The Queen's Secret (The Queen's Secret #2) - Melissa de la Cruz Page 0,18

I slump into a chair. I have no fight left in me. Rhema exhausted me physically during the training session in the courtyard, but this is far, far worse. It’s a malaise sweeping over me, a feeling of powerlessness that I despise. Intensely I wish that I was still Shadow, the girl who grew up in the forest and meadow glade, rather than the fine lady trapped in a castle, hectored about obligations.

My pulse is racing, as though my entire body were in rebellion.

“So,” says Hansen, as though we’d had a chat about new tapestries for the summer residence. “That’s that. The Small Council is planning a special meeting and we should both be there.”

I have no words, and I just stare at my feet. I suspect I look as defeated as I feel. Cal sent away. Hansen in his stead. A child—a child that isn’t Cal’s. How could I love such a child? Maybe I really am a monster.

“I know this is difficult to accept, but it is probably for the best. Holt is of much more use to us out in the field than shackled to court. Your assassin is a man of action. He’s not going to be happy to be some glorified guard or training a slew of fresh recruits. His job is to keep you from danger, and the sooner you bear my child, the safer you will be.” He squeezes my shoulder in a sympathetic manner. His kindness just about kills me.

I stare into the flickering fire, unwilling to meet Hansen’s gaze. “You have said your piece. I shall see you at the council meeting.”

Hansen leaves without another word, pulling the door open himself rather than tapping and waiting for the pages to open it. I’ve never seen him do that before. I always thought he was too lazy, too pampered. Then I realize he does this so that the pages feel they have done their job. It is a privilege to serve the king.

Hansen isn’t as detached and oblivious as I thought. He’s capable of politics. He’s capable of manipulation. And to hear him talk, he’s capable of setting his feelings aside in order to have this heir.

I’ve been deluding myself in these months since our marriage. The rumors are true, after all: My mother’s dream is to unite all four kingdoms of Avantine once more. Hansen and my marrying was the first step. The next step was having children who would grow up to marry the heirs to Argonia and Stavin. A new Dellafiore dynasty, she told me. I listened, but I suppose I didn’t really hear. Or I thought that when the time came, it would be a bearable duty, not something that intruded on my relationship with Cal. My love for Cal, my devotion to him.

I had promised him that my husband would be no true husband to me. I thought I could keep this promise.

The crows outside caw, laughing at me. Everyone knows everything here in this cold, miserable castle. Everyone wins. Everyone but me.

It’s time to grow up, I know. Time to face the Small Council and my husband and accept my fate as queen.

Chapter Seven

Caledon

When Cal is summoned to an emergency meeting of the Small Council, it’s almost dusk, and the day’s training in the yard is winding down. Exhaustion and incompetence have finished off most of the recruits, and Cal can’t help but feel the entire day has been an elaborate waste of time.

The meeting, he assumes, is about the scribe’s belief that an Aphrasian monk stalks the narrow staircase of the tower. Cal has already set a guard outside, and the evening search of the building will begin soon. After all the scribes—and Father Juniper, Lilac’s personal priest—are in their chambers for the night, the tower will be locked, soldiers standing guard until daybreak. Another search will take place then. The captain of the guard has promised a thorough search of the entire castle, in fact, to make sure no gray monk is harbored in any servant’s chamber, or lives secreted in the catacombs or cellars.

The captain of the guard, Cal suspects, believes that Daffran’s sightings are the terror-fueled imaginings of a doddering old man. Given the unreliability of the witness, Cal wasn’t expecting the Small Council to take this matter so seriously, but after what happened in Stur, perhaps they feel an incursion by the Aphrasians is a distinct possibility.

He sprints up the curving stone staircase that links all the floors in the building