AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I laughed, less from amusement and more to relieve the tension that gripped me.
Cait swished away in her blue gown, heads turning toward the beautiful and mysterious young brunette who crossed the entrance hall with a purpose.
So many observers and so much to keep hidden.
I wished I could be completely invisible, even to myself. I didn’t want to see what I would do tonight.
I lingered by the door, my breath catching, heading for a panic. I’d experienced this feeling before, when rampant fears had taken hold of me at the Academy Square and I’d lost all sense. That incident ultimately led to me winding up in prison. I couldn’t let panic control me again.
If I stood any chance of success, I had to be as convinced by my disguise as anyone else. I couldn’t be in my head. I took a calming breath and stepped forward into the hall, under the gold chandeliers, past the life-size portrait of Graham on the wall. I hardly even let myself look at the likeness. I didn’t want to get distracted.
The finely dressed guests held fluted glasses as they gossiped, their perfectly enunciated prattle merging into a cacophony. I searched the faces, focused on finding a particularly gaunt older man, but with a party this size, it could take a while.
At the end of the entrance hall, the ceiling became higher and vaulted. The staircase was ahead, the ballroom to my left, and a hall continued to the right. Even though the rooms of this house were laid out the same as my own, they were furnished and decorated so differently that I didn’t know where the hall on the right would take me.
Banquet tables lined the hall’s intersection, each one laden with refreshments so luscious and appealing that I couldn’t help but taste them. I picked up a twisted roll coated in white frosting and adorned with tiny blue flowers, then stuck the whole thing in my mouth, flower and all.
I didn’t know food could taste so good. I closed my eyes, thoroughly savoring it as the cream and cinnamon melted in my mouth.
When I opened my eyes, I saw Graham.
He stood under the doorway of the ballroom next to his mother, mingling with a group of nobles. His suit was dark blue, fitting his form so well that it was certainly expertly tailored. His face was clean-shaven once more. The only visible evidence of his time on the islands was the darkening of his skin and a newfound firmness in both demeanor and figure.
I fought the impulse to go to him. I wasn’t even supposed to belookingat him, but all I wanted was to cross the room to him. I wanted to see the clear blue of his eyes and hear the timbre of his voice. I longed to give him the perfect apology, to make him forgive and forget, and to make him love me.
My face flushed with heat.
Love. The word I rarely allowed inside my head when it came to Graham. But there it was. I wanted his love instead of his hate. I ached for it.
I tore my gaze from him and turned in the opposite direction, hurrying down the hall deeper into the house. I entered the doorway of the first room on the right. It was a library—dim, subdued, with only a few nobles scattered about, examining the books or lounging in deep armchairs with wine glasses in their hands.
I wandered the perimeter of the room, my fingers brushing the brittle spines of ancient books to ground myself back in reality as I headed toward a mahogany-framed mirror on the far side of the room.
The woman in the mirror looked back at me. She did look stunning, in an over-the-top kind of way. I adjusted a peony in my tall black wig and made sure my deep red lips hadn’t been smudged by the cinnamon roll.
I squinted at the made-up face, trying to find myself in the dark-fringed eyes that looked back at me from under furrowed brows. The color of my eyes had seemed much darker when my hair was blonde, but compared to the black hair I wore, theywere truly a light amber brown, especially under the lanterns that cast a golden glow over the entire party.
Under the polished surface, I saw pain, sadness, and desperation—a woman imprisoned by all her past mistakes, trying to undo them but falling hopelessly deeper into the traps she’d set for herself back when she didn’t know better. Not to mention the traps set by her father.
I wanted to escape this web of lies.
The sight of Graham was branded into my mind’s eye. I fought the urge to go back to him and confess what Cael had ordered me to do, to prove I was capable of honesty, the very thing Graham had accused me of withholding. But if I was honest, what would Cael do to him? If Graham became an obstacle to his power, Cael’s interest in protecting him and putting him on the throne would be obliterated.
No. The truth wouldn’t help Graham.
I needed to make him king,andI needed to make him love me.
I couldn’t say the right thing to make that happen. All the words in this entire library wouldn’t be enough. But maybe if I redeemed myself by clearing his path to the throne, he’d find it in his heart to see me as he once did instead of resenting me as the girl who’d betrayed him.
Killing one man was a price I was willing to pay to protect Graham.
It was both heroic and terrible.
Renewed determination blazed in the amber-brown eyes in the mirror. I breathed deeply, a slight smile lifting my face. Then I turned on my heel and passed the bookshelves, returning to the hall, my breath as steady as my resolve.
A strong male voice came from the room on the other side of the hall. It sounded like a speech or a presentation. I venturedtoward the doorway, listening more closely. No, it wasn’t a speech. It sounded more like poetry.
I peered inside the open double doors. A Poet Laureate held a worn and weathered book in his hands, reading it aloud to a spellbound room of nobles who sat in rows of chairs with their backs to me.
