The lock clicked. I was trapped with the Beast.
My eyes flitted around the room, looking for means of escape. The two sets of wrought iron staircases on either end of the conservatory were my only way out. I dared to turn my head back toward the mattress and noticed two couches on either side, one with a white nightgown draped across the back. A small round table next to that couch supported a silver platter with a large loaf of bread, grapes, and a bottle of wine with two brass goblets nextto it.
I looked around a few seconds more and waited for a maid to get me out of myruined dress.
Sir Bloodstone stepped over to the mattress and sat down on it, the stuffing of the mattress heaving under his great weight. He leaned down and began unlacing his boots. As soon as his massive fingers untied the laces, I realized no maids would come—hewas supposed toundress me.
No.Absolutely not.
A quiet hiss cut through the air. I softly stepped over to the couch on the left side of the mattress, following whatever the noise was. I had just picked up the soft white nightgown off the couch when I heard thehiss again.
“Sera!” whispered a small voice fromthe bookshelves.
I glanced over to Sir Bloodstone, who was still busy unlacing his boots, and snuck over to the bookshelf. Behind it was a woman hiding inthe shadows—Mother!
“Sera!” she whispered again. She yanked me behind the bookshelf with her. She let go of my wrist and her emerald eyes swam as she examined mydisheveled appearance.
“How did you find me?”I asked.
“I know the palace well,” she replied, dragging her eyes from the trail of blood on my skirt back up to my face. “I heard who selected you and this room is the only place large enough toput him.”
“H-how could you know?” I asked, panic filling my chest. “No one else wasaround when—”
“Serafina, you cannot panic,” she said, grabbing my hand and pressing her thumb into the center of my right palm. “Someone heard your father in the garden andword circulated.”
I had forgotten about Father’s certain fate. My lower lip trembled only once before Mother squeezed mypalm again.
“Do not worry about your father.” Her once glimmering emerald eyes swirled like two pools of poison. She spoke low and seriously, but without a trace of fear. “Anders willnotexecute another Baron. Villagers from Ravenwood and Bloodstone will be in Hyton square for the celebration tomorrow, many of them soldiers in the first siege against the giants. Anders will not lay a finger on your father anywhere near that celebration—not with a crowd of emotional peasants from the Northern provinces nearthe palace.”
I furrowed my brow. “Then why did he charge him withhigh treason?”
“Oh, Andie has to put on a show in front of the others,” she replied with a lightness to her voice I did not expect. “Especially his brother. He and Ragnar have had…some struggles in the past. But your father is safe, at leastfor now.”
Andie.My throat tightened, but I needed answers. “How areyou sure?”
Mother’s mouth briefly formed a fine line. “I have my ways. Speaking of which, I need tobe off.”
She snuck off to the staircase. The sick feeling of helplessness tugged on my wrist like a ribbon and I reached for my mother for the first timein years.
“Wait, Mother!” I whispered. “Could you pleaseundress me?”
Mother turned and looked at my bloody dress with a wry smile. “Looks like Andie spent too much time in the wine barrel before the ceremony. What a clumsy cut! Oh well, I told your father this dress was a waste of money. The Presentation dress is usually tornoff anyway.”
My stomach turned as Mother quickly loosened mylaces. “What?”
“Oh, surely they told you at Ashmore,” she teased. She slid the ruined bodice off my body and then helped me with my corset. “These men waited at least twenty-one years for tonight. Do you really think they have the patience to unlacea dress?”
My cheeks burned hot but my blood ran cold. “Um, Mother, do you think that hewill, um…”
“Maybe,” she answered as she helped me out of my skirt. “Some men are intimidated by a bride, others just gofor it.”
I could not imagine anyone earning the name “the Beast” and being intimidated by a little bride. If he just “went for it,” like Mother suggested, he would flatten me as thinas parchment.
I swallowed a hard lump in my throat. “Do you think I would survive?If he…”
“Serafina,” she interjected with a chuckle, spinning me around to face her, “think about it, someone had to survive a union with a giant to createhim, right?”
Dyingunderneathhim was not my only concern. Which side of him was stronger—the human half or the bloodthirsty giant half? Did he lust after flesh in a different way thanmost men?
