Page 125 of Fate's Sweetest Curse
In the following months, the royals did all they could to avoid the terrible unrest that Hattie’s claim could cause, squashing all hints in an effort to keep the marriage agreement between Archer and Raina intact. They refrained from informing the Lord of Lothgaim of the result of his long-ago dalliance with Odella. The Lothgaimian footmen were found—and then they disappeared. Maids and guards were questioned—a few, he heard, were paid off.
Hattie was kept in the dark; Noble was forbidden from visiting her.
Then a Maronan soldier—one of the few entrusted with the containment of the secret—broke into the keep and tried to murder Hattie in an act of misguided loyalty toward Raina. After that, the king and queen rushed an engagement between Hattie and the nephew of one of the king’s advisors, a mayor in an insignificant town in southern Fenrir. Her dowry was enough that her new husband did not question her lineage, nor the reason the marriage was so rushed. And by taking the surname ofa lesser-titled man in a different territory—officially recorded by Fenrir’s Census Ledger instead of Marona’s—Hattie Wynhaim’s true identity was erased.
On the eve of Hattie’s departure, Noble snuck onto her balcony one last time. To tell her the truth. To confess that it was his fault. To admit that he loved her, too. But before he could express that last part, Loreena was knocking on her door, and he was climbing back down her trellis with the image of her tear-stricken face seared into his mind like a brand. Then he was hiding behind the willow, watching the nondescript carriage steal Hattie into the night. Steal his heart from his chest. Never to return.
That night, Noble had thought he lost Hattie forever. Now that she was in his life again, he refused to give up on that long-ago glimpse of precious Fortune.
“Is the Hylder still working?”
Noble glanced sidelong as his travel companion. Mariana had her horse’s reins looped around the horn of her saddle and was using both hands to carve into an apple with her dagger. She slid a thin slice into her mouth and crunched down, waiting for his answer.
Generally speaking, Noble didn’t dislike Mariana. Over the past two years, they’d formed a cool but amiable rapport. She’d advocated for him more than once, and her clandestine contributions to Phina’s research had been invaluable. But he was not privy to her motivations, and therefore, he didn’t fully trust her. Knowing she’d harmed Hattie—for no fucking reason—had greatly soured his opinion.
“Yes, the Hylder is still working,” Noble grumbled, returning his gaze to the open land ahead of them. No matter how hard he strained his nocturnal eyes, he’d yet to spot evidence of a camp. “Why do you ask?”
“You look murderous.”
“I am.”
Mariana let out a little snort of amusement. “Are you about to tell me that I should be scared? Watch my back around you?”
“Are youcapableof fear?” Noble joked, fully expecting her to deny any and all weakness in that quippy, dismissive way of hers.
But she surprised him. “Of course, I am.”
“I would’ve thought you abandoned fear a long time ago,” he said, “what with your charge.”
She leaned forward, offering the rest of her apple to her horse. The charcoal-colored gelding kept walking, but turned his neck, taking the treat gently. Mariana patted his neck, then sat tall again. “I don’t fear what most people fear,” she said. “Pain, Fate, death. Those are inevitable and therefore not worth my concern.”
He decided to play along. “Then whatdoyou fear?”
“Swans.”
Noble snorted. “You fight abominations, and yet you’re afraid of pretty white birds?”
“I got bit by one as a child.”
Noble shook his head, bemused by her sense of humor. He’d thought he had Mariana pinned, but perhaps there was more to her than her prickly countenance. “Swans,” he accepted. “Is that it?”
Mariana rubbed her forehead with the back of her wrist, staring out over the moonlit plains. “Swans, and captivity.”
Noble considered that. He didn’t know much about her past, but he knew some things. That she was a thief. That she was tried for her crimes and forced into an Oath at a cruelly young age. That she fought monsters as punishment. And that her sentence was for life.
“Why are you helping me?”
“What? Do I not seem like the helpful type?”
Noble scoffed.
The moonlight made her tawny skin appear pallid, the night carving deep shadows under her angular cheekbones. Her doe-eyes reflected adepthless sorrow, a vacancy that Noble knew all too well. As he waited for her to answer his question for real, the pale scar that bisected her upper lip stretched with her smirk…then softened.
Mariana broke eye contact and patted her horse’s neck again. “I know what it’s like to lose someone you care about,” she said finally. “The powerlessness and regret. I figured if I could help prevent…”
Noble offered a quiet nod. Her sentiments were strangely tender. Who would’ve thought she was capable?
“Mariana,” Noble teased, “are you a romantic?”
