The first woman approached the dais where Prince Graeme was seated. He nodded at the woman and did not speak. The woman—dressed in silver ruffles and flounces that made her look more like a tumbleweed than an elegant lady of the court—bowed deeply and remained kneeling. To the side of the prince, both priests raised their hands in the air and said a brief prayer.
Nothing happened.
A long moment passed and one could scarcely hear anything but the sound of harsh breathing. Then, the two priests dropped their arms, and it was over.
He gave her a curt nod again, this one of dismissal. The girl in front of the prince broke out in loud sobs, and an elder woman—no doubt her mother—rushed to her side and took her away.
“Well, that was ill-bred of her,” Lady Mila crowed, fanning herself. “No surprise there.”
Seri said nothing, simply watching as the next woman lined up and the ceremony was repeated. The prince nodded acknowledgment, his face as cold and expressionless as ever. The priests raised their arms and chanted. Nothing happened. After a moment, the priests ended their prayer and the woman walked away, albeit with more dignity than the first girl.
Was this ridiculous show supposed to go on all night, Seri wondered? Her spirits plummeted at the thought, and she scanned the crowded ballroom. There were more women crowded in here than existed in her own small village. If the prince had to meet each individual one, it would indeed take quite some time to winnow through them.
And all for a Ceremony that had produced no fruit in over a thousand years.
These people were fools. To put such trust and hope in a ceremony with so little results. The cords of Lady Mila’s dress cut into her palms, and Seri bit back her sigh of irritation. It was going to be a very, very long night, she thought as the crowd surged forward once more, cycling a fresh crop of eager ladies before the prince.
Minutes dragged past as Seri and Lady Mila waited in place for their turn. At the back of the room, over the slow passage of time, they wound their way to the front of the hall. Hours had passed, Seri was certain. Lady Mila’s jaunty feathers were starting to droop, and even her flimsy costume was starting to stick to her moist skin.
And still nothing happened. The prince greeted each woman with the same bored yet polite expression and the priests chanted, all in vain. Seri began to have a hint of sympathy for the prince.
Time wore on slowly, and she began to think of all the things she could do with her princely sum of three
dru
. There was the new cow, but if she sweet-talked Rilen, he’d let her bring it to his farm and impregnate it. Then they’d have a calf as well as fresh milk, all within a year’s time. She’d have to buy some grain, but maybe if Josdi made a few more of her charming pillows, they could forge ahead with that. Maybe she’d spare a couple of pence and buy some pretty fabric for her handfasting with Rilen. Something in green, to match her eyes—
The cords in her hand jerked and Seri looked up to see that the last woman before them had exited the central area and now Lady Mila was making her grand entrance. Her breath caught in her throat—so close to being done!
Hands spread like she had been taught, Seri matched her steps to Lady Mila’s gliding ones, and she carried the excessive train of skirts out with aplomb to the center of the floor. Prince Graeme’s eyes focused in on her, his eyes flicking to Seri’s savage appearance and then back to the lady before him. He gave her a curt nod, the same as all the others.
Lady Mila stood before the prince. She touched her hand to her forehead and then sank down into a deep curtsy. Behind her, hands entangled in the noblewoman’s skirts, Seri hesitated. Everyone was staring at her with expectant eyes, waiting to see if she’d bow… or hoping that she wouldn’t so she’d be punished.
Biting her lip, Seri closed her eyes and bent her head, the closest approximation to deference that she could give without blasphemy.
With her head bent, she was unable to see the priests as they raised their arms, but she knew the ceremony had begun when their liquid chanting reached her ears. The words flowed together in the old language, the language that all had shared long before the kingdoms had sundered and there had been Vidari or Athoni. She kept her head bent and her figure relaxed in repose, wondering how long it she would have to wait for Lady Mila to get up and move.
Moments passed and Seri began to grow nervous. There was no familiar tug on the painful cords in her hands to let her know that it was time to get up. Was she in trouble because she had not bowed? Were the guards approaching even now to come and take her away? Was this what Mila had planned, knowing full well that Seri wouldn’t bow?
