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I waited impatiently just inside the doorway, peering out into the driving rain for a glimpse of Julius or Nokto. Of course, the rain would choose now to pick up again. Julius wouldn’t like it when he came back and I told him to change into dry clothes, but I didn’t need him getting sick. Not with whatever was going on.
“I suppose you won’t tell me, either?” I asked Mark, standing beside me and frowning alternately into the darkness outside and the dark hallway behind us.
“I have my orders,” he said simply.
Sometimes, the chain of command really frustrated me. My guard detail answered to me unless there was a threat, in which case they told me what to do, because, as everybody had said since I was just Chevalier’s maid, I didn’t know what was good for me. Well, walking around in the rain wasn’t good for Nokto. I was rehearsing the speech I would give him about that when he and Julius came into view.
He looked awful.
The slump in his shoulders and the heaviness in his steps was obvious from a distance, and as he got closer, I could see that his face was pale and drawn, with dark circles under his crimson eyes. I would have run to meet him if Mark hadn’t stopped me with a hand on my arm.
“What are you doing up?” Nokto asked wearily as he stepped inside.
“I couldn’t sleep because nobody will tell me what’s going on,” I said irritably, shaking free from Mark and pressing a hand to Nokto’s forehead. “You have a fever! Why were you out there?”
He forced a smile and shrugged. A violent shiver ran through him, turning the smile to a grimace. Realization hit me like a punch to the gut.
“She poisoned the tea,” I said in disbelief. “And you drank it. Why would you…” The lump in my throat stopped me from saying anything more. I threw my arms around his waist and hugged him tightly, squeezing my eyes shut and pressing my cheek to his chest. He stiffened immediately, his breath catching, but surprise didn’t explain his erratic heartbeat.
“Thank you, and never do that again,” I choked. I pulled back and glared up at him through my tears. “Never. Mark, go get the doctor. Julius, change into dry clothes. Nokto, come with me.” I took his cold, clammy hand and pulled him after me, but his quiet voice stopped me mid-step.
“There’s no point in calling the doctor. I’ve already taken the antidote.”
I spun and stared at him. “You knew before you caught up to me.”
“Princess-” Julius started.
“Do not tell me you won’t leave me alone,” I said to him vehemently. “I’m not alone, and I don’t need you and Nokto sick. Go change into dry clothes. Mark can keep me safe between here and Nokto’s room.”
I spun on my heel and tugged Nokto after me, knowing there would be no further argument. Nokto’s boots squelched with each step through the dark, empty hallways, and I felt every shiver travel down his arm and through his hand to mine. Anger, worry, and fear churned in my stomach, but I held my tongue until we were alone in his room with Mark standing guard outside the door.
“If you took the antidote, why are you still so sick?” I asked, leading him to the bed and pushing on his shoulder to make him sit down.
“It’s a slow acting poison,” he muttered. “I won’t die. I’ll just be miserable until morning. Unless you keep this up,” he tried to quip as I stripped his wet coat and jacket off of him. The attempted tease fell as flat as the clothes I threw on the floor.
“If you’re going to waste your breath with that kind of talk, then you can start explaining,” I said, undoing his tie.
“Somebody changed your schedule.”
“I know that,” I said, tossing his tie onto the pile of wet clothes and moving on to his sword belt. “Sariel’s aide gave me the updated version yesterday.”
“He didn’t give it to me, and Sariel didn’t authorize the change. You left an hour before you were supposed to and went to the wrong manor.”
I frowned, propping his sword up against the wall and squatting down to unlace his boots. “I knew I should have asked Sariel before I left.”
“Your guards were suspicious, but they didn’t see her do anything. I think she poisoned the entire teapot before you arrived,” he said, resting his elbows on his knees and putting his face in his hands. “She poured from a new one for me.”
I pulled his other boot off and glanced up at his strained expression. “Hold on. Let me get some towels.”
He just nodded. I hopped up and ran to the bathroom, grabbing a few towels, and I ran back to him, dropping all but one on the bed beside him and starting with his hair. My hand brushed against his forehead again. It was even hotter than before.
“Your fever’s getting too high,” I said. “Is your shirt wet? It is. Where are your clean shirts?”
“Top drawer on the left,” he muttered, immobile, as I unbuttoned his shirt.
“You didn’t have to drink that tea,” I scolded him, peeling the shirt off of him and toweling him dry. “If you already knew she poisoned it, you must have been looking into her already. Why didn’t you just arrest her?”
“I needed proof.”
“What about the bottle of poison?” I asked angrily. “Or getting Sariel’s aide to confess? Your life is too valuable to throw away like that!” I threw the towel on the floor with the rest of the laundry and stormed over to his bureau for a dry shirt.
“My life.” He chuckled weakly. “My life doesn’t mean a thing.”
“Don’t say something like that!”
I pulled his arms through the sleeves without much help from him. His skin was hot to the touch.
“This isn’t how the fantasy goes,” he mumbled. “I’m supposed to be undressing you.”
I blushed, but didn’t stop until I’d finished buttoning his shirt. “Your fever’s getting worse.”
“Yeah, I think you’re right,” he muttered. “I really want to kiss you again.”
“If it doesn’t break soon, I’m calling the doctor,” I said, straightening up and spinning away. “Lie down. I’ll be right back.”
I went to the bathroom and wet a cloth in the sink. When I returned to the bedroom, he was lying on his side where I’d left him, his eyes closed and his legs still hanging over the edge of the bed, as if he’d just fallen over. I sighed and helped him lie down properly, lifting his legs into bed, pushing his shoulder so he rolled - or fell - onto his back, and tucking the blankets around him. He didn’t open his eyes once.
