The day after Chevalier’s birthday was a Sunday. It still felt strange to dress in my least formal clothes before I went to church, especially after wearing an elaborate ball gown the night before, but I knew it felt stranger still to walk into a chapel full of servants and not look like them. At least the commoner’s dresses I had were fancier than anything I’d ever owned when I actually was a commoner, so I didn’t feel underdressed. My best used to be the worst in the congregation, after all.
So much had changed, and yet, so much was the same.
The palace chapel was a beautiful building, much larger than the one Mother and I attended in the village, and every window bore ornate stained glass images of roses. A massive organ took up the entire wall behind the altar, its golden pipes extending all the way to the ceiling. People filled most of the pews, but none were members of the royal family. There were a handful of party guests in attendance, though. Whenever there was a big event, I could expect to see at least one or two of the visiting nobility in church. Otherwise, it was just me and the servants. The people I used to work with.
It had been really hard at first. Walking into a new church without Mother had been difficult enough, and then I had to fake a smile and tell everybody to stop bowing and curtsying, and please, just call me Ivetta, not Princess. And they’d all assumed I wanted to sit in the front row where everybody could see me. What I’d wanted to do was burst into tears and run away, but I sat there, trying to focus on the sermon, not looking at the unopened Bible on my lap, knowing a single glance at it would do me in. I’d fled as soon as the service was over and spent the rest of the day crying in my room.
Sometimes, I still did that.
I glanced at the empty pew beside me. Mother and I used to sit alone at the back of church until I was seven or eight years old, when she took me next door to volunteer our assistance to Mrs. Stotts. Baby Henry had been squalling all afternoon, and Mrs. Stotts had been the definition of harried when she opened the door, bouncing him on her shoulder while Jason, then a toddler, tugged at her skirt and jabbered on and on. She was far too tired to care about the gossip and rumors regarding Mother’s background. Mother and I took them off her hands until Mr. Stotts returned from work, and it wasn’t long until we were babysitting regularly, inside and outside of church, which meant we weren’t sitting alone anymore.
I smiled, envisioning the familiar scene: Rachel, asleep on her father’s lap, looking so small encircled in his brawny blacksmith’s arms; one or both of the twins sitting on my lap, much to Jason’s dismay, although he couldn’t explain why that bothered him or even meet my eye for all his awkward blushing; Mother and Mrs. Stotts separating a fidgeting Henry from a grumpy Ron, warning them with looks and hissed shushing to behave. Of course, the seating arrangement changed as necessary to keep everybody quiet and under control.
My mind was wandering a lot today. I tried to return my attention to the pastor’s sermon and the open Bible on my lap, but it wasn’t long before my focus shifted again, this time to the notes Mother had scrawled in the margin on every page. It was just a word here or there, with an occasional paragraph of thoughts in places.
So true.
Love this.
Remember!
It was a breath of fresh air sometimes, like I had a little piece of her, still speaking to me. And sometimes, it felt suffocating.
She wasn’t the reason I was in church today, not directly. I hadn't walked through those doors for tradition's sake, or out of a sense of duty to her. Yes, she had brought me to church every Sunday as far back as I could remember, and we’d read the Bible together every morning, too, but somewhere along the way, it stopped being her faith and truly became mine. Although I’d nearly lost it when she fell ill.
I ran my fingers across the thin paper and the closely spaced lines of small text. This was the page. The one where I’d slammed the Bible shut and told her I couldn’t do it anymore. She had been mostly bedridden by then, and it wasn’t us reading together anymore as much as it was me reading to her, and I just couldn’t do it that morning. I had been getting angrier and angrier at God as she got sicker and sicker, and that was my breaking point. We had an argument about it. Well, I argued. And cried. And she listened patiently until my flow of words stopped. Then, she gently reminded me there was no promise stating we wouldn’t have to experience pain because of our faith. The promise was we wouldn’t have to experience it alone, and it wasn’t the end. No matter how hopeless a situation seemed, He could always turn it to good.
She’d underlined the verse three times: All things work together for our good.
It had been a hard pill to swallow. It still was sometimes.
“Let us pray.”
