I wandered through the crowds, Numair at my side because Juliette had found herself a girl and a guy for the night.
As we wandered the edges of the block party, the clop of approaching horse hooves gave me pause. I glanced up, intercepting a signal from a scout posted on a rooftop, then turned and waited. A white-and-silver liveried messenger pulled up, dismounted, and jogged towards me.
A palace messenger.
He bowed with a flourish and held out a letter. He waited until I took it, bowed again, then remounted his horse all without speaking to me.
The envelope was addressed to the Lady of House Faronne. I stared at it, almost afraid.
“Do you want me to open it?” Numair asked.
“Rip it open and get it over with,” Édouard said. Where the hell had he emerged from?
I did, scanning the handwritten sentences. There were only a few, as if the writer was remembering how to craft words. It wasn’t incoherent, and the script was elegant, but Fae never believed in short messages.
Yet this one was short.
I glanced up at them. “It's from Prince Renaud. The official offer of truce.”
Official meant legal, the weight of the city crown thrown behind it. They stared at me, grim and still but unsurprised. We'd been waiting for such a missive.
“He's inviting ‘Lady Aerinne and escort’ to a ball to precede the first day of negotiations, to be followed by a city-wide faire.” Saying the words felt surreal. A ball. Afaire.“Court attire, and attendance is not optional. Signed, Renaud Gauthier, High Lord of House Montague, Prince of Everenne.”
I turned away, palming the second slip of paper that had been enfolded in the first. The first letter, formal with the Prince’s silver seal. This one. . .
When I entered my bedroom, locking the door behind me, I unfolded it for the second time, reading the words slowly, a strange thrill of fear and anticipation running up my spine.
If I showed my House the note, they would seize their swords and storm the palace again to defend my honor.
So I wouldn’t show them. I would take this fight to a different field.
We have only just met face-to-face, and the nature of our meeting was not one I would have chosen. Perhaps it is just as well. I would rather you understand completely the nature of the male you challenged.
I told you I did not wake to entertain children on a playground.
I woke, Aerinne, for you.
Fair warning. I mean for you to be mine.
You may fight me if you choose—I would relish it. In the end, submission is inevitable. . .but not only yours.
—Yours, Renaud.
P.S. Sanity is the dream of my distant youth. I beg you, tread carefully. I do not wish to kill you.
ChapterTwelve
PRESENT, THE MIDNIGHT BALL CONT. . .
Prince Renaud lowered his mouth to my ear, his voice a breath of sound. “Do not run from me.”
“And if I do?”
“Run, and I will give chase, my halfling.”
Music began, a duo of harps with percussion that echoed the staccato beats of my heart, a wordless feminine voice twining through the notes, and we danced.
“Youhaveno right to hold me like this.”
