For her potential suitors, she knew her family connections were important, but they were not her only attraction. So she feigned the appropriate flattery she had learned to mimic at Court, and wished Lyman would quit glancing at her chest.
How could she endure any more of this?
A glance to her sister confirmed that she’d endure it to the ends of time. Any of the people around this table could possess the Half-Thistle Seal—could be committing treason.
Even Hugh...
What was he doing here? If he’d talked to the King that day, had the King sent him here? And if so, why? Did it have to do with the Seal? Or, if the King had denied his presence, was he here because ofher? That made no sense. He had rejected her that day long ago. Because of her vow to marry him, he had avoided her even before that.
No, he couldn’t be here because he’d wondered about her. It had to do with the King. And yet...
Every bite and drink she took, every question she gave and answered—through all of it she thought of Hugh sitting next to her. It didn’t matter that she kept her eyes away from him. His very presence enveloped her. Even if he hadn’t been there, she’d have been thinking of him. Either comparing his height to Lyman’s, or the colour of his eyes to Mitchell’s.
All her life she’d felt as if some thread bound them together. That they were at the whim of an unseen distaff and spindle. At the mercy of a master spinner who twisted the thread, tightened the edges. Made something sublime or frayed. For it had always been him.
Unlike what her sister thought, it had nothing to do with the vow she had made when she was six. If he hadn’t embodied everything she’d ever wanted, how could such a flimsy childish vow ever have sustained the years of loneliness she’d had?
No, when he had rescued her she had instinctually known the man he was. So much more than his family. Determined, kind. Respectful. And his haunted eyes had clenched her heart and sealed it from opening for anyone else.
But he had changed since she saw him last. He was hardened. Cynical. And he thought her a whore. She would have nothing to do with a man who could so easily—
‘Enjoying your meal?’ Hugh said, his voice low, but not melodious. As if he’d forced the words to sound pleasant.
Alice glanced to Hugh. His eyes were intent, and there was a slight frown to his mouth as if he was determining something. His hair was still wet from the snow outside, but it looked as if it had been brutally combed with his fingers to tame the waves there. His clothes were rumpled, as if they’d been pulled out of a travelling sack. His jaw was unshaven, his demeanour worse than wear.
He had been drinking much during dinner, and if she was right, quite a lot before. And yet... And yet none of it mattered. She wanted to run her hand across the roughness of his jaw, to kiss the frown from his lips.
She also wanted to throw the contents of her goblet at him. She was a woman grown. Her musings were pathetic. More so now, since he had revealed the man he had become.
Alice forcefully stabbed at her meat and it almost skidded off her trencher. ‘Of course,’ she answered. ‘I have such lovely company surrounding me.’ She pointed to Lyman and Mitchell.
Hugh’s eyes darkened as he acknowledged that she didn’t point in his direction. ‘It seems you enjoy your company quite a bit.’
His jibe against her innocence immediately erased her feeling of vulnerability. ‘What isn’t there to enjoy?’ Alice said. ‘And I see you’re enjoying yours.’
She signalled to Helen, who had surprisingly turned her conversation to her husband. Helennevertalked to her husband.
‘I’m certainly enjoying this feast,’ he said, dragging his meat through the sauce. ‘But this food can’t be as good as at the King’s table.’
And so their conversation returned to the King. She had never sat at the King’s private table; her feasts had been taken at the public banquets. However, perhaps she could have answers to her own questions.
‘The food at the Tower was...exceptional.’
‘Did you have much time to eat?’
That wasallshe had done. She wasn’t nobility—only a wealthy merchant’s daughter. It had bought her the attention of the Court, but didn’t rank her in any standing. Until the game, she had been ignored, without even Esther to keep her company. But that wasn’t for this conversation.
‘Why are you talking to me?’ she said, low to ensure her words weren’t overheard. Already she could feel her sister’s eyes on her and knew she had talked too long with Hugh...and yet her sister had sat them together.
‘Is a lowly knight not worth talking, too?’ he said.
Hugh’s fingers danced over the trencher he shared with Helen. That slight movement sent an ache through her that she tried to hide as his eyes caught with hers. His were dark, as if childhood pain and anguish had seeped deep within him. As if he was now wrapped with a malevolence she didn’t know or understand.
He was an enigma to her. There was cruelty to the curl of his lips, a blade-like cynicism in the way he held his body. The tilt of his head silently mocked everyone sitting around him.
Especially her.
‘That’s ridiculous,’ she answered.
