Page 6 of A King’s Trust (Heart-Mage Trilogy #1)

6

SEEING PEOPLE

T he bed he’d been given at the Macabries’ was too soft, worn in the middle where bodies had shaped a comfortable hollow. He lay cradled in it on his stomach, head tucked up on one arm so he could watch Elias doing his morning practice in the open space of the room. The sun lit up a comfortable patch of floor, and he was cozily warm under his blankets.

Though he’d seen Elias do the same exercises every day for years, it continued to astonish him how much strength could be packed into that lithe form. The control, the balance, the utter stillness when the man wanted to be still and speed when he wanted to move—it was poetry. Every muscle of his back, his shoulders, his arms was displayed, every scar, all the smooth planes of deeply tanned skin.

Some days, Beau did drills alongside his First to build his own strength, but on days like today, he simply enjoyed the show. When El set weapons aside to stretch, Beau caught his breath, an almost inaudible sound that nonetheless made the guard pause like he’d heard.

Beau closed his eyes, turning his face into the pillow. Don’t be a creep. You’re not permitted to be turned on by your guard doing his job. You will not, under any circumstances, make the best guard in the kingdom and your only friend uncomfortable just because he is a beautiful, beautiful man.

“Good morning, Highness,” Elias said, humor in his voice as he dropped to the floor and began smooth, easy push-ups.

Into the pillow, Beau mumbled, “Morning, El.” As he started to sit up, Master Uriel walked in. “Ah! Gods!” He clutched the blankets for a moment before remembering the man had seen his tattoos. “Uriel. Hello. Sorry, still getting used to you.”

“My apologies, Your Highness, I didn’t mean to startle you. I spoke with Master Elias and he suggested you’d prefer to wake up of your own accord and not be woken at a particular time, unless you have pressing morning business. Is that to your liking?”

“Um.” Beau pressed his fingertips into his forehead, missing the sleepy, slow-moving, cup-of-tea-and-comfortable-silence warmth of mornings alone with Elias. Another thing lost with Char’s passing. “Yes, that’s fine.”

“Wonderful. I’ve laid out two options for today: one formal and one more casual. Would you care to weigh in?”

When he emerged from his dressing room in the less formal attire, Elias chatted with Aloise as she made the bed and Capucine sat in a chair, repairing a tear in one of his shirts with the tiniest stitches he’d ever seen. Though he’d learned needlework in the isles and practiced enough to be decent, he knew he’d never match that.

“That’s really nice work,” he said, bending over her chair to look more closely. “I never had the patience or dexterity to sew that neatly.” She didn’t move, but her hands froze, tightening on the fabric, and he felt a sense of her withdrawing in on herself. He shifted back immediately.

Her eyes reminded him of a fighter’s, tracking an opponent’s body language to predict their next move. Beau took another step back. “I’m sorry,” he said. He smiled at her, hoping it was reassuring since he seemed to have unsettled her. “I don’t like to be bothered when I’m focused on a task either. Carry on.”

The prince drummed his hands on his thighs, feeling thoroughly in the way in his own rooms. “Have I been given my agenda for the day yet?”

Aloise spoke. “Yes, Your Highness, and good morning to you.” The copper of her skin glowed in the golden morning light and her smile was cherubic. She unfolded a gold-embellished letter. “I’ve got the itinerary from your hosts. There’s a quick-partner brunch this morning in the greenhouse and then a fighting exhibition. And, of course, the ball tonight.”

“A quick-partner brunch?” Beau shook his head, laughing at the absurdity of it. “Gods, this is all such an inane distraction from the actual problems of Granvallée.”

“ Your most pressing problem is lack of a bride,” Elias said. “Eating small bits of expensive food while eligible partners parade past you gets you closer to a solution.”

Beau huffed a sigh. “Yes, fine. Let’s go before I lose my nerve.”

The brunch was exactly as Elias described except that instead of partners streaming past him, Beau was among the handful who stood up from one small table and moved on to the next each time a chime rang. The food was delicious, though there was barely a mouthful at each table. Conversation was a nightmare, starting fresh every few minutes. Beau took to asking bizarre questions to avoid the painful small talk.

“Where’d you get your favorite scar?” he asked the young Lord Nathan Abadie, whose name Beau recalled from Dubois’s list. As the man described some duel with a childhood friend, the prince couldn’t stop imagining what had put him on the list, and what the room would do if he asked Elias to get rid of him.

