Princess Annie (18 page)

Lucian scrambled along at his side, barely controlling his desperation. “Rafael,” he gasped, “I’m afraid.”

At that, Rafael stopped and faced his half brother, laying his hands on Lucian’s shoulders. When he spoke, it was with genuine affection for the boy Lucian had once been, and for the man Rafael knew he could become if only he made the proper choices.

“I’m afraid, too,” Rafael said. “We all are.”

Tears of anger and frustration rose in Lucian’s eyes, but he offered no further arguments. He simply twisted free of Rafael’s grasp and strode away toward the main part of the camp.

Rafael hesitated briefly, then returned to his own fire, pulled off his boots and crawled into his bedroll. He held off sleep as long as he could, fearing the terrible nightmares of blood and fire and death that had been troubling him of late.

Still, he was exhausted and was soon overtaken by slumber. Instead of destruction, he dreamed of Annie Trevarren, smiling up at him as he stood on the balcony of the solarium at St. James Keep, swathed in the glimmering white silk of a wedding dress.

After the drama of their arrival at the Royal Palace of Morovia, the quiet days that followed were something of a disappointment to Annie. Everyone else in the house, however, seemed vastly relieved to enjoy some peace and quiet.

Phaedra soon recovered from whatever had ailed her on the journey from the keep to the capital, though Annie often found her standing at one of the windows, watching the gate and the street behind it.

Miss Agusta Rendennon followed them into the city, unmolested by rebels or malcontents, and brought Phaedra’s burgeoning, unwieldy wedding dress with her. The tiresome fittings continued, and the princess always managed to be in some other part of the palace—no one seemed to know exactly where—whenever Miss Rendennon decided to work.

It was after one such session, when the dressmaker had gotten into her carriage and gone back to her shop, that Annie managed to run Phaedra to ground in the library, and confront her.

“I’m tired of being fitted for a dress I’ll never wear,” Annie blurted out, without offering so much as a nod of greeting first. Having gotten up steam, she continued with conviction. “Why, it’s downright silly, Phaedra St. James! What do you mean to do if, on your wedding day, you go to put the gown on and it doesn’t fit? Answer me that, if you please. What will you do?”

Phaedra laughed. “You’re letting your imagination run away with you, Annie,” she scolded, taking a leatherbound book from a shelf and tracing its edge with the tip of her index finger. “Of course the gown will fit, goose—we’re almost exactly the same size. How many times have we worn each other’s frocks?”

Some of Annie’s steam evaporated, but her irritation did not abate. “It’s still odd,” she insisted. “Any other bride would be excited—”

That dreamy, somewhat tragic expression shadowed Phaedra’s eyes again, but only for a flicker of time. “Oh, Annie, do stop behaving like such a curmudgeon. I am excited—Mr. Haslett is a dear and kind man—it’s just that standing still for those fittings would bore me to the very edge of madness!”

Annie sighed. “I can testify from personal experience that it would,” she agreed ruefully, but a smile was already tugging at one corner of her mouth because this was the Phaedra she knew and loved. The one she’d almost given up for lost.

“And speaking of excitement,” Phaedra began, lowering her voice and glancing toward the library doors to make sure they weren’t overheard, “I believe it’s high time we had some.”

A rush of expectancy and sweet terror went through Annie’s system. She, too, glanced toward the doors. “Tell me!”

Phaedra came to stand within confiding distance, her forehead practically touching Annie’s. “We’re going to explore the shops,” she whispered.

Annie loved an adventure as much as the next young woman, perhaps more, in fact, but the memory of the angry, stone-throwing mob that had greeted them on their arrival at the palace had not faded from her mind. “You can’t be suggesting that we leave the grounds—”

Already, Phaedra was nodding. “It’s not a suggestion, Annie Trevarren,” she teased. “It’s a royal decree.”

“But the rebels—”

The princess folded her arms and tapped one daintily slippered foot in annoyance. “For mercy’s sake, Annie, I’m not saying we should have the palace carriage brought around! We’ll dress as maids, in plain dresses, with scarves on our heads and baskets to carry.”

The idea was rash, but it was also intriguing. It would be an expedition like none they had ever undertaken, even in their heyday at St. Aspasia’s. It would be a spectacular exploit they could both smile over in later years.

Provided, of course, that nothing went wrong.

Annie recalled the young maid, Kathleen, telling her that the servants traveled in and out of the palace without difficulty. “But we couldn’t actually go into the shops, could we? Not dressed as servants?”

Phaedra was already heading purposefully out of the library. “We’ll look through the windows,” she told Annie in an impatient whisper, “and if we see something we want, we’ll send for it later. Besides, we’ll have the run of the marketplace.”

Within half an hour, Phaedra and Annie had climbed, via a rear stairway, to the uppermost floor of the grand palace, where the female servants were quartered. The long, narrow chamber was vacant, since all the maids were working at various tasks in other parts of the house.

Annie hesitated in the doorway, touched by the row of Spartan, neatly made cots lining the wall, by the plain washstand and pitcher that stood next to each bed. On one pillow rested a bedraggled cloth doll, with a stitched-on mouth and single black button for an eye. The servants’ spare dresses—it seemed each possessed only one—were hung carefully from pegs arranged beneath the high windows. “Phaedra,” she said, “these things are all they have.”

Phaedra grasped Annie’s hand and tugged. “Don’t be a coward,” she said. “It’s not like we’re stealing the things we need—we’re only borrowing.” The princess took a gray frock down from its peg and held it against her chest. “If it’ll make you feel better, we’ll leave a few coins behind.” She preened as if she were holding up a jeweled gown of the finest silk instead of a rag that had been pressed and mended with pride. “What do you think?”

It seemed more diplomatic not to answer at all.

