Page 52 of A Vow of Embers

I didn’t agree with what Parthenia was saying but had learned when I needed to hold my tongue.

Except when the other person was Alexandros.

“They already took the sheets?” Parthenia asked, nodding toward the bed.

“Yes. What do they do with them?”

“The matron will take them to be washed and will tell others what she saw. In the old days they used to hang the sheets of the royal bride in the main courtyard for everyone to see.”

I grimaced. “That’s terrible.”

“Yes, it was. That’s why they stopped doing it.” She came in and looked around the room carefully. She walked behind the screen and I heard her open my trunk. She reemerged and said, “We will need to order you furniture. You will need a chair and a table with a mirrorso that I can arrange your hair, a full-length mirror to see your outfits in, and more than just one trunk. When do you expect your things to arrive from Locris?”

It was embarrassing to tell her, “I already have all of my things with me.”

But instead of commenting on it, she said, “Then you will need a full wardrobe. I will call on the head seamstress and get her started. We will definitely need to hire additional help. You will need shoes, accessories, belts, toiletries.”

“And jewelry,” I added, sensing a possible opportunity.

“Yes, we will bring the best jewelers, silversmiths, and goldsmiths in so you can make your selections.”

I seized on the opening and casually asked, “Is there a treasury or a vault where I can keep those sorts of things secure?”

“Three floors down, just before the stairs that lead to the lower levels. There are always guards posted at the doors, so everything will be safe.”

Suddenly I knew what I was going to do today.

“But first, I should help you get dressed,” she said.

I had forgotten that I was sitting on my bed wrapped in a wet sheet and a now damp blanket. Parthenia went back to my trunk and selected a tunic for me to wear. I put on my undergarments and then the tunic, but I didn’t understand how the top was meant to stay in place. I came out and she quickly tied it off for me, tucking it in at all the right places, showing me how it was to hang.

“I’m supposed to have dinner with the prince’s phratry tonight,” I said. “Will I need to wear something different for that?”

“Yes, because it is an important event.” She had me sit on the bed so that she could brush my hair with one of the prince’s combs. “It’s tradition for the new bride to have her first dinner with the men of the household, which in this case would be the prince and his phratry. It’s also where you will open your gifts.”

“Gifts?”

“Wedding gifts. Everyone who attended the feast last night brought one.”

What was I going to do with gifts for a wedding I didn’t even want?

“Perhaps someone gifted you with new bedding,” she teased.

And despite telling myself that I wasn’t going to think about what had happened a few minutes ago with the prince, her words brought me right back to it. I had to understand why I’d done it so that I wouldn’t be fool enough to fall into that trap again.

It had been my fault. He had been doing what he’d said he would—making it seem like we were a happily married couple. I was the one who had taken things further and he’d just been going along with it. Humoring me. A fact that was completely humiliating.

The more I thought about it, the more embarrassed I became. I was always so busy questioning his motives that I hadn’t bothered to question my own. I knew why I had turned over—to vex him. To prove that I wasn’t as revolting as he’d claimed I was.

But then I was the one who had slid my leg between his.

I was the one who had kissed his neck. I had told him not to touch me and then turned around and encouraged him.

Had I done it just to prove a point?

Or had I been seeking some kind of comfort, even from a person like him, because I was so upset about everything changing? I had told him once to kiss me and make me forget. Perhaps that had been my desire.

That led me back to why he’d participated. What if he’d only done so because I’d been brazen and he’d pitied me?

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