His next partner, Lady Ovanne, seemed scandalized when he asked, “What breed of dog do you think you’re most like?”

She wasn’t nearly as offended as Lord Lamont, who received, “If you could wish one person dead and they’d drop dead immediately, who would you choose, and why?” He declined to answer, and Beau was darkly amused that it was probably him in that moment.

When he sat at the next table across from Penamour, he expected to be rebuffed again. “If you could have one task done instantly with magic for the rest of your life, what would it be?”

“Brushing my hair,” she said without hesitation. “I despise it.” Her face said she despised him, too, but since she alone had given an earnest answer, he grinned at her anyway.

Her hair made an elegant halo around her head, all loose waves. Today it was held back from her face with gold combs that matched her nose ring. “What makes it such a chore?”

“It curls. Very difficult to detangle. My arms get tired.”

“Why not have someone else do it, then?”

Her eyes narrowed. “I have a sensitive scalp, and other people always pull when they brush it. Have you been asking questions this odd at every table?”

“Yes,” Beau said. “You’re the first one to properly answer, though, so I suspect you’re nearly as strange as I am.”

Lady Penamour took a deep breath, pressing palms to table and straightening her arms so her chair tilted back. “I don’t think you and I have anything in common at all,” she said quietly.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said, choosing to ignore her darkening mood. He popped something round and eggy in his mouth and chewed. “We’re both Granvallée nobility. We both spend too much time in ballrooms. We both want to see the people of Courdur’s holding taken care of, apparently. We both have an interest in Maurilel magic. And I, too, despise combing my hair. Although I actually like my hair pulled a little, so that’s one thing different.”

Her face contorted as a surprised laugh tried to make its way out of her mouth against her will, which seemed to infuriate her. He pressed his luck. “And we are both, you have to admit, a little strange. I heard you spent most of yesterday arguing about minutiae of Maurilel history, which is decidedly not what most ladies do at garden parties.”

“You do not know me,” she said.

“No, I don’t,” Beau agreed. “Isn’t that sort of the point of this little mixer?”

“The point, as designed by Lady Macabrie,” she said dryly, “is for you to suffer through conversations you’ll detest with everyone else and therefore be relieved when you finally get to sit with her. This is all—” She spun her finger in a circle to take in the entire room. “—for you.”

“What do you mean? This was designed so that I, specifically, wouldn’t enjoy it?”

“You’ve made no secret of your distaste for small talk,” she said, sipping her glass of chilled juice. “It’s a smart move on her part. She looks gracious and accommodating, giving everyone a chance to speak with you at her event instead of dominating your time for herself, and you’re all primed to be relieved when she uses the bits of intelligence she’s gathered to make your conversation better. I don’t know why she’s working so hard, honestly; you’ve not paid attention to a single other lady, and if you have no genuine interest in anyone else, she wins the ring by merit of her family’s position.”

Beau turned that over in his head, fumbling at his own glass of juice and taking a hefty swig. “Am I also supposed to hate the fighting exhibition?”

“No, I don’t think she understands how much you’ll dislike that. Not paying enough attention to the stories you tell and how you tell them,” Lady Penamour said. “If I had to guess, she just wants to see you in the gladiator outfit.”

“The what ?”

The chime rang out, and the rotating group began to stand and say polite goodbyes. Lady Penamour smiled darkly into her glass and gave him a mocking wave before morphing the smile into a much warmer welcome for the next person. Beau settled at another table, so lost in thought he missed his new partner’s first attempt at a greeting. “What? Oh, sorry, Lady Roben, I was…um. I have a question for you: if you had to stand up right now and sing a song all the way through without missing a word, what song would you choose?”

When he did eventually reach Lady Macabrie, she’d seated herself with the large, stained-glass feature window of the greenhouse behind her, casting her in jewel-toned light. Her white dress hugged her like a second skin. She looked gorgeous, but Beau couldn’t stop thinking about the way her eyes weighed and measured his reactions to calibrate her next move.

An urge to tease her rose up in him. Grinning widely, he sat down at her table with comfortable ease he didn’t feel. “What a lovely event you’ve arranged, Lady Macabrie,” he said. “I don’t think I’ve had the privilege of so many delightful conversations so quickly before. Some of these ladies I’d never gotten a chance to be properly acquainted with. Fascinating women.”

