Page 34 of The Prince or the Bard?
“I don’t think you understand.” She takes a step towards me, her hand shaking a little as it holds the walking stick tighter. “Without foolishness, you’ll never take a risk. You’d never have come to the castle. I’d never have left the Tideling Court to marry a man I’d fallen for at first sight—and he’d never have asked for my hand. You would never have fallen for the bard, or gotten close enough to Ruairí to help him search for the poison I’d been drinking. If you weren’t foolish, Laoise, I’d be dead by now.”
“I'd like to think that isn’t so, ma’am.”
“How could it be otherwise?”
I shrug. “Truly, I don’t miss it.”
“Then let me ask you this. If you had to choose today, whom would you pick? The prince or the bard?”
“The prince,” I say without hesitation.
A furrow appears in her brow, the trait that so reminded me of Unagh. “Why?”
“Because he’s a prince.” I tick the list off my fingers. “He has some power, security, wealth. And according to him, there is more to him than meets the eye.”
“More indeed. After the revel, when he made such a fool of himself, the high king tasked him with taking charge of our security—namely with ferreting out those who would do me harm.”
I suppose this should surprise me, but it doesn't. I nod my head. That makes some sense, I think. The prince seemed so different after that night.
“He did it for you,” the queen adds.
Now I'm surprised. My brows shoot up. “What? Why?”
“He wanted to be upstanding enough to court you.”
“Why would a prince wish to court a maid?”
“You’re looking at it all wrong, Laoise. Why would a prince wish to court the queen’s cousin, despite the danger and controversy surrounding púcaí in the royal family? He was in love with you. He wanted to make the court safe for both my sake and yours.”
I almost groan aloud. This is that foolishness required by love that Unagh spoke of.
Still, I cannot quite accept that I’m missing something when I feel perfectly whole. I try to make light of it all. “All the more reason why I’d choose the prince.”
“But you didn’t choose him. You chose the bard.”
Goddess above, she’s right. I looked upon Cillian Cloudtongue and saw all the glamor and beauty of his performances. I never truly saw the man. “Because of my foolishness. Yes, ma’am, I know.”
"Everyone's a bit foolish, the first time they fall in love," the queen says gently.
I have to turn away, emotion swelling and concentrating in a lump in my throat. “I guess I shouldn't fret over it, when it seems I’m not to love again. I’ll be spending my days in this cottage alone.” Doting on Unagh’s future children, apparently.
I’m surprised when I feel the queen’s hand, far colder than mine, taking my own. “That’s not true, Laoise."
As I face my royal cousin again, there is earnestness in her eyes.
"There are other ways to fall in love," she continues. "There's the kind of love you build day by day with someone, growing a little more each time you're at their side. It may not be dazzling like love at first sight, but it is the kind of love that keeps you warm at night. It’s the love that comes through for you when you need it most.”
Tears well in my eyes. “But you can put your time and heart into such a love, only for it to never bloom on both sides. It’s a risk. A terribly foolish one.”
“Perhaps, one day, you’ll be able to try.”
Queen Fiadh leans her forehead against mine, and I’m shocked at how familiar, how comforting the gesture is. But I’m no longer her maid, after all. All that’s left is for me to be her kin.
“My dear cousin,” she says, “I owe you my life. If you’d said you'd choose the bard, I’d have hunted him down and dragged him here for you.”
I stifle a laugh. “Thank you, cousin. But I’m well and truly shod of Cillian Cloudtongue.”
Just as I am of my once-foolish heart.
