If you want to share my author experience and don’t mind music playing while you read, try playing "Part that’s Holding On" by RED while reading this chapter and the next couple following...
*****
AYLETH
She wasn’t sure she breathed for several minutes.
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The first minute, she didn’t trust her body to move without shattering.
The second, all the couples that had been announced—happily or otherwise—rose from their seats, along with their parents, to meet in the center of the tables to shake hands and be seen to be publicly aligned. There were several couples, and so the crowd of people blocked any hope for a discreet escape for someone like Ayleth, trapped within the U of the table.
For the third minute, Ayleth slowly, carefully, cautious that her skin might shatter like glass, turned in her seat to stare at her plate so she didn’t have to watch Etan bow over the hand of the Lady Playn.
A very fitting last name, Ayleth thought bitterly. But the words lacked the punch of a landed blow because Ayleth knew they were both unkind, and only marginally true.
Sarya might not have Ayleth’s bright beauty, but she was a striking woman in her own right.
Nausea punched at the back of Ayleth’s throat and she swallowed and swallowed.
Trystan’s hand appeared, seeking hers in the folds of her skirt. She should have looked. Should have turned to him and made conversation. Should have stopped anyone from having any reason to think she was disturbed by these announcements. But she could barely think, let alone move or speak.
The words echoed in her head over and over, as if the Cryer screamed them on a loop.
The Kingdom of Summitras takes the Lady Sarya Playn of the Kingdom of Playn...
The Kingdom of Summitras takes the Lady Sarya Playn of the Kingdom of Playn...
The Kingdom of Summitras takes the Lady Sarya Playn of the Kingdom of Playn...
Do you, Lord Etan Summit, take the Lady Sarya Playn—
Trystan’s large, calloused hand squeezed, entirely engulfing hers, and Ayleth clung back. His warmth seemed, in that moment, the lone plank to keep her head above water in the ocean of this shocking, unparalleled pain. Please visit 𝗳re𝐞𝓌e𝚋n૦ѵ𝗲l. co𝐦
impending failure.
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The dear man leaned across her, his elbow on the table and his chin dropped next to her ear, as if they were lovers, anticipating their own announcement, the size of his shoulders hiding Ayleth from anyone except her parents.
"Breathe," he whispered. "You are deathly pale, Ayleth." He lifted a finger to push her hair back from her face as if he was being tender. "They’ll notice. You must keep yourself together long enough that your departure will not be aligned with the announcements."
Ayleth nodded dumbly.
The Kingdom of Summitras takes the Lady Sarya Playn of the Kingdom of Playn...
Trystan’s fingers closed more tightly on hers. "Ayleth..."
"Ayleth, are you well?" her mother asked quietly, under the level of the discussion rising throughout the room as the Kingdoms celebrated their alliances, or their enemies gossiped about their impending failure.
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"Not really, mother," Ayleth said, though where the words came from, she couldn’t have said.
She felt as if she had been skinned alive and left to bleed.
"Whatever is wrong?"
"The lamb, I think..." Ayleth trailed off, using Trystan’s bulk as a shield from the rest of the world. But she couldn’t escape the sharp gaze of her mother.
"Come now, Ayleth, you were fine a moment ago. Are you certain—"
"Your majesty, may I accompany Ayleth—and her Man, of course—to ensure she makes it to her chambers safely? I fear she may lose... herself. She will be more comfortable in her own chambers until the feelings have passed," Trystan said humbly.
From the corner of her eye, Ayleth saw her mother’s brows rise as if she were both impressed, and slightly offended by Trystan’s willingness to speak to her without invitation.
"Feelings?" her mother asked, with mock confusion.
Trystan sighed and lowered his voice further as if trying to hide his words from any others that might listen in. "The announcements... it’s difficult for a powerful beauty to be so... overshadowed," he said patiently. "We had discussed announcing today, but I felt it was too hasty. Ayleth... I fear I have placed her in a position to feel overlooked, and I regret it now. May I... comfort her?"
Her mother gave the oddest expression she had ever seen, but to Ayleth’s great relief, she sat back in her chair and nodded. "Given your plans, I see no reason not to," she said, her voice husky and suggestive in way that made Ayleth’s nausea roil again. But she swallowed it back.
"Thank you, mother," she rasped. Then, with Trystan’s help, and with little more than a glance at Falek—whose own face was pale and tight with rage. He’d stood guard against the wall, behind her parents where he could watch both Ayleth and the room, but with a snap of his formal cloak, he was moving to her and Trystan before Ayleth had even stepped away from the table.
Then, on Trystan’s arm, with Falek circling the tables to reach them, they started for the door—but that required passing through the crowd at the center of the table, the many happy couples and their families.
Etan stood on quarter-profile to her, nodding at the King of Playn, Sarya standing at his side, her hip pressed against his.
Ayleth stopped dead, but Trystan only used the moment to wrap her arm in the crook of his and murmur, "Just walk, I will guide you."
Then they were moving and soon other faces, other backs, other jaws were between her and Etan’s. Then Falek reached them, prowling through the crowd like some kind of avenging angel, his face thunderous and eyes flashing.
Not since she’d been kidnapped had Ayleth found herself so fragile, so desperately relieved to see him, to feel his shadow fall over her as he placed himself at her opposite side and matched her pace for shaking pace.
His eyes scanned the room for predators as they wove between people until they reached the open area awaiting dancers for the ball. The skin on the back of her neck prickled again—his eyes, following her, she was certain of it.
Nausea hit Ayleth in a wave and for a horrifying moment she thought she would lose what little food she’d eaten right there, in front of every ruler and court—and traitorous husband. But she shuddered to a halt, swallowing, her hands shaking, feeling the blood drain from her face.
Both men stopped with her and Trystan leaned in. "Ayleth, do you—"
"Take me to my ch-chambers," she snapped breathlessly.
Trystan raised his head to confer silently with Falek. But a moment later, one on each of her elbows, they began to move again, and soon they were finally out of the ball room.
The castle passed behind her in a blur as Ayleth struggled against the words, the memories, the way everything had begun to twist in her head.
The Kingdom of Summitras takes the Lady Sarya Playn of the Kingdom of Playn...
The only mercy was that she made it to her room and to the bedpan before she vomited with only Trystan and Falek as witnesses. And both of them swore—on her insistence—that they would never tell a soul.
Ayleth slumped into a chair at the side of the room, dropped her face into her hands and wept.
The Kingdom of Summitras takes the Lady Sarya Playn of the Kingdom of Playn...
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