The tightening around her eyes, the pinching of her lips, and the way her inhale tightened all the cords in her neck before she smiled lent credence to Lady Penamour’s theory. “I’m delighted to have been able to facilitate so many wonderful chats. I believe we’re at the end of the rotation. Have you had enough to eat? If you’d like, you and I can have a walk around the grounds while we talk instead of sitting in here if it’s getting stuffy.”

“Sure,” he said, standing again. “I’d like to walk.”

To her credit, she tried to tell kinder stories. She just didn’t understand what the hell kindness was. He wondered if it was immaturity that made her humor so vicious and the scope of her altruism so small. He guessed she was five years or so younger than him, though he couldn’t tell for sure and couldn’t ask. At that age, he’d been doing hard labor for whoever in the isles would give him a task, but if he hadn’t had that opportunity, Beau thought he could’ve easily been an asshole. Plenty of people probably thought he was an asshole now , so he ought to extend her some grace.

As they climbed to the top of a small hill behind the Macabrie manor, he saw more carriages disgorging passengers in the front drive. “Who’s arriving?”

“Oh, other guests for the ball,” Lady Macabrie said dismissively. “We wanted a more selective attendance for the rest, but for the ball, I’ve invited some fun attendees. Lesser Houses, second and third sons, you know. Not marriageable, but good for a turn around the room.” Beau watched them exit with moderate interest. At least there would be fresh faces in the crowd.

“Ah, it looks like everyone’s gathering,” Macabrie said, looping her arm through his and tugging him down the hill. She hugged his arm against her curves, giggling excitedly as they descended.

A twenty-foot circle was marked out on the lawn with stanchions and rope, and the nobles gathered around it. A small table hosted an A-frame board on which a man marked chalk lines. As they mingled with the others, Beau asked, “Are we making wagers?”

“Oh yes,” Lady Macabrie said gleefully. “And I’ve already committed a sizeable bet on you to win your first round.”

“On me?” Brunch sat queasily in his stomach. “Oh, I don’t…I don’t want to fight. I’ll watch and I’ll wager, but—”

“But you must!” she cried, attracting the attention of those around her. “All the other lords are competing! And everyone wants to test themselves against the crown prince. Especially a prince who’s proven his skill on the high seas.”

“I…” There were so many eyes on him. It was a harmless enough request that he couldn’t find the words to say no without revealing more about himself than he wanted to. Two lords emerged, laughing, from changing tents along the tree line in a strange half armor, half…dress? It appeared to continue the theme from the previous day’s senatorial robes, though this was closer to battle attire. The top half was nothing more than a leather harness holding up gold-inlaid pauldrons. Beau would not , under any circumstances, wear that.

As he panicked, Elias’s deep voice cut through the chatter insisting the prince join in. “Could he select a champion instead?”

Lady Macabrie’s eyebrows shot up at being spoken to by a guard, but when Beau didn’t call him down, she scanned Elias head to toe. “Interesting. Typically, I’d say no, but you would fit the costume nicely, wouldn’t you?”

Nodding to herself, she clapped her hands and raised her voice. “All right, a change of plans. Any lord—or lady—is welcome to appoint a champion to enter the ring in their stead.”

“Much more my style than yours,” El muttered, and when Beau gave him a grateful smile, he said, “Go on, tell me I’m the best that ever lived. Give me a little magic.”

Beau smirked. Elias always joked about Beau’s ‘magic,’ like El hadn’t brought skills and protective instincts any guard would’ve killed for all on his own. “You’re the best who ever lived,” Beau said, and he meant it, and Elias’s grin widened. He squeezed Beau’s arm reassuringly and waved for Jude to take his place. After several minutes of jostling and chatter, the combatants were dressed and lined up to receive their red-painted practice swords. They were paired off randomly, with the first to three hits claiming the win for the round.

When Elias stepped into the ring, a hum of approval ran through the crowd from the gathered ladies and at least a few of the men. The costume had to have been designed specifically to show off the man’s every attribute; there was no other explanation. Beau made an absolutely outrageous wager on Elias.

As the bell rang for the first round, Elias left the wooden sword at his side while Lord Cellier took a formal fencing pose. Though the audience muttered at his not being ready, when Cellier lunged, Elias barely seemed to move as he sidestepped and slashed a long line of red paint across the man’s stomach. Gasps and scattered applause erupted.