A voice gasped to the side of her and then a low murmur began in the room. Curious, Seri opened her eyes and looked up.
A white glow of light had descended on the center of the floor, and Lady Mila looked up with a radiant face. The two priests continued to chant in the fluid language, their voices no longer bored, but exultant. Whispers flew around the room as the prince stood and stepped down from the dais, approaching the two of them.
A tiny, evil part of Seri was disappointed. As the prince’s chosen bride—the first in a thousand years—Lady Mila would be even more insufferable than before. Poor Lady Aynee had looked to be a more suitable, more amenable bride for the prince, but it was not to be.
But then the prince walked past Lady Mila, and his eyes were on Seri. That strangely compelling scent filled her nostrils. Dread coiled in the pit of her stomach, her gaze flitting to Lady Mila. Was there a mistake? The noblewoman stood, trying to jerk her skirts away from the delicate cords that held them to Seri’s hands. Mila’s face was pinched and bright red with ill-concealed rage.
Seri realized that the white light that had descended upon the midst of the floor was centered firmly on herself.
Not Lady Mila.
The cords dropped from hands gone suddenly numb. The prince stood by her side, his impassive face with the cold, dark eyes looking down at her. He took her by the elbow, turning Seri slowly so that she would face the crowd, the spicy scent of him nearly overwhelming her. Behind them, the priests continued their chants, in a new verse of the prayer that she had never heard before—an exultant, glorious one.
The prince took her hand and raised it high. “The High One has granted me a betrothed,” he called out in cultured, cold tones that carried across the still ballroom floor.
The room erupted into wild cheers.
Seri’s heart sank.
Chapter Four
Seri didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry when the prince grabbed her gold-smeared arm in a tight grip and tucked her hand in his elbow like she was a real lady. He leaned in and she could smell his breath, minty and warm. “Smile to everyone, please, and follow my lead.”
With that, he turned his politely schooled features out on the crowd and gave them a half wave of politeness. “The kingdom is very pleased at this unexpected turn of events. Truly, we are blessed by the gods.”
Blessed? She wanted to wrench her arm out of his grasp and run out of the room, to run away from the staring eyes and the shocked and disappointed stares of the women, the lecherous, sly looks of the men. No, she was not blessed.
The priests closed in around them, a sea of swirling green robes and chanting figures, blocking them from the effusive partygoers who had begun to crowd closer, wanting to see—and touch—the prince and his god-chosen betrothed. Part of Seri was grateful for the blockade of dark green robes, but the wild, Vidari part of her felt trapped. Her arm jerked in his grasp reflexively, and she twisted when he didn’t release her, trying to writhe out of his grip. “Let me go,” she whispered.
He leaned in close to her, the same schooled expression on his face. “You cannot leave except with me.” His words were as cold and neutral as ever. “Rest assured that I will be more than happy to release you when we have left the ballroom for a less public domicile.”
She swallowed the whine of distress building in her throat and clung to his arm. The surging, chattering crowd around her was even more alarming than the original one, and her nerves were shot. The glow that had surrounded her when the chanting rose was now covering both of them, and her vision was blurring from the white light that seemed to cover all. Was this some cruel joke? Surely it could not be her who was to be the wife of the prince. Not the first one chosen in—how long had Idalla mentioned? —three hundred years?
When the cheering crowd surged again and a man grabbed at her skimpy costume, Seri squeezed her eyes shut and leaned closer to the prince. For a brief flash, she was thankful his larger form nearly swallowed her own against his, and his arm covered her shoulders protectively. She wanted to hide away from these people—these hateful, horrible enemies that would not stop staring at her. Time blurred, the white light threatened to blind her, and she was cognizant of nothing save the prince’s stiff, strong form against her own.
The chorus of voices faded away, and Seri’s tightly shut eyes eased open. She had to blink hard to clear the focus of white from her eyes, but when she did, she could make out an opulent chamber, the windows set into the wall covered in more of the ornate, colored glass that the Athonites seemed so fond of. A large stone table took up the vast majority of the room with small, carved benches pushed underneath the lip of the table, and one very ornate, wooden chair at the far end.
