"I never told your enemies. I swear to you."
Just Sober.
He was no enemy.
The face of the friend and the face of the betrayer often appear the same. Both men will look at you, sincerity burning in their eyes. One is a lover and one is a leech. One is true and one is an actor. And how can you tell between them?
~Lady Dannik, After the Curtain Call
Chapter 23
It took the prince all of fifteen minutes to find Repentance after the king had dismissed her.
She was on the stairs, heading for the fifth floor with a basket of suncloths.
Stunned. Not sure what she was going to do—how she could convince the king—when she turned a corner on a landing and came face-to-face with the prince.
"I was just up on the fifth floor looking for you," he said, leering. "You can never keep a secret in the palace, Repentance. Now you know."
She hugged the basket to her chest, bracing herself.
Lord Malficc smiled. "But don't you worry. I have no intention of letting you go back to Madame Cawrocc. My uncle is barbaric to suggest such a thing. I'll buy you myself."
"Excuse me. I need to hang these suncloths."
He didn't move. "It's a good thing the truth came out. Now I don't have to kill you as I'd planned."
She gasped and stepped back. "Me? I thought the king—"
"Well, I wasn't going to kill you myself. I was going to order it done, of course." He reached out and caressed her cheek with his knuckles. "Far be it from me to watch the life drain from such a lovely face."
She shrank back, keeping the basket between them.
He shrugged. "Still, it was a good plan. My uncle would not have said a word against me, for you were to be found dead in another man's bed after a feast where you were flaunting your infidelity. I was going to explain that I'd ordered your execution to protect his reputation. All your hours spent with the stable boy and the farmer worked perfectly for my plan. The more you were seen with them by the other servants, the more believable your affair with a certain nobleman would have been. It was a perfect plan—to kill you two and put you in bed together. I'd have been rid of you both. I've been wanting to kill him for years. An honest man who has never played well with my troopers.
He spoke of her murder with such coldness. As if taking her life would be no more difficult than squashing an irritating gnat. "Why kill me?"
She backed away from him. Two steps.
He stepped forward. "Well I couldn't very well kill the king. I already told you. If I'd have killed him, the people would have rebelled. Though, thanks to you, I'm in a much stronger position now than I was in last week. The king is a laughing stock now."
She cringed.
"And I didn't need to kill him. What did it matter if he toddled around the palace, pretending to be king? I ran the kingdom. But you came and he suddenly got some life in his half-dead carcass. He started to defy me. Told me I couldn't invade Westwold. Where did he get the energy to meddle, all of a sudden, I asked myself."
He reached out and caressed her hair. "What kind of magic did his new concubine work? I thought you were giving him something in the night. I thought you were like medicinal herbs, bringing him to life."
She took another step back.
"It certainly looked like you were his concubine, doing him a service," the prince continued. "He was happier than I've ever seen him. And what, I wondered, would I do if you produced an heir? Half-breed or not, I couldn't chance it. The king loved you and likely he'd love any ill-bred brat you conceived, as well."
Repentance fought down a gag. The king never loved her. She was a slave. He was an overlord.
"But then I found out you were giving him nothing in the night. I found out that there would be no heir. And, happily, I didn't have to have you killed. I simply had to make sure the story of the king's infirmity spread. He looks the fool and you are thrown out. But don't fear, Repentance. I will take you in."
"Thank you, your majesty. I'm happy to go to the slave quarters." Surely Sober hadn't told the prince. But he had to have told someone. The prince must have spies in the Deliverance Day people. "May I leave now?" She spoke quietly, not wanting him to think she was challenging his authority. "I need to get to my work."
He stepped forward, seized the basket, and threw it aside.
Suncloths tumbled onto the floor, landing in a tangled heap. Like her life.
"Now that I don't have to kill you," the prince said, "we might take some entertainment."
She threw her hands up, bracing them against his chest. "I'm too busy for entertainment."
He took her hands and put them on his waist. "You'll be busy, alright."
She pushed against him, backing away.
He followed.
She bumped into the wall.
He bumped into her—pressed himself against her—and, grabbing a handful of hair, he pulled her head back, tilting her face up toward his.
She twisted sideways, moving her mouth away from his.
"Ah, pretty little ear." He bent toward her.
Then caught his breath.
He pulled her head farther back.
She strained to look out of the corner of her eye.
He had an angry look on his face. He seemed to be looking at her birthmark. All praise to Providence! So he really did hate blemishes, just as the attendant had told her on her first day on the mountain.
