Page 124 of A Pact of Blood

Most likely, they’ll also get a demonstration of exactly where their empress is weak after all. Because just picturing driving a blade into a civilian who fought so passionately for freedom makes all my innards wobble.

I don’t know if I can do it. Any kind of fight is hardly my forte. Being up against an attacker I sympathize with so much…

Will I be able to summon the conviction to overpower my opponent? How can I put my all into this rite the way I needed to with the three before when it goes against every principle that’s given me strength?

And if I fail, I’ll either die by the rebel’s hand or look like a disgrace before all the people I most need to win over.

I want to vomit.

I can’t, though. All I can do is hang on to my smile for dear life and careen on along the path I’ve carved for myself, as awful as it may be. “Of course I’ll participate. It’s exactly what I asked for.”

Gods smite me, I wish I’d never asked at all.

Chapter Forty

Lorenzo

Aurelia moves through the parlor all smiles and bright words. She joins a game of darts at Vicerine Bianca’s cajoling and laughs as her unpracticed throws miss the mark. When a couple of the baronissas claim the empress to show off their new shoes, she exclaims over them as if she’s never seen anything lovelier.

It’s an incredible performance. Even a couple of months ago, when I thought I’d already gotten to know her well, I don’t think I’d have caught the signs that something’s wrong.

But for most of the past two months, I’ve had no choice but to watch her from afar as surreptitiously as I can. With every passing week, the subtle patterns to her movements, her intonation, even the angle of her smile have worked their way into my understanding.

Here and there, her shoulders slump just slightly, only for an instant. The light that dances in her eyes shines a little tooglassily. My honed ears catch the faintest brittle edge to her laughter.

She’s struggling, like I don’t think I’ve seen since she was in the midst of Emperor Tarquin’s trials. Something has shaken the nearly impenetrable determination I’ve watched carry her through so much torture.

Raul mentioned that Aurelia asked for his help with a minor scheme involving the hounds this morning. I haven’t heard any talk among the nobles about an incident.

I’m not sure what she’d have been hoping for, but at least it doesn’t appear to have had any horrifying effects.

Who knows what Marclinus might have said or done to her away from our watchful eyes, though? I knew he could be cruel, but I’ve never seen him jerk around any member of the court the way he has his wife.

By a small mercy, he hasn’t seemed all that interested in her since dinner. He’s prowled around the room with a few of the nobles he’s chummiest with and made occasional wry remarks with a vaguely distracted air.

I drift closer to the emperor, my ears pricked. It’s safer to pay attention to him than to Aurelia, and he might say something that paints a clearer picture of what I’ve missed.

He’s just getting up from a cards table, clapping one of the viceroys on the shoulder. “Good game. Maybe next time you’ll lose less catastrophically. But it’ll have to wait at least a day, because I’m ready to turn in for the night.”

Is he? As I track him from the edge of my vision, he says his good nights to a few other nobles and then heads out the door without a word to Aurelia.

A glimmer of possibility flutters up in my chest. If he’s gone to bed without calling on her, presumably she’ll be safe from his overtures for the rest of the night.

We can find out what’s gone wrong and come up with whatever plans we need to set it right again.

Aurelia lingers in the parlor for several minutes longer. I’m not surprised to see that as soon as it’s not obvious she’s leaving because she knows her husband isn’t around to monitor her, she bows out of another game of darts and ambles toward the door.

I position myself where I can carefully catch her gaze and ask a silent question with my hand.Going to Marclinus?

She responds as briefly as she’s able.No, my room.

Perfect.

I seek out my foster brothers across the room, spotting Raul’s dark ponytail first. As I ease toward him, a trace of hesitation passes through my limbs.

I haven’t had Aurelia to myself in weeks. I was the first of us she turned to, the first she trusted. Maybe it’d be best if I approach her on my own before making a full meeting of it.

If my motivations for wanting a private interlude aren’t entirely unselfish, I don’t think Bastien or Raul would blame me for it.

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