Long May She Reign(84)

“Well, I assume it means you like me. But how do you like me? It’s an imprecise word, really, don’t you think? I mean, do you like me like I’m your friend, or do you like me like you—like me in a different way.”

He was walking slowly toward me. I resisted the urge to take a step backward. “You said ‘like’ a lot there. It was confusing.”

“You understood what I meant.”

“I did.” He moved closer still. An arm’s length away. “Do you tend to kiss your friends like that, Freya?”

“No.” The word came out quieter than I’d like. “But some people do. And it was just a tiny kiss, and—”

I knew this time, a moment before it happened. Fitzroy moved closer, and I shifted forward to meet him.

My second kiss. I was kissing Fitzroy. Fitzroy’s hand was curled around the back of my neck. Fitzroy’s fingers were tangled in my hair. Fitzroy was . . . Fitzroy.

How could I possibly have ever thought I didn’t like him? That the way my stomach swooped, and my heart raced, and my thoughts calmed, was an inconsequential thing?

I was aware of every breath, of the blood racing through my veins, of the spot where Fitzroy’s nose bumped against mine. The slight difference in height, the tiniest shift of Fitzroy’s hand. I cataloged every detail, savoring them, saving them.

He pulled back, paused a couple of inches from my face. “Does that answer your question?”

I shook my head, just an inch, left and right. “No.” My voice came out breathy, like someone else was speaking. I had to know. “There are many potential interpretations for that.”

“Such as?” His eyebrows rose in a challenge.

“You just wanted to stop me talking. Or maybe you want to practice kissing. Or you just want to kiss the queen, but you can’t admit it, so you keep kissing me so you don’t have to lie to me. Or you’re just . . . very friendly . . . with your friends.”

“Then how’s this?” The question sounded grandiose, something Fitzroy the courtier would say, but then he paused. “I like you not just as a friend. And I don’t usually go around kissing my friends like that.”

“Not usually?”

“Not as a rule. I like you because you’re you, Freya. In all your stubborn strangeness. And because you make me feel like me. I told you the first time I talked to you, that’s not—I’m never sure who I really am. And it’s different when I’m with you.”

“Well,” I said, with a slight smile. “I think I like you, too.”

“You think?”

“I think.”

He laughed softly. “But do you like me as a friend, or as a lab assistant, or perhaps as the old king’s son who now won’t leave, or—”

“I like you as Fitzroy,” I said, with a decisive nod.

“Well,” he said. “I guess I’ll take that.”

And he kissed me again.

The Gustavites did not agree to meet me. Holt didn’t even ask them. “They would run, Your Majesty, before the request was complete,” he said the next day, in a soothing voice. “They’d think it was a trap, or else lay a trap for you.”

And so we were surprising them. I wasn’t sure that was safer, considering how they might react, but I wasn’t going to shake in my resolve now.

I cared more about fashion that morning than I ever had before. I tried on five different crowns and tiaras, not wanting to look too extravagant, not wanting to hide the fact that I was queen. Eventually, I settled for a simple diadem, the Star of Valanthe hanging around my neck.

Fog had settled low over the city, cloaking the alleyways, making the world feel close. Nothing seemed to exist beyond my carriage, my guards, and our small stretch of road as we proceeded through the quiet.

I was going to be sick. It was all I could think about. I was always nervous before speaking, often forgot how to breathe, but now I truly, genuinely felt like the contents of my stomach were about to spill all over the carriage floor. What was I doing?

The right thing, I told myself. The thing I needed to do.

It wasn’t much comfort, as acid bubbled in my throat. My fingers tingled with the beginnings of panic, but I counted my breath, willing it away.

The carriage stopped outside a nondescript manor house on a normal-looking street. I stepped out, ordering myself not to vomit. It wasn’t that it was dangerous, although that should really have been my concern. It was that I didn’t know what to expect. I had no idea what I was walking into, and yet I needed to speak to them. I knew these people hated me, and I still needed to try and change their minds. It wasn’t exactly a task I was well suited for.

But I was here. I could do this.

A couple of guards went ahead, to announce my arrival. I’d instructed them to be as nonthreatening as possible, but I still cringed as they knocked on the door. If this ended in violence . . .

It didn’t. They were too sensible for that, at least. Better to pretend it was a normal gathering, to deny and deny until the lie sounded like truth. The man who answered the door remained calm, not betraying even a flash of concern when he saw the guards. When my men told him that I wished to speak to them, with no mention of who we believed they were, he bowed without hesitation, his lips forming words of joyful surprise. Inside, people must have been scrambling to hide anything suspect, but the man was the picture of calm.