Ash Princess (Ash Princess Trilogy #1)(93)

This one is a deep blood-red, and I can already tell it won’t cover much more than what’s necessary. This is the last time I’ll be his trophy, I promise myself.

Heron and Artemisia haven’t returned yet, so it’s only Blaise here. I tell him to turn around before slipping out of the dress I’m wearing and stepping into the gown. Tiny buttons run down what little back there is, and it takes me a moment to manage them myself. Unlike other gowns the Kaiser has sent, this one doesn’t just leave my back bare but exposes more cleavage than most courtesans show and has a slit cut up to my hip. I’m practically naked. The idea of anyone seeing me like this turns my stomach, but I reluctantly call for Blaise to turn back around.

For a long moment, he doesn’t say anything.

“I’m sorry, Theo,” he manages finally, his voice quiet.

“I know,” I tell him before squaring my shoulders and walking toward the box on my vanity.

The lid lifts with ease, and inside, the crown is a perfect circlet of ash resting on a red silk pillow. It could almost be pretty under different circumstances, but seeing it fills me only with hatred.

“Blaise?” I say, glancing up to his wall. “I’ve never put it on myself. Hoa always does it and I don’t want to give the Kaiser any reason to suspect anything is different tonight.”

For a moment, Blaise doesn’t say anything. “All right,” he manages finally.

I hear him shifting behind the wall before his door opens out into the hallway. Seconds later, he’s slipping through my door as quietly as he can. His eyes are heavy with worry and I almost regret asking for his help. I’m already worried enough myself; seeing it reflected on his face just reinforces how many ways this can go wrong.

I try to smile at him, but it’s harder than it should be.

“Are you going to be all right tonight?” he asks as he looks into the box. “With the Kaiser?”

I’ve been struggling not to think of exactly that. I can still feel him touching my hip at the maskentanz, still feel his breath in my ear, his hand on my cheek when he promised me we would talk again soon. I try to suppress the shudder that runs through me, but I know Blaise sees it.

“I’ve survived ten years,” I tell him, knowing better than to lie to him. “I can survive one more night.”

Even as I say it, though, I wonder just how true that is. The Kaiserin is dead, so the Kaiser will grow bolder. If Blaise hadn’t broken his chair on the pavilion and our conversation had continued, I don’t know where it would have ended. I don’t want to know what would have happened next.

“I’ll be there the whole time,” Blaise says. He means it as a comfort and I smile at him and pretend to be comforted, but we both know there will be nothing he can do.

“I can survive one more night,” I tell him again. “But promise me something?”

He delicately lifts the crown from the box, eyes focused on it instead of me. “Anything,” he says.

“When the Kaiser is dead, whenever that may be, I want to burn his body. I want to put the torch to him myself and I want to stay and watch until there is nothing left of him but ash. Will you promise me that?”

His eyes flicker to me and I realize that I’m shaking. I take a deep breath to calm myself.

“I swear it to Houzzah himself. And to you,” he says quietly.

Neither of us so much as breathes while he gently sets the crown on top of my head, a few flakes falling on my nose and cheeks as he does. His eyes stay locked on mine as he reaches a hand up toward my cheek before hesitating and letting it fall away. Worry still creases his forehead.

“You will survive.” He says it like he’s trying to convince himself of the fact. He hesitates a second longer, as if he wants to say something else, before giving a brief nod and leaving the room just as quietly as he came in.

I take one last look at my reflection in the mirror. Ashes already flake down over my cheeks and nose, marking me. The red stain I used on my lips looks like fresh blood. Underneath, I see bits and pieces of my mother staring back at me, but twisted with hate and fury my mother never needed to know. I’m not sorry for it.

I am angry.

I am hungry.

And I promise myself that one day I will watch them all burn.



* * *



—

By the time I arrive at the banquet, it has already started; sitting at the long table are dozens of courtiers in rich, jewel-colored silks and velvets. The lot of them drip with Spiritgems of all shapes, sizes, and types, which glitter in the light of the chandelier overhead. Seeing them now, so many, sickens me. How many of my people have given their lives and sanity so that these people can have a little more beauty, an ounce more strength?

Crescentia isn’t here, I realize as I scan the room, which means Elpis’s trick with the treska seeds worked. At least that’s one thing that’s gone right so far, one less problem I have to worry about. But that relief is short-lived, because once my eyes find S?ren’s, everything in me tightens up again and I can hardly breathe.

He doesn’t look like the boy who left three weeks ago. He is hollowed out, with stark dark circles under his eyes. His long blond hair is gone, shaved off so unevenly that I wonder if he did it himself. It’s the traditional Kalovaxian expression of grief, and despite everything, I feel a pang of pity for him. I quickly drown it in more hatred, though. He might be mourning his mother, but he’s still a murderer. How many of my people has he personally killed? I doubt even he could tell me the answer to that, let alone remember all their names.