I shook my head and might have sighed a little too loudly. My back hurt from so much standing, I hadn’t eaten yet, and I was tired of pretending. Beyond that, I didn’t want to hear that a girl who’d have to marry me one day, if I was declared Prince Jaron, really loved the prince’s older brother.
“I asked you here because you spoke honestly to me before. If I’d entered that room with a face smeared in mud and asked another servant how I looked, he’d have bowed and told me I looked as beautiful as ever. When you’re in my position, Sage, you come to realize how few people you can trust.” She waited, expecting me to respond. When met with silence, she went on, “So I trust your opinion on my dilemma. Should I continue on to Drylliad, hoping Prince Darius will greet me there but knowing in my heart that something is wrong? Or shall I stay away, knowing that if there is no Darius, I am no longer a betrothed princess and have no place in Drylliad?”
This time I looked directly at her, although her eyes were so perceptive, I immediately looked away again. “You should go to the castle, Highness. You should always choose on the side of hope.”
“That’s good advice. I have less of a headache now than before, Sage. Thank you for that.” She smiled sadly. “Do you envy me, as a royal?”
I shook my head. The closer I got to the castle in Drylliad myself, the more I dreaded it.
“Many do. I’m glad you can appreciate your station in life as a servant. I’m a servant too, you know. Perhaps with finer clothes and servants of my own, but few choices about my life belong to me. We’re not so different, you and I.”
She was closer to the truth than she realized, but I held my tongue and stared at the ground.
“Will you not look at me?”
“No, my lady. If I cannot look at you as an equal, I will not look at all.”
She placed a hand on my cheek and softly kissed the other one, then whispered, “Remember this moment, then, Sage, when someone of my status offered a kindness to someone of yours. Because next time we meet, if Darius is dead, I will no longer be anyone of importance.”
Then she entered the room with her ladies in tow. Only after her door was shut did I look up again. Darius was dead, and very soon she and I would meet as equals. But I had the feeling it wouldn’t be a day she ended up celebrating.
Where are you going?” Mott asked as I began walking away. He was never far behind.
“To my room. My back hurts.”
“How will it look to everyone at dinner if the servant who left with Amarinda fails to return?”
“How will it look if that servant’s bandages bleed through and he drips blood on Conner’s dining table?”
“Come on,” Mott said with a sigh. “I’ll walk you to your room.”
“You don’t have to. I know the way.”
“Saving you from getting lost is not the reason I’m here. Tell me, what did you think of the betrothed princess?”
“I think she loves Darius.”
“There’s plenty of time for her to learn to love Jaron. Besides, this is the way of life for royals. They do their duty to their country, and if they are very lucky, it will sometimes bring them happiness.”
“I don’t want anyone to do their duty for me,” I grumbled. “A charade like that is not for her.”
“Conner is preparing you to wear a mask for the rest of your life,” Mott said. “It’s better that your queen pretends to love you, because if she truly did, she would only love a lie.”
That hardly made me feel better.
Errol was sitting on the bench just outside my bedroom door. He stood as he saw us coming. “Are you ill?” he asked me.
“Get me some dinner,” I growled, pushing past him to enter my room. “And no, I don’t need help dressing.”
Ironically, I did need help. My shoulders and back had stiffened over the past few hours of standing, and with every movement, I felt like my wounds might tear open again. When Errol returned with a tray of food several minutes later, he found me sitting on the floor with an unbuttoned shirt and vest.
Errol set the tray on Tobias’s desk, and then silently went to the wardrobe to gather my nightclothes. He was able to pull off my shirt without causing me too much pain and, without asking, checked my bandages. “Imogen is occupied at the dinner downstairs,” he said. “You must let me clean those wounds. They look hot.”
I leaned forward, which took less work than arguing. He soaked a towel in the alcohol and pressed it to my back. I arched it with the inevitable sting, then relaxed as it slowly passed.
“Every servant at Farthenwood knows Tobias cut you,” Errol murmured. “I’d be surprised if the master doesn’t hear of it soon.”
“The servants are mistaken. I was trying to climb out a window.”