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Chapter8
Pounding at my door was never good.
Pounding at my door when I was still in bed before the staff hall was even awake was worse and didn’t help my already frosty mood first thing in the morning.
“Coming!” I yelled as I quickly slid a cozy sweater on over my nightgown.
The knocking persisted, growing more and more impatient.
Throwing the door open, I almost shoved the person standing behind it. “What part of I’m coming is not—"
I cleared my throat immediately and bowed my head, not knowing if there were others in the hall.
Noah’s cheeky grin and wiggling eyebrows told me we were alone, and I instantly relaxed enough to move forward and shove him gently in the chest.
“—is not clear, Your Majesty,” I finished my earlier thought. We hadn’t seen each other since the incident with Vanessa yesterday morning, and the Noah that was there was not someone I’d be welcoming with open arms.
However, the thought of getting some alone time with him did excite me. Maybe if we could just talk this whole thing out, it would be better and he’d see reason. After all, it wasn’t only me who couldn’t stand Vanessa. After one day as her lady’s maid, I already knew the entire palace was on red alert to run the other way if they saw her coming. That or risk being chewed out and ordered to attend to things that weren’t anywhere near their wheelhouse.
“I’m sure you’re here solely because you've missed losing at cards since disappearing. So, bed. Let’s go. I’ll deal,” I said, hiding my annoyance and masking it with teasing quite well for how messy my feelings actually were inside.
When I didn’t hear or see any movement, I turned to find Noah standing awkwardly by the door still. His hands rubbed together a few times before he brushed them on his pant legs.
The playful way the prince had entered was gone, and his face was devoid of any sort of joy. He caught me staring and his entire demeanor changed.
Immediately.
His smile was back and he came in and leaned against my bed, not hopping up like a child as he normally would for our evening game nights.
“Who can think about cards, Cora?” He flopped back on the bed. “I have to know what you think. Isn’t she amazing?”
I narrowed my eyes, staring him down so hard that he must have felt my gaze penetrating into his soul. And yet he ignored it, just staring at the ceiling and smiling.
I refused to play along with this. After what that witch had said to me, Noah couldn’t possibly be here singing her praises.
When I didn’t answer, he rolled to his side and propped himself up with his hand. “She’s so much more intelligent than I gave her credit for. Truly, just a smart being. And the beauty has always been something everyone was drawn to, but add in the brain.” He smiled wider. “You’re going to be thrilled at some of the ideas she has for the castle and utilizing the servants.”
I coughed, trying not to gag outright. “Utilizing our talents or straight up using us servants?”
Noah rose, half sitting on the bed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You’re joking, right?” I asked. “She thinks I should just let myself die in battle instead of training because you can always get another feeder.” I mockingly and sickeningly sweetly stated the last part in my best Vanessa impression.
“That’s ridiculous,” Noah said, huffing in defiance. “You know she didn’t mean it like that, Cora. The duchess has a horrible time filtering what she says. She speaks her mind so much, it’s hard for her to stop. She’d never truly mean she wouldn’t care that servants died.”
There was that word again. Servants. I knew that was our level, I wasn’t that naive. But since I’d arrived here at the castle, we weren’t usually referred to as servants like Noah was saying it now.
If Noah was waiting for me to argue, I wouldn’t. If he was waiting for me to concede, I wouldn’t do that either. It was clear that right now, his rose-colored glasses were deeply colored. There wasn’t anything I was going to be able to say to change his mind or make him see what Vanessa was. She’d shown him her character, and he’d ignored it.
More cords that I’d grown and tethered between us in a bond of what I thought was a friendship and more were breaking. Arguing with Noah about this risked snapping it completely, and that wasn’t something I was prepared for, not right now.
Noah shifted back and forth on the bed. He opened, then closed his mouth a few times. “Captain Coltrain said you had some trouble the other day at training. Are you okay there?”
I didn’t even look at him, I couldn’t. “It’s nothing you need to worry about. I’m still in top shape with my training.”
“Cora,” Noah said. “I wasn’t implying that you weren’t. I just…I wanted to ask…I didn’t know…”
This time when he trailed off he didn’t bother making any attempts at finding the words. He just stopped. The silence was more consuming than the discomfort over speaking my mind, but it was there. The dark tendrils threatening to attack me and release either anger or sadness, neither of which I was okay with showing.
