Page 17 of A Fragile Enchantment

“Move. You’re in the way.”

Shock twisted Niamh’s stomach into a knot.

“I—” The man looked bewildered, but he nodded obsequiously. “Of course, Your Highness. I did not realize. My sincerest apologies.”

A few other nearby courtiers shuffled away for good measure, clearly eager to avoid the prince’s sharp tongue. Niamh stared up at Kit incredulously. What had he done that for? He likely couldn’t see much from here, either, but she couldn’t imagine him keen to see the woman he’d professed no interest in marrying.

Sensing her gaze, he turned his glare on her. “What?”

“Nothing!”

At least he made it easy to swallow her gratitude.

The steadyclack, clack, clackof heels against the wooden floors cut through the drone of a hundred conversations. When the footsteps stopped, the room fell into a strained hush. Even Jack stared at the door with an expression Niamh had not yet seen on him.

Dread.

King Felipe and Infanta Rosa stood in the threshold of the gilded double doors, framed like the subjects of an oil painting. The king, a bear of a man, filled the doorway with the broad set of his shoulders. Gold glittered on the military-style epaulettes of his jacket and the circlet resting in his dark curls. But somehow, with not a speck of gold or a single gemstone in sight, it was his daughter who commanded all the attention in the room.

Infanta Rosa’s gown fell to the floor in frilly layers of watered black silk. The color was, frankly, shocking. No Avlish noblewoman wore black unless she was in mourning. A black lace veil obscured most of her features from view, but Niamh could see that the princess’s lips, gloomily downturned and pouting, were painted black. Her hair, too, settled in black, glossy curls against her olive skin. She surveyed the crowd with an air of total disinterest, her eyelids drawn almost sleepily low.

Her lady’s maid trailed just a step behind the Carrillos. Compared to Rosa, Miss Lacalle looked like sunshine incarnate in her scarlet gown. She had round cheeks, a mouth that looked quick to smile, and hazel eyes that promised mischief. Her thick brown curls were gathered into an understated chignon at the nape of her neck.

“My God,” someone near her hissed. “She looks like the walking dead.”

“Worse,” their companion replied, “she looks like acommoner.”

Murmurs tore through the room like a cold wind. Some people looked delighted, others scandalized. Niamh was not sure what to think. Only that there must’ve been something in the Sootham air that infected all royals with a choleric disposition.

As the Castilian princess made her way toward Jack and Sofia, Niamh stole a glance at Kit from the corner of her eye. He looked at Rosa as though she’d stepped directly out of his worst nightmares and into his drawing room.

“Well done, Kit,” Sinclair whispered encouragingly. “She’s handsome.”

But for once, Kit had no retort. He only walked numbly ahead as Jack waved him insistently to his side.

This was certainly going to be an interesting wedding.

Niamh strained to listen to their conversation, but as close as they were to the royals, she could not overhear a thing amid all this chatter. She could, however, make out Jack’s thin smile and the sickly sheen of sweat on his forehead. He bowed so deeply to the king, she thought his nose might scrape the floor. King Felipe had a reputation for his hot temper—and his military prowess. Even so, she hadn’t expected such a show of deference from a man like Jack Carmine.

“It almost depresses me to see him this way,” Sinclair said, following her gaze. “I’ve never seen Jack so wheedling and eager to please in all my life.”

“Why, do you think?”

“Infanta Rosa is the king’s only daughter, and he’s notoriously overprotective of her,” Sinclair replied. “It likely wasn’t easy to get him to surrender his precious little princess to Avaland. I’d wager it wouldn’t take much to get him to change his mind. Just look at him.”

Felipe beheld his daughter with such open adoration, it made Niamh’s heart flutter with a strange brew of self-pity and longing. But as Kit drew nearer, the king’s entire demeanor changed. It was not only the effect of that loathsome coat. No, he had taken Kit’s measure at a moment’s glance, and Niamh knew by the stony disapproval on his face that he’d found him wanting.

A new wave of fear struck her then. She could not provide for her family if the king decided to call off the wedding. Her dreams depended on the most disagreeable and contrary man in Avaland proving himself to someone who had already decided that nothing and no one would be good enough for his daughter.

Which meant she’d have to do everything in her power to make Kitlooklike a prince, even if he would not act like one.

6

The first ball of the Season was tonight, and Niamh still had not finished the enchantment on Kit’s coat.

The lack of sleep over the past few nights had begun to catch up with her, and now, her fingers had gone pale and numb. A warning. Pushing herself much further, she knew, would not end well. It had been years since her symptoms had flared up enough to truly slow her down, but then again, she’d never used her magic this much before. She didn’t know what it said about her that her frustration outweighed her concern. But sometimes, the mismatch of what her body could give and what her mind and circumstances demanded threatened to drive her mad.

Most days, Niamh believed she’d accepted her lot in life: that her own body had betrayed her. There was a grim sort of comfort in knowing how she would die, even if she did not know exactlywhen. She and the death god, Donn, had a tenuous understanding. He would not steal upon her like a thief in the night. Instead, he would drain her slowly, like a farmer bleeding his cattle for pudding.