Page 36 of The Poison Princess and the Lord of Misrule

His thumb stops atop my thigh. Then slowly, his hand inches upward, the force of his touch demanding.

“Nor to want you,” he whispers, making me shiver. “And yet, I find that I can’t help myself.”

Aldric moves away and reaches for his goblet, downing a healthy swallow of wine. “You’re a maddening woman, Seravyn.” His gaze slips over me, something dark and vile buried there. “And it appalls me to confess that seeing you give a smile to a lowly, ragged jester makes me rife with a feral kind of envy.”

He looks across the hall, to where Ren is leaning against a stone pillar, and his jaw tightens.

A flame of fear fans to life in my chest, and I measure my voice when I say, “It’s a tad ridiculous for a king of your stature to be jealous over a jester, don’t you think, My Lord?”

His features darken. “Let us find out just how ridiculous.” He raises his hand and snaps his fingers, and the servant tops off his cup.

Aldric then rises from his seat. Lifts the gold goblet in the air. The hall quiets, all faces turning to their king.

“My friends,” Aldric bellows. “For this one night, we have a tradition. The Lord of Misrule. The fool who reigns, who turns the court on its head, who pisses on our customs and makes us laugh in the face of it.”

The court cheers, applause cracks in approval.

“And tradition demands that my own jester sit on my throne.” Aldric gestures lazily toward Prineus, who has been preening in anticipation. “But I say tradition has grown stale, and what is the Lord of Misrule if not the night we tear down all tradition?”

A sudden wave of dread crashes through me, my gaze darting to Ren amid the crowd.

“My queen-to-be has a jester of her own now,” Aldric continues, looking down at me adoringly, though I can see the furious curl of his lips. “A fool who has, against all odds, charmed her into laughter. A fool who has succeeded in making the Princess Seravyn smile.”

The court turns. A hundred faces. A hundred glazed, drunken eyes finding Ren where he stands at the back of the hall, bathed in the shadow of torchlight, his hat in his hands, his expression unreadable.

I can’t breathe.

Aldric is furious over Ren being able to succeed where he cannot, and he wants to punish him for it. It’s not that Aldric wants me. It’s that he wants no other to have any claim over me—my smiles, my laughs, my affections. My mind. Body.

“Come, fool!” Aldric calls. He’s laughing,his features tensing in a dangerous way. “Tonight, you rule over my court. Tonight, you are the Lord of Misrule.”

The crowd erupts.

Goblets bang on tables. Boots stamp. Lords shout. Someone shoves Ren forward, and Ren stumbles a step before catching himself.

He looks up and locks with my gaze.

The softening of his mouth tries to reassure me, but it’s his fisted hand that tells the truth. His knuckles have gone white where he grips the hat.

He walks the length of the hall, the bells on his motley tolling a dangerous theme. The court is laughing, calling his name, throwing pieces of bread at him in mock celebration, and he doesn’t look at any of them—his eyes trained on me.

As Ren moves toward the dais, his gaze shifts to look at the king who stands atop it. He stops when he reaches the first step.

Aldric snaps his fingers once again, and one of his men brings a circlet woven of straw and gilded paper from the table. A mock crown for a mock king.

He holds the woven crown, then with a sneer, tosses it away. “No, this won’t do.” He faces Ren, head tilting menacingly as he regards the jester. “Kneel, fool,” the king orders.

A moment of hesitancy, then Ren does as commanded, lowering himself down onto one knee, but he does not lower his eyes. A muscle ticks in his jaw, the knuckles of his fisted hand bleached at his side.

Aldric removes the crown from his own head of white-blond hair, and the court falls to a hush. My stomach dips. This isn’t right. It goes against the crown, every custom.

Aldric himself has gone mad.

As Aldric places his crown on Ren’s head, he announces, “The fool is crowned mock-king, chaos reigns tonight.”

The court cheers, a wild kind of anarchy.

“Rise, Lord of Misrule,” the king declares.