Three guesses as to who that is for
, Seri thought wryly and gave her hand an experimental tug. To her surprised relief, the prince released it, and she flung herself away from him and through the advisers.
“What is this all about?” The words tumbled forth from her mouth before she had the good sense to think them through. “Why are you taking me away?” The white aura still surrounded her, still made it difficult to see. She wanted to shut her eyes for hours, grind her fists into them like a small child.
Anything to try to abate the gnawing horror in her stomach before it turned into reality.
As she watched, the prince took out an elegant handkerchief and began to wipe his hand down, a distasteful expression on his face. Offended that he would have to wipe her touch away, Seri’s lip curled with disgust. Typical Athonite.
He tossed the handkerchief down on the table and moved toward the ornate wooden chair—his chair. The cold irritation returned to his voice. “Next time we are in public together, please take it upon yourself to not coat your skin in gold dust.” He glanced over at her, as if seeing her appearance—sweaty, too-thin garment, smeared dust all over her nearly bare skin—for the first time. “And for that matter, please clothe yourself more appropriately.”
Seri’s mouth worked in a wordless protest. She didn’t know whether to scream at him in outrage… or rush up to him and wipe more of the gold dust all over his precious clothing. “You think I chose to wear this?”
“Did you not?” His voice was icy. “I find it difficult to believe that someone held you down and forced you to put on such elaborate clothing. You must have had some complicitness.”
Mutiny must have been obvious on her face; one of the green-robed advisers came to her side and offered her a thick black cloak. “This is… unexpected,” he said when silence filled the air.
The prince laughed—a harsh, bitter sound. “I do not believe that this begins to qualify as ‘unexpected.’”
It was almost as if they’d forgotten she was in the room, the way they talked around her. A purely Athoni trait, she’d learned from her short stint in the castle. Seri tugged the cloak around her body, hiding it from view and blowing one of the ridiculous feathers off her forehead.
Silence fell again, and all eyes were on the prince, including her own. His look was inscrutable; he had a way of schooling the expression on his face into a polite, cold mien, and the mask had fallen into place once again, something that irritated her to no end. They didn’t know what to do with her; that much was plainly obvious.
Stoking up her courage, Seri stood, clutching the cape tight around her body. “May I go?”
All eyes swung from the prince’s impassive face to her own scowling one. “Go?” One of the advisers stammered, “You cannot go.”
“Why can’t I? I’ve no wish to stay, and it’s obvious you don’t want me here.”
The prince’s cool gray eyes met her own, pinning her under their hard gaze. She wondered briefly what he would look like if he showed emotion—any emotion—other than royal distaste. “You cannot leave. We have much to be done.”
“I? I have much to do?” She returned his mocking laugh with one of her own. “I am a servant purchased for the week for a few coins. I owe you nothing.” The thought of those three lovely
dru
that had slipped between her fingers without any say on her part rankled. “I want my coins,” she added stubbornly, thinking of her family.
“You are the betrothed of the prince, first among women. The first betrothed in three hundred years,” a fat adviser said, his voice wobbling as much as his chin. “Money is no object to one of your position.”
It wasn’t? A mixture of joy and dread swam through her veins. “And what is my position?” she asked lightly, her voice faint to even her own ears.
“Once we have the coronation ceremony,” the fat adviser said, “you will be acknowledged as the betrothed of Prince Graeme of Athoni, revered and beloved by all, chosen by the One True God. When you marry, you will become a royal princesse of the kingdom.”
Seri stared into Prince Graeme’s coldly polite eyes and wanted to laugh.
Revered and beloved by all, except her cold-as-a-statue betrothed.
“I am Vidari,” she protested again, the objection sounding hollow even to her own ears. “I am not Athoni. By your own laws I cannot be a citizen, much less royalty.”
“The laws of the One God are irrefutable, even by royalty themselves,” Prince Graeme interjected. “I am afraid that choice is not an option.”