Chapter Eight #2
‘Of course not,’ I said stiffly. What else did I have, really? Raleigh at least had a use for my scholarship. But what was I exactly for Yann? A cosy life plan and a mother for his future sons?
I wished I hadn’t left the library.
‘I need to see my father,’ I muttered. The sooner I was back on the hill the better.
‘I’ll escort you,’ Yann said without hesitation.
Not long ago his chivalry would have made my heart skip, and I was unprepared for the flash of irritation that hit me instead. ‘Of course,’ I said, and hoped he couldn’t see my reluctance.
Yann called out to his grandfather to look after the shop, then followed me to where I’d tied Sovereign.
From there I followed his lead, Yann always walking half a step ahead of me.
We had barely walked a block when a man emerged from a side street.
His name was Kay, a neighbour of Yann’s who he got along with tremendously and I’d always clashed with.
I’d never liked the way he spoke about women, and he’d never liked the way I pointed it out.
He spotted Yann first and greeted him warmly. Then he saw me and stopped.
‘Clara Wagner,’ he breathed. ‘I didn’t think I’d see you out in sunlight again.’
‘Lovely to see you again, Kay,’ I said without breaking pace.
He stepped in front of me, forcing me to stop. Sovereign nickered until I put a hand to her nose to soothe her, but when I tried to step around Kay, he blocked my path again.
I called his bluff and stepped forward, but Kay shoved me. I stumbled, letting go of Sovereign, barely managing to catch myself, too incredulous to feel anything more than annoyed.
‘Kay!’ Yann tried to wedge himself between us, but the fight left him the moment Kay placed a hand on his bound arm.
‘Stay out of this,’ he said.
‘What the hell are you trying to do?’ I snapped. ‘Are you drunk?’
He spat on the stones at my feet. ‘Demons aren’t welcome in Orlfen.’
‘What do you mean “demons”?’
‘You know exactly what I mean.’ He raised his hand.
‘I’m a human.’ I said, catching his strike as it came down, then twisted, stooping low and using his weight against him as my father had taught me.
Kay landed hard on the cobblestones, splaying his hands in submission when I pressed the tip of my boot to the underside of his chin.
‘Do not make an enemy of me,’ I said. ‘My betrothed can hurt you so much worse than I can.’
To my dismay, Kay began to laugh. ‘With that hand?’
My heart stilled as my thoughts caught up with my mouth. I hadn’t meant Yann. I stepped back from Kay, glancing at my true betrothed in hope he hadn’t noticed my slip, but his eyes were clouded, his teeth set.
‘Your betrothed,’ he echoed.
‘I didn’t mean—’
‘I know what you meant,’ Yann said hollowly as Kay climbed back to his feet.
‘Sorry, Yann,’ he said, grinning like he knew he’d already won. ‘It looks like you just can’t compete with the promise of being a princess.’
Somehow, amidst everything that had happened, it had never occurred to me that marrying Raleigh would make me Princess of Rostenburg.
Raleigh had never felt like our ruler. An ever-present terror?
Yes. But he never sent aid in the famine, never implemented a whiff of policy that might make our lives better.
All he’d ever done as reigning prince was build the dam.
‘Don’t,’ Yann warned him, but there was little fight in his voice.
Sovereign began to wander off. I snatched her reins back into one fist and stayed her, my back to the two men. I remained there a moment, calming myself. Why had I said that? One tiny slip-up in a moment of rage and suddenly it felt like I’d carved an untraversable rift between us.
I barely trusted myself to open my mouth again; every word I said was chipping away at the foundations that held us. How much more damage could I do in one day?
‘You don’t have to come with me to see Father,’ I said without turning around.
‘Clara …’
I hoisted myself into the saddle and peered down at the two men. ‘I’ll see you at the end of the year,’ I said to the love of my life, then urged Sovereign into a trot without allowing him a chance to reply.
I regretted it almost immediately. After two months of longing to speak to Yann, was I really abandoning him so soon?
He was still my fiancé. One horrible conversation wasn’t going to change that.
I sighed. It was no way to leave things.
I’d have to go back to the shop and apologise once I’d seen Father.
Or maybe this was better? In all likelihood I would be dead in six months’ time. Better for him to hate me now and lose a stranger than cling to a rapidly fraying thread of hope and lose someone he loved. For me too. It would be easier if I had no one left to say goodbye to.
I was glad Sovereign knew the way home. The houses around me had blurred into one.