Cellier, angry at how quickly the first touch had gone, went red to his scalp through his thin blonde hair. He lurched toward Elias again, and El neatly parried, then circled the man and lifted his wooden sword as though to slash again. Instead, he looked up at Beau, winked, and kicked the lord a stumbling step forward.

They fought, and Elias dragged it out, entirely in control. He could’ve ended it a half-dozen times, and he made sure the crowd knew it, but instead he showed off. Beau chuckled madly, fist pressed to his mouth so no one could see how hard he was biting his lip.

This had no right to be so attractive.

When he finally did finish it, Elias grinned and made two slashes appear across the lord’s chest so fast it took a full breath before the audience realized what had happened and reacted.

“Gods above,” Haydée Macabrie breathed as everyone cheered the winner. One hand clutched at her chest. When she met Beau’s eyes, her pupils were huge. “How do you get anything done with him around? And what are you paying him? I’m going to offer him double and steal him away.”

Beau laughed. “I sincerely doubt that.”

She raised a brow at him, cruelty back in her face. “I’ve never known a commoner who wouldn’t jump for twenty dorin a month.”

“I thought you wanted to double what I’m paying?” Beau said, mirroring her raised brow. “You’re not even close.” Beau bet more money on Elias to win it out, tipping the woman taking bets generously. Penamour did the same, which surprised Beau, since she’d entered her own champion, Nilah.

In the next round, Elias’s opponent, another champion, was more competent, but El barely broke a sweat beating him. The third round was the same, though it featured Lord Lamont, who’d been training passionately with the sword all his life. Elias seemed to delight in flaunting his prowess; Beau had never seen him show off. If he’d been a scrap less talented, his cocky, showy style would’ve been obnoxious, but he was so obviously better than everyone else in the ring that he could be forgiven for acting superior.

The finals pitted Elias against Nilah, and Beau found Lady Penamour’s eyes in the crowd, grinning expectantly at her. As soon as the bell rang, Elias’s cocky face vanished as he focused. He and Nilah circled one another, feinting, watching each other’s bodies. When they moved, it was immediately clear they’d both been holding back in their previous rounds.

They fought almost too fast to track, blades flashing red arcs of paint as they clacked and clattered. Nilah was a blur, braid trailing like a whip. But Elias was something else entirely. He was almost dancing, off hand leading Nilah where he wanted her. Always a step ahead, always anticipating her strikes. And he was speaking; Beau leaned forward, straining to hear El’s words.

“…good, but you don’t want to leave that wrist open for me,” he said as he circled Nilah’s arm with his fingers, jerking her off balance. His sword painted a mark across her throat almost casually. “Get your feet under you before—good girl. Ah, almost had me there. Are you pulling your swings? You’re not going to hurt me. Swing hard.”

Elias was coaching her.

The barest glance up at Beau, and then his First smiled and said, “All right, I think that’s enough.” He drew a line across her thigh and went for a quick slash to her belly, but Nilah dodged and scored a hit on Elias’s forearm, striking him hard enough that he had to shake out his hand. El laughed. “ Good . Much better.”

Nilah threw herself into combat harder, and to her credit, she made El actually defend. But he was still smiling, still laughing, still playing . He grabbed the end of her braid as it whipped past him and wound it around his hand, and Nilah jerked, stabbing blindly toward him since she couldn’t move her head as she wanted. Elias bent slightly to let the blade pass him and then pressed the point of his to the middle of her back. “That’s three.”

They separated, and Elias bowed to Nilah with genuine respect. She responded with a slight bow of her head, but as she panted, catching her breath from the whirlwind fight, she eyed him like an alien, dangerous thing. It was the first time Beau had realized Elias was dangerous. He’d never seen anyone swordfight like that. El wasn’t even winded. Nilah’s eyes found Penamour’s in the crowd, and they shared a brief frown.

“Perhaps a fairer bout would be Elias against everyone else?” Lady Macabrie said, half joking, but others picked up the idea. Beau could sense an edge of darkness in the audience’s calls. Elias was common, and he’d embarrassed lords. They wanted to see him fail and know he did have limits.

Beau wasn’t worried about Elias; based on what he’d seen, El could take on all fifteen of the other competitors. He was more concerned about how ugly things might get when they didn’t get the failure from him they wanted.

