Chapter Twenty-Two
The banquet had been as lavish, crowded, loud, and impossible to actually eat at as I’d expected, and the rout—to which even more people had been invited—promised to be more so, now filling a ballroom, three reception rooms, and the garden to bursting, with ear-splitting levels of laughter, music, and shouted witticisms.
Attempted witticisms, in any case. Why were so few people actually funny?
And why were they never the ones who meant to be, wanted to be, or thought they were?
For example, there stood Lord Griset across the terrace from me, gesticulating with his fan at two ladies and another gentleman, all of whom I’d met, but none of whom I knew much of.
Their polite titters suggested that they were humoring him far out of proportion to the humor he’d offered.
At least he seemed to be focused on keeping them barely entertained, because I didn’t want to catch his eye. I’d managed to avoid him almost entirely ever since Lady Vienni’s ball.
Not because he’d continued to leer at me. No, that would’ve been preferable. Instead, every time he so much as glanced at me, his eyes held a flat, venomous sheen, like a predatory snake, and it made my flesh crawl.
I turned to the side, pretending I hadn’t seen him and his friends, and smiled into the distance, as if at someone I meant to greet. Two steps, three, and I’d be clear—
“Lord Remigius!” That wasn’t Lord Griset’s voice, but when I winced, stopped, and turned, fixing a polite smile on my face, it turned out to be the other gentleman in his small group waving me down.
“Lord Remigius, over here,” he repeated, with a gracious bow.
Or apparently gracious, anyway. Something about his posture made me wary.
“Do join us. Tell us about where Lord Stefan has gone. I can’t believe he’d want to be more than an arm’s reach from your side. ”
I hid another wince; there went my hope that it’d been long enough since the wedding that no one would comment on his absence. But any friend of Lord Griset’s would surely be a malicious ass. Anyway, at least the story I’d propagated during the banquet had made the rounds.
Stefan had left me a note when he went out after his consultation with Fritz.
It would be better if everyone believed me absent from the city tonight, he wrote.
If I’m recognized, I’d like to be able to deny it with some plausibility.
Thank you, Remi. I know how you detest lying. I promise it’s for a good purpose.
I could live with this, couldn’t I? A husband who desired me, at least, and trusted me enough to confide in me?
In any case, I had no choice. That was the life that had been given to me. It could’ve been much worse. And that meant taking the bad with the good, including crossing the terrace to be courteous to people I barely knew and didn’t like, as a courtier must.
“Good evening,” I said as I reached them, and gave a bow of my own, particularly to the two ladies. “My husband’s been called away on business. But he’ll return in a day or two. He asked me to convey his devastation at being required to be absent.”
To Lord Corombos only, and he hadn’t meant a word of it. But this being Nevaia, no one pointed that out.
Instead, Lord Griset smiled. Oh, no. The words I’d said to him still rang in my mind, and probably in his.
A courtier never forgot an insult. Stefan had said so, hadn’t he?
That I’d made an enemy. But I stiffened my spine and smiled back as if I didn’t remember any of it, and we were the best of friends.
What could he do here, at a crowded party in front of several hundred witnesses?
Nothing but be rude, and I could swallow that if I needed to.
“Since he’s allowed you to come here alone, I can only surmise that the first bloom is off the rose,” Lord Griset said.
He paused meaningfully. “Marriage, that is,” and he tittered, giving me a knowing look.
The other three laughed too. The heat rose to my cheeks.
No, he meant me. He meant me! I couldn’t show my anger, I couldn’t, he’d only turn it against me…
“Damned inconvenient state, isn’t it? So limiting.
” He took a step forward, leaning in. I fought the urge to edge away.
“When there are so many other possibilities, hmm?”
Oh, surely he knew better than to try to approach me that way again. What did he think would be different this time?
I opened my mouth to try to fend him off politely and prevent a scene, but before I could say a word he reached out and cupped my jaw in his hand, stroking a finger along my lips.
The shock of his touch held me frozen in silence for a long, suspended moment. That finger. On my mouth! The pressure of his fingertip against the softness of my lower lip nauseated me, as if a line connected it to the pit of my churning stomach.
I jerked away, crying out in surprise and disgust.
But too late. It had only been a second, but that was more than Lord Griset needed.
