Her brow furrowed. “Is something the matter?”
“No,” the Shepherd exhaled, retracting his hand and taking a step backward. He bowed his head. “I am merely honored to serve you, Your Majesty. By your leave? The Lord Chancellor and I have some last-minute preparations to discuss for the wedding tomorrow.”
At the mention of the wedding, her stomach twisted itself into knots all over again.
She was going to marry the Crow.
In the grand cathedral of Goldreach.
Before thousands of witnesses.
“Of course. The Lord bless you,” she dismissed him with another attempt at a smile.
But when her gaze slid past Father Perero to spy Lord Tiberius Beaumont lingering near the door, clearly waiting to speak with her, her half-hearted smile immediately evaporated.
She couldn’t even begin to imagine what her former “favorite” wanted with her now.
“Come, Father,” Duchess Edith murmured, taking the Shepherd by the arm. “Let us go and retrieve my husband together before His Grace says something to Prince Aldric that he will surely regret.”
Her godmother and Father Perero drifted away, leaving Seraphina alone with only Alyx for company. And no excuse for further avoiding the Baron of Crestley’s company.
You’re being ridiculous,she chided herself as she raised her hand and gestured toward the baron, signaling that he could approach.It is only Tiberius.
The man who had been her friend since they were both children.
The man she had pined for so desperately as a teenager; the memory haunted her still, even now as a woman of thirty.
The man whose proposal of marriage she had rejected just this spring.
The man who now expected her to broker a marriage between him and another lady of the court instead. As if any noble family would accept a self-made man for a son-in-law.
Seraphina painted another smile across her lips as she tracked her once-dear friend’s approach. Well-tailored blue damask shimmered upon his tall frame. His honeyed curls tumbled loosely across his shoulders. His emerald eyes sparkled, mirroring the warmth of the smile he reserved for her alone.
She knew what that smile meant. He wanted a favor.
“Your Majesty,” Lord Tiberius purred as he drew to a pause before her and swept into a low bow. “How well you look today.”
Seraphina’s smile tightened. “Liar. I look dreadful, and we both know it.”
“Never,” he breathed. Rising back to his full height to loom over her, he extended his hand, unmistakably seeking to claim a hold on her own. “Even at your most dreadful, you easily outshine every woman in Elmoria.”
Alyx flapped her wings and hissed at the baron’s sudden nearness.
Seraphina’s right hand twitched where it hung limp at her side. A part of her wanted to hiss right alongside her winged serpent. But she fought hard against the desire to retreat from Lord Tiberius’s nearness—to deny him what he so clearly wanted: to kiss her hand.
She didn’t dare cause a scene, not in front of her councilors.
Not in front of theCrow.
A masculine hand abruptly wrapped itself around her fingers, laying claim to them before Lord Tiberius ever could. It was a strong hand.
Rough. Warm.
Her breath hitched as she turned her head and looked down to find Aldric of all people now standing beside her, looking as he always did: like a battle-hardened mercenary rather than a prince. Dumbfounded, she glanced down further.
To the sight of her hand now captured within the firm grasp of his.
“Wife,” he growled in way of greeting, his one-eyed gaze all for the baron.
