The Bride Tournament (Hexed Hearts Book 1)(26)

Ellie kept her cape over her head to hide her hair. She doubted anyone would recognize her, as most of the women here had imbibed prior to the event. It took guts to climb the dais steps in the throne room and kneel at the prince’s feet in front of hundreds of onlookers. She swallowed.

I’m happy I’m not entering.

Right?

A mass of excited young women crowded the throne room. The ceiling soared stories high. She’d never been in this room before. The combined perfumes, scented bouquets of roses, and smoky candles overwhelmed her nose.

A thick mask blocked the corners of her vision. The three clung together and shimmied to the edge of the grand room. One hundred carriages could park on the marbled floor and never touch sides.

I’ve never had any ambition to be queen. All I want is to buy my mother’s home from Irene.

Ellie snorted. “If I was queen, I could buy the whole damn Citadel.”

“What dear?” Meera leaned in.

“Nothing,” she mouthed in the din of chatter.

Rachel tugged the two into a hazy corner. Yellowed candles burned with dancing flames, casting shadows across the walls and pale marble columns holding up the beamed ceiling. A gaggle of blonde curls was to her left. Ellie paid them no mind as she scooped up a wedge of cheese from a passing butler’s tray.

Music, light and nonsensical, floated around the room as solitary golden violins bounced above the crowd. The one directly overhead changed directions and Ellie picked up on the blonde group’s conversation and glanced their way.

“Who’s our real competition?”

“The redhead who’s been exchanging winks with Prince Pierce.”

“Or the busty mass that is Marie.”

“They both need to be forced out, tonight,” one blonde hissed, her olive cape much like the one Ellie had draped over Lady Olivia’s shoulders earlier this evening.

Rachel’s eyes widened.

Angling her body to hear better, Ellie caught sight of the exact gown and lime-green feathered mask Marigold left the house wearing. Next to her was Dame Lange’s unmistakable magenta dress. Crowded around the pair had to have been Lady Irene, Violet, and the five Lange daughters. All of the gowns, capes, and masks looked familiar.

Fruitcake.

“How do we take them out?” Violet cheerily yelled above the music.

“Hush!” Lady Irene, in a mask of peacock feathers, scolded and tugged her daughters away from the Langes to a dark corner. Her tone signaled an oncoming lecture on decorum.

“Simple.” Dame Lange’s whispered voice crept under the thrum of sound as she spoke to her daughters. “There are ways to take out the competition, old ways. Forbidden ways.”

“Now that sounds exciting.” Lady Olivia grinned under her mask.

“I know a particularly vile spell that should do the trick.” Dame Lange leaned in closer to her daughter.

The violin returned with a trumpet in tow and Ellie missed the rest of the plan. She shivered in the warm throne room. It sounded like the dame wanted to use old magic to hurt the other women in the tournament. Old magic was as destructive as it was helpful. Ellie scanned the crowd, her gaze landing on a curvy redhead conversing with a busty blonde. Presumably the targets: Marie and the woman the prince had been eyeing.

Bong!

A heavy bell clanged at the throne dais. The Entering had begun. Ellie dragged Meera and Rachel farther into the room to hide from her stepsisters and the Lange girls.

“Do you think they were serious?” Rachel asked.

“I wouldn’t put it past a woman like Dame Lange to know a few old magic spells. She has confiscated many an old conduit over the past few decades. I bet she kept one or two instead of handing them over to the royal family. She could do real damage.” Meera squinted.

“Like kill someone. We have to do something,” Ellie whispered as the music ended. She bobbed and weaved, aiming to reach the pair and warn them.

“We don’t want to cause alarm if there is no danger, but I believe the founder of MAM might not hesitate to hurt someone she considered a threat to her daughter’s future as the next queen.” Meera scanned the crowd.

“We can hope they cast the spell wrong,” Rachel said.

“Doesn’t matter, a spell performed badly can still endanger its victims.” Meera shook her head.

The king, dressed in burgundy and gold with a sash across his barrel chest, ascended the dais and announced the Entering’s commencement. He was a handsome older man with gray spreading out from his temples and deep wrinkles at the corners of his eyes as though he smiled often into the sun.

“Let the contestants come forward and announce their wishes to enter the ceremony.” His baritone voice boomed across the room and echoed in the excited crowd.

“We need to warn them!” Ellie said, quietly.

Despite the horde of eager women standing hip to hip in the throne room, only a small percentage would step forward and stake a claim. Each woman would press the pad of her left thumb to the pointed edge of the crown prince’s scepter until a drop of blood formed.

The blood signified the pact and provided evidence of nobility. Blue blood indeed. Ellie stared at her own thumb, calloused from years of service. The digit lacked the softness of a cushioned life.

I still carry my mother’s lineage in my veins; I still have her blue blood. And now, magic.