Molly popped back out of the trees and onto the walkway, effectively trapping Nara between us. “Of course.”
Nara spun in the direction of Molly. “You have a twig. In your hair.”
I tried to trap the laugh in my throat but seeing Molly standing there in such a lovely gown with a twig coming out of her hair was just too much given our already silly conversations earlier.
And then we were all laughing, even Nara.
“Are you okay?” I asked Nara as soon as the laughter died down. “We truly just wanted to know you were okay.”
She looked from Renna to me and then to Molly. “You guys know? That I’m—”
“Spending time with the king?” Molly offered wisely. “Yes, we know.”
“How—” Nara shook her head. “Never mind. That question has an obvious answer. The princes.”
“To be fair,” I explained, “only Renna found out at first. Then because she was worried about you, she told Molly and me.”
“Oh. That makes sense, I suppose,” Nara said with a tight smile.
She looked okay. A little tired with the dark circles under her eyes, but she also didn’t look bruised and battered. So there was that. I kept scanning her arms, wanting to look at her wrists for bruises that matched the ones I’d been given by the king, but from what I could see of her skin from around her navy gown, she was fine.
“So are you?” Molly asked gently in that way that only Molly could.
“Am I spending time with the king?” Nara asked. “Yes.”
Molly shook her head. “No.Are you okay?”
Nara took a deep breath. “Yes. I’m okay. Not...” She trailed off. “I thought being the king’s mistress would be far more... glamorous? He is kind to me though. And I’m not in Rallis.”
He was kind to her likely because she was giving him something he wanted. I swallowed down how repulsive that thought was. Even if Nara was blind to it right now, she still needed to be saved from this man.
“Well, if you are ever not okay,” I added at a whisper. “Please let someone know?”
Nara bounced her shoulders in a shrug. “I think sometimes even he just gets lonely. And for the most part he is easily... satiated.”
I tried not to lose my lunch on the spot.
“He can be charming when he wants to be and is quite handsome for his age,” Nara finished.
Molly also looked like she wanted to gag. “So, are you happy?” she asked.
Nara cocked her head. “No. I wouldn’t say that I am happy. But I also wouldn’t say that I am unhappy. I am out of Rallis. So for now, that is enough.”
I took a deep inhale, trying to bite my tongue. If she wasn’t happy with the king, then what did she think she was doing sleeping with a man who tortured people that merely irked him? Did she truly have no idea what kind of volatile situation she had just planted herself into? I’d always taken Nara to be shy but observant, not oblivious. Then I thought of her curiosity with the Hallow’s Eve outfits. Maybe there was a lure to being the king’s mistress. While it sounded like the makings of a grand love story, instead she’d planted herself in the middle of a tragedy.
I pushed my magic down and decided that to get Nara to see the light, tough love would not be getting us anywhere. We were going to have to kill her with kindness. Maybe there was a reason she didn’t want to return to Rallis. Or maybe there wasn’t. Either way, we needed to get to the bottom of this.
“Will he allow you to play cards with us?” I asked nicely. “Or see us, I suppose, since he doesn’t know we play cards.”
“Oh, he knows,” Nara said with a smirk. “He just doesn’t care.”
“Well he used to,” I snapped, unable to say it nicely. He’d left bruises on my wrist for that very reason.
“I will ask,” Nara said, unaffected by my harsh tone. “He feared his sons’ reaction to our...relationship, so there for a while I was sequestered away.” She paused. “Now that the princes know and the cat is out of the bag, so to speak, he may allow it. Just as he allows my trips down here for fresh air.”
Until this moment, I hadn’t realized how docile Nara was. Of course the king would have picked her. The king’s most glaring flaw was his constant need for control. And Nara was what he believed pliable. Easily controlled.
I had a sinking feeling in my gut. If Nara was truly just after an escape from Rallis, that was one thing. But if she was after a crown, the princes had severely underestimated her. How they had convinced her to take the king’s ring was beyond me. Having seen her in person made me even more terrified for her.
