The Beginning of Everything by Kristen Ashley Page 0,134
she was physically attached to him and had been torn away.
And now he had to hide that grief from a beautiful woman with kind, sad eyes.
A woman who was falling in love with him.
“Are you going to confront him?” she asked the screen.
He’d told her of Carrington and his father.
And Silence.
Mars knew.
And Farah could have no desire but what was best for Firenze, and what would be her kingdom of Wodell, therefore it was not a risk to share the knowledge with her.
Regardless of all of this, he trusted her.
Not because she was falling in love with him.
Because he sensed, above all, she was trustworthy.
“It might expose Silence,” he replied.
She turned her head his way.
Yes, she was incredibly lovely.
“If they were speaking in a way that could be overheard, it could have been anyone that reported this to Mars and you. Most especially Mars. There’s at least one servant in that corridor at all times.”
True trusted Farah.
But he did not share that he had noticed his cousin had an unnatural ability to hear things others could not. So he could not know that just anybody would have overheard this conversation.
What he did know was that his cousin could.
Silence tried to hide it, and she’d been so roundly neglected in her home and by the people around her, he reckoned she succeeded.
But she hadn’t hidden it from him.
“I do not wish to risk that, and Mars definitely doesn’t.”
She smiled a small smile. “He wouldn’t. He’s much charmed by her.”
“My cousin is charming.”
The smile that received was not small.
It faded as she turned fully his way and walked to him.
She stopped close enough to reach out and touch.
But she didn’t do that.
“May I speak candidly?” she requested.
“In all things,” he granted.
Her beautiful almond eyes softened.
“You must negotiate this counsellor out,” she said.
“I know this, sweets,” he replied. “But he has a hold on my father that is unhealthy. If I even begin to suggest it, he ends our discussion.”
“This unhealthy hold,” she began. “Do you think he knows something about the king that makes him do his bidding?”
“Blackmail?”
Farah shrugged uncomfortably.
“It would surprise me,” he told her.
“But it isn’t out of the question.”
“There are times, Farah, when Father doesn’t take Carrington’s counsel. These are whims or when he tires of Carrington’s nagging or when I suspect my mother has had his ear. And Carrington doesn’t like that much. If he knew something sensitive about my father, my father would just be a puppet.”
“Hmm…” she murmured, her gaze drifting off.
“We know his plan and even if he convinces my father and moves forward with it, we leave for Wodell in but days. The journey to Notting Thicket is less than three weeks. He would have little time to bring any fullness to his schemes, and being closer to them unfolding, I could keep an eye, uncover them and assume on my own shoulders whatever would fall when they’re exposed.”
She turned her attention again to him.
“On your shoulders,” she said quietly.
“It is the right thing to do.”
“It is the True thing to do.”
His name was odd and on more than a rare occasion caused some confusion.
But True was not confused with her current meaning.
“I can take it on my shoulders,” she suggested.
True blinked.
Slowly.
“Pardon?” he asked.
“When we get to your capital city, and I will say, a capital city named Notting Thicket is someplace I very much desire to see, in hopes the city is as charming as its name,” she said with a grin to start. A grin and words that were designed to deflect his attention from the dangerous absurdity of what she would say next. “I will pretend I heard something, or saw something, and did what Silence did, though no one will know she did it. I would tell my prince…and my king.”
She would do nothing of the sort.
“You won’t do that, Farah,” he stated.
“No one would question it.”
“It would make you visible.”
“And I’m not visible now?”
True felt a burn hit his throat.
For she was.
Even if those who felt her very visible were pretending that she was invisible.
Carrington hadn’t yet acknowledged her.
But that didn’t matter.
His mother, father, Aunt Vanka and Uncle Johan very poorly masked their antipathy to his future wife.
It was beyond rude as to be sickening.
“I’ll have a word with my mother, Farah,” he said gently.
She shook her head. “No, True. We’ve spoken of this.”
They had.
They’d discovered there was very little on which they didn’t agree.