Traitor's Masque (56 page)

Embrie just looked at him as though he were insane, if not dangerously so. “I’m not certain about very much these days,” she replied cautiously, “but I’m quite certain I haven’t got a grandmother.”

Ramsey smiled at her, but it was a sad smile, at the thought of how many years had been lost to lies. “Yes,” he responded gently, “in fact you do. And you’ve known her for most of your life.” He stopped, letting her think, letting her discover it on her own…

“Vianne?” She gasped in shock. “That’s absurd! Vianne could not be. My father never…”

Ramsey nodded in confirmation. She needed to know the whole truth. “Yes, Vianne,” he said, hoping she would be willing to hear him out. “She never told you because your father threatened to act against her family if she did. I believe that hiding it became a habit that was too hard to break, even when your father died.”

Embrie’s mouth opened and closed a few times before she managed to speak. “How could I have had a grandmother all this time—right in the house—and no one knew?” It was probably a bit much to absorb. Not just the fact of it, but the pain of realizing how badly she’d been lied to.

“But wait.” Embrie’s brows had drawn together in furious thought. “When she came to you with this story, you believed her? Why would she have bothered, knowing how implausible it would sound?”

“She brought proof,” Ramsey answered, bracing himself for the next revelation. “Papers, some taken from a locked box hidden in your stepmother’s study, and one that Vianne had secretly kept for years.”

Still stuck on “grandmother,” Embrie was obviously not yet coherent enough for “papers.” Ramsey forged ahead as carefully as possible, trying to make himself unmistakably clear. “They were quite important papers. In fact, one of them was your father’s will.”

Embrie looked neither surprised nor concerned. She had, he suspected, put the matter of her inheritance behind her several years ago.

“And the other,” he went on slowly, “the one in your grandmother’s possession, was a certificate of marriage.”

“Of marriage,” Embrie said slowly, cautiously. “Whose marriage?”

“Your father’s,” Ramsey said quietly. “Not his second marriage, but his first.” When Embrie’s face went pale he picked up her hand and grasped it firmly. “Embrie, your father was married to your mother. He let everyone believe otherwise, even lied to his closest friends, because he could not bear the humiliation of having anyone know that he had married a kitchen maid.”

Trystan felt herself stop breathing. The whole world seemed to be spinning around her. The rough stones under her thighs, the dull ache in her wrists, and the warm pressure of Donevan’s hand were the only things that seemed real.

She had a grandmother. Vianne was her grandmother. And her parents had been married. For an instant she felt a blinding surge of anger. How could they have let her live like that, believing she was alone, for so long? But the anger drained away as quickly as it had come. She knew too well the power of a threat. Had let Malisse rule her with threats for years. She was in no position to judge Vianne.

“So after Vianne convinced you of who she was, she told you what had happened to me?” Trystan managed to ask the question in a more-or-less normal voice. Donevan was still watching her with evident concern. He had no doubt known this would not be easy for her to hear.

“She had guessed at some of it,” he answered, looking relieved that she had weathered the news. “And thought, correctly in some respects, that I was her only chance of getting you back alive.” He squeezed her hand gently. “She risked a great deal for you, you know. I believe she’s always loved you, but never had much of a chance to show it.”

Trystan shook her head. “The truth is, she’s always shown it; I simply never recognized that love for what it was.” A tear threatened, and she blotted it with her sleeve.

“Your grandmother,” Donevan admitted, “is a rather terrifying woman.”

Trystan smiled in spite of herself. The image of Vianne terrorizing the prince of Andar with a wooden spoon was an oddly appealing one. “I’ve never found her quite as terrifying as my stepmother, but she can be intimidating,” Trystan agreed.

“Speaking of Lady Colbourne,” Donevan added.

Trystan shot him a quick look of dismay. “Do we have to?” she muttered darkly.

“She was my second visitor,” he confessed. It earned him another disbelieving look from Trystan. “I believe her intent was to contain the scandal she knew would arise when it was discovered you had been staying at Westhaven at the time of Lady Westerby’s death.”

That definitely sounded like Malisse. She would have been furious at the need to protect her good name from her stepdaughter’s misdeeds, but she would have risked it. “If she knew what happened, why has she…” Trystan considered for a moment. “She has been suspiciously polite ever since I returned.” She turned to Donevan, hoping for an explanation. “Did you…?”

Donevan actually laughed, with evident satisfaction. “I did,” he answered. “I told her that I knew who you were and I showed her the documents your grandmother provided. She had guessed,” he added, “about your parents. Your father hinted, but never told her the whole story—how he and your mother ran away together when he was young and foolish, and she died shortly after you were born. Malisse chose to assume the worst when your father never produced proof, and then, after he passed, she saw a way to profit from that assumption.”

“What did she stand to gain?” Trystan wanted to know.

Donevan’s look did not bode well for Malisse. “Your father’s will left half of his estate to you, Embrie. By simply declining to contradict the general public rumors of your illegitimacy, your stepmother was able to control his entire fortune herself. It was a despicable fraud, and by the time a judge is finished with her, I suspect she will come to regret it nearly as much as she should.” He pressed her hand again. “You should know, however, that my barristers have confirmed that you are, in fact, an astonishingly wealthy young woman.”

Trystan was rather tired of losing her powers of speech, but it was a lot to learn about oneself all at the same moment.

She was forgiven.

She had a grandmother.

She was not illegitimate.

And she was quite disturbingly rich. It all felt so unreal, so very wrong somehow.

“I don’t feel like I deserve it,” she burst out, before she could think better of it. “All this good, when I’ve done nothing but make horrible decisions.”

