Scallywag or Scoundrel

Chapter 1

Lia did not like Captain Julian Salamar, and it was not because of his blue beard. Though admittedly, that was odd.

It was also not because he was a Captain—though that was an odd profession for a nobleman.

But Captain Julian had grown up in a castle on an island off the coast of Allys, so Lia could not even fault him with that.

No, there was just something about the way he was looking at Princess Tavia from across the ballroom.

His dark eyes were so intense, unblinking, and the rest of his face was just as expressionless.

How was one supposed to read a man like that?

And if you could not read a man, how could you trust him?

She had been surprised to see him at the Iseldan ball.

Captain Julian was a fellow Allysian and everyone knew he preferred his solitude and sealife over fancy functions.

Perhaps his ship had been in the Iseldis ports recently?

He definitely was not here to win the heart of Crown Prince Ian—which was the reason everyone else was in attendance.

Not Lia, of course, she was merely there to attend to her lady, the Princess Octavia of Allys.

Princess Tavia, for her part, was also doing an extremely poor job of winning the heart of Crown Prince Ian.

Rather, she was grinning ecstatically under the intense gaze of Captain Julian and squirming in an attempt to withhold an explosion of giggles.

Tavia had been friends with Crown Prince Ian of Iseldis since childhood, but neither had ever been interested in something more.

Tavia, however, had been unusually excited about making the long trip to Iseldis for this ball, so Lia was hoping that something might have changed.

Lia’s frown deepened as she looked back and forth from Julian’s stoic face across the room to Tavia’s giggly one right next to her.

If this had been the reason Tavia was so excited to get to Iseldis .

. . Well, Lia was only a handmaiden, and while it was not her place to comment on the situation, that was not going to stop her.

“I did not think he would be so young,” Princess Tavia whispered to her.

“He’s not that young,” Lia grumbled. “He’s got to be at least thirty.”

“No,” Tavia replied. “He’s . . . twenty-five . . . maybe?”

Lia rolled her eyes. “And how exactly does one end up with seven broken engagements by the age of twenty-five?”

“My cousin broke off three engagements before he was eighteen.” The princess shrugged.

Lia stiffened her eye muscles to keep them from rolling again—an art she had mastered after a lifetime of serving Tavia. “You can usually get away with one—maybe two—eyerolls a day,” her grandmother had once told her. “Our royals are not tyrants, but try not to push them, please.”

Princess Tavia made that advice quite difficult at times.

Most of the time.

Glancing sideways at Tavia, Lia wondered if maybe she should not have made the princess quite so beautiful for the ball.

Tavia’s naturally dark hair had been dyed a golden yellow and intertwined with silver highlights.

Amongst the Iseldan nobles, her hair was like a shimmering star of light in a sea of dark brown and black tresses.While they wore it too simply for Lia’s taste, the Iseldan royal family had lovely dark hair.

To mimic their monarchs, most of the nobles in attendance also wore their natural hair color.

Or, at least, they attempted to match it by darkening their frequent blondes and reds to fit in.

Other than Tavia, only one other person in the room had dared to stand out.

One man and one man alone was wearing his bright hair as nature intended and that was Captain Julian.

How indigo was Julian’s natural color, Lia had no idea. Yet, hairstyling ran in her family for six generations—even from across the crowded ballroom she could tell he was a natural blue.

That wasn’t the reason she didn’t like him though! She told herself. Afterall, there was absolutely nothing wrong with having an unnatural color naturally! No, It was the rumors . . . the missing fiancees . . . that lifeless stare . . .

“I am going to go talk to him.” Tavia grinned.

Lia clenched her jaw as her lady straightened up and attempted to elegantly glide across the room toward her .

. . admirer? The right thing to do would have been to hang back and let the actual princess do as she pleased, but Lia was too protective for that.

She had a hair pin in her pocket and wouldn’t hesitate to use it.

Captain Julian’s gaze never broke from Tavia’s as she navigated through the dancing nobles. Did he ever blink?

Grinning, the princess offered him a hand, which he took and kissed with a stiff bow.

“Captain Julian Salamar, I presume?” the princess beamed.

The captain's already somber eyes hardened. “Why do you presume?”

Lia’s brows shot up. Unconsciously, she put her hand in her pocket and felt for the wig pin.

