“What do you do?”
“I…work for a theater called the Vulture’s Prose.”
For the first time, his eyes brighten with something close to interest. “What do you do there?”
It takes me a few seconds to find my answer. I can’t help but smirk with pride when I come up with just the right phrasing that makes my next words true. “I help fund its endeavors.”
“I’m intrigued,” he says, and seems to mean it. Without taking his eyes off me, he sets his cup down and angles himself toward me. It seems he’s growing more comfortable by the minute.
Podaxis clears his throat. “I’m…going to go take a look out the window.” He leaps from the chair and scrambles across the floor as fast as I’ve ever seen him move. Once he reaches the window, he plants his back firmly toward me, making it impossible to witness what happens next.
That’s our sign. It’s time.
I scoot another inch closer to him. My blood roars in my ears and sweat beads behind my neck. The tingling in my lips intensifies while everything else inside me recoils at the thought of what I’m about to do.
He’s a bad man, I say to myself.
He killed a fae.
He defended Saint Lazaro’s rebellion.
And the part that matters most of all…
It’s his life or mine.
“Can we speak about…the question I asked you at dinner last night?” he asks.
My stomach bottoms out. I recall our tense talk about fae salvation and his defense of the church’s rebellion. If he’s going to bring that up, I’m losing my chance. Furthermore, Glint McCreedy could be back any moment. “Ask me anything,” I say, shifting another inch closer.
Something like nervousness crosses his face, making him look far less severe than before. “I know you said you couldn’t confirm what I’d asked, but I figured now that we’re alone and without reporters…I just want to know if you…if you’re her. Because I remember a girl that night.”
Gathering every ounce of determination I have, I lean forward, take his face between my gloved palms, and press my tingling, burning lips—
“What are you doing?” His hands encircle my wrists, and he lightly pushes me away.
I pause with several inches remaining between our faces. My breaths grow shallow as I debate whether I should lean forward and try again. His firm grip makes me wonder if that’s even possible.
Slowly, he releases my wrists and rises to his feet. “Did you…just try to kiss me?”
I keep my gaze averted, my hands falling to my lap.
He backs up and settles stiffly into the chair at the far end of the table. “I don’t mean to embarrass you, Miss Maisie, but perhaps—as a fae princess—you aren’t aware of human propriety.”
There’s so much apology in his tone, it makes me sick. My mind spins between terror, panic, and the weight of failure. Woven through it is the most incomprehensible feeling of all—that very emotion which he stated. Embarrassment. It makes heat rise to my cheeks, makes my fingers curl around the folds of my skirt. It burns hotter with every rapid beat of my heart until it almost feels like anger—a far more welcome feeling, and I take hold of it like an anchor. “Embarrassed? Me? I’m a fae princess, Brother Dorian. I’m not…why should I be embarrassed?”
His expression hardens in a flash. “Oh? Then am I to assume you were trying to trick me into ruining your reputation in private so that I’d feel honor-bound to choose you at the end of the competition?” He leans back in his chair and shakes his head. “I’ve heard about fae deception, Miss Maisie, and I’ve heard aboutselkies. The temptresses of the sea. You’ll have no luck using your wiles against Saint Lazaro’s brotherhood. None of us would ever be so naïve, and certainly not me.”
I stammer before I can form my retort. “I wasn’t…trying to trick you into ruining my reputation. The fae care far less about such things than humans do.”
He rises from his chair. “Then perhaps we aren’t well-matched at all. Good day to you.”
Without giving me a second look, he strolls over to the door and leaves.
My heart is the only sound I hear in his absence, echoing the slam of the door. I don’t even notice Podaxis until he’s on my lap. “I told you it wouldn’t be that easy,” he whispers.
I open my mouth to argue, but there’s no fire left in me. I failed. I had a plan, I followed it…and I did everything wrong.
Dorian’s voice floods my mind, both his apologetic tone and the spiteful words he said after. I cringe at the way my cheeks burned when he rejected my attempt to kiss him. He thwarted my efforts to murder him, and yet I can’t shake the shame of having had my kiss rebuffed.
