“Since you’ve been so reluctant to abandon your princely obligations, which is honorable, truly, I thought I should make it as effortless as possible for you to fulfill your duties as host.” She strode past him into the room.
Alder stared at her, frozen in his place at the doorway. He made no mention of the dream, but she did not think he would, real or not. He had come to her in her bedchamber and imagined her a Westrende gown. Mireille suspected those were things a prince of Rivenwilde would not admit even upon the threat of death.
Safely inside and a good distance past, she turned to face him. “So, I will take dinner here, with you.” Her tone brooked no argument, but he did appear as if he had one at the ready. Mireille smiled. “Alder.”
His brow lowered. “Why do I imagine Noal will not need to be ordered to bring a second plate?”
“He is very clever, I’m certain he’ll sort it out.” She glanced around the room, looking for something,anythingto redirect their conversation. She refused to let one more night go by without learning something useful or breaking down his walls. Her gaze caught on a stack of books atop a side table. “Do you read often?” The beginnings of a civil conversation, at the least, even if she felt a bit like a ninny asking in the middle of his personal library.
“When necessary.”
Her gaze shot back to him, where he stood suddenly close. Not menacingly, exactly, but her pulse picked up a beat. She said, “Surely you enjoy at least some activities that aren’t strictly necessary. Or do you only find satisfaction brooding alone in your dark study?”
A look of genuine surprise crossed his face. It did not last long. “I do notbrood. I have never.”
She had to bite down a smile. “Highness, I daresay it is one of your most finely honed talents.”
“What would you know of my talents?”
He was baiting her, she knew it. She shrugged. “If you have any others, they have not been demonstrated thus far.”
A noise came from deep within his throat. “And what talents have you to speak of?”
Mireille had sparred with nobles before, and she knew the prince was quick, but a long-buried ember lit in her at his smug expression. She found she would like very much to wipe it from, at the very least, those lips.
There was a talent she could show him, one of her finest, and though it bore a high price, the game she was attempting had even higher stakes. She lifted her chin, swallowing the familiar sensation of grief tickling her throat. “I will show you, if you like. But I cannot do it here.”
There was no disguising the surprise that flitted across his features.
She would have given nearly anything for Noal to interrupt them with dinner that very moment and relieve her from a show of boldness, but the corridor outside the study remained stubbornly silent.
The tickle in her throat grew to a lump as Alder offered his arm. Her hand nestled in the crook of his elbow, Alder gestured toward the door. “Lead the way.”
His tone gave her courage. It was a dare, and if Mireille knew anything, it was that men on a gamble always had their tell.
* * *
She satat the piano she had discovered during their palace tour—the very one she had avoided. Gleaming instruments stood around them in silent witness, the blue and gold draperies nearly black in the moonlight. Looking down at the keys before her, Mireille took a shuddering breath. But Alder stood at her back, waiting, and she placed her fingers on the heavy ivory keys.
She could do it. It was only a simple song. She had done far more dangerous and daring things. Deciding on one she had played a hundred times before, she closed her eyes, but her fingers made a different choice.
Mireille nearly missed a note at the unexpected tune, one of the last songs she had played for her mother. It had been a favorite. But she did not falter, letting herself sink into the music, her fingers moving without thought, always just where they should be. The instrument was impeccable and her notes built to a devastating crescendo that echoed through the dark hall. She had needed this, she realized, so lost in the fae world with only Thomas to anchor her to everything she had left behind. She had needed the reminder of who she was, of what she had endured before and why it was so important to give her all. The song tapered off, its final notes a receding tide.
Swallowing back tears, she managed a casual, “There, do you still find me so talentless?”
When Alder did not reply, she looked back at him. He held her gaze, his dark eyes searching. He said not a word, but lifted his hand. She slid hers into it, their gazes locked. Moonlight cut a sharp line across his features, a stark reminder that he was wholly fae. But he only stood, keeping hold of her hand, his expression soft. She rose from the bench, her body seemingly drawn to his of its own will, her heart hammering in her throat. They were very close. They were very alone.
“Extraordinary,” he breathed.
Her lips parted, and his eyes tracked the motion. Then, as if suddenly remembering himself, he turned and precisely tucked her hand into the crook of his arm.
Heat rose up Mireille’s neck as he led her from the room without a word.
In the study, Noal and Kin hovered near a table perfecting two place settings.
Alder released Mireille from his arm, stiffly gesturing for her to enter. She no more than took a step inside, having given up discovering anything from the man after their encounter, when he cleared his throat, leaned in, and said, “I enjoy sculpture. And, it must be said, I am not terribly unskilled at it.”
She spun to ask him more, but he was already disappearing down the corridor, leaving Mireille to dine alone.