“No,” Beau said, “someone will get hurt if we do that.” And it won’t be Elias. “Let’s end it here and go have a drink and a dance.”

Elias ducked under the rope and took his usual spot next to Beau, no more than a glance necessary to make Jude back up out of the way. “What do you think, Highness?” he asked, eyes dancing with amusement as he spread his hands at his sides. “Should I replace my usual attire? I have to admit, this is very easy to move in. And breezy.”

Beau fought with every fiber of his being not to stare at the drop of sweat drawing a ponderous trail down Elias’s bare abs. “It might draw more attention than you’re looking for.”

“True.” His First laughed, nodding toward the woman distributing winnings. “How’d you make out in the betting?”

Beau accepted the sacks the woman dropped into his hands. “Like a fucking bandit.” It was unbelievable how much money was thrown around at events like this. Any one of these sacks could reroof every house in the isles and have more left over to put in some windows. He pocketed three of them and tossed the fourth to Elias. “Here, you earned that.”

Elias’s laugh was sharp, dismissive. He threw the sack right back. “What the fuck am I going to do with that? You can’t give a guard a thousand dorin as a bonus, Highness.”

Beau grabbed Elias’s forearm and smacked the gold back into his hand. “Says who? I didn’t fight in that ridiculous outfit; you did. And anyway, now every noble here wants you—let’s call that security against someone luring you away with the promise of better pay.”

His First rolled his eyes. “There’s not enough gold in Granvallée, Highness.”

B eau was antsy when he walked into the ball. Hungry. After the ridiculous day, he wanted company of exactly the variety Lady Macabrie had described—unmarriageable fun. In the isles, Maisie wouldn’t have let him get more than two dances in before she recognized this mood and dragged him into his room at the inn, but the nobles didn’t know him well enough to recognize it. Even if they had, the crown prince didn’t have the freedom of a quick fuck with nobility. Sleeping with absolutely anyone at this ball would be a political nightmare.

Still, he was drawn to those ‘unmarriageable’ sons invited for their humor and their dancing, who had no stake in the larger political plays being made at the Macabries’ since none of them could ever be queen. They were easy with him, quick to laugh, quick to touch.

At the midpoint of the evening, when musicians took their break and most people drifted into conversations or dined, Beau found himself out in the torchlit gardens with a handful of lords, arguing animatedly about the benefits of sabers versus rapiers versus smallswords, and what it said about the type of men who wore each.

“A true gentleman needs nothing more than a smallsword,” said Lord Deirre, so pompously Beau assumed it had to be an act, a character he was playing for laughs. “Anything larger gets in the way on city streets or in palace walls.”

“Anything larger makes you seem to be compensating for deficiencies elsewhere,” interjected the dark-haired Lord Gandinne with a laugh that showed off pretty dimples. Gandinne looked over to see if Beau laughed, and Beau rewarded him with a wide smile.

Pulling his rondel from its tooled leather sheath at his waist, the prince twirled it in his fingers dexterously. “That’s why I only ever carry a knife. Nothing at all to compensate for.”

When that drew laughs from most of them and a considering look from Gandinne, Beau nodded toward Lord Harcine, a slightly unpleasant young man from a very unpleasant family—his father’s name had shown up on Dubois’s list, though Beau was trying not to hold his family’s sins against him. “You don’t seem to agree, my lord. Tell me, does some aspect of your person make you feel compelled to wear a greatsword out and about?”

The gathered men’s laughter intensified, and Beau fully expected Harcine to retort with something cutting, but the man narrowed his eyes at the prince and said, “Would it please you if it did, Your Highness? We’re all trying our damnedest to figure out just what is to your taste.”

The laughter trailed off, replaced by curious looks all around. Beau studied them back, one face after another. “Sussing me out for your sisters?”

Harcine spread his hands, half welcome, half shrug. “If you prefer.” His voice left open other options, other preferences. Beau reassessed the group quickly; maybe they were more open to being unmarriageable fun than he’d assumed. Were all of them options?

Beau gave Gandinne another once-over. He had such a weakness for dimples.

But Elias shifted his weight behind Beau, not enough to be an obvious signal, but enough to make a faint crunch in the gravel and remind the prince what he was there for. Beau sighed. “I’m not sure what I prefer really factors in.” He tried to twist the bitterness into wry humor with an upturn of his lips.