“Is this how you were with your mother?” he asked.
“Yes.” I sat on the edge of the bed next to him and lay the cool, damp cloth on his forehead. “Why would you do this? Are you trying to get yourself killed?”
He chuckled and winced. “Maybe I am. Licht’s been trying since he killed Mama, but he can’t pull it off, either.”
My heart stopped for a second.
“He…what?” I gasped.
There was nothing but emptiness in his dark crimson eyes when he opened them and looked up at me. “He killed Mama. The night before our tenth birthday party. You didn’t know that?”
I stared at him in shock. “W-why would I know that?”
He closed his eyes again. “Oh, I thought Chevalier or Sariel would have told you by now.”
I swallowed hard and curled my fingers into my skirt. “Just…just rest.”
“He didn’t want to,” he continued. “But she was going to kill me, so he had to. It’s my fault he doesn’t laugh or smile anymore. I made him what he is. A mother-killer.”
I felt sick. I knew there was something painful in the twins’ past, but I never expected something like this.
“Why would she try to kill you?” I whispered.
“‘Twins born in the palace bring both good and bad fortune,’” he mumbled, as if he were reciting something. “She couldn’t handle the pressure anymore.”
I swallowed again to budge the lump in my throat. “We can talk about this later. You need to rest.”
He opened his eyes again and looked up at me, his crimson eyes raw and vulnerable. “Don’t think badly of her. She loved us. She wouldn’t let the midwife kill me, and she tried to keep everything from us as we got older, but we knew. We knew what people were saying about her and about us. Nobody wanted us around. It just got to her, that’s all.”
I shook my head. “Nobody wanted my mother and me around, but she never tried to kill me,” I said, my voice shaky.
The corner of his lip turned up in a wry smile. “She probably didn’t beat you, either.” He turned his face away, toward the uncovered window and the storm raging outside. “It started with competitions. She made us compete in everything. Whoever won was the good boy, whoever lost was the bad boy, and the bad boy had to be punished.”
I couldn’t hold back the tears anymore. They streamed silently down my cheeks like the rain streaming down the glass, but the only moisture on Nokto’s face was sweat from the fever.
“We were happy, though. We did everything together. Nobody wanted us near the other princes, so it was just us until we met Yves, and he didn’t care that we were twins. He wanted to be our big brother. He hated it whenever one of us had bloody, bruised hands from Mama. Sariel hated it, too, but it didn’t stop. It just got worse.”
I put a hand over my mouth to mute my sobs. There was no anguish on his face, no sorrow. This was just his reality.
“That night, she said it was the last competition. She gave us swords - real swords, not practice swords - and she told us to fight to the death. We cried and begged her not to make us do it. But she said she didn’t want both of us anymore, and if she had to do it herself, she would. She took my sword, and I couldn’t even move. Licht killed her to protect me.” His brow furrowed. “He killed Mama, and I killed him.”
“Nokto…”
“She should’ve let the midwife kill me. It would’ve solved everything.”
“No,” I whispered, shaking my head. “That’s not true.”
“It’s not like any of them need me,” he continued, as if he hadn’t heard me. “Chevalier, Leon, Jin, Clavis - they’re all smart and talented, and I’m just the court jester. Useless. It won’t make any difference if I die.”
“That’s not true,” I said, louder this time. “Y-you’re intelligent, and charming, and Chevalier relies on you so much for all the business deals and trade agreements you’re so good at making. You can talk to anybody, and you’re always three steps ahead of the game that nobody even knows you’re playing. None of your brothers can do that. They don’t want you or Licht dead, and - and I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
His eyes turned back to me, and he winced, pulling his hand out from under the blankets to brush his hot fingers across my wet cheek. “You really believe all that, don’t you?”
“Of course I do.” I wiped my cheeks, and his hand fell limply to the blanket. “It’s probably time for me to change this,” I said, removing the cloth from his forehead and checking his temperature again. He was still hot, but not as bad as earlier. “I think your fever’s getting better. Let me just rinse this out, and I’ll be right back. Do you want me to bring you some water?”
His eyes closed. “No. Just…go back to your room, Ivetta.”
“You’re too sick to be left alone,” I said, standing up. “And I’d be too worried about you to sleep, anyway.”
He muttered something as I walked away, but I didn’t quite catch it, and I didn’t ask. He’d already told me more than he would under normal circumstances, and I didn't want to hear more. I went to the bathroom and rinsed the cloth in the sink. My eyes were red and puffy from crying, and the weight of the day was pressing down on my shoulders. I was tired. It had to be close to midnight, if not past it already. The sofa sounded good right now. It had pillows and a blanket folded neatly at one end, as if it was waiting for me. But if Nokto’s fever went up again, I’d need to call the doctor. I couldn’t sleep yet.
His breathing was slow and even when I returned. I arranged the cloth on his forehead again, whispered “goodnight,” and picked up the room, hanging up his overcoat, dropping the rest of his clothes in the laundry hamper, and closing the drapes over the windows. He didn’t stir or speak. I went to the door and opened it a crack.
“He’s asleep now, but he still has a fever,” I said quietly to Julius and Mark. “I’m going to stay here tonight.”
Julius opened his mouth, probably to argue, but thought better of it and nodded. I shut the door and went back to Nokto, sitting at his side until the cloth needed to be rinsed again. His forehead was a little cooler. I rinsed and replaced the cloth, hung my dressing gown on the edge of the sofa, and curled up under the throw blanket on the sofa, listening to the rain as my heart throbbed painfully in my chest.
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