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Whipping the sheets off my body, I kick my legs over the side of the cot and jump out of bed. It’s the bell that pushes me into the land of alert and awake. Back at home, I was the one who had to be forced out of bed at the break of the Chill to go into the village for errands.
My sweet reprieves are when the prince is gone from the castle, and I get to sleep in.
This is not one of those times.
So I’m quick to throw on my dress, leaving the corset on the floor, and fasten up the strings of my bodice.
As I rush out of the room, damp curls whip me across the cheeks and I falter for a beat. My hair is still clinging to the wash-water from the start of the Quiet.
Surely it must have dried by now. Or ... it’s not the Warmth yet, and it’s the middle of the Quiet.
A frown sticks to my face as I hurry my way through the corridors, down to the kitchen. Hilda is gone, which is odd—and I notice it right away. There’s only the butler and the cook with one kitchen maid.
I cut a glance to the map, expecting to find the prince’s dot in his bedchambers. But he’s still in the parlour room, and Elden is gone. With a further study, I see that Elden is in a guest bedchamber.
It is the Quiet, I realise.
“Where are the others?” I ask, meaning Archer and Gary—the last house slaves to be on service before the Quiet. They should be the ones still here, or even in the parlour room with the prince.
“I sent them to bed,” the butler says, his dark brown eyes slithering over me with a hint of disdain. “The prince has requested you.”
“Me?” I blink, my heart pausing, startled. “I ... I haven’t worked the parlour alone yet.”
The butler runs me over, his upper lip twitching. “I am aware.”
That’s all he says before he cuts his gaze to the tray on the kitchen counter, prepared for the prince. Prepared for delivery.
I sigh heavily, one that pushes out my full belly, and reach back for my hair. Without pins, I have no way of forcing a bun to stay in place. So I whip the load of curls down my back, then tuck them behind my ears, hoping they don’t spill all over the place when I’m serving the prince.
I wipe my hands on my skirt before I take the silver handles of the tray from the counter.
I know what I’m serving as soon as I lift up the tray and the stink of wine drifts up from the corked bottle.
I take it out of the kitchen and through the slave corridors to the parlour room.
The door is ajar when I arrive, making it easier for me to carry the tray inside.
The heat from the lit hearth hits me like a slap to the face. It burns my face a hot-pink before I’m even past the door.
I spot the prince sitting at the game table by the window overlooking the grape gardens. He looks utterly undone.
Wine stains are spilled all over his shirt, his pink mouth is swollen by the constant drinking from the empty bottle on the table in front of him, and his shirt hangs over his muscular shoulder.
Sea-blue eyes slide to me from the window. Lashes hang low over them, darkening the prince’s shadowy face.
Defeat clings to him the way fatigue hangs off of me.
I carry the tray to the table, my eyes on the faint rattle of the wine bottle.
Please don’t spill, I echo to myself over and over.
I make it to the table without a drop spilled. Coming to the prince’s side, I lean forward and gently set the tray down, releasing the rattle from my unsteady hands.
But before I can draw back, a blur of movement flashes out the corner of my eye—and in a hitched breath’s moment, the prince has snatched me up.
The wine bottle, in the scramble, is hit off the table. It falls to the rug with a bounce, then crashes over the marble edge of the carpet, spilling all over.
But I’m caged, and I can’t rush to clean it—