It wasn’t long before we reached her old stables. As we approached the doors she pulled back, reluctant to go inside. I couldn’t blame her. Her memories of these stables were of slowly starving to death. I wasn’t the only one who wanted to go back to the castle.
‘It’s not for long,’ I reassured her. ‘I’ll be back soon.’
She nickered as if to say she understood, although she could have just as easily been asking for me to bring back the nice man who fed her.
I shook that thought away. He was not nice.
Father was already outside by the time I carved back around to the front of the house.
His hug nearly knocked the wind out of me.
To my relief he hadn’t suffered any injuries after my escape attempt.
He looked gaunt and there were traces of grey in his side-whiskers I couldn’t remember seeing before, but his bones were all unbroken. His smile was unchanged.
‘I thought I’d lost you,’ he said as we pulled apart.
‘I’m sorry I couldn’t come sooner,’ I said.
‘Well, it hardly matters now. Come, come inside.’
I followed him in, marvelling at the strange yet familiar scent of returning home after a long time away. He led me into the morning room where we had always received guests. With a pang I realised that was what I was now.
‘You didn’t make the journey alone, did you?’ he asked. He never used to worry about that sort of thing. ‘You don’t have a chaperone?’
‘I’ve never needed a chaperone before. Why would I now?
’ The answer was obvious the moment the question passed my lips.
Clara Wagner, the mayor’s daughter, didn’t need a chaperone to tousle with her long-time sweetheart in the woods.
Princess Clara Linford von Rostenburg would need one to visit the unwed baker.
Especially the one who had notoriously ruined her prospects. ‘My maidservant was unavailable.’
‘Of course,’ Father said. ‘I can’t imagine how much work goes into maintaining a castle like that. What’s her name again? Magda? No, don’t tell me. Moira?’
I jolted. ‘How do you know Moira?’
Father’s lips tightened. ‘You never wrote,’ he said instead. ‘That’s not like you.’
Was he avoiding the question? ‘I tried,’ I said.
I couldn’t use the same lie with him as I had with Yann.
Rare as it was, I’d glimpsed the Rostenburg crest on letters he’d received in the past. As Raleigh’s representative in Orlfen, Father knew better than anyone that it was possible to send letters from the castle. ‘They must not have reached you.’
‘I feared that was the case,’ Father said. ‘So I sent my own courier to take letters there directly. He told me he handed them to a servant named Moira. Did she not give them to you?’
He felt so very far away. ‘No,’ I said. ‘She didn’t.’
Father nodded. ‘Does the prince know you’re here?’
I stared at my feet.
‘Clara,’ he breathed, then pulled me back into a hug. ‘You’re home now. That’s what matters.’ Once he’d released me, and I found myself perched on the lumpy sofa reserved for guests, he asked the question I’d been dreading. ‘Did you see Yann on your way here?’
I made a non-committal noise.
‘You didn’t fight with him, surely?’
‘My gift to you,’ I muttered.
‘You know I would much rather you marry him than the prince.’
‘Perhaps you shouldn’t have given your blessing to Raleigh, then,’ I said bitterly.
‘You know I had no choice.’
‘Do I?’ I was still no clearer on what Father had tried to hide from me on the night of my betrothal.
Raleigh had never raised the subject, and when I tried broaching it with Moira she told me quite clearly she had no intention of involving herself.
Dwelling on it would only drive me to madness, so I’d tried to keep the question buried in the back of my mind, but it was harder with Father in front of me.
He changed the subject before I could ask the question. ‘Was Yann at fault, or are you having another one of your …’—he waved a hand—‘headstrong moments?’
I didn’t meet his eye. ‘I don’t know,’ I said, though I’d replayed the conversation enough times to know I couldn’t really fault Yann for being upset. Yes, he’d barely tried to defend me, but hadn’t I stood by when Raleigh broke his hand? My betrothed, I thought with a curl of regret.
Father sighed and rose to his feet. ‘Wait here.’
‘Where are you going?’
‘To get him, so that you can apologise and we can spend one evening pretending to be a normal family.’
‘Why are you so sure I’m in the wrong?’ Regardless of whether or not he was right, Father hadn’t witnessed my conversation with Yann, and the fact that he immediately assumed I must have said something made me feel like I was shrinking.
‘It doesn’t matter who is in the wrong. Your job is to stand by him. Whatever he did, I’m sure you can forgive it.’ He offered a smile I couldn’t return. ‘I won’t be long.’