3. Angélique
3
Angélique
W hen I finally arrive at the écuries—the stables—, I’m one minute late, and I couldn’t have chosen a worse day for that to happen.
Because sitting next to my tutor, Ari?l, is the man who forced me into that relentless training years ago.
My father.
Micha?l.
I wish I could say I still see some of the warmth I used to see in his eyes as a kid, but his dark blue eyes that match mine are nothing but cold and hard.
He’s handsome, by any standard: dark blonde hair with blue eyes, a hard but well-sculpted face that has made many women swoon, and a build worthy of any fighter, but all I can see are his eyes.
Léandre told me he read somewhere that eyes are a doorway to one’s soul, and if that’s true, I don’t think there is any chance of redemption for Micha?l.
This man, he’s not my father, hasn’t been for years, and yet I can’t shake the feeling that once again I disappointed him.
He used to be my role model. The one person I was supposed to shadow and learn from. Now, my path has veered so much from what was initially planned for me that I don’t even know what I am to him.
One thing is sure, though.
I am late, and he knows it.
I stop short in the middle of the room.
Its name might come from the royal stables, the building looks nothing like stables.
It’s grand and if I didn’t know what it looks like inside the Versailles palace, I would say it’s fit for a king with its high ceiling and floor-to-ceiling windows illuminating the room.
And it used to be, after all. The first floor for the horses and the rest, I don’t really know, to be honest, but it’s filled with old maps and marble statues that hint at a grander time.
A time ruled by men and not by shifters who think they are better than anyone else.
I feel for the humans.
We stole their world, took power, and made them change their lifestyle.
I feel for them because without ever being authorized to shift or spread my wings, I’m more or less a glorified human.
A well-trained one, but still a human.
“Remove her chair.”
My father’s voice rings inside the room as he commands the guard near the door.
I don’t move.
Whatever he has planned for me, I’m pretty sure I won’t like it, especially since Ari?l is doing everything he can to avoid meeting my eyes.
I don’t like this.
It feels like a trap, so I keep my mouth shut as I bow to my father, my hands clasped at the small of my back and eyes on the ground.
For someone who hates monarchy, he sure as hell borrowed a lot from them.
The palace.
The etiquette.
The greeting to archangels by bowing.
And forced marriages.
It’s not all on him, but still, he loves it too much and I keep wondering if he’ll ever relinquish his power to my brother.
Because I can see it in his eyes, he believes it’s his power now and I’m not sure he even realizes that it got to his head.
He loves power too much, and I’m pretty sure his removing my chair is just to show he has all the power over me.
He doesn’t need that for me to know, but he is still going to make me sit on the ground or eat while standing just to prove it.
“Sit,” he says without even looking at me.
I walk to the spot on his left, facing Ari?l, and lower myself. It’s not practical, but I’ll make do. Like I said, it was that or stay standing the whole meal.
Not sure how my etiquette lesson is going to go like this, but if there’s one thing I learned with my father, it’s not to ask questions.
I have a raised scar on my back for each time I talked back or questioned his actions.
I was a dumb teenager who thought Micha?l was still my father and he wouldn’t dare raise a hand on me.
So, when he started to count each time I talked back, I knew something would come, but I still believed my punishment would not be so drastic.
Until he reached ten.
That was when he decided he had counted enough.
That was when he had gotten the whip out.
At first, I thought it was good. If he was the one giving the lashes, it meant he could control the strength with which he hit. He could make it soft; he could make it endurable.
Oh, I was so freaking wrong.
Yes, he controlled the strength he used, but not in the way I initially thought. No, he hit as hard as he could.
By the end of those ten lashes, my back was a bloodied mess and my teeth had ground so much that I wouldn’t have been surprised if they had shattered in my mouth.
I wish I could say I didn’t cry, but it would be a lie.
But I was silent. I didn’t beg. I didn’t scream. I didn’t yell. I didn’t curse the world or even him.
I silently let my tears slide on my cheeks until all ten strikes finished, and then I hardened myself.
Or I tried.
There were two other occurrences like this.
Only two and there was a lot more time between the first time I heard him count one again and the time he reached ten.
I’m on three right now, but it’s been a long time since I talked at all in his presence.
My tongue could be cut from my mouth. He wouldn’t hear a difference.
“No.”
The word comes like a shock.
What does he mean by ‘no’?
I stop in my tracks, halfway to the ground before rising again.
“No, no, no,” he says, and when I turn my face just enough to look at him from the corner of my eye, I can see the smug smile he’s sporting.
I will not like whatever he has in mind. I just know it.
I cast a glance at Ari?l, but nothing can be read on his face.
He might be nice to me when Micha?l isn’t there, but he’s a coward, much like I am, because he would never, ever say something that would get him punished.
And looking at me with compassion or even pity would be already too much.
Ari?l isn’t Micha?l’s flesh and blood, and no one can forget what he did to me.
I’m still halfway between the ground and standing and I don’t really know what he’s waiting to say.
“Good.”
What?
He can’t mean for me to stay at table level without a seat, right?
When his smile stays smug, I realize he meant exactly that. I’m supposed to act as if the chair was there and sit on nothing.
”Ari?l, I need a report on Angélique’s progress. Is she ready?” he asks, as if he hadn’t been discussing exactly that before I arrived.
I recognize the question for what it is. He’s stalling.
He wants me to be in pain, or at least very uncomfortable, by the time we eat and my etiquette lesson starts.
“She is, my lord,” Ari?l answers, and I can’t miss the touch of pride in his voice.
It almost makes me smile, but instead, I zone out as he explains that we’ve covered cutlery, body positions at dinner or during parties, and my acceptable behavior anywhere and anytime. I particularly zone out when Ari?l talks about bedside manners.
My hypothetical sex life and my father shouldn’t be in the same conversation. It’s not right.
I keep my breathing slow, my back ramrod straight and my forearms on the table—but not too far on the table, elbows aren’t authorized on a table in France—on each side of the cutlery, as I’ve been taught.
I should be listening, but I know everything that Ari?l is talking about—I’m the test subject, after all—so I let my mind wander.
I wish I could be anywhere else.
Not that I’ve been anywhere else.
I was born in Versailles and have only ever seen the gilded palace and its wonderful gardens.
I know there is more to visit, even just in the vicinity. Paris used to be the capital of France. It used to be the capital of love. I’ve seen movies and documentaries. It used to be lovely and it probably still is, but I’ve never seen anything else than my gilded cage.
And I’m not really kidding. Versailles’ palace literally has gilded fences made of bars. They’re adorned with suns, in honor of a French king who lived about a thousand years ago, and I can’t deny that it looks grand, but when you’re stuck behind bars, it still feels like a prison, especially when you have the kind of special treatment I have.