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“Aye, the finest schemer in Tenebra. I know what’s going on behind that blank expression of yours when you’re wearing a hole in the floor. I often think to myself, ‘Every step of her slippers gives the lords of Tenebra more reason to shake in their boots.’”
Cassia reached over her shoulder and clutched Perita’s hand. “Thank you.”
Perita faced Cassia and leaned against the dressing table, her expression clouded with worry. “Is it so hard this time?”
“It’s impossible. I’ve thought of everything—triedeverything. I cannot see a way for me to be with him.”
Anger crossed Perita’s face. “Where is he to help you when you need him? If he loves you so much, he shouldn’t leave it all on your shoulders.”
“He hasn’t. He has done so much for me.”
“I had hoped he was working on something for you back in Tenebra, while you’ve been here.”
“During the entire Summit, he has worked tirelessly for our cause. But some forces are too great to overcome. Even for him.”
“This isn’t right! A lady ought to be happy on a day like this.”
“There are many of us who have not rejoiced upon our betrothals.”
“My lady ought not to be among them.”
“Do not feel sad for me, Perita. I am fortunate, if not in my betrothal, then the reason for my unhappiness.”
Perita stowed a brooch in the dressing table with a vengeance and slammed the drawer shut. “If he can’t fix this, then he isn’t good enough for my lady.”
“Don’t be angry, Perita. He is…the best.”
“I am angry. I’m angry at the bird in the bush for spoiling your chance for happiness with the bird in the hand. Flavian may be Segetian, but I think he has it in him to rise to the occasion, once he realizes how fortunate he is in you. Benedict is a good sort. He’ll knock sense into his lord and see you’re treated right. And I can’t really say anything bad about the family, even if I can about the title. Lord Titus is a generous man, and Lady Eugenia will be a good friend to you.”
“Risara and I understand one another well,” Cassia said.
She recalled what Titus’s concubine had told her the day of the Autumn Greeting.Don’t ever forget what you deserve.
“See there,” said Perita. “I think you might have been happy today, if not for Lord Fancy Soap beguiling you with illusions that aren’t real.”
“If not for him, I would have regarded myself as fortunate and never known I was unhappy. I would have deemed Flavian an advantageous choice and dismissed love as of no use. I would have resigned myself to my duties to Flavian and never had a taste of real passion.”
If she had never known Lio? She could not bear imagining such a life. She must give up their future. But no one could rob her of their past.
Nor the last, precious remnants of their present, before the Summit must come to an end.
Again. She was going to lose him again.
Perita’s indignation did not abate. “Will happiness and love and passion take you out of your father’s household and see to it you’ve one of your own? And enough to eat? And family to fill the house and the years, to care for you as you grow old?”
“He would give me everything.”
All she had to do was ask. Speak her desires. Tell him how much she wanted.
“Woulds and might haves aren’t enough,” Perita concluded. “Not for my lady.”
NIGHT TO LAST FOREVER
The bird in thebush stood just outside Cassia’s door. Rose foliage and a curtain were not enough to keep Lio from hearing the end of Cassia and Perita’s conversation. Was it wrong of him to eavesdrop? He thought not, for Cassia had been glad of his nearness during her heart-to-heart with Benedict the other night. Even now, she must know Lio was nearby.
So this betrothal nonsense was what had upset her, while she pretended everything was fine, as if he couldn’t tell. Didn’t she realize that meaningless agreement was no threat to her now? Perita need only depart, and he would deliver the cure for Cassia’s fears.
But when Perita left, Cassia did not come out. Her aura lingered in her shadowed room, as if she were hiding from all that lay without.
