To Marry a Dragon

22. Crowned Thief

Lord Eldwin's solar was furnished with tapestries of hunting scenes. White stags and ochre horses on slim legs, smiling hunters and swarming dogs peered at her with fake contentment. The long table set with the silver plate was stained oak. The mostly teal hue of the tapestries, the somber wood and the metallic glimmer chilled her to the bone despite the fire blazing in the human-height fireplace. She thought nostalgically of earthenware mugs in the Twisted Cockerel, the torches in the scones on the whitewashed walls. It was cheap and jolly. In comparison, luxury depressed her.

Sir Theophil's tale didn't stimulate her appetite either.

The slabs of meat and trays of vegetables seemed to leach poison into the sauce. She loaded her bread trencher with stew, then studied the content to see if there were any mushrooms in the mix.

The first bite filed her stomach with acid.

Don't be an idiot. He is eating of the same dish as you do. He can't poison you, not yet.

Indeed, Lord Eldwin sunk his yellowish teeth into his bread and meat with gusto.

Sauce dripped onto the table, soaking through bread forgotten in her hand, still raised to her mouth. She just couldn't make herself take another bite. Couldn't.

"Are you not hungry, Dame?" Lord Eldwin asked pleasantly as his serving man came to fill the wine goblets.

"I am afraid that seeing Prince Sigvart first hanged, then devoured alive so soon after learning of my siblings' demise is too much for my constitution."

She lowered her eyes, because if she kept fixing the Lord Protector with her stare, he'd see it as a challenge. And as much as she wished she could challenge him, at the moment she was alone and she didn't understand his sorcery.

"Prince Sigvart is a handsome man," Lord Eldwin observed neutrally.

"I've been betrothed to him from childhood," Elvira replies in the same tone. "I wanted to remain faithful to Gallicia."

For all his faults, Sigvart was a perfect foil to hide her intentions toward Ferrante. Icy shivers crawling down her spine told her that she must hide Ferrante from this man. Hide him, whatever the costs to herself.

Having had traveled the world for three years, fighting various evil-doers, she now couldn't believe that the younger version of her didn't spot the predator hiding behind the benevolent mask Lord Protector presented to the world.

Some villains did the unspeakable in a moment of uncontrollable passion.

Lord Eldwin was of the other sort, the villains who patiently weaved a doomsday web, dedicating his mind to it.

I should have known he was tricking me when he made me sign the abdication, but he offered me exactly what I wanted: an escape into the wide world, away from my duties.

"A commendable attitude in a woman of royal breeding. You are not a peasant to roll in the bushes with every likely lad riding past," Lord Eldwin replied.

Elvira had to take a sip of wine to soothe her parched throat. The image was shameful, yet seductive. Her fantasies immediately leaped to Ferrante, but Lord Eldwin couldn't have meant him. And if he didn't mean Ferrante, whom did he mean?

She hoped it wasn't Theophil, for she loathed to inadvertently put the earnest knight in danger. After all, Lord Eldwin wasn't afraid to hang Sigvart. He'd stomp Theophil out of existence.

Unfortunately, it couldn't have been an idle observation. Lord Eldwin never spoke idly...which meant Theophil. Perhaps, a servant carried a tale of their little tumble in the hall to Lord Eldwin. Almost certainly, actually.