CHAPTER 9
 

B
arely fifteen minutes later, Annie and Phaedra were wearing the ill-fitting frocks they’d “borrowed” from the servants’ quarters. Scarves covered their hair and shadowed their faces, and they were careful to keep their eyes down when they approached the tradesman’s gate behind the carriage house.

The guard on duty was a young man, with spots on his skin and a sullen set to his mouth, as though he’d been made to do better things than oversee the comings and goings of servants, messengers and errand boys. He allowed the disguised princess and her companion to pass with a desultory air.

Annie was naturally pleased that the venture would not be thwarted at this early stage, but it also troubled her to know how easy it was to leave the palace grounds. No doubt a clever person could contrive to
enter
the compound with equal facility.

Phaedra hooked her arm through Annie’s and hurried her along the narrow alley that ran parallel to the street fronting the royal residence. “Don’t dawdle!” she hissed. “We might have deceived that idiot of a guard, but if Chandler or Felicia happened to see us from a window, the jig would be up, my friend. And believe me, we’d sooner be caught by rebels than have word of this outing reach Rafael!”

Annie glanced anxiously back over one shoulder, her eyes rising to the narrow windows of the servants’ quarters. She wanted an afternoon of anonymity and escape as much as Phaedra did, and she wasn’t the least bit afraid of Rafael St. James. In fact, she’d welcome an encounter with the prince, however tempestuous, just so she could see him, touch him, and know for certain that he was alive.

All the same, when she thought of that room on the uppermost floor, and the occupants’ few but clearly cherished possessions, her conscience was pricked. Annie had never wanted for anything, but she had been taught to have compassion and respect for those who were not so fortunate.

Still, as Phaedra had already assured her, they would return the dresses and scarves, and offer a few coins in payment. No real harm would be done.

She hoped.

They reached the marketplace by a circuitous, winding route, carefully avoiding the wide, fashionable streets where servants did not walk.

Annie’s heart swelled with excitement when she saw the market, for it was teeming with noises and smells, colors and textures. She smiled, recalling her mother’s story about a similar place, a
souk
in the kingdom of Riz, and what had happened to her there.

Phaedra nudged her. “Keep your eyes down,” she said quietly. “Servants don’t gawk.”

Reluctantly, Annie lowered her gaze, but she took in her surroundings all the same, in furtive, side-to-side glances. Moving among the stalls, she admired everything from imported fruit to lengths of colorful grosgrain ribbon. At one booth, over Phaedra’s whispered protest, she purchased a small, pretty doll with a china face and a pink dress and bonnet. The merchant was happy to make the sale, it seemed to Annie, and not at all suspicious. Still, to assuage the princess, she tucked the toy into a corner of her basket and covered it with a cloth napkin.

Phaedra purchased half a dozen huge, succulent oranges and didn’t bother to hide them. After all, servants bought food of all sorts for their employers’ kitchens.

A few streets over from the marketplace was a square lined with elegant shops. Phaedra and Annie lingered in front of each window, admiring gowns and bonnets, shoes and parasols, books and paintings. Despite the uncertain political climate in Bavia, the merchants seemed to be doing a brisk business.

The two adventuresses were on their way back to the palace, by way of the marketplace, when a young man standing on a box in front of a fountain caught their attention. He was speaking with heated eloquence to a sparse but attentive audience, shouting about crimes against the people. The gist of his message chilled Annie’s heart.

This man wanted to see Rafael not only deposed, but hanged. Publicly.

Forgetting she was supposed to be a servant, Annie started toward him, fully intending to set him and all of the listeners straight where the prince’s true character was concerned, but Phaedra stopped her by grabbing her arm and hauling her back. Before Annie could pull free, or even protest, there was a great clatter at the end of the street and suddenly the square was filled with men on horseback.

They were soldiers, led by a fair-haired man with striking brown eyes. Even in the midst of chaos, Annie noted that there was something familiar about him as, brandishing swords, he and the other soldiers sent the small crowd fleeing in terror. The merchants in the market cowered in their stalls and those few shops that were nearby were immediately closed and locked.

The young man who had been speaking scrambled onto the fountain’s edge and yelled above the furor. “These are your prince’s own men! These louts who would trample you beneath their horses’ hooves and run you through with their swords serve Prince Rafael St. James of Bavia!”

“No,” Annie whispered, but even as Phaedra tried to pull her away, she knew by their uniforms that these soldiers were indeed allied with the crown. Even as she watched, a member of the militia leveled a gun at the dissenter and shot him in the center of the chest.

He toppled into the pool surrounding the fountain, his blood staining the water, and Annie screamed in horror.

“Stop!” she yelled, flinging herself at the nearest horseman, the blond man who had been giving orders from the beginning. She clawed at his saddle, trying to climb his leg, shrieking in furious, hysterical protest.

The soldier laughed, centered his boot in the middle of her chest, and pushed hard, sending her tumbling onto the cobblestones. Phaedra fell to her knees beside Annie, trying to shelter her and at the same time using all her strength to keep her from bolting back to her feet and flying at the man like a scalded cat.

“No, Annie,” Phaedra pleaded, in a sobbing whisper, “he’ll kill you.”

Frenzied, the riders began knocking down the merchants’ booths, upsetting carts and letting their horses trod upon precious fruit and vegetables. Vendors knelt on the ground, weeping over their lost goods, and Annie heard screams of fear all around her.

She and Phaedra clung to each other, in the middle of it all, their faces wet with tears. At some point, Annie came to her senses and crawled under a stone bench, pulling the princess after her.

There they stayed until Rafael’s soldiers had grown weary of their game and ridden away. Not an hour had passed, according to the clock in a nearby tower, yet for Annie Trevarren, the whole world had been forever altered. She loved Rafael St. James as much as ever, but her loyalties had shifted to the side of the Bavian people.