I shut the Bible and my eyes, bowed my head, and folded my hands while the pastor said the closing prayer. When he finished, I repeated “Amen” with the rest of the congregation, and then I stood, plastering a smile on my face and preparing to greet the visitors. Etiquette stated I needed to chat with them a few minutes before I could leave. Most of the time, I didn’t mind the small talk, especially since I didn’t really have any close personal connections with people in this church yet, but I wanted a little time to myself before I met Chevalier for lunch. And it was really cold today. Julius insisted it was important for my security to have one guard standing outside, watching for threats, but at least the other guard got to stand inside, at the back of the chapel.
Watching for threats.
Just another reason I was having trouble settling in here. It made people nervous to have an armed guard monitoring every interaction with me.
“I really wish you would come inside,” I chided Julius when I finally slipped away. “Couldn't you guard the door from the church foyer?”
“I can respond more quickly if I see a problem from a distance,” he replied. “And your safety is more important than—”
“‘Than my comfort.’ Yes, I know,” I finished for him. “At least get a hot drink when we get inside. I’m sure Byron can keep me safe on that long, treacherous walk back to my bedroom.”
Julius didn’t argue with that. He knew better. I tolerated Chevalier’s protective measures because I knew how much the thought of losing me scared him, but I wouldn’t tolerate my guards neglecting their own needs for me. And, if anybody asked, I had a reasonable explanation that even Chevalier couldn’t question: What good were my guards to me if they weren’t healthy?
Julius left us and went to the kitchens when we reentered the palace. Byron followed me back to my room. He resumed his post outside my door, and Theresa resumed teasing me where she'd left off earlier in the morning.
“How was church?” she asked. “Get forgiveness for whatever you and Chevalier were up to last night?”
I rolled my eyes at her suggestive smirk. “I didn’t need forgiveness for anything we did because we did nothing wrong.”
“Uh huh. So, you would have told your mother everything you told me?” she teased.
I collapsed on the sofa and looked across the room at the portrait beside my bed, positioned specifically so I didn’t see it first thing in the morning. Mother and Father, smiling and laughing and so in love. I could see the spark of mischief in her green eyes, and I smiled. “My mother wouldn’t have let me go to sleep last night without prying it all out of me, and she would have asked for more detail than you did.”
“You’re kidding.” Theresa dropped onto the sofa beside me, her eyes wide with surprise. “Your mother?”
I looked down at the Bible, sighed, and set it on the cushion beside me before I looked back at Theresa. “The only difference between your teasing and my mother’s is you tell me to go to bed with him, and Mother told me to make him wait and work for it.”
Theresa propped her elbow up on the back of the sofa and leaned in eagerly. “Oh, this is good. Any other pearls of relationship advice from her you’d care to share with me?”
“Theresa,” I said, laughing, “I’ve only ever had one relationship.”
“See? Whatever she told you worked, so spill it!”
“Well, we only really had one relationship talk,” I said, shrugging. “Most of it was just stuff I picked up along the way.”
Theresa sat back and raised an eyebrow. “You're stalling.”
“No, really. I never thought I’d be in a relationship, and whenever she tried to talk to me about it, I’d brush her off or change the subject. The only time I didn’t was right before she died.”
“Oh.” Theresa’s smile fell. “Sorry. I didn’t—”
“It’s fine.” I sighed again and looked across the room at the portrait. “That was the only time she ever talked about Father, too,” I said thoughtfully.
There was a quick rap at the door. Theresa made a sound that was half-groan, half-sigh as she stood up.
“It’s too early for Chevalier to be here,” she grumbled, heading for the door.
I fingered the Bible at my side, my eyes lingering on the painting. Mother’s hands curled around Father’s arm. The crow’s feet at the corners of his eyes and the deep laugh lines around his smile. I remembered the nights I woke up to hear her crying softly, finding her curled up in a corner and hugging his journal to her chest. The crate of items Gilbert gave me as an engagement present hadn't contained any more journals among the books and documents salvaged from the siege of Garnet, although there had probably been more. Chevalier theorized my father ensured their destruction to prevent Obsidian from gaining sensitive information. Like the contingency plan for smuggling my mother out of Garnet in the event of an invasion.
