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He could have given me a hundred titles if he didn’t want to make me Queen, but there is an ownership associated with a consort. He may as well have snapped a collar around my neck for all the pride he has afforded me, and I know it shouldn’t matter. I remind myself of that constantly.
But it does, and it’s not the only thing I can’t get past.
“It doesn’t matter what you do once you call me that, a fact we are both well aware of. So, tell me, my king, my master, just how your consort should view you now, so that I may follow that order as well.”
His face is red with fury, his mouth opening as though he genuinely has no idea how to respond. If that's the case, he’s the only one who’s short on words, because I can’t seem to stop mine.
“Is that why you wouldn’t permit me to bring my own ladies or maids along? What need does a prisoner have of companionship?”
His flinch is barely perceptible, but I notice as he leans forward, no doubt to defend himself. Still, I don’t stop.
“Perhaps you could force me to wear a veil as well.” I am as close to shouting now as I ever come, closer than I can remember being in years to losing the carefully cultivated threads of my temper.
“Or have you already commissioned one? How much fabric do you think it would take to obscure the hideousness of my own features from Your Majesty’s untainted gaze?”
I have moved subconsciously closer to him with each word until we are mere inches apart by the time I stop speaking. This close, I can see that his eyes aren’t really blue — at least, not entirely. They’re flecked with silver, like jagged shards of ice. His lips are parted in acrimony or something I might interpret as desire on anyone else.
We sit like that for another heartbeat, frozen in time but for our furious breaths. Then he swallows, closing his mouth and backing away from the charged moment.
“I would never force a veil on anyone, let alone my own people.” He delivers the statement without inflection, his attention solely on the queen he is now sliding slowly across the board. “There are things beyond you here, things you don’t understand.”
I take a deep breath, studying the minute changes in his features. The slight furrow in his brow, the vein pulsing in his neck.
To the untrained eye, he could appear emotionless, but there is something there brimming below the surface, something I can’t quite name. None of it makes sense, though. If he doesn’t force his servants and guests into masks and veils, then why speak so sharply to the girl cleaning the slime that day?
And why hide their faces, if not at his command?
“How can I possibly understand something you refuse to explain?” I finally interject, but he holds up a hand.
“You can’t understand, but you can look outside the bubble of your own making to acknowledge that much before jumping to conclusions, something you have clearly not bothered to do.” He stands up in a single, fluid movement, not breaking eye contact with me.
“Check mate.”
I look at the board in disbelief, but he isn’t wrong. And for once, I wasn’t pandering. He’s outwitted me.
By the time I glance back up, he has swept out of the room, leaving the room feeling even emptier than it did when I arrived.
Chapter Nineteen
Iturn our exchange over and over in my mind, dissecting it piece by piece, yet still, I come up wanting. What was said and all that wasn’t is spinning in my head like a carousel that never stops.
I am already tired of playing this game. Of waiting for him to soften or change or to explain anything about this horrid, frozen, soulless place.
Weeks go by, and Einar doesn’t join me for breakfast. I’ve taken all of my meals in my room, alone but for Khijhana.
Even Sigrid has been keeping her distance, though the way she gingerly helps me dress and insists on brushing my hair tells me there is no ill-will between us. There’s only a wall of secrets that neither of us can seem to breach.
I groan for the millionth time, and Khijha rubs her massive head against my neck, nearly knocking me backwards on the bed.
The chalyx never stops growing. In just the few weeks that have passed, she is now the size of a full-grown wildcat. Her purr practically rumbles through my bones, and I allow myself to take comfort in her for a moment.
Today is another echo of each day since I argued with the king. Sigrid draws my bath while I sip the special tonic she makes me each morning. Then, breakfast. Then, I am left to my own devices until lunch, and the same from the span of lunch until dinner and all through the night.
I return to the study most days, but neither Odger, nor Einar makes an appearance. And I don’t touch the piano again. My emotions are precarious enough without another trek down memory lane. Instead, I pass the time by staring at the endless mountains and wishing I was anywhere but here.
Khijhana and I are on our way back to my rooms after one such visit when I turn a corner and stop dead in my tracks. A man is walking from the direction of the king’s rooms. It takes me a moment to realize that it is, in fact, the king. His face is concealed by a black silk mask, but his arrogant posture and his solid footsteps are impossible to hide.
Unlike the doctor's masks of the guards flanking him, his is fashioned after the head of a wolf. He freezes when he spots me.