They variously shrugged and nodded; they all knew perfectly well what was expected of him. He supposed he could marry a man and then father a bastard or two to name as heirs, but that seemed unfair to all involved, and it certainly wasn’t a secure way to pass down a crown.

“But out of respect for the information-gathering missions you’ve all been given, I’m sure, by your dear mothers,” he said, “what can I tell you about my taste?”

“Anything,” one of the lords burst out, a small man with pale, silvery hair. He blushed when he realized how loudly he’d spoken. “Blonde, brunette, dark skin or light, tall or short?”

Beau made a face. “I don’t care about any of those things.”

He found certain features more attractive, of course, but it was a stupid thing to choose a wife over. “Honesty. Wit. Kindness. Curiosity. Beauty obviously doesn’t hurt, but it’s authenticity I’m looking for. Interesting interests, hobbies, intelligence…” Nose rings. Ink on their hands.

The noblemen exchanged glances, and the chuckles began again, this time slightly awkward. “Well, my sisters are out then,” Harcine said, and they all laughed in earnest.

Back in the candlelit ballroom, the musicians began a rousing group dance to bring everyone back to the floor. Beau gestured toward the open doors. “Shall we?”

As they made their way back, Gandinne slowed to walk beside the prince. He said, “You’d like my elder cousin, I think, but since I’m here and she’s not, could I ask you to save a dance for me?” His eyes were intent but sad. It didn’t quite fit the words he spoke.

Beau grinned at him, hoping to cheer the man, but for some reason that made him swallow hard and turn away. “I definitely will,” Beau said. “But first, please excuse me.”

Three glasses of chilled juice had worked their way through him. A servant showed him to the powder room off the main hall.

As the prince washed his hands, he saw Elias in the mirror, shifting his feet uncomfortably as he did when holding back something he wanted to say. No one else was around to hear, which meant whatever he was not saying, he held back because he thought it would upset Beau. The prince’s good humor sagged, and he met his reflection’s eyes. All the tiny inconsistencies in how the noblemen reacted to him, the disconnect between their eyes and mouths and words began to line up. “Gandinne doesn’t want me, does he.”

His First winced. “Don’t ruin your own good mood.”

Beau scowled at him as he toweled off his hands. “Does he?”

Elias hesitated, then shook his head. “I know how much you hate the idea that your position would make someone uncomfortable telling you no, but to be fair, he asked you .”

“But you agree, he doesn’t want to be here. Probably none of them do. Someone told them to get close to me. Watchers fucking take me.” Beau’s hope in the potential of the evening evaporated. “Why is it so much easier to spot it when the ladies are manipulating me? Shit, maybe I don’t know how to recognize genuine attraction from a man.”

Elias’s hazel eyes caught the light from the low lamps in the powder room as his chin came up. He studied Beau’s face. “What are you trying to do, Highness? You’re looking for a wife. Are you trying to find genuine interest from a man?”

“No. I—I don’t know. I can’t, really, can I.” He sighed, plucking at lint on his pants leg.

Elias reached out to rap Beau’s arm with the back of his hand. “You do still like women, don’t you? I know you had Maiz and Léontine in the isles, but you haven’t shown interest in any of the noblewomen. If you need it to be a man, you could probably make things work if—”

“If I were willing to fuck around and set my bastards up for a fight when I die?” Beau finished dryly. “I’m not going to do that. And yes, of course I like women. I prefer women, I think. Or at least I did in the isles. It’s just, none of the ladies here will talk to me like a human being except Lady Penamour, and she fucking hates me.”

Elias set a hand on the back of Beau’s neck and leaned in to drop his voice further. Beau tried very hard not to feel anything at all about the calluses against his skin because this was not a romantic touch, it was friendly, it was encouraging, it was a guard touching his prince and nothing, nothing, nothing else. “It’s not going to get better if you keep avoiding them, Highness. You can find what you’re—”

A servant chose that moment to enter the restroom, and Elias took a step back and dropped his hand, alert again.

“Is there anything I can get for you, Your Highness?” the serving man asked in a papery voice. His eyes flicked, bird-like, over every detail of the room. Beau wondered what he was going to report about the scene, and to whom. Other people might not under stand the ways Elias touched him, that they didn’t mean anything. No doubt he’d soon be hearing gossip about himself and his secret trysts with his own staff.

