“Oh, no.” Tu’s reply was too quick. “I would never presume,” he tacked on. “You are looking for a suitable consort.”
“And you are too old and insignificant, you said.” David continued to regard him intently.
Tu hoped his costume held up beneath that stare. He turned his head and cleared his throat. “We really do want you to be happy. The announcement surprised many.” It had devastated him, though he had expected it. He just had not expected it sosoon. He’d thought he would have years to accept David’s marriage to someone else. “We did wonder at the strangeness of the masked balls, but you are a good prince, and a good man, and you deserve to have your heart’s desire.”
David caught his breath, then straightened. He inclined his head and offered another polite smile. “That will have to remain a desire only, but I thank you for the kind words.”
“Remain?” Tu echoed breathlessly, shocked into raising his voice.
The curtains behind David twitched and then opened, revealing David’s father, the King himself, as a gray wolf.
Tu jerked his head down, not certain if he ought to slink away or bow or wait to do either until the King addressed him. David turned to walk back toward the curtain, and Tu watched him go, silent and frozen. He should have shuffled off before he was noticed, but this was likely his last glimpse of David until the public pomp surrounding his eventual wedding. Tu assumed he was already forgotten, in any case, and his racing heart in his ears left him in a strange, ringing silence filled only with the sound of his pulse and that word, that out of place word from David.
He did finally move back, only a foot or two, but enough to escape attention before the curtain closed behind David.
Except it did not.
David stood in front of the King, hesitating without stepping onto the dais.
“You are not enjoying yourself,” the King observed, voice lowered but just audible where Tu was stock-still against the wall.
“…Doing my best,” David answered.
“You are beingpolite,” the Kingreturned, but he seemed more worried than admonishing. “We want you to behappy. That’s why it’s this way. You said you didn’t care, but we want you to have the chance to know them. We’re not cruel.”
“I know that.” David tipped his head up, perhaps to look his father in the eye. “Your marriage was based on more than convenience, and I appreciate you wanting the same for me.” David paused, usually a sign he was about to make an unpleasant point. “Why not just learn about them and find the best one? I don’t think I have the heart for false courtship. I’m too honest.”
Tu pulled in a breath, scowling though David couldn’t and wouldn’t ever see.
“David,” a woman’s voice interrupted, making Tu distantly fret that the Kingandthe Queen might notice him at any moment. “We know you do not think of us as romantics, or as daring as you and your friends.” David made a sound of objection, which his mother ignored. “We were allowed to choose, and so will you. It will have to be someone suitable, but you should have a chance for friendship, if not anything else. We discussed this before you embarked upon this plan, do not forget.”
“Suitable is the most important requirement,” David replied without hesitation. “I am well aware. It was a point driven home long before you two thought to remind me of my duty.”
Tu closed his eyes, remembering how David had burst into his rooms as though he had been pushed, his eyes bright, a smile on his face despite his anxious movements and the nervous waver in his voice.
David’s voice was almost lifeless now as he restated what he must have previously discussed with his parents. “We must find someone not just of the proper background to attend these parties and comport themselves appropriately, but someone knowledgeable, who does not mind my interests, even if they do not share them.”
“What about someone to care for you?” the Queen cut in. “If they cared for you, we could teach them the rest of what it means to be married to the Heir. As long as they are suitable.”
“What does that mean?” David pressed, voice growing softer. “Make me laugh? Hold a conversation? Want me more than, or as well as, the crown and all that comes with it? If the rest of the world wants the good prince, someone who chooses me?”
He said it as though it was impossible.
“You can choose them,” the King argued stiffly, like someone deeply uncomfortable with an emotional conversation but having it anyway.
David huffed, with that hint of bitterness that had so startled Tu the first time he’d heard it. “I’ve done that before. Someone far wiser than me, which seemed a good thing, before then. Experience and wisdom to temper my idealism and theory.” Tu opened his eyes to study the tense line of David’s back. “Maybe…” David sighed and dropped his shoulders. “Maybe itwasa good thing, the right thing. What had to be done.”
Even if I end up hurt, he had said about Flor’s advice. But this was not about Flor.
“You may find that again.” The Queen stepped forward to pull David to her, reaching up to stroke his cheek and then straighten his mask. “There are many here tonight, and will likely be more at the next. You have only to speak to them to find out. And if not… we will try something else. But this was your idea, David.”
Tu bit his lip to stifle a shocked sound.
“I know.” David let his mother kiss his brow. “It is a duty and I will get through it. I will… try to smile more. And listen. But I told you from the outset that my heart would not be in it, because it is already taken. I will tell them, too, if they ask. Although, if their goal is the Prince, why should they?”
The heat in Tu’s chest was nothing at all like the hollow ache he had lived with for months. He was not used to anger, not personal anger, hot and shameful like this, and had nothing to do but clench his hands at his sides. His good, kind, wonderful David did not think love compatible with his station.Davidcould be loved, butthe Princecould not.
Tu had done that.
