”
We stand in silence while people pass by the alcove.
“They want us divided,” Aileen says at last. “That much is clear.”
“Then we won’t be,” I reply.
Her mouth curves upward, “We should swear it.”
I blink. “Swear it?”
She glances around, then lowers her voice conspiratorially. “A blood oath.”
I should hesitate, but I don’t.
She produces a small pin from her sleeve—where did she even get that?—and presses it into her palm without hesitation. I mirror her.
“On the Devil’s mercy, then,” I say.
We clasp hands, blood warm and slick between our palms.
“I swear loyalty to you,” Aileen murmurs. “Against court, crown, and whispers.”
“I swear it back,” I reply. “No matter what they try to make of us.”
We release each other, hastily wiping our hands on the lining of my gown.
Aileen pulls me into a quick, fierce embrace, and for the first time in weeks, something inside me loosens.
As if the sun, long hidden behind cloud and stone, has finally found its way back to me.