hand on a prince, and even if Javier might school his conscious mind to other ends, the core of him would lash out and bend Marius to his will. Better that Marius hold in his betrayal and let it show in smaller ways than clear insubordination and threats.
“So you will act at last,” Marius finally whispers. Javier isn’t expecting that, and finds himself staring through the darkness at his friend. “Does she love you, Javier?”
“I don’t know. I hope not.”
“Do you love her?”
Only because he owes this man so much, in the form of Beatrice Irvine, will Javier answer that question. He closes his eyes, savoring the words as he speaks them: “I don’t know. I hope not.”
“I do,” Marius says steadily. “Love both of you, and see no way for this to end happily. But then, that’s not the point, is it?” He needs no more answer to that than he might need answer to the colour of the sky. He stands, gesturing toward the food Javier still holds. “Eat, my prince. You’ll need to be sober if you’re going to ask a woman to marry you.”
Javier, unusually obedient, tears at the bread with his teeth, its aroma suddenly heady. For a few minutes he does nothing but gobble down the tender savory and the cheese. Marius hands him wine, so well-watered there’s only a glimmer of flavour, and waits for him to drink that before he speaks again. “Will you tell her that she’s only a mark to be used in a political game?”
The thought quite literally hasn’t occurred to Javier. He scowls through the dimness, more at the fire than at his friend. “Should I?”
Marius breathes a sound like laughter. “How many women would say yes to a proposal like that, Jav? But Beatrice might,” he adds more quietly. There is something indecipherable in his expression again. In another man Javier might call it subterfuge or canniness, but Marius has always worn his heart on his sleeve. The idea that he might now be trying to manipulate events is laughable. “Her passion for her country’s freedom is great,” Marius finishes, and Javier has to look away again.
“And being engaged to royalty, however briefly, might make her an even more appealing wife,” he offers. Marius exhales again, another noise that resembles laughter.
“To those who care about such things, yes. I don’t. I don’t even think my mother does. Now, if you were to elevate her to some duchy or something, Mother might care…” He’s joking, and his expression changes to startlement, then horror as he sees Javier considering the idea. “Jav, I don’t need-”
“But it would make a magnificent bride-gift, wouldn’t it,” Javier murmurs. “So outrageous as to alarm Lorraine. Take a minor Lanyarchan noble, elevate her to a duchess, propose to marry her…short of slapping her face with a glove there could be no more obvious announcement of Gallin’s intentions toward Aulun.” He offers a smile that he knows is too weak. “And in the end my friend could become nobility, without me ever conferring the favour directly. It’s a pretty setup, isn’t it?”
“And where does it leave Eliza?” Marius wonders.
“Oh, hell,” Javier says recklessly. “I’ll marry her to Sacha and we’ll all be happy.”
Marius barks laughter this time, so derisive Javier straightens in offense. “Yes, my prince” is all the merchant lad will say, though, and Javier climbs to his feet unsteadily. Puts his hand on Marius’s shoulder, gripping muscle as he leans heavily.
“Will you forgive me, Marius?” The question’s asked thickly, more than just wine weighting it. Marius folds his hand over Javier’s on his shoulder, then reaches out to grasp the back of the prince’s neck, bringing his head in until they touch foreheads, an intimacy Javier would allow almost no one else. Marius holds them there a long time before his grip tightens and he sighs.
His answer, the only answer he can give, will haunt Javier for the rest of his days: “Yes, my prince.”
BELINDA PRIMROSE / BEATRICE IRVINE
10 November 1587 Lutetia “The prince has sent his carriage for you, my lady.” Nina bobbed a curtsey as she stepped into the sitting room with her announcement. Belinda glanced up with a faintly startled look toward the windows and the dimming afternoon sky. “The coachman says I’m to extend his invitation to dinner.”
Amusement curled Belinda’s mouth. “How forward of the coachman. I don’t believe I’ve ever been invited to dinner by one before.”
Exasperation flickered over Nina’s face and Belinda’s amusement turned to brief laughter. “I know. I have no propriety, have I? Have blankets brought out for the horses, invite the driver in to the foyer, and send Marie to my room. I’ll have to dress for him.”
“For the coachman, my lady?” Nina looked down her nose in half-teasing mockery, then bobbed another curtsey and scurried to do as she was told. Belinda climbed the stairs to her room, laying out the amber gown she’d dismissed for the outing with Eliza months earlier, only to earn Marie’s cluck of disapproval as she swept into the room behind Belinda.
“’Tisn’t the fashion, m’lady. Going to the palace you ought to wear the fashion you set.”
“Eliza set it,” Belinda said absently. “And I haven’t any of her fashions warm enough for the weather tonight. The amber is flattering and warm. It will do.”
Marie hummed, urgent little noise of dismay, but did as she was told, first settling her mistress into a chair so Belinda’s hair could be made suitable, then arranging petticoats and skirts and corsets until the amber overgown could be settled into place. It took longer than Belinda preferred-it always did-but the result looking back at her in an unwarped mirror seemed worth the time. Even Marie clucked again, this time in satisfaction. “M’lady should have a winter gown in the new style made up in this colour. It does m’lady’s eyes and hair good. Shall I have the dressmaker come round?”
“And insult Eliza? I’ll discuss it with her,” Belinda offered, and Marie, satisfied, ducked her head and backed out of the room. Belinda watched her go in the mirror, wondering, not for the first time, what kind of dragonish mistress had trained that particular obsequience into the girl. Only royalty expected such behavior, and even then it was usually only in the courtroom or private audiences. Servants were expected to be efficient, and backing through rooms wasted time.
Nina stood too near the coachman in the foyer, startling into a proper distance and blushing beyond her collarbones as Belinda entered the room. The coachman, only a few years her senior, held his expression steady, as though the flirtatiousness in it couldn’t be seen if he didn’t admit guilt in its being there. Belinda hid amusement as Nina helped her slip a cloak on, and watched the coachman as he led the way down to the street. He was young for the job, which meant he had talent that might be parlayed, in a few years’ time, to a position in the stables as a judge of horseflesh and a breeder. He could make Nina a good match, and she could be kept on as Beatrice’s servant as long as Belinda desired her.
A dark smile played her mouth as she stepped up into the carriage with the coachman’s hand in support. As long as Belinda desired her, or as long as Marius did. Nina’d lost none of her good nature or bidability in the weeks since she’d become their plaything, recollection swept away by the witchpower. She had not been taken advantage of since, out of fondness for the girl and out of no time or need to sate Marius, but Belinda was satisfied Nina’s memory and body were hers to manipulate. With the girl safely wed to the coachman, any child would be assumed legitimate. Belinda would discuss it with Javier over dinner.
The prince met her in the courtyard, dressed in blues that shaded toward purple in the rising moonlight. He took her hand as the carriage door was opened, breathing a sigh that shone silver in the cold air. “You’ve chosen a more conservative dress. Thank God.”
“My lord?” Belinda arched an eyebrow as she stepped down to the flagstones. “Have Eliza’s dresses fallen out of fashion already?”
“No, no, God, no, not with Mother looking fresh as spring in them. No, a contingency from the Khazarian court is here. They arrived without warning this afternoon, and they look to a man as if they’ve walked out of another century. All dark and dour and fur-covered. Do you have any Khazarian, Beatrice?”
The impulse to reply, blithely, “Oh, I’ve had several” nearly strangled Belinda, the expression she imagined on Javier’s face almost worth the cost of the answer. “None, my lord, except perhaps yes and no, which do me no good at a dinner. There is a dinner,” she half-asked, and Javier let go an explosive breath.
