This did not seem to distress her. Throughout the course of breakfast, during which I barely stomached a blueberry, Tori encouraged me to “give that nasty Narcissa what’s coming for her”. Genevieve pulled me into a rib-crushing embrace as if I were being sent off to the gallows. Lord Strongfoot, after hearing about the matter, merely guffawed.
A carriage was called for me and I clutched the letter in my hand, crumpling and smoothing and crumpling the parchment until it felt like tissue. When I finally arrived at the south wing of the palace and showed the guards the crumpled letter, they led me to Lady Hortensia, whom I immediately recognized from her frilly gown. Her face was pinched in disapproval. I colored.
“Come along, Miss Flora,” she said.
I followed Lady Hortensia down the hall of the south wing. Giant portraits of old, dead politicians with white beards and finery hung along the wall to my left. They seemed to glare down at me as I passed. After a couple minutes of walking down the lusciously furnished hall, we entered an archway that led to a wide chamber. Arched windows let in cheery daylight, a cruel contrast to my bleak situation.
“Wait here,” Lady Hortensia said, gesturing to a small alcove before a pair of oak doors. “The queen will see you soon.”
I took a seat on a particularly lumpy couch as the woman left with a sniff. I gripped the crystal around my neck with a shaky hand, willing myself to calm.
The possible punishments that loomed before me were unlike anything I dared to imagine. Would I be whipped? Shamed and disowned? Publicly beheaded? My fingers went to my throat. A beheading was a very viable punishment for throwing punch at the duchess’s daughter.
My gaze wandered to the oak doors that led to the queen’s study. Voices could be heard. Narcissa and the duchess were inside, perhaps overdramatizing the situation to reap a harsher punishment. I closed my eyes in frustration, wishing I were Elowyn so I could disappear and reappear elsewhere.
The doors burst open and the Whittingtons walked out. Narcissa was red in the face from fuming. Her Grace barely spared me a glance.
“The queen will see you now, Miss Flora,” Duchess Wilhelmina said icily.
I swallowed and stood, careful to distance myself from Narcissa, who was glaring daggers at me.
“Prepare for the worst, city girl,” she hissed, her slender shoulders shaking as I entered.
Queen Cordelia’s study consisted of a sprawling desk and shelves of books that spanned the length of two walls. Before us was a stained-glass window depicting a mermaid at the shores of an aquamarine sea, tinting the carpeted floor with shards of multi-colored light. The queen herself sat behind the desk.
She looked up. For a moment, a scarlet aura rippled around her. It disappeared when I blinked.
I dipped into a low curtsy. “Your Majesty,” I said, my voice hopelessly feeble.
“I suppose you know what you’re here for, Miss Amarante?” the queen said with a firm, though not unkind, voice.
Shame colored my face. With Narcissa’s glare burning into my cheek, I was sure I looked like one of Rowena’s ripe heirloom tomatoes. “Yes, Your Majesty,” I murmured.
“I am sure as a young lady of good upbringing,” Queen Cordelia said, pressing her fingers together, “you are aware that splashing drinks on another debutante is a great offense.”
It was difficult to meet her eye. If I did, she’d know I felt no remorse. “Yes, Your Majesty,” I said.
“Well then. An apology is in order,” the queen said.
I bowed my head. “I apologize.”
“Not to me, child. To Narcissa.”
Duchess Wilhelmina scoffed. “Your Majesty, Miss Flora owes more than an apology. Perhaps an explanation for why she decided to soil my daughter’s gown with the same punch Narcissa so kindly offered her before?”
“Well, I-I...” I stuttered.
“I was only trying to be friendly,” Narcissa said, sniveling. I looked up, shocked at her drastic change of demeanor. The venom in her words before was gone. Now, she was all teary innocence.
“The punch was laced with a laxative, Your Majesty,” I said, finding my voice. “Tori, Miss Victoria Strongfoot, could attest to that.”
Her Majesty’s brows raised ever so slightly. She turned to Narcissa. “Is that true?”
Narcissa’s snivels crescendoed into a sob. “I offer you an olive branch and in turn you have struck me with it and tainted my name with nonsensical slander,” Narcissa wailed. I stepped back, thoroughly appalled at her theatrics. If only she had used half that effort during the hunting party, I would’ve truly believed she wanted to be friends.
“Miss Flora, have you no decency?” Duchess Wilhelmina scolded, wrapping an arm around her daughter, who was dabbing her nose with a lace handkerchief. “Your Majesty, I demand you to punish this young lady at once. I have never seen such an ill-mannered, nefarious girl in my life.”
Queen Cordelia stared for a minute, not quite at me and not quite at the duchess or Narcissa. She looked more tired than thoughtful, the dark circles beneath her blue eyes deeper than they were before.
