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While composing another letter, the sharp tip of my quill scraped across the parchment. At the bottom of the page, I pressed too hard. Ink squirted from my quill and puddled like tar across the leaflet.
I gaped at the mess, then left to find a cloth. When I returned to the desk, a sheet peeked from inside one of the manuscripts. To anyone else, it would look like mere stationery, like the rest of my notes.
My pulse skittered. I plucked the missive, unfolded it, and scanned the contents. Two words looped across the paper in fluid cursive.
Nothing happened.
***
In the great hall, he played with his audience. He juggled coins, flung them to the ceiling, and then hurled them toward his spectators. Everyone bleated and hooted as they tried to catch the golden pieces.
A fitted leather doublet with a sapphire diamond pattern hugged Poet’s frame while he strolled past a know-it-all who claimed to have eyes in the back of his skull. In a sequence of moves behind him, Poet switched the order of the man’s cutlery, the feat effortless and quick, to the guests’ hilarity but with his target none the wiser.
In Queen Fatima’s opinion, a third chalice of wine was one too many for her husband. Poet convinced her to let the monarch drain four, to which King Basil nearly knighted the jester on the spot.
Another day, at the lotus ponds, the jester recited poetry to his admirers. As he sauntered across wooden bridges intersecting over the water, words such ascovetandprovokerippled like satin from his tongue.
***
The jester and his troupe entertained revelers on a lawn checkered in tulips. They pitched themselves into the air and vaulted across the ground. He moved like liquid. And when he finished with an elegant inclination of his head, those eyes slid toward me and discovered he wasn’t the only one out of breath.
***
I sat in a chair amid the wisteria arbors, engaged in conversation with the Queens of Winter. At which point, a hand balancing a candle broke us apart. The jester presented the flickering taper he’d once denied me, his gesture hushing the crowd.
My heart gave a violent kick. I accepted the gift, our fingers brushing. His lacquered nails grazed my knuckles, and my smooth fingers clashed with his calloused ones.
The exchange invited murmurs. In fact, I knew of seven notable jaws that dropped.
Poet dipped his head, then magnified his voice for everyone to hear. “Your Highness. This is overdue, for the leenix was no match for you. What an honor to be saved by Autumn. And so, I thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” sprang from my tongue. “I—rescue men all the time.”
Amusement glinted in his pupils, the vision so angelically devious. Black and white paint swept across his temples in whorls, the design curling outward at the ends.
After a prolonged moment, Poet nodded to Winter and my heedful mother, then pivoted on his heel.
As he strolled away, Cadence grimaced at me and took a resentful swig of her wine. Posy and Vale cast intrigued glances my way.
The rest decided to get vocal. Questa mouthed, “Jester’s pet,” which earned stifled chortles from Freya, Lisette, and Rhiannon.
Although she’d been discreet so the Royals wouldn’t hear, my head sliced in the female’s direction. At the same time, Poet’s boots stalled in place. With the slowness of a predator, his face cut a mercenary line toward the ladies.
Their mirth disintegrated, swallowed whole as he prowled their way. A bowl of apricot slices balanced on Questa’s lap, and her fork sat arrested between her fingers.
In a rapid succession of movements, Poet bumped the silverware’s hilt from her frozen grasp, sent it flipping into the air, and caught it in the opposite hand—all while keeping his face tacked to hers. He squatted, placed himself level with the bowl wobbling atop the lady’s thighs, and gazed at her. “The only person who gets to laugh at the princess—” his voice dripped with venom, “—is herself.”
Even though he sank the prongs carefully into a wedge of apricot, Questa jumped as if he’d rammed the utensil into a hard surface. Poet lifted the morsel to his lips. He squished it between his teeth, took his time chewing, and devoured the fruit while watching her.
My thoughts scattered. I didn’t want him to humiliate the lady, but my mouth hung ajar like a broken padlock.
Questa nodded vigorously, conveying her understanding. Satisfied, Poet set the fork in her bowl, winked at the other gaping ladies, and strode from the lawn.
That same evening before a performance, I found the door to his dressing chamber. Eliot had informed me the artists were granted such a space, abreast of the great hall and connected by an inlaid passage. I wove around several dancers who curtsied and pranced off.
I knocked. The gentle percussion of my knuckles echoed the pounding in my sternum, the drumming so heavy it felt disproportionate to my size. How was it possible for my body to contain this much sound?
Because the inner latch wasn’t bolted, the door craned open under my hand. I peeked between the crease, my gaze stumbling across the expanse of Poet’s back. He sat before a mirror, clad in an open robe of dusty pink, the satin falling over a pair of tight-fitting ebony pants. In his reflection, he drew a path of kohl beneath his eyelids and smudged the pleat with his thumb.
