Page 56 of Tusk Love

Guinevere hardly spared a glance for anything as they led the horses through districts that were a riot of color and noise. That was strange. She had burst into every settlement they’d passed through along the Amber Road with innocent eagerness, soaking up all the sights that were new to her. Oskar had assumed that Nicodranas wouldn’t prove any different in this regard, particularly because it was her first time on the Menagerie Coast.

But she didn’t marvel over display windows of curios and jewels and silks, or outdoor stalls where vendors and customers haggled overpiles of spices and dates. She showed no interest in the palm trees that waved in the wind or the cawing seagulls that streaked overhead. She didn’t look at the street performers juggling and playing music and casting little spells, or at the Clovis Concord’s Zhelezo that patrolled the city in mismatched armor that was so different from the deep uniform red of the Dwendalian Empire’s Crownsguard. Instead, her violet eyes were practically glued to her feet, the letter her father had written to tell her of her betrothal crumpled in one small fist.

She had shown the address on the letter to a tanner near the city gates, and after about half an hour of walking, they were drawing near the fifteen-foot-tall stone archway crowned with a large opal that the man had described—one of eleven that marked the entrances to the imaginatively named Opal Archways district, where Lord Wensleydale’s estate was located.

Guinevere walked through it as though she were walking to her execution.

Oskar concluded that she was nervous about reuniting with her parents and meeting the stranger whom she was to marry. He ached to pick her up, deposit her onto Vindicator’s saddle, and ride off with her in the opposite direction. Back toward the Wuyun Gates, back toward the Amber Road. The urge gripped him like a fever.

But that was kidnapping, and it was frowned upon in civilized society. There was also the fact that the neighborhood they were currently in was a study in gilded elegance, each house grander than the one before, with manicured lawns and windows bedecked in curtains of finest snow-white lace. The streets were less crowded compared to other areas of the city, and the silk-clad, bejeweled folks whowereout and about all sported the pinched features and perennially turned-up noses characteristic of nobility. Even the oil lanterns mounted to the poles boasted all sorts of fancy embellishments, which struck Oskar as ridiculous, because why would a lantern need to be carried on the backs of golden dolphins leaping up from golden waves? Who evencared,as long as it did the job of providing light at night?

It couldn’t be denied, however, that this was the world to whichGuinevere belonged. Here in the Opal Archways, there was neither hunger nor hardship. Judging from the residents’ expressions of alarm that would have been more appropriate for a dragon attack, the most distressing thing that could happen here was the arrival of a pair of grimy, shabbily dressed travelers.

Not even Guinevere’s considerable beauty could save her from censure. People were actuallycrossing the streetso as to avoid walking right by them.

“Oskar,” she whispered, and her next words filled his heart with ice, “could we possibly change before we call at Lord Wensleydale’s estate?”

Couldwepossibly change…?She was ashamed not just of herself, but of him. He was thinking about the meeting with Lady Foxhall again. The way Guinevere had tried to hide her humble attire with her cloak, the way she had hesitated to introduce him.

He was too tired to be angry. The journey was drawing to a close, and all the lies he’d told himself about what mattered and what didn’t were shattering left and right.

Princesses didn’t marry blacksmith’s apprentices.

He wasn’t even a blacksmith’s apprentice anymore. He was literally an unemployed bum wandering around Wildemount. What kind of life could he give someone who’d once had everything?

They ducked into an alleyway between two houses. Oskar blocked it off with Pudding and Vindicator but also kept watch while Guinevere changed. The furtiveness required of being in a city was a far cry from swimming naked in a lake or making love in the forest with the eyes of creation upon them. They were back in reality now. Back to hiding bits and pieces of themselves.

Feeling a light tap on his shoulder, Oskar turned around to find Guinevere in a clean if wrinkled blue dress, one that she hadn’t worn before. He realized now that she’d been saving it for today. But even a fresh garment couldn’t disguise the tangles in her silver hair or the dust all over her skin or the fact that she was thinner than she’d been when they first set out on the Amber Road.

Gods, what had he done to her?

“Your turn,” she said, not quite meeting his eyes.

She took watch while he changed, resentment simmering through him. He selected his least beat-up linen shirt and the black jacket that Guinevere had embroidered with roses in happier times. When he was done, he yanked off the Vigilance Stone and shoved it into his rucksack before she could give any indication of what he already knew—that the leather strap and its lone cheap gem were out of place amidst all the gold-chained, diamond-encrusted pendants dangling from aristocratic necks that they’d seen thus far.

“Do I pass milady’s muster now?” Oskar hated the bitterness in his voice, yet he was powerless to do anything except feel it.

Guinevere appeared startled by such a question, but she eventually nodded, biting her lip. Her gaze lingered on the adorned collar of his jacket, and he silently willed her to say something,anything.Just the slightest acknowledgment that all that had happened had happened. Because that was what she had reduced him to.

But she didn’t breathe a word, and they left the alleyway and continued on, until at last they came to a house that fit the tanner’s description and was in the location that he’d stated.

It was a house in that it was a place where people slept and ate and passed their days. However, Oskar had seen smaller villages.Mansionwas the more appropriate term, perhaps evenpalace.It loomed on an incline over a seashell-flecked granite driveway shaded by palm trees. Its façade was all graceful lines and snow-white alabaster gleaming in the bright coastal sunlight, capped by a painted roof that rested on bas-relief carvings of Minotaurs, which were the symbol of House Wensleydale.

There were guards everywhere. Not the Zhelezo, but a private security force. Oskar derived some comfort from that; laying siege to this estate was probably above the Web’s pay grade. As he and Guinevere started up the driveway with the horses, the guards crossed their spears together, blocking the path.

A captain-of-the-guard-looking fellow stepped forward, assessing Oskar’s and Guinevere’s appearances and their luggage. “Deliveries are through the servants’ entrance out back,” he told them with a sniff.

Oskar jabbed his thumb in Guinevere’s direction. “Even when I’m deliveringher?”

The probable captain’s eyebrows nearly disappeared into his helmet. Guinevere showed him her father’s letter and explained the circumstances that had led to her showing up on Lord Wensleydale’s doorstep several days behind schedule and with only one escort.

Servants were summoned—grooms to take care of the horses, and a butler to ferry Oskar and Guinevere to the gardens, where “Master Illiard” and “Mistress Betha” apparently were. Even as Oskar followed Guinevere and the butler, the pearwood trunk tucked under his arm, he wondered why he was doing so. He had fulfilled his duty. He was supposed to be heading back north by now. Why wasn’t he? Why hadn’t Guinevere sent him away yet?

The stately gardens were to the left of the mansion. No wildflowers here, no overgrown grass. Everything was perfectly calculated, from the neat beds of red chrysanthemum and purple phlox and white verbena to the glimmering marble fountains to the trellises of morning glory and firecracker vine. Wensleydale must be retaining an army of gardeners in addition to his army of private guards. Two figures were standing beneath an arbor, looking out over the sweeping grounds beyond. They turned at the sound of footsteps and were rushing over even before the butler had finished announcing Oskar and Guinevere’s arrival.

But they stopped within arm’s length of their daughter, their postures making it clear that they were prepared to turn right back around and run in the opposite direction at any moment. That was the moment it truly sank in for Oskar that Guinevere’s parents were afraid of her, and rage made his vision go dim and his fists clench.

Guinevere had inherited her pale hair and violet eyes from her father, Illiard. She’d gotten her copper complexion, slim build, and delicate features from her mother, Betha. Both parents were as well attired as any noble in the Opal Archways, but there was a conspicuous absence of jewelry.

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