Chapter 12
Lucien stood awkwardly in his bedroom doorway, seeming unable to summon enough courage to cross the threshold. We’d begun our second courtship with an argument about where he should sleep—he insisted on returning to the library settee where he’d passed the night before, whereas I encouraged him to spend the night in his room since he so desperately needed sound rest.
His exhaustion had deepened as the day progressed, magnified by the stress from today’s meeting as well as his restless sleep brought by his uncomfortable accommodations the night before. Yet my victory at his eventual reluctant surrender was short-lived now that he stood paralyzed at the door.
He stared helplessly into the room faintly illuminated by the single candle left by the servant who had prepared his bed before he glanced at me with the look of a lost child. “I don’t think I can do it after all. I’m not so dishonorable as to invite an unmarried maiden into my room, especially so early in our courtship.”
I frowned, puzzled at why he would characterize this as “early” considering we’d been engaged for years and in love for quite some time now, but responded to his concerns. “Technically you didn’t invite me—I followed you.”
The impropriety had been necessary. Our connection already felt fragile; I was afraid too much time spent apart would sever it completely, leaving me at the curse’s mercy. I grazed his arm, and though I doubt he felt it, the movement was enough to draw his wide-eyed panic.
“Please, Lucien. I’m afraid to be alone.”
With a tentative nod and steadying breath he inched into the room. His destination wasn’t his grand four-poster but the wardrobe, where he pulled out not his bedclothes but a stack of blankets and a pillow, which he used to set up a makeshift bed a conscientious distance from his own.
“There’s no need to go to the trouble; I can’t sleep in this state.” But he ignored my hasty insistences and added an extra blanket.
“It’s not any trouble at all, Lisette.”
The sentiment stirred my heart, as did hearing my name on his lips. As a woman of title I was rarely referred to by my given name, and even Father avoided addressing me directly as much as possible. I mulled over his words, marveling. I always had the sense I was nothing but trouble, that my very existence was an inconvenience to everyone around me. “It’s not?”
Crimson stained his cheeks as he determinedly averted his gaze. Bashfulness wasn’t an emotion I would have expected from the confident prince, but the endearing, relatable trait created another thread that bound us together.
“But I don’t need to sleep.”
Even with this argument his preparations didn’t falter. “I won’t be able to sleep comfortably if you have no place to rest during the night.” He gave the pillow one last fluff before settling across the blankets he’d just arranged.
My brow furrowed. “Isn’t that bed mine?”
He finally glanced up, his look aghast. “What honorable gentleman forces his fiancée to spend the night on the floor?”
“But—” My protests were in vain. I watched helplessly as he slipped fully dressed beneath the blankets laid across the floor and propped himself on his elbow with an expectant look. I tentatively obeyed his silent plea and settled on the edge of his four-poster as best I could, but rather than being enfolded by the duvet’s soft creases, I floated several inches above the mattress.
I frowned. “I’m not even touching the bed, meaning the floor wouldn’t be uncomfortable for me.”
Such logic did little to persuade him. He searched my uncooperative expression before sighing. “Regardless, it’s the gesture that means something. You’re worth serving, Lisette.” Without another word he lay down with his back facing me, effectively ending our conversation. Within moments the sounds of his heavy breathing filled the darkness.
Night settled around us. I measured the passing time with each of his measured breaths, my mind alternating between reviewing what we’d learned about the curse, worrying about the problem with Thorndale, and savoring the memories of Lucien’s sweet words as he insisted I had worth, a concept I couldn’t remember anyone telling me before. Aira had shown me true care, but the reigning monarchs’ cruelty—along with the quiet distance maintained by my older brother who scarcely seemed to notice my existence—had stripped away any confidence I might have otherwise had.
After an hour had drifted by I sensed a shift in the darkness, similar to the sensation I’d experienced yesterday in the library. The veil separating me from the invisible force seemed thinner beneath the cloak of night when the shadows grew more pronounced than during the day, allowing hidden things to be brought to light.
The presence was gradually growing stronger. Curious and uneasy, I took in the room, but other than Lucien’s sleeping presence I appeared entirely alone. Yet sounds extended beyond my sight, wisps of wind that gradually shifted into whispers against my consciousness, a symphony of muted voices. I searched through each note filling the night until the familiar one I thought I’d noticed the night before rose above the rest to form words—garbled at first, save for my name.
“Lisette…”
I didn’t immediately recognize that the muffled voice belonged to my vanished handmaiden; even once I did, I wondered if it was nothing more than another unfulfilled longing to find some semblance in the chaos around me.
