I was still standing in the hallway, staring out the window, not really seeing the silver wetness sheeting down the pane, when footsteps approached.
I turned to find Merron. Fatigue and wariness dulled his features.
“Hey.” I reached for his elbow, but he stepped back.
“Your Highness,” he said stiffly.
I winced. Well, his avoidance this past month had definitely been intentional. “Yeah, about that. I?—”
“I just need to know one thing,” he said. “That day, when we were together. Did you know? Had you already decided you were going to marry him that same night?”
My mouth went dry. “Merron...”
“Just tell me.” His eyes shimmered, accusation held at bay. “I need to know what that was. If that was why you told me to forget you, afterward.”
A prickle invaded my throat, and I bought a moment’s delay by squeezing my dagger.Zephyrine, help me.
I’d never meant those words so literally, but now I knew I had a goddess on my hip—one I hadn’t treated with much courtesy, or any deference to speak of. In fact, I’d done an embarrassing amount of swearing in front of her.
The dagger hummed.Yes?
I tried to make up for my heathen ways by adopting a tone of supplication.Tell me what to say to him. Please. I can’t stand making him suffer.
A laugh murmured against my palm and faded.
I frowned. Unhelpful vixen.
The truth it was, then. “Yes, I...knew.”
Pain bled through Merron’s stoicism. “And you didn’t tell me?”
“Because you would’ve tried to stop me.” A pleading note snuck into my voice. “You know you would have.”
He swallowed in silence, and if nothing else, I appreciated him not coming out with a denial we both would’ve known to be a lie.
“I deserved better,” he finally said. “From you.”
Oh, goddess. I wanted to pull up the carpet and crawl underneath, then tack it back down to the floorboards. “You did. You absolutely did. And I’m sorry. I hate that I hurt you. I have no excuse. This whole marriage thing was a mistake, and I’m stupid for having done it.”
“Then you...regret it?”
“Deeply.”
He recoiled like I’d delivered an aimed blow. “Goddess, Harlowe, that’s even worse.”
“Worse? What? How?”
“Because.” His brows drew together. He looked so...woebegone, with the silvered light robbing his skin and hair of their rich brown hues. “If you regret marrying him, that makes this whole thing a waste. It means I lost you for nothing. It means I feel this way for no reason.”
My chest caved in. A thousand excuses bubbled in my throat—aspersions on Kyven’s honor, promises of an annulment, denials that I could feel anything for some russet-haired prince of Hightower. But none of it would’ve helped. I’d ground Merron’s heart to a fine powder, and I couldn’t seem to stop doubling down on that process.
So I said the truest thing possible. “I did it for Amryssa.”
“Amryssa.” A hard wall went up behind his eyes. “Right. Of course.”
Shit. Why had I gone with that? If I stuck my foot into my mouth any further, I’d start digesting it. I tried to explain, but he fended me off with a raised hand.
“Don’t. Just don’t, okay? I don’t want to hear another word about how you’d go to the ends of the earth for her when you refuse to do a single thing for me.”
