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There were downsides to my new life as a princess, and the biggest was that I didn’t get to see as much of Chevalier as I did when I was his maid. Now that the doctor had released me from bedrest, Sariel’s lessons didn’t stop at two thirty. The book work continued, but now I had to practice my posture, my walk, my curtsy, how to hold my silverware - there was a rule for everything. Never blow on your food if it’s hot; wait until it’s cool. Cut one dainty bite, eat it, and then cut the next. Cutting everything at once was improper. Head up, shoulders back, graceful steps.
It was grueling.
From sunrise to sunset, I was in Sariel’s office, or putting what I’d learned to the test with practical applications: a tea party in the gardens with Yves and Licht one day, lunch with Leon’s faction the next, a mock social gathering with Clavis and Nokto one afternoon. I learned a lot just by watching the princes. They’d grown up with the rules and expectations of the upper class, and they met them all without thinking about it. Yves, daintily cutting a bite from his cookie, never using his fingers. Licht, using the correct spoon to add sugar to his tea and holding it at the exactly perfect angle. Even Jin and Leon had impeccable table manners, and their corrections were much less sharp than Sariel’s.
Clavis and Nokto’s lesson gave me the most anxiety, but that anxiety vanished as soon as Clavis escorted me into a parlor full of assorted junk dressed in fancy hats and ball gowns.
“Lesson one: it’s rude to laugh at the other guests, even if they look ridiculous,” Clavis said, smiling down at me as I tried, and failed, to stifle a giggle.
“But that’s a broom with a hair bow.”
“Ah, Lady Nora, you’re as stunning as always,” Clavis said to the broom, a bright pink hair bow adorning its bristles. “I love what you’ve done with your hair.”
“Clavis, is this really going to help me at the coronation ceremony?”
“Lesson two: greet everybody with a smile and a compliment,” he said, ignoring my protests as usual. I sighed and gave the broom my best smile.
“Thank you for inviting us, Lady Nora,” I said, dropping into a curtsy. “That color suits you.” I burst out laughing again and covered my mouth with my hand. “Clavis, I really can’t do this.”
“Lesson three: don’t ask for a drink in the middle of a conversation, no matter how dull it is,” he continued. “Servants will come around with a drink tray. Ah, there’s one now.”
“This is ridiculous,” Nokto muttered, bearing a silver tray with several glasses of wine. “We should have done it my way.”
“Thank you,” Clavis said brightly, taking a glass and handing it to me. “Lesson four: your escort does everything for you. If you want a drink, or something to eat, or to throw up because you just saw Nokto pawing a young lady in the corner, tell me, and I’ll see to your needs.”
“You won’t see me pawing a young lady in the corner,” Nokto assured me with a sly grin. “I save such activities for a more private venue.”
“Lesson five: the hand-off. There’s a gentleman over there who I have to speak with about a sensitive business matter. You wouldn’t mind waiting here with Nokto, would you?”
“Not at all,” I said, slipping my arm from Clavis’ and smiling up at Nokto. “Isn’t that something a servant should do?” I asked, nodding at the drink tray
“Now you’ve got her doing it, too,” Nokto complained, setting the drink tray on a barrel in a waistcoat.
“I’m terribly sorry, Lord Simmons,” Clavis apologized to the barrel. “He’s had one too many.”
Nokto rolled his eyes and offered me his arm. I took it, and Clavis crossed the room to have an animated conversation with a lamp in a top hat.
“I worry about him sometimes,” I said, shaking my head at his antics.
“Lesson six: the hasty escape,” Nokto said, heading for the door. “You can always say you’re not feeling well, but don’t pretend to be drunk. There are men who will use that as an excuse to take advantage of you.”
I glanced back over my shoulder as we slipped out the door. Clavis was looking right at me with a mischievous gleam in his golden eyes that was unsettling.
“Um, Nokto? Do you think he let us get away too easily?”
Nokto stopped in his tracks, frowning in thought. “You’re right. Let’s go this way.”
He turned to lead me in the opposite direction, but I lagged a step behind, looking back at the closed parlor door nervously. Clavis was up to something. His pranks hadn’t involved me yet, and although pulling one in the middle of a lesson would get him in trouble with Sariel, that wasn’t a threat he would worry about. I bit my lip and returned my focus to Nokto, just in time to hear him yelp in surprise and disappear, his arm yanking free from mine. A string of curse words I’d never heard from him before spouted from a net hanging from the ceiling. I clapped my hand over my mouth, trying not to laugh at his expense.
“Lesson seven,” Clavis said smoothly, coming up behind me and taking my arm. “Don’t leave the party with shady characters. You never know what could happen.”
“Clavis, I swear-”
“Gentlemen don’t swear in front of ladies,” Clavis interrupted Nokto’s angry tirade.
“Fine. I won’t swear in front of her, and I won’t kill you in front of her, either. Let me down. Now.”
“I don’t think you’re in the party spirit, Nokto,” Clavis chided.
“Clavis, let him down,” I interceded, still stifling laughter. “We still have to finish the lesson.”
He gave an exaggerated sigh. “Well, I suppose. Stand back.”
I took an obedient step back. He drew his sword and eyed the net for a moment.
“Where to cut?” he said thoughtfully.
“Right below your chin,” Nokto said bitingly.
Clavis pointed his sword at Nokto, and my stomach did a complete somersault as he flicked his wrist and sliced through the ropes. Nokto fell to the floor with a solid thud, scrambling to his feet with murder in his crimson eyes.
