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She pinched her cheeks a little bit for good measure before stepping out of the palace, and into the gardens. It was a warm evening. Summer. She had hated summer once. But she loved it now. “There you are,” he said. “Little Mouse.”
He had taken to calling her that, and she didn’t really know why. He didn’t have nicknames for anyone else, so it felt... It felt almost special. He did pay special attention to her; it had been noticed by the other members of staff. She did not live with them in their quarters; rather, she kept her room in the palace. It caused tension between her and a couple of the girls, but everybody else seemed all right with it. Anyway, they were wrong about him. He wasn’t keeping her to use her.
Would it be such a bad thing if he did?
Of course, she did not want to be any man’s mistress. Nor did she want to be a whore.
But you could never be a king’s wife...
“Yes.”
She waited for him to say something about her dress. To wish her a happy birthday. He did neither.
“I have something to ask you,” he said.
Her heart leapt up her throat, lodging itself there. He was a dark, imposing figure out there in the night, backed by a black sky shot through with stars. She used to sleep under a sky like that. The vastness of night had been frightening for her, never beautiful.
With Matteo in front of it, it felt...different.
He brought the vastness down to earth. Embodied it. She could no more tame or touch him than she could one of those stars but... But he made her feel safe, too.
He made her want.
“Yes?”
“Livia,” he said, his tone going grave. “I would like for you to be my personal assistant.”
Her heart stalled, then started again, slamming inelegantly against her breastbone. “Oh?”
“Yes. You see, I’ve been watching you, and I particularly appreciate your attention to detail. Plus... I don’t know. You... You see things. It’s not just details. You see things, and I need someone in my sphere who does. I need someone strong. Strong of opinion, strong in action. You will be my assistant, yes, but also my...advisor of sorts.”
“Oh.”
It was an incredibly flattering thing. But it was very far away from what she had hoped, for one brief moment, he might ask.
“I will of course pay you handsomely.”
He named the salary that nearly made her double over.
“I don’t understand what I’ve done to merit this kind of favor.”
“Just being who you are.”
And that was the shiniest, most glittering thing anyone had ever said to her and she took it and she held it close. And it wouldn’t matter what else came after that.
“Now, I have sort of an unpleasant job for you, for your first task.”
“Yes?” she asked tentatively.
She had no idea what he would classify as an unpleasant task, and frankly, it was a little bit disconcerting.
“I need you to select a farewell gift to my current mistress. Have it sent to her along with a note. Say something kind, but firm.”
“I... You want me to...break up with a woman for you?”
“Don’t be silly. It’s a business arrangement, nothing half so feeling as ‘breaking up’ with. I never stay with a woman for longer than a few weeks. There’s simply no way around it. If I stayed with someone for too long then I would have to start taking them to events, and I’ve yet to meet anyone who I would consider to be Queen. I have a prearranged marriage, you see.”
And that was when all of her fantasies well and truly turned to dust. And that glittering thing she held close to her chest turned into nothing more than garden-variety craft glitter, which mattered not at all, and merely got all over everything and couldn’t be gotten rid of, making a mockery of that feeling she had only a moment before.
