Page 67 of The Winter Princess

I move to her side. “You need something?”

“Just a quick word with Her Majesty, if I’m not interrupting. I have a message from His Majesty King Otto.”

The monarch of Vorburg may not be an old friend, but he’s an important one.

“You’re not interrupting,” I assure her. “Come in.”

“I’ll wait here, if you please.”

A line forms on my brow. “Don’t be silly.”

The moment is resolved when Mama crosses the room with her favorite aperitif, Dubonnet and gin, drawing Caroline aside in a smooth motion.

“That was weird,” I say under my breath.

Noah hears me. “What’s weird?”

“Caroline, just now. She was hesitant.”

“This is a private family dinner. She won’t want to intrude.”

“Intrude? She should have been off work an hour ago, and she’d never have come unless it was urgent. She’s around us so much, it’s almost as if she’s one of the family.”

“Not my family,” Noah declares.

I frown. “Rude.”

His stern face softens. “Tell me about your museum,” he says, escorting me to the other end of the room and filling a small glass with dry vermouth and a thin slice of orange—one of the Pavian customs we’ve carried on.

Caroline is gone before I’ve taken my first sip.

“We aren’t supposed to talk shop over dinner.”

Noah’s gaze is on the open door. His jaw flexes. “Humor me.”

I follow his eyes, wishing I understood more than I do. This is what comes of being so much on my own. I take another sip of my drink. “I’m a social media influencer now.”

“Really? Our bookishdonnina?”

Mama’s housekeeper, Una, announces dinner, and Noah escorts me into the small private dining room. “Where’s your wide-brimmed hat and aspirational selfies?”

Thanks to these last weeks of research, I understand his joke, even if it’s a few years out of date.

“Are you describing your last girlfriend?” I shoot back. He laughs even though such a girl doesn’t exist. I can’t remember the last time he saw anyonegirlfriend.

We bow our heads for Père’s brief Pavian prayer. My ear picks out each word, and I feel a sudden wish to go beyond these rote phrases. I touch the wall. I think of Oskar.

When Père concludes, I reach for my serviette, draping it across my lap. “I’m mostly appearing on live broadcasts and doing short videos about art restoration.”

“They’re good, too. Freja’s been holding out on us,” Ella pipes up from the other side of the table. She serves herself the asparagus and prosciutto before reaching for the next dish. “Ooh, scallops.”

“These will be the last of the season if we don’t want to start another war with Vorburg,” Noah warns.

There was something in the news recently. I try to remember what it was, but the truth is that tensions between the two countries are always at a rolling boil. There’s no matter too trivial to trigger a diplomatic skirmish.

“It wasn’t a war,” Ella counters, spearing a quarter of a scallop and popping it into her mouth.

“Max told me,” Clara chimes in. Mama’s mouth tightens. Clara halts but pushes forward. “Max told me it was more heated than it appeared in the newspapers. Nearly forty Vorburg vessels surrounded five Sondish boats, throwing nets into their propellers, attempting to ram them. They had to deploy a rescue craft. It got tense.”