Chapter 5 #2
“Thank you. Your gifts are…exquisite.”
His smile deepens. “They’re not gifts. They’re intentions.”
Warmth pools low in my chest, and I swallow it.
With a regal nod, I turn. But the pendant remains heavy in my hand. I pass it to an attendant with careful composure, though I feel Darian’s gaze burning at my back—silent, deliberate. Like a man who’s set a game in motion and trusts the board will rearrange itself in his favor.
I step toward the northern dais where Starsfall’s council sits like carved obsidian and pearl.
Candlelight flutters across their faces.
The High Chamberlain raises a thin goblet in greeting, his ivory-and-purple robes echo the heraldic banners behind him—symbols of courage, honor, sacrifice.
Of everything my father’s kingdom claims to be.
A group of tributes—blue cloaked—wait below.
The pause seems too long. To refuse them would be weakness. To ignore them, cruelty. But to speak…that would be playing the part assigned to me. Tonight, I wear the mask beautifully.
A tall, ash-blond youth bows stiffly, and another smiles too easily, as though he expects to fail anyway.
I offer polite nods, ask trivial questions: their quarters, their training.
The words taste bitter on my tongue. Their eyes give nothing—no awe, no despair.
Just quiet confidence mingled with complacency, as if they already know the outcome.
The crowd’s hum swells. My name flickers through the air. Fans flutter; eyes sharpen. The room tightens, thickens.
Then, a light graze on my sleeve. Deliberate.
“I hoped,” Darian murmurs, his voice pitched just below hearing, “that I might steal a moment.”
The pause hits too hard.
“Very well,” I say, careful to keep my voice aloof. “A moment.”
Darian draws me to the edge of the chamber.
A quiet recess, lit only by the spill of amber scones and the low draft from the service tunnels that thread beneath the royal kitchens, still warm with the scent of spice and smoke.
He waits until the servants have finished fetching refreshments, their trays clinking faintly as they disappear back into the passageways, leaving behind only the echo of silver and the scent of sugared citrus.
“I had hoped for a…private audience?”
I arch an eyebrow.
“You’re very good at this,” he says softly, no longer smiling. “The performance. The stillness. The way your silence says more than most speeches.”
My silence gives nothing away.
He angles his head. “You wear your role like a veil. Almost translucent. Almost impenetrable.”
“What did you expect of Starsfall’s heir?”
“That’s not all you are,” he murmurs, stepping closer. “You’re enjoying this.”
I glance at him. “What is it you think you’re seeing?”
He doesn’t answer.
Instead, he lifts a hand—slow, deliberate—and brushes a stray strand of hair from my shoulder. Not possessive. Not tender. Just…curious. Like he’s mapping a puzzle. Feeling for a weakness in the grain.
“Some women want to shine like stars,” he says slowly, “but I think you want to be the lightning that splits the skies.”
The silence that follows is not awkward—it’s charged. Measured. A held breath.
“We should rejoin the reception,” I say, barely above a whisper.
But my heart stutters behind my ribs, and magic hums beneath my skin—like smoke curling toward flame. I don’t know if it’s warning or want.
“I will,” he says. “If that’s your choice.”
There’s no challenge in it. Just quiet deference. And that makes it worse.
His expression shifts—not smug, not victorious. Recognition, maybe. Or restraint sharpened into reverence. And those eyes—those bright blue eyes—dazzle with a flicker of something half-wild, half-knowing, like they’re frost catching fire and realizing they want to burn.
“We are alike, Princess. Born to a purpose we did not choose. I know that loneliness. I see you.”
Then he bows—not courtly, but intimate, deliberate. Like an offering. A secret folded in the palm.
Without another word, he turns toward the golden light of the reception hall—toward the jeweled laughter and the women who wear their interest like perfume. He moves like someone used to being watched, but never truly seen.
I press my back into the alcove for a few breaths more, letting the cold wall ground me. Listening. Thinking. Burning.
By the time I return to the reception, the music has changed. Darker now, slower. A waltz meant for intrigue. The nobles are drifting to the floor in pairs and trios, all satin and suggestion.
And that’s when I see Mallen.
He is not at my side.
He stands near one of the pillars at the chamber’s edge, half-shadowed by the spill of a jade banner. His arms are crossed, his face carved in stillness. But his eyes are locked on me as I return to the lonely center of the room.
For a moment, the world quiets.
The music slips away like the memory of summer when it’s winter. The heat settles low in my chest, and a slow, delicious ache pressing between my ribs. And the slow, silver smile Darian left behind fades, like a ghost settling on my skin.
All I feel is Mallen’s gaze. Its heat. Its weight. It’s a quiet storm sweeping me away as if I were fallen leaves. This is a maelstrom contained, the calm before the winter’s tide carries the shore out to sea. It’s not angry, not jealous.
Worse.
It’s resigned.
He looks like a man bracing for war, knowing he will not stop it.
My feet take me toward him before reason arrives. Perhaps it’s because I want to explain. Or because to be seen differently. Or maybe it’s to catch that look again, the one he has worn these past days, as if I mattered more than the orders that bind him.
He watches me approach.
But he doesn’t move.
“Were you going to vanish into the walls?” I ask, tone light. Too light. “Or just glare like an old ghost?”
Mallen’s voice is low. Rough. “I did not neglect my watch. You didn’t need me.”
“Don’t say that,” I say, and it comes out small. “That’s not true.”
“You walked with him,” he says, eyes unreadable. “You let him touch you. Gave him your attention. Your silence. And I’ve guarded enough nobles to know when they’ve been dazzled by trinkets.”
“You think I can be bought with poems and sparkly things?” I ask, as steadily as I can. “You think I wanted a prince in the Reaping?”
“I think,” he cuts in quietly, “you stopped looking for me when you saw something prettier.”
That lands. Not because it’s true, but because he believes it. And somehow, that is worse.
“I didn’t stop looking,” I say, voice tight. “You stopped standing where I could see you.”
A long breath passes between us.
Then he bows—sharp, fast, too formal.
Not a dismissal. A retreat.
And as he goes, something in me strains toward him, like a thread pulled tight but not yet cut.