Page 74 of The Court of Venus

Bess returned minutes later and said Roland had sent her to help me dress. She was unfocused and dazed, her mind scattered to pieces. Several times she pinned my sleeves in the wrong place.

Perhaps she imagined he’d find her later. Push her against the door, or a desk, and take her as the ship groaned and rocked.

As she clasped a necklace around my neck, she bit her lip. “Mistress Bianca?”

“Mmm,” I said softly, wary of her, of myself, of the heat crawling up my neck. “Yes?”

“I’ve been told in Lionesse, the men and women do not need chaperones to enter each other’s chambers. And even the maids of honor with no husbands take lovers.”

I glanced over my shoulder. “Do you want a lover, Bess?”

Her pert nose wrinkled. “I am engaged. To Lord Martin.”

Martin, the treasurer. One of the king’s friends, once young and strapping but now sagging with gout. “I’m sorry to hear it.”

She laughed sharply. “I do not mind,” she said, fixing my pearls so they rested beneath my collarbone. She paired them with lapis earrings, to match the blue of my gown and crescent hood. “I’ve always known I would marry him. We were engaged when I was eight.”

“And when will you marry?”

“When Roland decides. He approves all marriages for the king now. He delays it, for reasons no one will explain to me.”

Mercy, perhaps.

“Thank you, Bess,” I said, trying to smile warmly. She blinked in confusion and curtseyed, murmuring something about honor that she didn’t mean.

Up on deck, Roland was watching the swell with his hands behind his back. He was draped in pearls. One dangling from his ear, more hung around his neck.

“Why do you delay Bess’s marriage?” I asked, sidling up beside him.

He turned his head only slightly. “You wore a gown after all. What a shame.”

I smacked his arm, and he smiled. “Answer my question.”

A shrug. “Because Martin is a toad who hops at Charles Guildford’s heels, and I have no interest in pleasing him anytime soon. Why? Have you come to care for her? After all she whispers about you to Cecily?”

“A little. Yes,” I admitted. The sun pressed against a white sweep of clouds, trying in vain to emerge. The water kicked up against the hull.

Roland wiped spray from his cheek and said, “I was thinking about the other night. About my mother.” There was a beat of hesitation, then he seemed to gather himself. “I meant it. I’d like to remember what she looked like. When Prospero came for me, I was forced to acknowledge something I had always known: There were things she wanted far more than raising me. I was unexpected. She was very young. Unmarried. I wonder if, when I was taken, she felt she finally had an opportunity to live. I tried to forget her after I left, to punish her. But I was up all night. Realizing I missed her.”

“Tonight, I’ll help you. If you’d like.”

He nodded, looking out to sea again.

“You’ve risen higher than she ever could have hoped, Roland.”

“Oh? I don’t think she had much ambition for me. That all came from myself. It began with wanting to please her.” He turned, appraising me. “Your ambition was the only match for mine. When we were children, I admired it.”

“Admired?” I’d hardly felt a spark of his admiration as a girl. There were only a few times I could recall. The race to the tree, when he’d thrown his arm around me. Once more, when I’d fetched his practice sword from the bottom of a mucky pond. “You didn’t make it known.”

He frowned. “I didn’t?”

“No. I remember every time you or Hal were kind to me,” I said softly.

A shaft of light cut across the deck. He waved his hand through it, back and forth. “Who would you—” He caught his lip in his teeth. “Who would you say was your favorite between us? If you had to choose?” His eyes cut to mine. “If, say, I had a knife to your throat.”

My heart staggered. There were layers to this question he didn’t know. How deep would I cut him, cut us both, if I pressed the sharp edge of my past against him now? “I’m not playing this game.”

“Why not?”