Page 27 of The Prince or the Bard?
“When I asked the high queen what else she might eat or drink outside of her meals, she answered me too quickly,” I explain.
Ruairí’s dark eyes widen.
As he wheels, his coat spraying rainwater, I take a moment to gather myself before following. I spare just a second to wonder when I began to think of the prince as simply Ruairí.
Chapter Fourteen
The court healers areso distracted by my pacing and constant questions, they sentence me to walk the halls until their examination of the queen is concluded. As I leave her chambers, High King Tadhg grips the arms of a hearthside chair in absolute silence, his knuckles paling as his eyes follow the healers' movements.
The mighty Connor King has never looked so frightened. Until now, I wasn't sure hecouldfeel such fear.
When more healers keep arriving, it sinks in for me just how serious Fiadh’s condition is. By my count, every healer and apothecary in the castle and nearby army barracks is now pressed into the queen's bedchamber.
Prince Ruairi waits, too, so still he is little more than a shadow against the wall. When I turn at the end of the hall, my strides hurried with no place to go, I can see that he nibbles but does not bite through his nails.
My feet are beginning to ache from all the pacing. It's almost a relief when Ruairi seizes my arm, causing me to stop and whirl to face him.
I think he'll admonish me like the healers, or tell me my movements are driving him mad. Instead, I find his eyes dark eyes soft with understanding.
All at once, the tears begin to flow again. This time, they are for Fiadh. They are so desperate and burning, I regret I ever wasted any on Cillian Cloudtongue.
Queen Fiadh must live. A puca as high queen means so much for every púcaí, every fae shifter and every low fae.
And, I now admit, she means a great deal to me, too. My royal cousin.
Until I knew for certain that her body was riddled with deadly poison, I did not know how many of my own hopes I had put into her reign, and how deeply her kindness and friendship towards me had kept me going these last few months.
When I arrived here, she was a distant relative I had little memory of meeting, for the sake of whom I’d been plucked from everything I knew. I resented her with all my might. Now when I look upon her, I see family.
Ruairi’s arms envelop me as I sob into his shoulder. She can’t die. She just can’t.
As my eyes wring themselves of every tear I have left, I slowly become aware of the prince’s touch. His palm cradles the back of my head, his fingers tangling into my rain-dampened hair as he holds me close. My chest presses into his stomach, his arms into mine, my balled hands into his chest.
I catch the breath I needed.
Withdrawing from his hold, I mash away my tears with my palms, desperate for any shred of composure. I know that Ruairi looks upon me with concerned eyes. And that if I see that concern, I’ll only start crying again.
“Thank you, sir, for your attempts to comfort me,” I say stiffly. “I’m fine now.”
“Laoise—”
“I’m fine now.” I say it louder, aware of the other servants gathered in the hall.
And that is when I realize who I don’t see.
In all the time the healers have been here, a single, frantic lady-in-waiting has arrived, remaining at High Queen Fiadh’s side to preserve her modesty.
So where are the rest?
“Ruairi—sir.” I choke a little on the slip. “How can it be that none of the other ladies-in-waiting are here?”
His eyes widen for a fraction of a second before something dark flashes across them. “Stay here,” he says, and it sounds like an order.
Gone is the prince who so tenderly comforted me moments before. I finally see it: The evidence of that daily knight’s training he spoke of in the garden that day. This is a warrior stalking away from me, and he is truly frightening.
Good,I think. Because if those other ladies have anything to do with poisoning my cousin, they deserve to be as afraid as I’ve been for her, as they’ve made the queen feel as she lay in bed suffering, asking me when the pain would ever end.
Not a quarter hour after Ruairi disappears, a bellow of agony tears through the hall. The quiet, nervous conversations that have arisen out here become silent.
