Chapter Twenty-One
Stakes
Eleanor meandered along the outskirts of the tables, where the richly dressed courtiers were playing card games in the lavish white marble and gold room.
Unlike the bare expanse of the ballroom, this room was smaller and dimly lit, despite the heavy diamond chandeliers hanging overhead.
Gold curtains covered the large windows, adding to the oppressive feeling.
Unlike the other rooms she’d seen at the party palace, paintings decorated these walls.
Each painting varied, but they all featured twelve naked women kneeling, lying, or sitting around a golden king.
The Sol King, as he’d proclaimed himself to be.
Even though the king himself wasn’t present tonight, the eyes of his many likenesses watched his court.
She looked over at the lords while sipping the sweet, sparkling wine that tasted like berries and almonds from a gold-tinged flute.
It hadn’t taken long to become reacquainted with how delicious it tasted.
She lamented the loss of having this wine to drink once it was all over.
Her underfloor stash of booze would have to suffice, much as it’d successfully done while she’d stayed in her room whittling down the hours until she’d needed to emerge to join the other courtesans.
She’d barely made it to the carriage in time to leave The Ladies Grace, so her hair dark auburn hung loosely in its natural waves.
Her lip had finally healed after soaking it in salt water, so she hadn’t seen a reason to select a bright dress tonight.
The sheer plum-coloured dress trailed along her chest and joined at her waist with a split to reveal a single rosy-freckled leg.
With every stride, she felt the cold steel pressed against her inner thigh and, effortlessly, her slither of magic shielded the scars that peeked from beneath her dress.
The mood in court tonight was more of an accurate reflection of a young court, the laughter feeling genuine and lighter, while the wine flowed freely.
But Eleanor stood on the edges of the room watching the gambling courtiers steadily lose more with the more alcohol they consumed.
At the tables, the courtesans kept the lords company.
Eleanor’s drily thought that the lords thought it lucky to have a scantily clad woman draped on their arm.
Supposedly, the lord became even luckier if the woman kissed him before he threw the dice or drew a card.
Eleanor didn’t want to spend her night attached to an arm of an unlucky lord. She sighed in relief as she sat at a vacant polished table, taking the pressure off her tired feet, wanting to indulge in sitting alone for a moment longer. This day had taken a toll on her, more than she cared to admit.
Although, the reprieve was short-lived. No matter how much Eleanor had tried to drown out her restless night with day drinking, the memory of her dreams still plagued her.
Her hand tightened around her glass. She had to trace the necklace back to its source.
She hadn’t wanted to go to anyone else about this sensitive topic, but she couldn’t wait until the Flea opened, stirring restlessly on her chair at the thought of how the wait will stir up more dreams. She couldn’t continue like this.
There was only one option, and she’d have to go tonight.
When she’d taken the last sip of her glass to strengthen herself, then would she get up from the cushioned seat and belatedly attach herself to whichever lord she selected for the evening.
Before that could happen, the small hairs on her nape alerted her to his presence. She held herself in place and willed her body not to turn and seek him out. Not after the last time she’d been with him, and he’d slammed the carriage door in her face.
A voice that promised too much drawled, “May I?”
It was a voice that she’d regrettably become familiar with, and a sound that didn’t fail to flare her annoyance.
“Feel free,” Eleanor replied, matching the velvet voice with as much indifference as she could muster.
The one with the infuriating voice walked from behind her, and the Dark Star sat gracefully in the chair opposite.
Eleanor tried to ignore his obvious beauty and focused on her annoyance with him.
She didn’t like how this aristocrat looked, as he acted like he owned everything and everyone in the room.
He had a continuously bored expression on his beautiful face, and that further irritated her.
As if she wanted to be here of her own accord.
Eleanor would have loved nothing more than to be left alone to read, with the addition of a glass, or three, or even the entire bottle of wine.
She held onto her annoyance, and her disdain for him was furthered by his clothes.
Each time she’d seen this man, there wasn’t a stitch out of place.
He was undoubtedly the most decadently dressed man in the room, with a deep ripe-blackberry velvet long-coat with swirling silver embroidery inlaid with purple jewels dotted along the opening of his long-coat and a matching waistcoat underneath.
Eleanor knew that the amethysts on his long-coat had to be real, even his black hair had the gemstones sprinkled into his soft dark waves.
She wouldn’t put it past him for the embroidery to be actually spun silver woven into his clothes, rather than coloured thread. From the way the waistcoat caught the light, she wasn’t wrong.
