“I expect you all to behave like proper young women tonight.” She did not sound pleased. Her eyes flicked to my place card. “Especially you, Miss Amarante Flora.”
I bowed my head. “Yes, Your Grace.”
“I’ve heard about you,” the duchess said, looking at me through her lashes. “You caused quite a scene in your own backyard, yes?”
My face burned. I could already see Julianna’s smug face.
Duchess Wilhelmina took my silence as confirmation. She shook her head. “I cannot blame you for being uneducated, coming from such a family. It is unseemly to isolate yourself with such lowly personage, Miss Flora. Do you understand?”
“Y-yes, but Your Grace, you told me to go with him.”
Not even a clink of silverware interrupted the silence that ensued. I wished I hadn’t said anything. Arguing with the duchess? I must have gone mad.
“Stand up,” the duchess said softly.
My legs stood on their own accord, barely able to support my weight.
“Look at me when I address you, Miss Flora.”
I lifted my chin. The duchess’s gaze was steely, intensified by her slate-colored irises. I made out the harsh creases between her brows. Hers was not a face that had seen much joy.
“Repeat after me,” she said crisply. Her voice rung out in the banquet hall. “I will not flirt with inconsequential men.”
My breath caught at my throat. “B-But, Your Grace—”
“I said, Miss Flora, repeat after me.”
I clasped my hands behind me, wishing that the silence weren’t so deafening. “I...I will not flirt with inconsequential men,” I said.
“Louder, Miss Flora, for the young ladies in the back.”
“I will not flirt with inconsequential men.”
Snickers sounded from the head of the table. Julianna’s was the loudest. I hated how my eyes prickled.
“Very good. Do well to remember that.” The duchess swept away, heels clicking against the marble. She clapped her hands. “Now, let us start dessert.”
––––––––
THROUGHOUT DESSERT, Genevieve threw me concerned looks I pretended not to notice. Tori opened and closed her mouth, as if wanting to speak but thinking better of it. It was a good thing she did because I was too mortified to do anything but eat my slice of cake, hoping that each swallow would push down the tears that threatened to spill onto my plate.
Why should I cry? It wasn’t as if I wanted to impress the duchess in the first place.
When the banquet ended, we all were escorted outside to wait for our carriages. The night air and hazy lights eased the tension in my throat and I managed to join Genevieve and Tori’s lighthearted debate on whether Lady Hortensia’s gown was lime green or chartreuse. My comfort, however, was short lived.
“What a humiliating performance!” Julianna’s voice pierced through the murmur of conversation as she sauntered toward me. A few debutantes stopped and stared.
“Julianna,” Genevieve said, crossing her arms. “We were talking.” My stepsister looked almost hostile, which I would have marveled at if I weren’t dizzy with indignation.
“I cannot imagine what Madam Lydia was thinking, letting you attend the Season,” Julianna said, tossing a curl behind her shoulder. She sneered at me, her eyes lingering on the wrinkled, wet stain at the front of my dress. “Flirting with the staff. Really, Amarante, have you no shame?”
Tori stepped forward. “Have you no shame bullying people when you know perfectly well they did nothing wrong?” she said.
Julianna scoffed. “And who might you be?”
“LadyVictoria Strongfoot, daughter ofLordStrongfoot,” Tori said.
“Oh. The blacksmith’s daughter. You say those titles as if they mean something, peasant girl,” Julianna said.
