AYLETH

Ayleth slid into her seat at the head table just as her father stood to make the toast. She was glad, it gave her a moment—several moments, given her father's preference for making the most of a captive audience—to breathe and try to understand what had just happened.

She looked at her hand in wonder, touching the blood smeared across her palm, his blood as well as her own.

"Who has stolen your heart so quickly?" her mother murmured, shooting her a catlike smile from the side so that she appeared to anyone watching not to be speaking, but only greeting her daughter.

"What?" Ayleth hissed through unmoving lips, her heart hammering. How had her mother—

"You're late back, and without your ladies. My guess is that someone caught your eye already. I always feared you'd be like your father, too quick to give your heart away."

Ayleth sighed with relief. Her mother was curious. She didn't know.

"I wasn't delayed by a stolen heart, Mother. I was… flustered, so waited in the maze to calm myself."

"Flustered? That sounds promising."

Ayleth gave a tiny shake of her head. "One of the drunk lords cornered me in the maze." Her mother went very still next to her. "I took care of it. It was just… unsettling."

"Do you have his name?" her mother asked in a far-too-calm voice.

"He is just an oaf, mother. He was drunk and—"

"If he laid his hands on the future Queen of Zenithra, he is a dead man," her mother breathed.

Ayleth closed her eyes and prayed. "That won't be necessary. He only… made his intentions known. He was rather insistent, but he did not fight me once my desires were made clear to him."

Her mother's face was a cold mask as she scanned the room. "You will give his name to your father when the feast is over."

"Yes, mother."

"Are you alright?"

"Yes."

"Did anyone see it?"

"No. I had taken a wrong turn and he found me. But he left when I… was clear with him."

Her mother huffed a quiet laugh and forced herself to smile, speaking through unmoving lips. "That's my future Queen."

They both turned their attention to her father then. While Ayleth was glad to have distracted her from the questions about a suitor, she disliked putting Roarke under her father's disapproval. Though, she supposed he had earned it. If he'd done that to someone who wasn't capable of getting themselves untangled… Ayleth bit her lip. Yes, she would give her father his name, though she'd ask for leniency if he'd never shown this tendency towards others before. Perhaps he really was just maddened by the drink.

"Whoever caught your attention tonight, leave him alone now," her mother murmured behind her goblet a moment later. Ayleth should have known she wouldn't forget. "Men enjoy the chase. Don't make yourself too easily available."

"Yes, Mother. Honestly, I plan to go to bed soon. I'm tired."

Her mother thought about that for a moment, tapping her fingernails on the table. "Do you know who it was?"

"We weren't together at the mask reveal. I'm sure I'll know him, though," she said, honestly.

"Mystery is wonderful. But do not focus too much, too quickly. Let yourself get to know several of the men. If he is a good candidate, he will fight for you."

"Yes, Mother."

That was the only discussion about it, but Ayleth's mind kept turning back to Etan. She scanned the room for him, but knowing her father, he and his family had been placed at the furthest reaches of the feast hall. It turned her heart dark, realizing the man who was to be her husband, who would father her children, sat in a place of dishonor. And she could do nothing about it.

Yet.

With grim determination, Ayleth forced herself to chew and swallow the feast offerings, though she couldn't make herself taste it. Her heart yearned, it ached. She kept leaning forward, pulled towards him. But even if she were to see him, to stand in front of him, she couldn't touch him—would be unwise even to speak to him!

She was miserable.

Her only saving grace was that everyone had gotten too drunk to dance, so the feast became the end of the official events of the night. In less than an hour she was able to excuse herself and take a maid to chaperone her to her bed chamber.

Her mother gave her a sharp glance when she told her she was leaving, but Ayleth's misery must have shown on her face, because she said nothing and only kissed her cheek and wished her a good sleep.