He rested his cane against the table. It differed from Riccie’s cane—while his handle had been decorative it’d also been wider.
She scoffed, imagining the aristocrats' extensive cane collections, each one complementing their expensive clothes.
This noble's cane was proof enough as embedded into the pommel was an amethyst the size of a small apple. Her gaze shifted from the massive rock to the stranger’s disinterested face, where cold eyes met hers.
“You,” Eleanor accused.
“Me,” the stranger’s lip twitched. It was a minute movement that, if she hadn’t been transfixed with his full lips, she’d have missed and would have assumed he was bored. “Do you play?” his dark eyes glinted briefly with something she didn’t recognise.
“Sure.” She looked down at the empty table before her and her bare gown, and realised she had nothing to play with. Well, she had her dagger, but she wasn’t giving that up. She’d need it to stab him if he annoyed her enough tonight.
“I only ever play for stakes. First?” he offered smoothly.
“Stakes?” she asked, wary of him.
He shrugged while his long elegant ringed fingers deftly shuffled the cards, making her thighs tighten together. “I make requests from those who lose.”
Something niggled in her awareness of his explanation, but it slipped away as easily as the tide before she could inspect it further.
“Such as?”
“For you…” He made a show of taking a long look at her. “Your time should suffice,” he said as he tapped his glittering ringed finger against the table.
“Why? You don’t know me.” Eleanor narrowed her eyes, questioning what sort of court trick this was and how could she avoid it as it surely went to this man’s advantage.
If he was serious about wanting her company for more than a night, then he’d need to pay for it, and Madam Grace would ensure this aristocrat paid dearly.
It wouldn’t be enough to pay off her debt entirely, but it’d make a sizable dent.
“Your time would remedy that. Maybe I find you to be the loveliest in the room,” he replied with his face cast in a boredom that only an aristocrat could achieve. “And I only want the loveliest on my arm.”
Eleanor couldn’t help the snort that escaped her, as she doubted the truthfulness of his words.
His clothes implied he believed himself as the loveliest in the room, no doubt in the whole of Solas.
She’d be a fool not to consider it. She was a courtesan and had been instructed by Madam Grace to ensure the courtiers’ satisfaction.
Although the madam hadn’t specified whether it was just one courtier for any period.
Eleanor knocked her knuckles on the polished table but immediately regretted it. She hadn’t heard the full stake.
“How long?” she asked, not wanting to give him the satisfaction that he’d easily persuaded her, as if she had a freewill of her own.
“A day,” he said simply, as he dealt the cards.
She dismissed the fluttering feeling in her stomach. “I didn’t agree to your terms. What if I win?”
His lip curled as he raised his cards. She was too far away from him, but she swore his eyes flashed with amusement, which was at odds with the expression on his too handsome face.
Eleanor roughly grabbed the cards from the table and realised she’d lost. Her hand was terrible. A two of diamonds and a seven of hearts.
“You didn’t.”
She narrowed her eyes at his ability to read her and threw the cards face up onto the table.
He laid his cards out, a pair of kings. “Your time is mine, at a time of my choosing.”
She could have sworn that his eyes twinkled, but it was probably from the brilliant chandeliers above and, as briefly as she thought that she’d seen it, it disappeared.
His attention flickered to her side, making her aware that someone was joining them.
“It’s been nice playing with you. Next time, know your opponent better,” he said in a smooth voice, while his lip curled in that self-satisfied way of his.
She bristled at his drawling courtly tone. “You know you’ll still have to pay…” She started to say that Madam Grace was not giving her over for free, but her words trailed off as a reddish-brown cane came into view. The mahogany hue matched the lord’s swirling gold embroidered long-coat.
She recognised the striking blue-eyed courtier from her first night in the party palace’s ballroom, and from when he’d been standing next to her as the court had bid on her the other night.
“Ah, there you are. Your Lordship,” the man said, interrupting them in a drawling voice as he gave a flourishing bow.
Eleanor felt her eyes widen as that niggling feeling from earlier crashed into her in the realisation of just who she was sitting opposite.
The court addressed only one person as Lordship .
The Marquis of Laerus.
Fuck.
The marquis’s eyes moved to Eleanor with an expression she couldn’t read, and her stomach dropped, realising that she’d agreed to give her time to him and only him.
Fuck.
Fuck.
He shifted his eyes to the lord and greeted him. “Duke Aillard—” he started to say, but she didn’t hear the rest as she slid away from the table, hopefully unnoticed.
Tonight, she was picking the quietest and drunkest courtier she could find, so she could quickly and quietly leave the party palace.