Page 111 of Rise of the Vicious Princess

He lifted his head. “Yes.”

“Yes,” Charis whispered.

He adjusted one more hairpin and then let his hands come to rest on her shoulders. When he met her gaze again, the shadow in his eyes was gone. “This isn’t the right night to overthink things. You’re happy. I get to go to a ball with my favorite person in the world. Life is good right now, and we should savor that.”

Charis stood slowly, her eyes still on him. “You can talk to me about how you feel, Tal. I know I’m not the only one who needs to figure out how to live with a very complicated situation.”

“I will after we enjoy tonight.” He stepped close to drape her fur cloak around her bare shoulders. “I promise. Now, here’s the list of items submitted to the guards’ station today by various members of the nobility. See anyone you want to show favor to by wearing their gift?” He handed her a sheet of paper.

She glanced over the list, calculating the benefits of showing favor to each person listed. There were sixteen gifts on the page with the name of the benefactor beside each item. It wouldn’t hurt to wear the bracelet offered by the Severins, or the lacy scrap of a shawl left by Lady Merryfin. A show of support for the north on the heels of a peaceful end to the war would remind both the battle-worn northern nobility and those who’d tried to annex the north for the sake of peace that the Willowthorns kept their word to all.

Of course, if she slighted Lady Whitecross’s offer of a pendant, there was the issue of complicating the message sent to the council members. Still, no one else from the council had sent gifts, so she could simply let Lady Whitecross know her pendant would be worn at Charis’s next social engagement.

She ran her finger down the list of items one last time, as something—some vague memory that felt important—itched in the back of her mind.

Show of support to the north? No, that wasn’t it.

“Are you ready?” Tal asked.

Shaking her head, she kept staring at the list. Choosing with care so that she didn’t offend a council member?

Not quite, though that felt closer to the truth.

“What’s wrong?” Tal sounded concerned.

She set the list down, her mind racing. “Where are the papers?”

“What papers?”

“The ones I had the other night, before Vahn’s visit. From the guards’ station. I left them on the side table by the fireplace.”

He moved to her desk. “I put them here for safekeeping.”

She followed him and scooped up the list of visitors who’d come to the guards’ station at the entrance of her wing to leave a gift the night of the ambassadors’ ball. The night someone had snuck an assassin into the ladies’ parlor and a spy into her own chambers.

Milla

Fada

Luther

Lady Ollen

Lord Westing

Lord and Lady Rynce

Lady Silving

Lord and Lady Mefferd

She frowned, running her finger over the list again. There were fourteen names. “Something’s off about this.”

He peered over her shoulder. “A visitor log?”

“From the night of the ambassadors’ ball. These are the people who entered my wing that evening and could have ostensibly helped the spy hide in my chambers.” She opened a drawer. “Mother and I studied this already, of course, but that was right after Milla, and I . . . my focus wasn’t very sharp.”

“Understandable.” He watched as she pulled out another sheet of paper filled with Milla’s looping scrawl.

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