“I’m glad she’s all right,” I say. “I’ll leave her to your capable care.”
They curtsy deeply, and I pause in the doorway as they go back to tending to their sister. “Do you need anything? What can we do?” Ophelia frets.
Aren rises on her elbows. “Actually, there is something. Girls, gather some of the herbs from the windowsill—chamomile, lavender. Steep them in water with a slice of ginger. It will help clear my head. And bring me my casket of dried remedies.”
I step out into the hallway, and after her sisters scurry past to collect the requested items, I quietly leave the house. I can see the light still emanating from her room, the shadows cast by her family as they tend to her flickering on the walls, and I feel an ache I can’t describe—a longing for the return of something that was never mine to begin with.
They love her dearly, unconditionally. I wonder what that’s like.
Chapter Nine
Aren
The night was shitty, but by morning I’ve recovered from the effects of the poison, and I’m back at the Raven’s Beak by the afternoon. It rains all day, an exhale from the heavens, like a breath that’s been held too long gusting from the sky in a great rush. The damp doesn’t help with how I ache all over, but I’ve never been one to take a day off, even when I’m sick. My sisters always tease that the only day I’ll rest is the day I die. But they don’t know: I’m here today because there’s no way in Albion I’m going to let that bastard marquis scare me into hiding at home. Hewillsee my face.
I didn’t tell my sisters what really happened, though they keep trying to pry more of the story out of me. Of course, they want to know how the damn prince ended up at our house, and they kept teasing me about it, inventing some attraction between us. But I kept telling them it wasn’t like that at all. I just had a little too much wine and he walked me home. The prince is a gentleman, right? That’s it. End of story.
I don’t want to admit that just thinking about what could’ve happened last night makes me shake. I can still feel the ghost of those fingers choking me. As soon as I can, I’m going to turn that dress I was wearing into rags.
I can’t let anyone see the damage, either, so I tied my mother’s old kerchief loosely around my neck to hide the bruising. It still smells like Mother, like her homemade perfume of citrus peels and jasmine. Maybe I just imagine it, and it doesn’t smell like anything at all. But even after all these years, her scent brings a small measure of comfort as I go about my day, pouring drinks and serving food to those looking for shelter from the rain, wanting a hot meal and to rest their feet by the fire.
At the end of the day, after nightfall, I go out back to feed the pigs, carrying a heavy bucket of scraps. It’s still pouring. I freeze when I spy a shadow moving in the alley—the same alley where…
My heart pounds, and I start to tremble all over again, thinking he’s come back to finish the job. I want to scream. My blood rushes; rage, hot and fierce, fills me. Before I know it, I’m running after him, my fists clenched. “Hey! Bastard!” I yell, as the rain muffles my voice. “What do you think you’re—”
But when he turns around, it’s not the marquis, nor one of his men.
“You.” I don’t know what to say, but my rage is suddenly doused, as if the downpour put it out. My shoulders fall. I’m still shaking, but now from the cold.
“Me,” replies the prince. He has a wool hood pulled up, masking most of his features, but the light from the tavern catches his sharp nose and high cheekbones. “I assume you’re feeling better today, since you’re back to yelling at me.” He gives me that charming smile again.
“Oh, about that…” I’m filled with gratitude, relief, and shame that I couldn’t fend for myself.
He waves it off as if it were nothing. Maybe it was nothing.I’mnothing to him, after all, compared to all the women fawning over him. He was just chivalrous enough to save me.
“I apologize, Your Highness. I didn’t know it was you,” I finally say.
“Dietan—please, just call me Dietan.”
“Not Dario?” I can’t help but laugh.
“All in all, I’d prefer my real name.” He laughs with me.
It’s nice to laugh together after everything. But the rain is falling in torrents on the two of us, and the pigs want their dinner.
“Do you need help with that?” he asks. Without waiting for an answer, he takes the slop bucket out of my hands and sloshes its contents over the low pigsty fence into the trough.
“Thank you, Your Highness,” I say as he hands it back to me and our fingers brush.
“Dietan. Please.”
I shake my head. As if I’d ever call a prince by his first name. “What are you doing out here?” I ask. He’s skulking around alleyways dressed like a thief. I remind myself I can’t trust him, even if he did save me last night.
“I mean to take a stroll through the forest,” he says casually, as if it isn’t storming all around us. A clap of thunder makes us both jump. “So, if you’ll excuse me—”
“You’ll get lost if you go that way,” I tell him, jutting my chin in the direction he was heading.
“Oh, right. I’ll go the other way, then.” He gives me a wink, just like last night, and heads in the opposite direction.
