Page 73 of A Game of Veils

I fill in the lines with swift strokes and consider my other options. “And it’d certainly be a shame if they ended up needing to decide what to do with several reams of lace rather than linen.” I adjust the shorthanded li into lace.

Aurelia’s laugh makes my pulse sing in return. “Do you alter the accounts a lot?”

“Only a little here and there. So the adjustments can still appear to be mistakes rather than malice.”

She turns to peer at the other ledgers. “Who do you think we should tackle next?”

Her use of “we” gives me more of a thrill than it probably should. I select a couple more volumes, nobles whose purchases I haven’t messed with recently.

It’s hard to look away from Aurelia’s eager face as she points out another cost we could increase. Her arm brushes against mine, and warmth blooms over my skin even with our sleeves between us.

I wouldn’t have expected the stoic, impassive woman I’ve seen in front of Marclinus to delight in this minor sabotage, but here we are.

After we’ve tweaked an entry in the third book, Aurelia’s enthusiasm dims. She looks up at me, so close I feel as if I might fall into her gaze. “Don’t you ever want to do more than this?”

The question prods a sore spot buried deep inside me. I snap before I can catch my tongue. “What makes you think I haven’t?”

Aurelia flinches and steps back, her retreat tugging at my gut. I scramble for the right thing to say, my thoughts abruptly muddled.

I’m not angry at her. I’m angry at myself, for all the ways I’ve failed.

“I have wanted to,” I say. “So much more. But the most important things… I couldn’t.”

Aurelia’s bittersweet smile comes back. “I’m sorry,” she says, even though I should be the one apologizing to her. “But even if you couldn’t before—there will always be more chances. We might even do something important together.”

I don’t know if it’s the liquor or the resolve in her gaze or everything about this unexpected encounter, but a spark of hope like I haven’t felt in longer than I can remember flashes to life inside me. I find myself reaching for her hand as if I need to touch her to convince her of my words. “I don’t want you to die at all. Not in the trials, not by Marclinus’s orders—not any way.”

Her smile widens. “I’m glad to hear that.”

She looks down at our joined hands and turns hers over to wrap her fingers around mine. Even as the jolt of that contact shoots straight to my groin, she eases in and brushes the gentlest of kisses to my mouth.

It’s over before I can even kiss her back, though heat has flared across my lips.

Aurelia’s cheeks flush pinker than before. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I’d better—it’s late.”

Before I have a chance to decide what I’d even want to say to her, she’s ducked out of the records room and vanished behind the swing of the door.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Aurelia

When I walk into the dining room for breakfast, I’m probably not as alert as I should be. It took me too long to get to sleep last night, replaying my conversation with Prince Bastien in my head.

I’m increasingly convinced that he was honest about not having meant to nearly murder me. Whatever resentments led him to his mistake with the stew, I can’t afford to hold unnecessary grudges against my only potential allies when I have so few.

He does feel like something close to an ally now. By the end of our talk, he trusted me enough to reveal his more illicit activities. I believed him when he said he wants me to survive the trials.

He looked so earnest in that moment, with his hand tucked around mine…

Perhaps it’s not surprising that a little affection sparked in me before we parted ways. But was that goodbye kiss a clever strategy for deepening whatever connection I’ve finally forged with him or an ill-advised impulse I should have known better than to follow?

Could it possibly have been both?

Whatever the case, I’m too distracted to give Fausta’s cluster of friends a wide enough berth. I’ve barely noted her flame-red hair at the edge of my vision when a murmur and a couple of giggles rise up from their midst.

They surge toward the head table, even though nothing edible has been brought out yet. One lady contrives to step straight into my path at the last second, forcing me to stumble backward to avoid plowing into her.

In the same moment, an unnerving ripping sound hits my ears alongside a tug of my skirt.

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