Bleek heaved a breath, indicating a sigh of the long suffering, shaking his head as he slowly guided Lory’s blade down with two fingers. “We’re here for a crash course in court manners.”
Lory’s cheeks turned bright pink as she understood Bleek hadn’t been about to attack her, but toescorther the way the noble gentlemen supposedly did with the ladies in court. She’d never seen it, though, only heard of it.
“I’m—” She searched for words that would convey how utterly embarrassed she was. “Sorry?” she offered, drawing the word up at the end as in a question.
Anees laughed, covering her mouth with one hand while she ushered Lory aside with the other.
“Out of the way, Vednis. Let us show you what a proper court greeting looks like.” Smoothing her grin from her face, she gripped the sides of her pants like she would a skirt and lowered her body in an elegant curtsy, head bowed, and eyes on the floor in front of her feet.
Hadrian Bleek did the same sequence as before, first indicating a bow, then holding out his hand to Anees, who gracefully placed her fingers in his broad palm, lifting her gaze to meet his.
“Allow me,” Hadrian said in a smooth tone that didn’t tell Lory whether he liked Anees or despised her, his features unreadable as he pulled the other phantom to his side, looping her hand around his elbow, then pulling it to the top of his forearm, placing his own hand on it to secure it there.
Anees graciously endured the procedure, a polite smile on her face that could have been real or a mask; she was that good and matched Bleek’s pace as he started walking, crossing the stone-tiled room to Khayrivven’s side, then back to the window.
“Splendid,” Bleek commented as they stopped in front of Lory once more, the perfect noble couple, despite Anees’s plain clothes. Had she worn a dress, she would have passed as one of the coveted beauties at Ulder’s court she’d heard about. “It’s always a pleasure, Miss Frier.” One more, he indicated a bow, lowering his arm and freeing Anees’s in the process.
The woman curtsied again, stepping back, and when she straightened, the smile left her face, and she gave Lory an expectant look. “Your turn, Vednis.” But her gaze didn’tlinger on Lory for long, quickly wandering over her shoulder to Khayrivven, who was still leaning by the desk at the side of the room, arms folded and a dangerous expression on his face.
“Miss Vednis?” Bleek held out his hand, indicating a bow, and Lory stifled a sigh as she gripped the folds of an invisible skirt and imitated Anees’s curtsy with less grace than she’d hoped, grimacing in the process. “Allow me.”
Lory placed her hand back in Bleek’s, lifting her gaze to his, and nearly burst out with laughter at the serious, almost arrogant expression he’d donned. Perfect.Perfectfor the nobles of this city. He either grew up at court, or he’d had a lot of practice.
When he guided her hand around his elbow and placed it on his forearm, Lory didn’t draw her dagger this time. Instead, she focused on not tripping over her own feet as Bleek pulled her close enough to his side to feel the warmth radiating from his body. By the side of the room, Khayrivven cleared his throat, and they started walking, Lory forcing her feet to match Bleek’s pace and slow down.
“So, Miss Vednis. Tell me a little bit about you,” he said, his head turned ever so slightly that she could make out the thin scar above his eyebrow. The soft, warm light played in his hair, throwing golden highlights here and there.
“Like what?” Lory prompted, almost entirely certain this wasn’t what a lady would have responded, but also at a loss for a proper response.
“Like when you arrived here at the palace,” Bleek supplied. “I haven’t seen you before.”
“At the palace,” Lory muttered, trying to come up with a smart story when she clearly had no clue about court life or where a lady invited to a palace would have come from and act like. Throwing a helpless glance at Khayrivven didn’t give her any hints either, for he merely pulled that supple mouth of his into a dangerous curve, winking at her. Lory’s thoughts stuttered, but she also forgot to worry for a moment and picked the first thing coming to her mind. “Only a week ago, my lord. I am staying with my cousin, and this is my first visit to the palace, so even if you had walked these halls every day, you wouldn’t have seen me.”
Bleek raised a brow. “Who, pray tell, is your cousin, my lady?” His lips spread into a smile, evoking a sense of warmth and familiarity in Lory which she hadn’t felt before. “Iwalk these halls, as you called it, quite regularly, so I surely know him.”
Damnit.Lory had no idea of the nobles roaming the courts of Brestolya. The only name she could think of was one she’d read in a history book when studying for the ashling exams. “Her,” Lory corrected, putting more effort into her story this time. If coming up with a persona was part of training, perhaps she could actually enjoy this. “Anora Pervaille. You might have heard of her.”
The smile on Bleek’s lips faltered for a fraction of a second before he inclined his head. “Of course. Dear Anora. I’ve seen her recently, but she didn’t mention she had such a beautiful cousin.”
A blush fluttered onto Lory’s cheeks at the blunt mention of what Bleek might have thought of her appearance, and her eyes found Khayrivven’s on their own volition.
The Veiled Hand’s face was a mask, impossible to read, but the color had drained from his cheeks, and his hands, now braced beside his hips on the edge of the desk, were clenched in white-knuckled fists.
Bleek gently tugged at her hand, reclaiming her attention. “Where do you usually reside?”
Lory swallowed the sense of foreboding threatening to take her voice. “Criu.” She tilted her head a little bit, meeting Bleek’s eyes in an attempt at reading how she was doing.
“What a beautiful city,” Bleek praised, that smile back on his lips, and warmth filled Lory’s chest once more, rapt fascination for the phantom swirling through her like a foreign thread that had invaded her thoughts. “Of course, I wouldn’t know the least thing about its state since travel to the Criulian capital has become increasingly difficult with the mountain passes in control of Criulian rebels.”
Shit—Lory couldn’t have chosen a worse figure to embody. Anora Pervaille’s cousin, when Anora Pervaille was the Duke of Criulias’s wife. The duke who had been exiled from his own province. Ulder’s uncle now sat on Criulias’s throne, executing the king’s every whim.
“It was a horrible journey,” Lory lied. “Took a full month. We had to use the sea road for parts of it, and even the travel on land was quite taxing for an inexperienced young lady such as me.” Lory fluttered her eyelashes in an attempt to flirt away her mistake. Had this been a real situation, she would have probably already been arrested for being associated with the man who dared stir unrest against the King of Brestolya, but this wasn’t real, so she could try to learn.Perhaps then she would know how to handle herself when she stood in front of a real noble.
Bleek let his court-expression drop and pulled up a real smile, patting her hand as he released it from his arm. “Not bad, Vednis. I must say, I expected you to bristle at the first question.”
Lory suppressed the urge to roll her eyes. The sense of fascination with Bleek vanished as quickly as it had appeared, now that he was no longer touching her.
Quirking a brow, she turned to Khayrivven, hoping he’d read the question from her face, but the man had turned into stone where he stood.