“What are you doing here?” Theresa snapped.
Her sharp voice woke me from my reverie. I tore my gaze away from the portrait to look at her, standing in front of the open door with her arms crossed over her chest and her eyes flashing at the unknown visitor.
“I’d like to talk to Ivetta,” Clavis’ voice said.
That would explain her reaction.
“You—”
“It’s fine,” I intervened, stopping her before she could give him another tongue lashing. “He can come in.”
She shot me a scowl, but she stepped aside for Clavis to enter. “I need to get your lunch, anyway,” she spat, returning her glare to Clavis, “before Chevalier gets here.”
“Don’t mind her,” I told Clavis. “I wanted to talk to you, anyway. You can sit, if you’d like.” I patted the sofa cushion beside me, and he gave me a forced smile.
“Wow. You kidnap somebody just once, and everybody acts like you’re a criminal,” he quipped, taking a seat. “I wanted to apologize again, and to explain,” he said, his smile fading and the false humor in his voice disappearing.
I shook my head. “Clavis, you don’t have to—”
“You were supposed to sleep through the whole thing,” he said. “But I ran into some trouble slipping you past your guards—who still look like they want to kill me, by the way—and then Gil showed up, so that put me behind in setting the traps, and then Chev got delayed, too. You were supposed to wake up after it was all over, and then we could all have a laugh about how there was no way I could ever beat Chev if you were involved. But…well, you woke up too soon. Exactly on time, but too soon.”
I stared at him for a moment. “That…makes a lot more sense. You’ve never scared me like that before.”
He shrugged sheepishly and stood. “And I didn’t mean to this time. But that was all I wanted to say, so I’d better—”
“No, please stay,” I said, reaching out and grabbing his hand. “I still have something I need to say to you.”
He glanced down at my hand and hesitated a moment before he sat again. I released his hand and folded mine nervously in my lap.
“Um, well, I…said some things in the heat of the moment that I didn’t mean to say,” I started. “Most of the time, I enjoy your pranks and your traps. I don’t know how I would have gotten through those six weeks of bedrest without your shenanigans to keep me entertained. So…there’s nothing wrong with you being wild and crazy. Well, as long as you don’t hurt anybody.”
His usual grin spread across his face. He leaned forward and said, “So, are you saying I had a chance with you, then?”
“Well…no,” I said, smiling, too. “You’re still a bit too much for me, and to be perfectly honest, I’ve thought of you as a brother for a long time. What you need is someone who’s just as wild and crazy as you are. Someone who can be your partner in crime.”
He sat back thoughtfully. “Know anybody that matches that description?”
I shook my head. “No, but…” I sighed and leaned toward him, lowering my voice conspiratorially. “If you ever tell anyone I said this, I will deny it to the grave. The way to find someone like that is by pranking people. The woman who laughs off falling in one of your pit traps is the one for you.”
His grin widened. “Now, that’s devious.”
I sat back. “And I didn’t say it.”
He sprang to his feet, laughing. “Well, I’d better get started. There was a blonde at the party last night making eyes at me. I wonder how she’d take to a bucket of—”
“Not ice cold water,” I interjected.
“Rose petals,” he said slowly, pausing for my nod before he finished, “falling on her head.”
“Go on, then,” I said, making a shooing motion. “Just know that I’ll be in here with Chevalier all afternoon, so I won’t be around to rescue you. And we’ll be studying my father’s journal,” I added hastily at his raised eyebrow.
“Studying,” Clavis repeated, his smile morphing into a smirk. “Is that what you two were doing last night?”
Warmth rushed to my cheeks. “Just go!”
He laughed and went to the door, flinging it open with all the exaggerated enthusiasm he normally displayed. “Oh, hey, Chev. Have fun ‘studying.’” He gestured widely with his arm for Chevalier to enter the room, and then he winked at me and left, a bounce in his step and a scheme in his heart.
Chevalier barely spared his younger brother a glance as he walked across the room to join me on the sofa. He sat beside me and draped an arm around my shoulder, and I looked up at him with an apologetic smile.
“I just did a bad thing."23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡt5Wr5eMN8z