Donevan was silent for a moment. “My aunt said something similar to me, not so long ago,” he finally answered. “She wondered what I would have been like, had it not been for my brother.” He looked off into the distance thoughtfully. “I think she was trying to say that I didn’t deserve his blighting effect on my life. But when I thought about it, I realized that I wouldn’t care to change anything.”

Reaching across the space between them, Donevan tipped up Embrie’s chin and looked into her eyes.

“Life is too precious for regret,” he told her. “Remorse and forgiveness are important, yes, but not regrets. Because in the end, we affect each other in unforeseen ways. No one would have chosen the path you have walked. But if it had not been for all the misunderstandings, all the suffering, and yes, the betrayals, we would not be sitting here today.” Trystan tried to protest, but he stopped her. “The plot would have gone forward, and you would not have been there to stop it. My father would likely be dead. They were planning to kill me before they decided that marriage would be preferable, so I would be dead as well, and Rowan would be king. Your grandmother would have had no reason to come out of hiding and your heritage would never have been revealed.”

He smiled at her, and suddenly, Trystan felt as though the entire world had come out from behind a cloud.

“So you see, perhaps we should thank Rowan, after all,” he finished, dropping his hand and sighing, “for making all of this possible.”

Trystan sensed a sort of melancholy when Donevan mentioned his brother. “What happened to him, then?” she asked tentatively. “To Rowan, I mean.”

Donevan’s lips twisted. “He’s gone,” he replied simply. “In the end, I saw him for what he was and I let him go.”

Trystan wanted to comfort him as he had done for her, but she’d had so little experience either offering or receiving such a thing that she found herself holding back. “Do you miss him?” she asked quietly. “Or hope he will return?”

Donevan shook his head without hesitation. “I exiled him,” he answered grimly, a note of resolution in his voice. “Forever. As the prince of Andar I promised that he would die if he ever set foot in this kingdom again. But…” He hesitated. “Yes, in a way, I miss him. I miss the boy he was, and the man he could have been.” His voice grew tight and harsh. “And I wish I had never known what it felt like to want to kill my own brother.”

Trystan did reach out then, to clasp his arm in sympathy. Donevan looked at her in surprise and answered by placing his other hand over hers. Their eyes met, and this time they held.

“Embrie.” Donevan did not move, but his tone and expression changed, to become both humorous and hopeful. “My brother is gone. My castle is turned upside down. My father is a cantankerous wreck and my kingdom is in shambles. And after all this trouble over the small matter of one masqued ball, it seems I am still in need of a wife.”

Trystan’s breath caught. Her heart threatened to jump out of her chest and her brain went dead.

“I’m not asking for an answer right away,” he went on, dropping his gaze to the top of his hand where it rested on hers, “but I am going to ask the question. I don’t care about your money. I don’t care about your family. I don’t even care that some people are going to question my sanity when I tell them.” He drew a deep breath. “And what I’m hoping to tell them is that you have agreed to marry me.”

Trystan felt tears and laughter rising together as he finished, and said the first thing that popped into her head.

“That didn’t sound like a question.”

Her prince looked at her and raised a disbelieving eyebrow. “Are you, Trystan Embrie Colbourne, going to quibble about language at a time like this?”

She nodded, not quite managing to hold back a smile that threatened to split her face in two. “Your Highness,” she answered around her laughter, “I intend to quibble quite strenuously about whatever I choose for a very long time to come.”

His answering smile was lopsided and perfect.

“Besides,” she added with an irrepressible twinkle, “you haven’t even told me why you want to marry me.”

Donevan subjected her to a mock glare and slipped off the wall. He came to stand in front of her, took both her hands in his and addressed her.

“Embrie,” he said, quite seriously this time, “some weeks ago we stood here and I accused you of seeing me, perhaps more clearly than I saw myself. And you answered, by speaking of all the things you could not see. Things that we concealed from each other to protect our secrets. Since then I have decided that I no longer wish to have secrets from you. So I will tell you what you wished to know. Starting with this: what I love, now and forever, is you.” Trystan stopped even trying to hold back her tears. “What I fear is that you will never be able to trust me enough to love me in return.” Donevan’s gray eyes held a depth of sincerity that banished all possibility of doubt. “What I hate is those people who have used you and countless others for their own gain. What I envy is my aunt Lizbet and her husband, whose lives have given me hope that marital happiness is not impossible.” Those eyes crinkled in a smile that would have melted a far more resistant heart than Trystan’s. “I live for the day you say you will marry me, and I would not hesitate to die if it would keep you safe. And I get up every morning with hope, rather than despair, because I believe there is a purpose to everything we have done and everything we will do. That purpose, I believe, has conspired to bring us together and so, I ask you, Trystan Embrie Colbourne… will you marry me?”

Trystan’s laughter and tears could not really have been separated. “Your Highness,” she answered through those happy tears, trying and failing to hide the depth of her emotions by matching his solemn demeanor, “I would be pleased to accept your proposal.”

His Highness did not bother to hide anything. He picked her up off the wall and whirled her around while she shrieked with laughter. When he set her down, however, his face was stern.

“Miss Colbourne,” he admonished with mock severity, “I have not given you permission to address me with such irritating formality. I believe I told you my name is Donevan.”

“Yes,” his wife-to-be responded, smiling sweetly, “but now that I know it irritates you, I will be sure to refer to you as ‘Your Highness’ as often as possible.”

His answering laugh warmed Trystan to her toes.

“Then I can see,” he said, smiling back and taking her upturned face between his hands, “that I may have to resort to underhanded tactics.” And he kissed her.