Lio opened his mouth to argue further on her behalf, but Belle placed her hand on his arm to stop him. “Lio, please. I don’t even wish to go.”
All of Lio’s bluster left him at once. He turned to look at her fully. “Are you certain?”
She waved her hand at him. “Yes, I was dreading it the whole way here. I’m happy to have a reason to avoid it, and I’d much rather spend my time in Paris on foot, visiting the places I remember my father taking me to, and exploring new ones.”
Lio frowned. “Bastien just finished telling us that Paris is in turmoil.”
“Oh, mon petit lionceau, you are so provincial.” Bastien rolled his eyes. “The Third Estate is nothing. Merely rabble-rousers without anything better to do. The most they’ve achieved is the forcible seizure of Paris’s tollhouses, so unless Belle has a cartful of taxable goods entering the city, I doubt she’ll even much notice their presence.” He laughed sharply. “King Louis has everything under control. The city is perfectly safe, I assure you.”
Belle watched as the duc’s smile slid from his face the moment Lio looked away. It was the sort of quirk her mind would have latched on to were she not tired from her journey and bursting at the thought of reacquainting herself with the places in Paris she remembered her father taking her to, to say nothing of exploring new ones.
And so she tucked away the duc’s curious expression, promising to revisit it when there wasn’t a whole city of delights waiting for her.
Lio left with Bastien for his chambers in search of something more appropriate to wear to meet the king. A servant guided Belle to their apartments, where she was happy to have a moment alone with her thoughts.
The bedchamber was as sumptuous as the rest of Bastien’s home. Belle’s feet sank low into the plush carpet that covered most of the floor, as elaborately woven as the richest tapestry. She wandered absently to the full-length mirror anchored to the wall to study the dress she wore, the one Bastien had insulted. To her eyes, it was the finest thing she had ever seen, finer even than the gown she had worn when she married Lio in the breathless days following the breaking of the curse. She had donned it that morning at the inn where they were lodging, having picked it specially for their entrance into Paris. When Lio had seen it on her, he couldn’t disguise how happy it made him to see her so finely attired. To him, it was a step toward the acceptance of her new role. To her, it was armor, a signal to the rest of the world that she could belong.
Now she realized it was just another illusion, and not even an effective one, for Bastien had seen right through her. The world of the French court was not her world. She would never fit into it.
She tore off the gown, desperate to be rid of the artifice. She dug through her trunk, searching for the plainest dress she had packed, buried deep at the bottom. She pulled it over her head and relished the familiarity. It was blue like the gown she had discarded, but the fabric was cheap muslin that she covered with a thick white apron tied around her waist. In Paris she knew the style of dress was actually popular. It was called a chemise à la reine, named after Queen Marie Antoinette’s fondness for all things pastoral. Only, Belle truly had fed chickens and washed laundry in hers. She thumbed the stubborn stain that had never come out, the one that Gaston had given her when he splashed her skirts with mud after his ill-fated proposal.
Lio’s voice made her jump. “Don’t be mad at me, but I think I prefer you like this.” She looked up to the corner of the mirror to see him standing in the doorway behind her, dressed for Versailles.
“Only if you won’t be mad at me when I say you look ridiculous.” A curled white wig covered his beautiful chestnut hair, thick white powder coated his warm skin, and his outfit mirrored Bastien’s in its extravagance and quality. He wasn’t her Lio anymore—this Lio belonged to Versailles.
He approached her bashfully, joining her to stand before the mirror. “I don’t even recognize myself.”
But despite her misgivings, she could see how princely he looked, how easily he would be accepted by Versailles’s courtiers, and how different they really were, standing side by side.
Lio seemed to read the discord on her face. “It’s only temporary, Belle.” He pressed one hand to the small of her back and used the other to gesture at himself. “All of this will be gone as soon as I’m back in King Louis’s good graces, I swear to you.”
“It fits you so well, mon coeur,” she remarked.
He pulled on the lapels of his forest-green frock coat. “It would seem we are built the same, Bastien and I.”
“No, I mean the whole thing. You look like a prince.”
He raised a brow at her. “I was a prince before I put on a wig and powdered my face.”
“Yes, of course.” But she couldn’t shake the feeling that Lio was inching closer to the person he was supposed to be, and all the while she had been straying further from her true self.
Lio changed the subject. “Are you excited to explore Paris?”
She tried to shake her worries away. “Very.”
“And you’re sure you don’t want to come with us to Versailles? Because I don’t care what Bastien thinks. If you want to come, you’re—”
“I promise you I don’t.” She reached for his hand. “It’s better this way.”
Now Lio wouldn’t have to be ashamed of his common, provincial wife, and Belle wouldn’t have to pretend she couldn’t hear whatever insults were lobbed her way. She was always going to be more comfortable in the streets and markets and gardens of Paris.
Bastien appeared in her doorway, freshly powdered and with a garish beauty mark painted on his cheek. “The carriage is ready.” His tone was ominous, and Belle couldn’t help but laugh at his severity.
Bastien gave her a questioning look, and she took a deep breath to suppress her laughter. “Oh, come, now. It’s Versailles, not prison.”
Bastien sniffed. “Oh, but the king’s court is its own kind of prison, Belle.” They began to descend the grand staircase. “France’s nobility is in chains, madame. They may be gilded, but they are chains nonetheless.”
Belle was quite sure any number of France’s working class would have happily been shackled by the gilded chains of the nobility, but she held her tongue as they exited the duc’s home. Bastien immediately ducked into the awaiting carriage while Lio paused, taking Belle’s hands in his.
“We shouldn’t be too long. King Louis must have matters to attend to that are more pressing than a wayward prince étranger.”
Bastien laughed coldly from within the carriage. “Don’t be so sure, Cousin. You may find that Louis has plans for you yet.”
Lio rolled his eyes and pulled Belle a bit closer. “To hell with the king and his plans,” he whispered in her ear. “We’ve got plans of our own.”
Bastien poked his head out of the carriage window. “Would you like us to drop you somewhere, Belle?”
The thought of spending time in an enclosed space with the duc was unappealing, to say the least. “No, thank you, Bastien. I’m happy to explore on foot.”
He looked her up and down. “Yes, I’d imagine you are.”