Chapter 30 #2
The mustached man who’d come in with Agatha, reclining gracefully on a sofa, raises his eyebrows and looks at her reproachfully. “Well.” He draws out the word, chiding and insinuating at the same time. “You had several tricks up your sleeve, my lady!”
“Your—your highness!” her worthless father pants. “If I would have known!” I tune out the rest of his groveling.
Agatha, for her part, is still flushed, and she shrinks toward me.
I can’t help the way my chest puffs out. That fowl-like pose again, I fear, but I can’t help it.
The godmother clicks her tongue. “Tired of your present so soon, little prince?”
I turn my snarl from Manfield to her. “You can be quiet, too,” I say. “This mess is all your fault.”
“Mess?” The godmother flicks her fingers, gathering the splinters of my guitar up into a heap next to Agatha’s china shards. “You blame me?” Her strange, round eyes peer at me without blinking. “You asked for it.”
“Agatha didn’t.” I cross my arms and return her stare with one of my own.
I may not be a fairy, but I can win in a glaring contest, magical non-blinking eyes or not.
“So you’re all going to be quiet and give her some time to think.
In fact,” I turn my glare to Mansfield, “you’re going to go fetch my lady some tea. ”
“I am not!” He cows under my sustained scowl. “Go get it,” he mumbles to the ruffian, looking away.
I’d rather not let him go so easily, but that has more to do with my injured pride (and my injured face) than any practical reason.
Besides, I’m not sure he’ll be quite as impressed by status, so better if he’s just out of the picture.
“You three,” I say to the remaining men. “Go. Give the lady some privacy.”
Mansfield begins blustering again and Agatha’s father increases his obsequiousness, but I lock eyes with the third man, who nods slowly. “I think,” he says to the others, “we’d better not call this particular bluff.”
“You can run like a cowardly badger if you want,” Mansfield huffs, “but I won’t be ordered about in my own house by a deformed vagrant—”
“Deformed?” I step closer to him. I hate leaving Agatha behind, but she seems to be recovering from her shock.
I point to the puckered scar once more running down the length of my face.
“You mean this?” He doesn’t respond. “You know where I got it, don’t you?
How the princes of Rhylorria are chosen? ”
His gaze shifts side-to-side. “Silly stories,” he grunts. “I’ve never believed a word of it. All a bunch of hogslop to make yourselves sound more heroic.”
The mustached man curls his lip.
I draw myself up to my full height which is, admittedly, not much different than my height when I’m slouching. But I hope the action of squaring my shoulders and refurrowing my brows makes me look more in control, even though my heart is beating rapidly and my palms are sweating.
Agatha is the clever one. Agatha is the one who’s good at talking.
I’m barely capable of convincing my own servants to do something for me, let alone foreign dignitaries.
But a quick glance over my shoulder shows that Agatha is still flushed, biting her lip in uncertainty, and looking at me with … with admiration?
I look away before I start blushing and stammering and retrain my ire at Mansfield.
“In Rhylorria,” I say deliberately, “the succession is not determined by heredity.” His face registers doubt.
“Instead, there is a contest, of sorts, to see who is worthy of being the next king. Would you like to know what that contest is?” I lean closer, pausing before I continue, letting my voice drop.
“The honor of joining the royal family of Rhylorria goes only to those who have had the courage and strength to slay the fearsome wolpertinger.”
The duke sniffs. “As if you can expect me to believe—”
I point to the scar on my face again. “I have more, if you care to see them.”
“You could have gotten those anywhere,” he says, but his voice is more hesitant.
“Call Henry to vouch for me.” I smile grimly, my scar twisting, and crack my knuckles. “Or I can demonstrate my prowess.”
I wouldn’t have a chance if the ruffian were still here; my inability to take him down has been proved more than once already.
But since he’s out fetching tea, and no one is likely to come to Mansfield’s defense, I let out a bovine bellow and run headfirst at him.
My skull connects with his soft midsection, and he lets out a gasping oof as we topple to the ground.
I scramble to get on top, my fists swinging and somehow, miraculously—perhaps the godmother is blessing me—connecting with the side of his jaw. He oofs again as I struggle upright, moving toward his head so I can press my knee to his neck.
It would feel slightly more satisfying if I could revenge myself on the ruffian in this way, but I saw the way the duke treated Agatha, and I’m quite pleased at my ability to pin him down now. Let him feel helpless and weak and scorned for a change.
“Satisfied?” I growl. He can’t answer, wheezing and writhing under the pressure. “I’ll tell you what’s going to happen next,” I say. “I’m going to get up, and you’re going to leave this room. And send in the tea for Agatha. And then never bother her again.”
I wait for an assenting sort of wheeze before I slowly remove my knee from his neck, waiting in a crouch to make sure he’s going to obey me.
The pit in my stomach roils and churns, and I feel sweat beading along my hairline. What if he calls my bluff? I tackled him out of sheer luck. Or what if his man returns? He could throw me out a window. Or what if—?
My ever-present scowl must disguise my unease, because Mansfield scrabbles backward along the floor, away from both me and Agatha, as soon as I’ve given him his freedom.
Perhaps a braver man would have pounced on me, but he’s all talk.
The other noble rises lazily from the sofa, plucking at the duke’s collar to haul him to standing.
“Come, friend,” he says mockingly. “Let us have a drink. I think we need to talk about the terms of our wager, hmm?”
Mansfield’s face contorts in rage, and that’s the last I see of him as the other hauls him from the room.
“You too,” I say to Agatha’s father. He dips his head meekly and scurries after the others, shutting the door behind.
I dust my hands together and let out a slow, shaky breath.
That … worked? At least until the ruffian gets back?
Fortune has smiled on me for once.
“Lem.” Agatha’s voice comes from behind me, hesitant and with a hint of a quiver. “That was magnificent.”
I turn and nod, stiff and awkward, not quite meeting her gaze as my face reddens. The godmother perches in midair, legs crossed and skirts fluttering around her in an invisible breeze, watching me with obvious glee.
“See how nice that is?” she says with a wide-eyed smile. “You did it yourself!”
“It was not nice.” My voice is a grumble, and I fold my arms over my chest, resisting the urge to feel my restored scar again. “At best, I bought us a few minutes.” I’m afraid to look at Agatha, but I do anyhow. She dips her head.
“Time for us to go, I think,” she says.
And she reaches out and takes my hand and when her fingers lace through mine, I swear to myself that I’d break anything and everything for just a single moment of her touch.