Really? Maybe it was because he was the only man dressed in captain’s attire in the entire room!

Maybe it was because there was only one blue-bearded sea captain in all of the five kingdoms. Not that there was anything wrong with having blue hair, Lia reminded herself.

But honestly, did this man have any idea who he was speaking to?

The princess’s eyes widened in amazement. Lia thought she was rightfully offended at the captain’s obvious question, but then Tavia giggled.

“Because I have heard so much about you,” the princess replied. “I—”

“What have you heard?” the captain interrupted.

Lia choked. The audacity of this man!

Tavia smirked up at him. “I heard you saved my father’s ships from Baleacanis, the sea beast.”

Between the erratic sea storms and the terrifyingly large sea beasts that inhabited the eastern oceans, and the western oceans, and the northern—well, all of the oceans except for the southern oceans because no one had sailed far enough south to find out—sailing had become an increasingly dangerous venture.

And despite his scowl and his hair, Captain Julian was largely praised for his fearless destruction of said sea beasts.

And now that Tavia had given the man an opportunity to boast, Lia pre-emptively blinked to stop her eyes from rolling again.

But what the captain would have responded, Lia never got to find out because he was distracted by a grey cat that emerged from beneath a table and snaked its way over to his feet.

For the first time, Julian broke eye contact with the princess and stooped down, taking the animal up into his arms. The cat’s purring increased as he slowly stroked its head.

“I like cats,” the captain stated, looking back at Tavia.

Stepping forward, Lia grabbed Tavia’s sleeve. “A word . . . Princess . . .” She put special emphasis on this title hoping Julian would take notice. He did not.

“Oh, excuse me,” Tavia said politely to Julian.

Lia, having at least the bare minimum respect for royalty, did not exactly drag Tavia from the room. But she hurried her through the nearest open door and into a mostly empty hallway.

“May I speak plainly, princess?” Lia said once they were well out of earshot of any passing guests and kitchen staff.

“Of course,” the princess answered, furrowing her delicate golden brows.

Lia had removed most of Tavia’s actual brows and what remained was more like a carefully painted line.

Lia would have liked to leave a little more width, but apparently thick brows were “unbecoming” in Allys at the moment and according to her grandmother, “The princess is always right.”

“No.” Lia stated.

“No . . . what?” Tavia asked, her eyebrows drawing together until they were almost a single line.

“I know you,” Lia said. “You like him. And . . . No.”

The princess’s jaw dropped. The tiny brows were now crinkled with annoyance. “Why?”

“He is so rude!” Lia insisted. “Who would dare speak to the princess that way?”

Tavia crossed her arms. “You do, for one. You do it all the time, like right now.”

Lia rolled her eyes, thus exhausting the daily supply allotted by her grandmother.

“I asked permission first,” Lia pointed out.

“First of all,” Tavia argued. “He is not rude. He is bold. It means he sees me as an equal, and I respect that.”

“He sees you as inferior,” Lia stated, remembering the judgment in that man’s unblinking stare.

Tavia scoffed and turned her face back toward the ballroom.

“There are at least a dozen eligible suitors there,” Lia pointed out.

“And they're all the same!” the princess whined. “Spoiled, arrogant, little shrews who have never accomplished anything for themselves.”

“What about Lord Tyrell?” Lia asked. She had noticed the young Allysian nobleman as soon as they had entered the ballroom. Apparently, Captain Julian was not the only man in the room who had been staring at Tavia.

“What about him?” Tavia asked, sounding genuinely oblivious.

“He’s kind and respectful and he lov—”

“He’s boring,” Tavia interrupted. She stepped forward, moving back toward the ballroom.

“Only because you have never taken the time to talk to him!” Lia shot back. She wanted to throw her hands in the air, and she almost did since the princess’s back was turned.

“Do you know what I think?” Princess Tavia exclaimed, twirling back around to her handmaiden. “I think you do not like Captain Julian because of his blue beard.”

Lia was about to protest, but instead released a defeated sigh and stiffened her eye muscles.

“Do as you please, princess,” she said. “It is not my place.”

The princess flew off to the party, leaving Lia to brood in silence. Which she was fine with. It was not like anything exciting was going to happen in the ballroom.

The blue beard . . . how could the princess possibly think that was the reason? Afterall, there was absolutely nothing wrong with having a blue beard! Nothing!