“The facilities are perfectly well equipped, thanks,” he said shortly, brushing past the man and running squarely into the back of the young lords Deirre and Gandinne, who seemed to be waiting for him, chatting together. The perfect targets for his frustration.

“Just the men I wanted to see,” he said, pulling Gandinne around to face him. “I’ve got a room upstairs, bed all ready. If I told you to come with me right now, would you want that?”

Beau caught the strain in the man’s neck as he drew his head back, swallowed, and then pasted on a grin. “Of co—”

“Stop,” Beau said, waving him to silence. “And you?” He pointed to Deirre. “You’ve been flirting all night. Would you drag me upstairs yourself?”

Deirre shot a quick, startled glance at Gandinne and licked his lips. “Your Highness, if you’d like—”

“ Stop ,” Beau repeated, and both men stared at him, baffled. He rubbed his forehead, smoothing away the lines frustration had drawn there. “Stop lying to me. Stop pretending, please. I’m begging you. No, I’m ordering you: speak plainly. Neither of you is actually interested in me. What do you want?”

No two men had ever been so eager to flee, but they held their ground uncomfortably, silently. Beau sighed and shook his head. He wanted to shake them both, to shake all the nobility until their honest thoughts fell out.

He spoke to Deirre. “Fine, if you won’t be honest about yourselves, throw each other under the wagon wheels. Why doesn’t he want to be here?” He pointed at Gandinne.

Gandinne’s eyes narrowed at Deirre, throwing daggers. Deirre hesitated, then looked past Beau at Elias and wilted. “Lord Gandinne is an honorable man. He has a fiancé in Durebord. He feels being here, getting close enough to ask a favor, is a betrayal of—”

“Deirre!” Gandinne called the other man down sharply. Huffing out a sigh, he flicked a glance at Beau and said bitterly, “Since we’re speaking truths , Lord Deirre here doesn’t even like men! He’s just a whore for power.”

Deirre grabbed Gandinne’s shirtfront and reared back to punch him, but Beau seized his hand. Behind him, Elias made a choked sound of irritation as he had to step in and pull Deirre back, now that the prince had included himself in the brimming violence.

“Thank you for your honesty,” Beau grated out. One man all but married, the other not even gay, and both willing to do anything, it seemed, if the prince was willing to look past their reluctance. “Let me make something clear: I don’t fuck for favors. So whatever you came here hoping to gain by getting close to me, you’re much better off asking me for it.”

Deirre looked mulish, Gandinne scandalized, but the prince pushed on, shaking Deirre’s arm, since he still held it. “What under the twelve would make you flirt with a prince when you don’t even like men? What do you want?”

Deirre looked surprise by the question. “To be Prince Consort,” he said with a shrug.

“Just power, then? As he said?” Beau pressed. “For what? What change are you trying to make in the world?”

“Change?”

A wave of such contempt for the viscount rolled through Beau that touching him disgusted him. He dropped his arm. Of course he wanted power to have power, no further thought than that. His scorn must have shown on his face; Deirre skittered back a step.

With less curiosity and more demand in his voice, Beau asked the other man, “Gandinne, what made you come tonight? What was worth fucking over the love of your life?”

The dark-haired Viscount of Durebord straightened his shoulders, all trace of smile gone, and brushed a curl out of his eyes. “Last year, Paibona torched and salted our fields. They’re ruined—we can’t grow a thing. And they were thorough. The only place they missed is my mother’s personal apple and pear orchard, and we’ve distributed that fruit as far as it will go.”

Beau’s ire dissipated as he listened. Gandinne went on, “Our second year without a harvest, we can’t support our people anymore. Durebord wasn’t a wealthy viscounty to begin, and our coffers are empty from buying grain and produce. Lord Courdur did nothing to help, though I’ve pleaded with the duke himself and with his son in Piagette. He’s taken us for nearly every penny we have, and what’s left, we need to pay our soldiers, to keep the Paibons from taking what we’ve scraped together. We’re at wit’s end, Your Highness.”

“Why haven’t you brought this as a formal petition?”