I took in the dark room once more. Though I still didn’t see anyone I could sense someone nearby, a heaviness upon the air. The curtains fluttered in a nonexistent breeze, as if someone had brushed past them…even though I couldn’t see any kind of figure.
“Can you hear me, Lisette?”
The voice steadily grew louder, sounding as if it drifted—not from the other side of a closed door, but from within the room. The stronger it became, the more I could feel the tingling sensation of the presence accompanying it, creeping closer until it paused directly beside me.
A soft breeze caressed my ear, the air displaced as if someone leaned in; this time the whisper cradling my name was unmistakably that of my handmaiden.
I tilted my body towards where I thought I sensed her. “Aira?”
Her name reached across the divide created by the lack of the sight separating us. Slowly, like ripples in a previously still pond, she came into focus…but only for a flickering moment before disappearing again. I lurched forward.
“Aira!”
Though she remained invisible, the force that had drawn the curtain over my sight hadn’t deafened her voice. “I’ve been struggling to get your attention for several days now, ever since the curse consumed me.”
The full familiarity of her voice settled over me with every word she spoke—it was truly my beloved handmaiden, the one person I’d been able to trust and depend on in the decade since she came to the palace as a child near my own age when my aged, taciturn nursemaid had been dismissed. Tears of relief burned my eyes. It was difficult to speak through the sob cinching my throat. “I’m so glad you’re safe. I’ve been so worried.”
I winced upon noticing the insensitive implication beneath the words—Aira might not have permanently vanished, but she was certainly not safe. As usual I lacked the proper decorum expected of a princess.
Even though I couldn’t see her, I detected no offense to my thoughtless remark. “I haven’t ceased to exist as I imagined I would, though things remain uncertain.”
The vanishing curse softened her tone, making it quiet enough not to pull Lucien from his deep slumber even if were able to hear her voice. Even so I cast him a nervous glance, finding it difficult to look away from his features relaxed with sleep. The disapproving force I thought I’d imagined earlier returned, emanating from where my handmaiden had briefly flickered into view.
Though I couldn’t see her, I wondered whether I was visible to her. “Can you see me?”
“Yes. Our forms are more similar than they are to those still in the visible world.”
“Then why am I visible only to Lucien?”
By her resulting silence she likely didn’t have an explanation for the phenomenon Lucien and I were currently experiencing. While the uncertainty gnawed at me, there were more pressing mysteries to unravel. “Where exactly are you?”
“I’m not entirely sure. It’s a place without form. Sometimes I feel as if I’m trapped in a void of nothingness, other times I’m in a world much like this one…or I’m here, invisible to those who remain free from the curse’s power.”
“I wish I could do something, anything…” My helplessness cinched my chest, an emotion that for once wasn’t directed towards my own difficult circumstances but instead another’s. I’d never meant to be selfish during the years I’d grown up in Father’s unfeeling court, yet my efforts to survive had made it difficult to consider others—made more so considering I’d never had a model of what caring looked like aside from Aira’s quiet, faithful service. Despite my unintentional selfishness my handmaiden had worried for me, concern I wasn’t sure I deserved.
“You’ve helped me more than you realize,” she offered reassuringly. “I believe my worry at leaving you behind is what allows me to remain close to this degree.”
Could her concern for someone as seemingly insignificant as me be so powerful? “So it’s lingering purpose that tethers one to the real world?” Did purpose or regret for an unfulfilled wish also keep me here? The mystery haunted me, making me desperate to search out every clue until I’d uncovered the truth.
While I wasn’t sure whether I’d ever experienced this propelling emotion for myself, I had at least witnessed it in the lives of others, most notably my father in his determination to utilize any means to achieve his ends…including me. I shivered and offered that particular memory as sacrifice for the curse’s insatiable appetite before returning to the matter at hand.
“Have you truly been with me this entire time?”
“I’ve been with you as much as I’ve been able ever since I vanished, but you didn’t seem to notice my presence until last night. As your handmaiden it is my duty to stay with you; you’ve never truly been alone.”
I found reassurance in that thought. I never imagined that even after she’d disappeared she had remained with me—unseen and unfelt—even in my loneliest moments following my capture by the curse. Though her explanation at least solved one mystery, a myriad of others lingered, ones that in my overwhelm I wished the curse could claim as well.
Knowing she had never been far and once more speaking with her only increased my yearning to see her again beyond the single flicker before she’d vanished from my sight. I reached across the space that divided where I imagined she stood nearby, as if I was stretching my arm across the length between our seats in the carriage we’d been riding when she’d disappeared.
