Page 24 of This Midsummer Heart
Titaine cocks her head at me. “You feel something?”
I’m feeling a lot of things right now, and all of them are confusing. “This darkness…it’s unnatural,” is all I say.
“Actually, it’s very natural. It’s just”—she hesitates—“new to this part of the forest.”
“I feel so much better now.”
The whites of Titaine’s eyes flash through the deepening night as she rolls her eyes at me. “Let’s just focus on getting to Lunevelle. There are bound to be elves left there. Even if everyone’s somehow left without us hearing about it, the city will be a safer place to make camp.”
“Would you be upset,” I ask her, “if Cassandra had moved on and you didn’t have to see her?”
Titaine goes utterly rigid, her hand nearly slipping out of my grasp. “Maybe I would be,” she says at length, her words clipped, “since I never got the opportunity to thank her for saving me from a true marriage to you.”
Anger surges in my chest. I know I should hold it back, but instead I find myself taking the bait. “You mean to tell me Cassandra is the reason you altered our marriage contract?”And tricked me into signing itgoes unsaid.
And made me think I was in an equal marriage to you for months, while you acted as though everything was fine.This also goes unsaid.
And the very last thing I would ever say is:I wasn’t fool enough not to notice. I felt the distance growing between us, the way you kept yourself separated and above me. I didn’t want it to be true. I thought I could make you love me again. And when I couldn’t, I found other women who would.
After all, you’re the one who made it a political marriage.
“Cassandra enlightened me. She warned me about you and Lusida, and that the elves wouldn’t accept our marriage unless you still took an elf as your concubine. I did what I had to, to protect the dignity of the House of Fetes. And you upheld your people’s expectations.” Titaine tries to sound nonchalant, but she is squeezing my hand far too tightly.
I think we’re headed for more stony, irritable silence, when she surprises me by continuing, her voice dropping, laced with an unmistakable pain that nearly breaks my heart all over again.
“I just didn’t expect it to hurt so much when you did.”
And that is when I realize:
We aren’t alone anymore.
Chapter thirteen
Silverbeard
Titaine
Tears,hotandhumiliating,dot the corners of my eyes as Daegris Silverbeard—said beard now little more than neatly trimmed stubble, now that he is a civilized, married elf—seizes Auberon from behind.
Daegris always has terrible timing like that.
My foolish emotions are swept aside in a moment as Auberon lets out a shout of surprise, and I realize:Auberon never heard him coming.
A glance behind me assures me he never saw Daegris’s wardens, either, a quartet of three female wood elves and one male armed to the teeth.
“You’ve lost your touch, man,” Daegris says good-naturedly, as if this meeting were not instantly uncomfortable. Daegris is stealthier than most elves, but the four wardens didn’t bother to hide their approach from behind me. Even though I did not see them, it was obvious they were there.
Auberon rubs the back of his neck, his cheeks no doubt darkening at this embarrassment—something I know without being able to see him. Becoming a Houselord through war means Auberon has always put too much stock in his physical prowess and skills. But now?
I brought him along for his strength and fighting ability. Since I’m apparently still a queen consort of elves, I didn’t even need him for invitations to stay in elven woodlands.
And were I not with Auberon, I never would’ve lost Giselda and our supplies. I’ve tied myself to a nuisance for no reason.
Even more of a nuisance is the way Daegris and his wardens turn their attention to me, all sweeping into low bows immediately after offering them to Auberon. But since they’re moon elves, there’s a slight air of mocking to their formality.
“Lady Titaine,” Daegris says, his teeth flashing in the darkness. “You are as radiant as ever.”
“Actually,” Auberon pipes up, “I asked her to turn down a bit of that radiance, given the changes to Nerania. What in the boughs of Dauron happened here?”