Drowning out my cry, his scream rang out over the party, sending a wave of startlement and horrified gasps and “What on earths” through the assembly.
Lord Griset flung himself back, drawing his hand to his chest and cradling it there, falling against the terrace railing with his face twisted into a grimace of terror, his eyes wild and wide.
“What have you done, you little demon?” he wailed. “My hand! My hand, it burns!”
“I didn’t, I didn’t—your hand?” I stammered. “You touched me! You laid your hand on me! How dare you!”
“I say, what about your hand?” the other gentleman said, frowning. “Do I smell smoke?”
“Magic! That little fiend used magic on me, he assaulted me!” Lord Griset pushed himself off the terrace rail, managing to stagger a little, as if injured.
His face had a dreadful cast to it, too much powder and rouge over a sweaty flush that peeked through around the edges.
It certainly gave credence to his claim of being hurt, damn him to hell. “I demand satisfaction!”
I glanced around wildly at the circle of gathered faces, every one of them staring in absolute delight at a spectacle unlike anything Nevaia had seen all year.
Most of them had shaken my hand, smiled at me, bowed to me, at one party or another.
Some of them had invited me to their own events, or called on me at home.
But not a single one moved to defend me. Stefan. My chest had clenched tight, panic bubbling up and making me lightheaded, everything going hazy around me. I needed Stefan, and he wasn’t here.
Lord Griset had caused this scene because Stefan wasn’t here to defend me. He must have, because whatever else he might be, he wasn’t a fool. Stefan would’ve taken charge and turned this to his advantage in a second, and I had no idea what to do!
But I had no one to depend on but myself.
“I should be the one demanding satisfaction,” I said, my voice coming out thin and unsure. Lord Griset watched me like a shark tracking a minnow, and no one else said a word. “But I’m not. I am, I’m willing to let it pass. Excuse me, I—”
“You refuse to meet me?” Lord Griset demanded shrilly. “When I was generous enough to treat you like a gentleman, rather than the little whore you are? Then I’ll have my justice through summoning the city guards to arrest you for magical assault and—”
“You’ll do nothing of the kind!” Lord Corombos pushed his way through the crowd, stepping into the little circle that had formed as if it were his stage.
He wasn’t a particularly tall man, but his bristling mustache, and his bulk all wrapped in black satin and gleaming lace, gave him an air of command, and besides, this was his house.
For a moment I thought he’d save me from this insanity, and then he said, “We’ll all settle the details of this affair in private.
Come along, Lord Remigius, Lord Griset, and—who’s going to stand with them? ”
“Griset, if you’ll have me, I am of course at your service,” said the gentleman who’d flagged me down in the first place, and of course he did, and of course he had, because he’d obviously been Lord Griset’s co-conspirator.
But I could still extricate myself, I had to, and I stood up straight and lifted my chin and turned to Lord Corombos, saying, “No one needs to stand with me, my lord, because this challenge is absurd. I didn’t use any magic!
I decline to challenge Lord Griset for touching me without my leave, and that’s the end—”
“Are you calling me a liar?” Lord Griset stepped forward, striking a dramatic pose.
For a giddy moment I wondered if this could possibly be some bizarre entertainment, planned by Lord Corombos and about to be revealed as a farce.
But no. Lord Griset’s eyes glittered with true hatred.
“He used magic against me. I will not be pacified so easily!”
“I did not use magic!” My panic made me sound like a liar, even though it was the truth.
A murmur went through the crowd. They didn’t believe me.
“I did not, and so—yes, I suppose I am calling him a liar. Or, or mistaken. He was mistaken.” He wasn’t mistaken at all but lying through his teeth, but I’d learned enough about the way things worked to know I must allow a path for Lord Corombos to retreat gracefully, and to drag Lord Griset with him.
“Anyone could make such a mistake. I’m not offended. ”
Lord Griset’s eyes blazed with triumph, and cold shivers raced down my back. I’d made an error. Somehow, though I didn’t know how—
“No one calls me a liar without proving his assertions with his sword,” Lord Griset hissed, sounding for all the world like that snake I’d imagined when I looked into his eyes.
And that was how. Oh, Ennolu and Dromos save me, because no one else would. He meant to carry this through no matter what. And I barely knew which end of the sword to hold.