A Beast's Tale

Chapter 37

I debated the point countless times. The final piece of chocolate cake remained on my plate, taunting me with the memory of her flushed, flustered face when I'd teased her with the beignet, and I knew I shouldn't repeat that incident. I knew I should eat the cake and remove the temptation. But she was outside my door, laughing and talking with my brothers, and that annoyed me. I had no right to feel jealous of her attention. And yet every hour that passed was an hour closer to my having to ride out to the border to deal with Gilbert and fetch Clavis. Why shouldn't I have a little fun before then?

I was rationalizing my faulty thought process, and I knew it.

The noise died down as the cake disappeared and my brothers went their separate ways. When the door finally opened, the library outside was silent. I kept my eyes on my book.

"Is there anything else you need from me before I go, Prince..."

I looked up at her as her voice trailed off. Her cheeks were already pink, her green eyes wide. She bit her lip and looked from the cake to me and back. I felt a smirk spreading across my face.

"Yes."

I stood, and she took a step back, her blush deepening as I advanced on her. This was already worth it. She held the plate in her hand, but her eyes stayed on me, darting on occasion to the door with as much uncertainty as I'd felt before she'd walked into this room. She could run. If she wanted to leave or make me stop, she could. Perhaps...

No. I couldn't allow myself to think that.

Her back hit the bookshelves. I took the plate from her unresisting grip. Her fading bruise had vanished amidst her flaming red cheeks.

"Prince Chevalier, please..."

"I didn't realize you were so sensitive to a little teasing," I commented, loading the fork.

Her brow tensed. "A little teasing? That's all you and your brothers do!"

I lifted the cake to her mouth. She pressed her lips together and glanced at the door, then shifted her weight and reached a hand behind her to grip a shelf. Uncertainty was becoming discomfort. I wasn't sure what had changed, but it made me uneasy as well. I lowered the cake by an inch.

"Does this bother you so much?"

Her eyes snapped to mine. "Yes, it does. It would be a lot easier if you just ignored or insulted me like everybody else."

I dropped the fork onto the plate, irritation rising within me. This again. I knew none of my brothers had been ignoring or insulting her this afternoon, which meant it was their attention that upset her, and I knew the reason. I wanted to hear it from her anyway. She needed to rid herself of this. "What are you talking about?"

She glared at me with narrowed eyes as hard as emeralds. "For somebody who accuses me of being naïve all the time, you can be pretty clueless, Prince Chevalier."

"Explain."

"Think about it. I have no father, no family name, no money, and I'm supposedly the bastard child of a prostitute. You've said before that the perceptions of others are inconsequential, but perception is everything. Truth is irrelevant. I am nothing to nobody, and I shouldn't even be talking to you about this."

And there it was. The lies she'd heard and internalized all her life. She didn't know how to handle anything else, and I realized this was another facet of herself she'd been hiding. The more favor shown to her, the more it hurt her. She craved and hated positive attention. If I hadn't seen similar warped thinking in Licht, I wouldn't know how to interpret this. But interpretation did not mean I knew what to do about it.