“Your chin!” he fumed, swiping a hand across his neck. “Not mine! If you left a mark-”
“No mark, no blood,” Clavis said nonchalantly, sheathing his sword and spinning back to face me. “Now, shall we return to the party?”
“I appreciate what you’re doing, Clavis, but I’m not sure this is the best way to get me ready for the coronation ceremony,” I said, watching Nokto over Clavis’ shoulder. Anger seethed in his crimson eyes, and he looked like he was still considering killing Clavis. “Brooms and lamps won’t help me practice my conversational skills.”
“You won’t have many conversations at the ceremony,” Clavis replied, taking my arm and leading me back to the parlor. “And meaningless pleasantries are the same, whether you say them to a barrel or a fat nobleman who’s more interested in snagging a glass of wine from a passing tray than listening to you.”
“As much as I hate to admit it, he’s right,” Nokto grumbled, brushing past us and snagging a glass of wine for himself. “Most of the people at the ceremony are only now hearing about you. This is as much your debut into high society as it is Chevalier’s coronation. They’ll be watching you for any mistake, so it’s actually better for you to avoid conversation at this stage. It’s easier to slip up in a lengthy discussion than it is in idle chatter.”
My stomach was suddenly churning. I took a sip of the wine to settle my nerves.
“Which brings us to lesson eight,” Clavis said. “Getting out of a conversation. This duchess is particularly chatty.”
“How many lessons are there?” I asked, looking from the supposedly chatty mop in a ball gown to the other assorted ‘guests’ I hadn’t met yet.
Nokto downed his glass, returned it to the drink tray, and grabbed another. “However many he makes up.”
The mock social gathering continued for another hour, and as soon as it was over, I escaped to the gardens for a brief respite before dinner. Sariel had already told me about the coronation ceremony being my introduction to the upper class, so what Nokto said wasn’t a surprise in that respect, but I hadn’t realized the scrutiny I would face. It was a little overwhelming, even with Clavis’ antics. And I couldn’t just find Chevalier and talk to him about it, because he’d resumed his previous habit of sleeping through the morning and working all afternoon. He wouldn’t be free until after supper. Unless he worked late, in which case I might not see him at all.
I sighed and sat down on the bench next to the pond. Another sigh echoed in the air above me, and I looked up just as Luke jumped down from his perch on a tree branch.
“The social thing didn’t go well, huh?” he asked, sitting next to me.
“No, it went fine, but - how did you know about that?”
He grinned. “I helped Clavis put it together. How’d ya like the pink hair bow on the broom?”
“That was you?” I giggled. “Why would you even think of that?”
“‘Cause I saw a lady at a party who looked jus’ like that. She was skinny as a rail, an’ her blonde hair jus’ stuck out everywhere, an’ she had a big pink bow in it, like that made it look good.”
The giggling progressed to full-blown laughter before he finished. He set his large hand on top of my head and tousled my hair playfully.
“There ya go. That smile looks good on ya.”
I swatted his hand away. “Theresa worked really hard on my hair, you know.”
He shrugged. “I didn’t mess it up that bad. Ya still look better than broom lady.”
“Did she really look that bad?”
He nodded, grinning that boyish grin that made him look like an overgrown child. “The barrel in the waistcoat was a guy who was so fat, I thought his buttons were gonna pop off.”
“So, all of those things were based on real people?” I asked incredulously.
“Yeah. I like ‘em better that way, too. The nobility aren’t all bad, but some of ‘em are real rotten. I wish I’d had a practice thing like that before I went to my first party.”
“Was it that bad?”
He shrugged. “It coulda been worse. They threw this big party the day after I came here, all excited ‘bout how there was a new prince, but all I knew was how to be a commoner. So, there’s this big, long table fulla food, more food than I’d ever seen, an’ I jus’ started eatin’. Then they got all upset ‘bout how I was never gonna be nothin’ but a dirty commoner, ‘cause I was usin’ my hands to eat instead of the fancy silverware. It made me kinda mad, but then Jin dropped his silverware an’ started eatin’ with his hands, too. Said I was right, it was better that way. It didn’t really matter what everybody said after that, ‘cause he didn’t care, so I didn’t, either.”
I could picture the scene, and it made my heart hurt for Luke. He was kind and friendly, and it wasn’t fair for anybody to judge him on his table manners when he didn’t even know the rules yet.
“I’m glad Jin did that. You didn’t deserve to be treated that way.”
“Yeah, he’s jus’ like that. He’s the oldest, so he looks out for the rest of us. We all kinda look out for each other.” He turned his leaf green eyes from the pond to me, patting the top of my head again. “Ya got nothin’ to worry ‘bout with the coronation ceremony. We’re all lookin’ out for ya, an’ ya already talk an’ act more like the nobility than I do, so you’re gonna be fine, yeah?”
I didn’t swat his hand away this time. It was a comforting weight on my head, lifting the heaviness from my shoulders. I sighed again, releasing the tension, and smiled up at him.
“Thanks, Luke.”
“No problem. Hey, ya wanna get somethin’ to eat? I gotta work on my table manners so I don’t make you an’ Chevie look bad for this thing.”
“Sure. And maybe you could help me study in the library afterwards. Sariel has a test for me tomorrow, and I’m not looking forward to it.”
He hopped to his feet and offered me his hand. “Why not? Us commoners who are secretly royalty gotta stick together, yeah?"
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