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Later, much later that evening, long after dinner had been served and dessert had been eaten, Ana stood in Casimir’s bedroom and waited for him to start shedding his clothes.
‘So,’ he said, ‘Claudia’s alive.’ He looked a little lost, a little low. He’d walked his sister to her guest room and clearly had plenty on his mind.
‘She likes Sophia.’ Casimir’s sister had won a lot of ground with her unforced attention for the wide-eyed little girl with the ruby-red shoes and the blue eggshell that simply had to come from a dragon.
‘Yes.’ He loosened his tie. ‘I asked her why she stayed away all these years.’
‘Oh.’ He’d speak when he was ready, or not at all.
‘She said she had the opportunity to return, several times over, but that she would not go where she wasn’t wanted. She said my father renounced her. That he thought she was not his and that my mother had had an affair.’
‘With those eyes?’ Because, seriously, if ever there was an inherited trait…
‘An affair with my uncle, who had the eyes. He died in a hunting accident in the mountains. Before Claudia was born.’
‘So is he dead, dead, or likely to arrive any minute?’
Casimir’s eyes warmed just for her. ‘I love what you bring to my world.’
‘You’re welcome.’ She had a new nightgown she wanted to bring to his world too. It was ivory silk with amber ribbon bows, but now was probably not the time.
‘I was three years old at the time, but I’m going to say that my uncle is dead. By all accounts his body came down from the mountain after the accident. We buried him.’
Cas began to remove his cufflinks, but he wasn’t undressing to please her. His thoughts were still firmly lodged in the past. ‘Claudia believes my father found out about my mother’s affair and had my uncle killed. My father then claimed Claudia as his own, but changed his tune when she was kidnapped. He didn’t care what her captors did with her. And my mother knew why and killed herself. It makes sense.’
Maniacal sense.
‘Lord Ildris’s wife took Claudia in. When she was ten they told her everything and asked if she wanted to return to the palace. She didn’t. At eighteen, they asked again if Claudia wanted to return.’
‘And she didn’t,’ Ana said quietly.
‘All these years she let me think she was dead and that it was somehow my fault. I blamed myself for her death and for my mother’s death and no one ever told me I was wrong to do so,’ he said roughly. ‘I want to be angry with all of them, and with Claudia for letting me think she was dead, but I can’t. Claudia was a pawn. A child who thought no one wanted her, and when she was offered a way out she took it. Her allegiance now is to the north. Not to me.’
‘And yet she returns to you, flying royal colours. Don’t write her allegiances off so easily, Casimir. Wait and see. Because it seems to me you may both want the same thing. A new beginning.’
Casimir said nothing.
‘Does she want to be acknowledged as your sister or your half-sister?’
‘I don’t know.’ He rubbed at the royal ring he wore. ‘We never got that far in conversation.’
‘What would you prefer? The lie or the truth?’
He shrugged. ‘Me the man or me the monarch?’
‘This is our bedchamber.’ Okay, his bedchamber, but she slept here too these days. ‘Out there, at the dinner table tonight, I sat with the king in front of guests of unknown influence and responded accordingly. When we’re in here I’m speaking to the man. I prefer the man. I’m really not here for the figurehead.’
The man smiled crookedly. ‘The identity of Claudia’s father doesn’t change my feelings for her or my joy at knowing she’s alive and well. She’s my sister. My family. Mine to love. I don’t do things by halves.’
He certainly did not. Which reminded her of his words on the battlements and that she had her own bone to pick with him.
‘So,’ she said mildly because she’d been patient with him all evening. She’d been patient with everyone all evening. Clearly she had the patience of a saint. ‘You speak Russian.’