At first my frantic gesture grasped nothing but air, but gradually it took on a more tangible form, as if I’d dipped my hand in a swirl of fog. The deeper my longing to see her again grew, the more tangible she became, until gradually the nothingness surrounding her took form.
This time when she reappeared she lingered, allowing me to study her. She looked as she had when she’d disappeared—adorned in her traveling cloak, her body nothing more than a shimmery outline like mine currently was. I wasted no time in reaching for her, my desperation for her to remain with me.
My fingers curled around her hand. It wasn’t until I felt something solid beneath my grasp that I realized how much I’d been craving human contact. The fleeting pseudo touches I’d experienced with Lucien that left me with an imagining of what they felt like had been empty, but this was something real I could hold onto. I didn’t realize how tightly I gripped Aira’s fingers in my touch-deprived state until her expression twisted in pain; I hurriedly relaxed my grip.
If only I could touch Lucien this way. Would we find a way to break the invisibility upon me so I would finally be able to, or had the curse created a chasm so vast it would forever keep us apart?
My attention shifted back to the man sleeping nearby. Though Aira’s features were blurred in shadow, I could faintly feel the heat of her disapproving gaze. “Why do you keep looking at him in that way?”
Apparently the curse had had a similar effect on her, freeing her of previous reservations like it had for me, as she would never have spoken to me so freely in our usual relationship; despite our similar ages and closeness, she had always been better than I at behaving in the way dictated by her station.
“Because he’s my fiancé.” Rather than the previous indifference I’d once experienced from the title in an arranged engagement, my heart warmed at the word, a feeling that despite my lost memories had only been growing the more time we’d spent together.
She snorted. “Perhaps in name only, but there was never any affection between you two.”
My breath caught and my gaze snapped back to her. “What do you mean?”
She studied me thoughtfully and her eyes bulged. “You truly don’t remember much about your relationship, do you?”
I shook my head. “For some reason the curse has chosen to consume those memories, along with many others.” It only restored the unpleasant ones, as if it wanted to provide me further reason to release my attachment to the real world.
The fact that it had erased a relationship that according to Lucien had been a joyous one seemed to confirm his assertion that we’d been in love, even as something about that assumption still didn’t feel quite right…notably the doubts expressed by Aira, the one who’d often acted as our chaperone. Her words nourished the unsettling uncertainty I hadn’t been able to uproot, threatening the relationship I only now realized how desperate I was to cling to.
Because she had served as a witness to the courtship I couldn’t remember, I ached to ask her some of the questions I hadn’t yet dared broach with Lucien, even as I was afraid of her potential answers. “You remember my courtship?”
She hesitated before shaking her head. “From what I understand based on my observations, you entered the arrangement with hope that your fiancé would finally provide you the opportunity to create a relationship, something you’ve always lacked even within your own family. However, you were only met with the same indifference you received from His Majesty, something that brought you not love and affection, but pain.”
This hurt emerged from my suppressed memories to wrench my heart anew, even as the recollection of his sweet consideration these past several days and the earnestness that filled his eyes whenever he declared his affection prevented me from giving the pain full rein.
“He told me he loved me.”
She narrowed her eyes. “So I heard. But from what I witnessed, such an emotion never developed between you two…which means he must be lying.”
The words slashed my heart, evidence that supported the unsettling memories that continuously lapped against my awareness, building on the underlying fear that thanks to both my questionable heritage and my inherent lack of royal qualities, a future with Lucien was impossible. I wanted to forget them, even as I was afraid ignoring them would leave me susceptible for further heartache.
I glanced towards Lucien again. His sleeping face betrayed no hint of hidden malice, while his position on the uncomfortable floor served as evidence of his consideration—he’d willingly chosen to give me the possibility of resting on his bed.
I yearned to defend him, but my lost memories prevented me from offering examples of his caring, save for the one that had transpired since my disappearance.
“He gave up his bed for me even though I don’t need to sleep.” The gesture seemed too heartfelt not to have come from a place of at least some caring, even as I was still afraid to believe anyone could feel that way towards me. “More importantly, he noticed my discomfort and sympathized with my difficult past. He’s helping me overcome my pain, repeatedly assures me he loves me, and wants to give our courtship a second chance. If what you say about his deceit is true, what reason does he have to contrive such a story, when all he has to do is pretend not to see me and move on to another arrangement?”
She shrugged. “Perhaps the answer to that is what is preventing you from moving on: the need to uncover the truth.”
While I sensed my forgotten purpose was deeper, I couldn’t deny her assumption possessed some merit. If I wanted to further develop our tentative new courtship, I would need to first investigate Aira’s claims to determine whether or not they were founded. I resolved to hunt every last suspicion down until none remained.