“We have. My uncle asked for aid last year. Your father assured him we’re at peace with Paibona and ordered Lord Courdur to sell to us at whatever price he found fair.” Bitterness rasped through his voice. Gandinne’s pretty blue eyes were intent on Beau’s, honest, angry , no longer shaded by his lashes in faux-flirtation. “I know Durebord is not important, on the grand scale of the kingdom. But my people are important, and they’re starving. And I…I heard you’d spoken to His Grace in court about our struggles, all the viscounties in Suteneir. That’s why I came. To talk to you .”

His people were important enough to trade his own happiness for. Beau’s respect for Gandinne grew, and a wave of wistfulness shook him. He gripped the lord’s shoulder. “They are important. Bring this to court again next week when we’re all back, and I will help you.” He could feel the other man’s relief in the way he sagged, his shoulder dropping under the prince’s hand.

“And you,” he said, turning to Lord Deirre, “find someone you’re actually attracted to and dance. Stay out of my sight.”

Deirre vanished, and Gandinne was close behind, pausing only for a deep bow. Alone in the hallway, Beau let out a deep sigh that started in his toes. Elias put a hand on his back, a reassurance and a reminder that he had things to do yet.

He was too much in his head tonight. Normally, he could ignore the warmth and strength of Elias’s hands, but in that moment, all he could think was, Elias has that dimple in his right cheek.

Shameful.

“Back to it,” Beau said, striding into the ballroom and straight for Haydée Macabrie.

She seized him the moment he was in reach, both hands digging into his sleeve. “There you are! I’ve been looking for you all evening. When the next song starts, we must dance. Come here, come here! I was just congratulating Lady Penamour on what an excellent idea the fighting ring was. I haven’t had a show like that in years.”

The duchess, draped in pearls and moonstones this evening, gave Beau a smug, close-mouthed smile. “Oh, that was your idea,” he said. “And you do listen to my stories and how I tell them.” Her smile widened, showing sharp canines.

“We all listen to your stories,” Macabrie said, not understanding the dynamic between Beau and Penamour. “And now we all have new stories to tell about your great defender.”

Her eyes scanned past him to where Elias stood. Then she reached out to touch the guard, her fingers prodding at the muscle of one of his arms like she was examining a horse at auction. El did nothing but watch her, but Beau bristled. “I’ll ask you to keep your hands off my guard, Lady Macabrie. He has a job to do, and entertaining noblewomen is no part of it.”

She withdrew, pouting, but then brightened again. “Well, when I buy him off you, I’ll make it part of his job. He entertained us all exceptionally today. He’ll be a delightful toy.”

Lady Penamour coughed and bent her head, covering her mouth with her hand. Beau was so shocked by the statement—by Haydée’s implication that Elias was for sale —he could only stare for a moment before hot, red rage rose. “Are you out of your fucking—”

Elias’s knuckles knocked against Beau’s back twice, an urgent signal to reel himself in. With a deep breath, Beau recovered. “I’ll give you a moment to think,” he said coldly, “and figure out what was wrong with what you said. You can apologize once you’ve got it.”

Lady Macabrie’s stricken face seemed trapped between disbelief and horror at Beau’s outburst. She settled on disbelief, which bubbled out of her in uncomfortable laughter. “Your Highness, I’m sorry if I’ve—”

“Not to me,” Beau said. “To Elias.”

She laughed again, more uncertainly, her mouth hanging open as if the thought of apologizing to a guard was as bizarre and inexplicable as wishing a piece of furniture a good day or challenging a goat to a game of cards. “I don’t understand. He’s just a guard . How have I offended you? I complimented you on your guard and his—”

Beau turned and left, ignoring her spluttered objections. He’d marry that woman the day the earth split open and swallowed every other person in Granvallée, and maybe not even then.

Elias waited until they were in the hall out of sight of guests before grabbing the prince. “Highness, stop. You can’t storm out of the Macabries’ ball because she was rude to me.”

“Fucking watch me.”

“ Highness , stop, now .” He half growled the order, and Beau was surprised enough at being commanded by his own guard that he stopped. “Look at me. I do not care what unhinged things the people in that room say about me. And you also need to not care because it doesn’t matter—you have things to do.”

“It matters if they don’t think you’re a person, Elias,” Beau said, and when El began to speak, he overrode him. “Not because it’s you . I can’t trust them to give a shit about people when they don’t even see people. I will not marry Haydée. I’ll find someone else, some where else. We’re returning to the capital in the morning. I’m done with this fucking place.”