“Are you twins?” she asks.
“Technically, I’m five minutes older,” Nico says.
Gisella rolls her eyes, giving her brother a sharp elbow in the side. “A fact he never lets me forget,” she murmurs.
“I’m the same with my sisters,” Beatriz admits, another pang of homesickness rippling through her. “We may be triplets, but I am still the eldest.” She pauses, as if a thought is only just occurring to her. “I was actually hoping for word of them—I know they’re heretics, but surely we should endeavor to keep our hearts open to all, even if we must prevent their rot from touching us. I sent a couple of letters, but it might take a while to hear back from them. I thought maybe I would ask the Temarinian ambassador for news—whether Sophronia’s married yet, how she is adjusting, that sort of thing. Have you seen him?”
“Lord Savelle?” Gisella asks with a snort. “Oh, you won’t find him here—he prefers his own company most days. I’ve heard he only visits the sea garden before dawn, when there is no one else around.”
Beatriz’s heart sinks and she has to stifle a groan at the prospect of having to drag herself out of bed before the sun.
“How is Pasquale?” Gisella asks. “He’s been quite elusive, though I suppose most newlyweds are.”
Well, wherever he’s been hiding, it hasn’t been with me, Beatriz thinks. Out loud, though, she takes a more neutral approach—perhaps this trip to the sea garden needn’t be wasted.
“We’re both finding marriage quite surreal,” she says. It’s the kind of truth she likes best, the kind that others can interpret however they like. “You must know Pasquale well, being cousins,” she says.
“Oh, there are many of us cousins running about—a dozen, last I counted, not including King Leopold and his brothers in Temarin,” Nicolo says, shaking his head. “But the Cellarian court isn’t really a place for children—those of us raised here had no choice but to band together.”
“Of course, Pas wasn’t raised here at first,” Gisella says. “He came to live here when he was…what, thirteen or so? After…” She trails off, glancing at her brother, though Beatriz has a good idea of what comes next.
“After?” Beatriz prompts anyway, because though she knows the story, she doesn’t know their version, and her mother has always told her that when it’s repeated enough, gossip becomes its own truth.
“After Prince Pietro passed away,” Nicolo says. “Before that, Pasquale lived in the south with his mother.”
Beatriz pretends this is new information, though whispers of Queen Valencia made their way even to the Bessemian court. The Mad Queen, they called her. Beatriz heard a more factual telling of the queen’s tragic suicide as part of her lessons, but it’s the rumors that have stuck with her most over the years, even though most are too outrageous to be believed.
And as for Pietro’s death…well, she remembers when news of that reached Bessemia and how, even at the age of twelve, she was certain her mother had had a hand in it. Beatriz was the only one of her sisters betrothed to a second son, but Pietro was already married and there was no help for that. Five stillborn children and a hunting accident later, though, and Pasquale was his father’s heir. The empress had been either lucky or diabolical, and Beatriz has long understood things well enough to know it was the latter.
“Some people say they saw her walk into the sea one morning,” Gisella says, lowering her voice, though there is no one close enough to hear now. “They thought she was going for a swim, I suppose. Her body washed up some hours later, stones in the pockets of her dress. Pasquale was never quite the same.”
“I don’t imagine anyone would be,” Beatriz says, chewing on her bottom lip. Though she knew the bare bones of the story of Queen Valencia’s death, hearing the more human details now digs beneath her skin. She thinks of her mysterious new husband, with his sad eyes and soft voice. She thought she knew him well, based on reports and gossip, but there are many things she doesn’t know about Prince Pasquale.
That night, when Beatriz retires to their bedroom, she finds Pasquale already there, dressed in his nightshirt and standing beside the sofa, a pillow already in his hands. He looks up when she comes in, trying on a smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes.
“I heard you went to the sea garden today,” he says. “Did you enjoy it?”
She doesn’t answer him. Instead, she reaches behind her, fingers fumbling with the buttons of her gown. After a moment, she manages to undo enough of them that she can pull the dress off her shoulders, letting it fall to the ground in a pool of crimson brocade, leaving her standing before him in nothing but a thin white chemise that doesn’t quite reach her knees.
Pasquale averts his eyes, his cheeks turning red.
“What are you—” he starts, but she doesn’t give him a chance to finish the question. She crosses the room toward him and takes the pillow from his hands, tossing it aside. Taking his hands, she guides them to her waist, feeling them begin to shake.
“Triz,” he says, his voice a warning.
She doesn’t heed it. She rolls onto the tips of her toes and presses her mouth to his. She kisses him soundly, bringing her hands up to the back of his neck, anchoring him to her. To his credit, he does try to kiss her back, does try to respond to her touch as he must think he should. He does try, but when Beatriz reaches for the hem of her chemise, ready to remove that as well, his hands come to rest on hers, holding them still. He pulls back, looking at her with anguished eyes.
“I can’t,” he says.
Not I won’t. Not I don’t want to. But I can’t.
She steps back from him, watching him carefully. “The boy,” she says. “Ambrose.”
Beatriz didn’t know for certain before, but the second she says his name, the second Pasquale flinches and drops his gaze, she knows she’s hit the truth of it.
She turns away from him, crossing to her wardrobe and finding a dressing gown. She pulls it over her chemise so that she doesn’t feel so exposed. Her fingers shake as she pulls the sash tight around her waist, tying it into a bow.
“Does he know how you feel?” she asks.
She waits for him to deny it, to pretend he doesn’t know what she’s talking about. Instead, though, his eyes meet hers and he lets out an exhale, seeming to deflate as he does.
“No,” he tells her, his voice barely louder than a whisper. “Or maybe he does. But I didn’t tell him.”
“He doesn’t feel the same way,” she says.
He shrugs, looking away. “There’s no point in asking, is there? If anyone found out…I’ve seen people arrested for the feelings I have, Beatriz. My father’s had them executed, and if you think he’d spare me that fate because I’m his son—”