Miracles and blessings. It was all she could do not to leap from her seat and run screaming from this hall.
“Let us toast to the happy couple.” The king raised his glass, as did everyone seated at the long wooden tables, mountains of food and drink heaped before them. “To Magnus and Cleo. May their days together be as happy as mine were with my beloved, departed Althea.”
“To Magnus and Cleo,” the guests echoed immediately.
Cleo’s knuckles were white on her goblet and she raised it to her lips, only to find her hand was shaking. The taste of the sweet wine offered small comfort. Such a familiar taste now—this Paelsian wine. It teased her with the chance for escape. Perhaps she would drink enough wine tonight to drown herself in.
Nic caught her eye from the back of the hall, where he was standing guard at the far entrance. No guests were allowed to leave until the king decided the banquet was finished.
A sob rose in her throat, but she swallowed it down with another gulp of wine. A servant was at the ready to fill her glass when it was empty and she had another. Then another. Instead of the world brightening, though, it only seemed to grow darker, with shadows slithering across the floor, clutching at her ankles and legs.
As the banquet wore on, Cleo couldn’t stop thinking of Jonas. What must he think of her now? At her suggestion, so many rebels had been killed.
Magnus was a constant presence, so close that she could feel the heat emanating from his body. He smelled of the leather from his overcoat, and a deep, warm sandalwood. He hadn’t spoken a single word to her since they’d left the temple. They’d ridden in the same carriage, but he kept his gaze on the view outside, on the landscape passing by on the return journey. He was sullen, cold. As he always was.
“Ridiculous,” she mumbled. “All of it.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” Magnus replied.
Her cheeks heated. She hadn’t meant to say this out loud. She’d had too much wine, downing glass after glass as it had been presented to her. Magnus had been drinking nothing but spiced cider. She realized she now did an excellent impression of Aron—who sat in the front table and cast occasional drunken, miserable glances in her general direction.
“I need air,” Cleo whispered after a time. “May I have a moment?”
Would Magnus expect his wife to always ask permission for her every move? Would he be cruel to her and controlling on this, their first night of marriage?
First night.
Her heart began to race at the thought. She wanted to remain in public for as long as possible. What came later she couldn’t deal with. Not with him. Never with him.
“By all means,” he said, not bothering to look directly at her. “Go get your air.”
She left the dais without delay. Her walk was more of a stagger as the amount of wine she’d consumed during the banquet became more apparent. Too much. And yet, not nearly enough. She moved as calmly as possible toward the archway leading to the hall . . . to escape.
Or as much of an escape as she could manage with a limitless number of guards keeping watch over her every move.
Cleo pressed her hand against the wall to steady herself. Once she found an exit to a balcony, she grasped hold of the railing and tried to calm herself.
“Quite the ceremony,” a voice greeted her from the shadows and she jarringly realized she wasn’t alone. Prince Ashur was already taking air on the balcony.
She attempted to compose herself. “It certainly was.”
The prince wore a dark blue overcoat, trimmed in gold. It fit his impressive form perfectly. His shoulder-length black hair was tied back from his face, but one long lock fell over his left eye. “I can’t honestly say I’ve ever been to a wedding like that before. If I were a superstitious man, I might be more wary of returning to the palace tonight. It was very brave of you to want to continue on despite such unpleasantness.”
Cleo let out a half-laugh that sounded more like a hysterical hiccup. “Yes, so brave of me.”
“You must be very much in love with Prince Magnus.”
She pressed her lips together to keep herself from blurting out the truth. She did not know this man, only that his father had gained his expansive empire by conquering other lands, crushing each one easily. Cleo’s father had once told her about the Emperor Cortas and how his empire compared to that of Mytica . . . like a watermelon next to a grape. At the time, she’d found such a comparison amusing.
Why would a watermelon care about a wedding taking place on a grape? To her, it seemed a waste of the prince’s time.
“Why are you here, Prince Ashur?” she asked, then cursed herself for being so blunt. The wine had succeeded both in clouding her judgment and loosening her tongue.
Luckily, he did not seem offended by her question. Instead, he smiled—a devastatingly charming smile that proved why most every woman who crossed this exotic prince’s path swooned at the sight of him.
“I have something for you, princess,” he said. “A wedding gift, just for you. Of course, I have also given a larger gift from my kingdom to both you and Prince Magnus in the form of a villa in Kraeshia’s capital, but this . . . this is a small token of friendship. It is something given in my land to a bride on her wedding night.”
He pulled a small, bound package from beneath his coat and handed it to her.