The court laughed good-naturedly, and Aury forced a smile. Before she could argue further, everyone raised their glasses and drank.
A servant pulled out her chair. Filip still didn’t meet her eyes, even as he drank to her health. He looked everywhere else—at the Sacred Oak painted on the ceiling, the cerulean ribbons fluttering from the high beams, the king and queen.
Aury reached for her own drink and took a fortifying sip.
Then Filip returned to his chat with the nobleman. “I fight with both sword and small axe,” Filip said in an accented version of the common tongue.
His voice rumbled deep in his chest. That chest she’d seen bare just an hour ago. She swallowed and untied her cloak. She’d seen a few male chests in her day, but none as fine as his.
“And your nickname is Bard, yes?” the nobleman asked.
Aury let her cloak and hood fall onto the back of her chair, the heat of a challenge rising in her chest. She’d said this was no game, but it felt like one. One she must win. “Bard? Are you a singer, then, Prince Filip?”
Filip’s gaze pinned her down, but he didn’t recoil at her glamour or even twitch. She felt as though he stared right into her soul, and the white flash of lightning seemed to storm across his gray eyes though she knew it was merely a reflection of the candlelight. He traced the edge of his cup with a thumb, and his lips parted. Heat speared her body. “Bárda means something different in my tongue. But I can make my steel sing if it pleases you, my lady.”
Invisible flames licked up Aury’s body. Was he threatening her or seducing her? Definitely threatening. He couldn’t want to seduce this face she’d had the fae glamour up. Only the caster of the glamour could see through it. Her nose was abnormally pointed now and boasted a nice little wart. They’d puffed her jawline to give her the first hint of jowls. And her eyes were bloodshot like she hadn’t slept in ages.
The nobleman laughed, the sound grating. “In the elven language it means hatchet.”
Filip studied her face, and she smiled at him wanly, taking a serving of venison and chewing it with her mouth wide open. His dark eyebrow twitched, but he returned her smile. She could hardly keep from laughing. He had to be horrified. See what happens when you try to control me? she longed to shout. She was done with the control the fae had lorded over her at the Agate Palace. Never again. She would live as she wanted to live. But instead of shouting, which would do nothing for her, she forced her frustration down, only talking quietly with the noblewoman to her right and ignoring Filip as the servants brought in dessert.
“Queen Gwinnith tells me you hail from the eastern provinces. How are grape prices from the islands these days?” Aury asked the woman.
“I’m Lady Ethel, and yes, the queen speaks the truth. The price of grapes grows steadily higher due to the piracy near Sea’s Claw.”
“Pirates?” Aury hadn’t seen anything of that when she’d gone there with Werian.
“It’s a new problem and one I don’t see us solving soon. They are crafty and quick.”
“Are the pirates from Wylfenden or…” Lady Ethel glanced at Filip—all but an accusation in her gaze.
Filip’s gaze was flat. His jaw muscles bulged, and he looked to the table, taking a breath before responding. “We are not sailors, my lady.”
Aury spotted the dessert now sitting on the table, a perfect subject change. “Chocolate scorchpeppers?” She reached for one, her mouth already watering for the spicy-sweet taste.
The king leaned forward. “I heard you like them, Daughter.”
Aury set the dipped pepper onto her pewter plate, a heaviness in her chest. “Thank you, my king.”
Her initials had been pressed into the chocolate, and she traced the R for Rose, her mind humming with a feeling she couldn’t name.
Filip bit into a pepper, then whistled. “Hot. I can see why you like them.”
No one else had tried their dessert, and it was no surprise. The peppers could peel the paint off the walls. Filip finished his and licked his fingers. He leaned his chair back and winked at her.
Aury pushed away from the table, frustration rising at Filip’s acceptance of her glamoured looks and her horrible parents’ sad excuse for pretending to care about what she liked. They couldn’t buy her with dessert. She was a grown woman.
“Apologies. I must take some fresh air with my ladies. It’s been a chaotic few days,” she said, leaving the table. Kind murmurs of understanding flowed from the guests.
He had winked! He was flirting with her despite the horror that was her face. The nerve!
Hilda, Gytha, and Eawynn stood on the outer edges of the room with the guards. She gestured to them as she hurried past.
“Is he able to eat?” Eawynn clapped her hands and for once actually looked a bit wicked.
“He winked at me.” Aury dragged them into the broom closet again. “You have to make me more hideous. It’s not working.”
Hilda shook her head. “Any more and the king and queen will notice. We can’t risk it. If you defy Athellore, he’ll lock you up, and you’ll never get your chance at Darkfleot.”
“How old are you? How do you know so much about him and what he’ll do to me?”
“Older than I’m going to share, thanks very much,” Hilda snapped. “Trust me.”
“Why should I? You knew the truth about everything, and you never told me even though you were supposed to protect me.”
Gytha snorted. “Aury. We were under a binding. If we had uttered even a word, the Fae Queen would’ve taken our tongues. And you know that for truth.”
Aury sighed. “All right. I get it. You aren’t the enemies here. My father and mother are. And Filip.” She still didn’t trust a single one of them.
Eawynn spun in a circle, looking more like a lovesick youth than an old fae female. “He’s stunning!”
“No.” Aury gripped Eawynn’s arms and stared into the fae’s brown eyes. “He is not stunning. You do not get to think that when you’re playing on my team here.”
Eawynn stuck out her lower lip. “But he is as spicy as those scorchpeppers you love!”
“Nope. He’s not spicy. He’s a killer. And he’ll treat me like a slave.” She’d read a scroll about mountain elves and their slaves during the century war with the islands of Khem, a land across the sea. During that long ago war, the elves had taken on hundreds of human slaves to build the fortresses in the higher elevations. “Prince Filip is an obstacle blocking my path to ruling as a princess, and someday a queen, in the way I see fit. That’s the only version of freedom I see in my future, and I will have it.”
Eawynn shrugged and pointed a finger at Aury’s face. “I made your nose longer.”
“Good. I’ll try to belch more, too.” Sure, it was childish. But she’d seen baser plots work at the fae court. In some matters, males were males, no matter where they were raised. “I’m headed back.” She swung the broom closet door open. “You hang back. I don’t want my parents to guess what we’ve been up to. Return to the guards after you’ve given me a few moments to go on ahead.”
As she rounded the corner, she slammed into Filip.