The Queen's Assassin (The Queen's Secret #1)(85)

“Oh, hello,” Cal says. Bunny rabbit? The duchess is getting bolder by the moment. Good. Perhaps he will finally learn something from her.

This is what he should have been doing from the beginning, warming up the duchess, becoming her confidant. Why hadn’t he? He was distracted, he realizes now; he was too concerned with Shadow. No longer.

“Shall we dance once more?” he offers.

“Oh! Yes, let’s do that,” she says.

It pains him to return to the dance floor, but it is the closest thing to intimacy in a public setting. The duchess is voluble and na?ve, and he would like to know more about this mysterious duke and his business in the country.

He sees a flash of Shadow’s dress across the ballroom and tries to ignore it.

The duchess leans in to whisper in his ear. “The duke is away so often, it gets terribly lonely, and cold. Even in the summer months, the house is so large and drafty, the nights are simply frigid. I shiver, all alone.”

“He leaves you often?” Cal asks.

“Yes, and he goes so far away. He never pops back up unannounced, you know. No out-of-the-blue midnight arrivals back from Renovia, like some husbands like to do. Try to catch their wives at something naughty.” She giggles. The sound stabs him in the ear. But she’s finally said something interesting and so he twirls her back toward the center of the floor.

“You poor thing. What is so important in Renovia that could keep the duke away from his lovely wife?” he asks.

She tilts toward his ear; he gets a whiff of the alcohol on her breath. “My husband is a very important asset to the crown, bunny. He has many associations in Renovia.”

“Is that so?” Cal says. “Friends? Family?”

“You could call them friends, I suppose. The grand prince was one,” she says coyly. “A very good friend indeed.”

“Is that so?”

“Oh yes, Alast was here on a hunt not too long ago,” the duchess tells him.

“The duke does enjoy the hunt,” says Cal politely. “He is so good at it.”

The duchess laughs. “Oh! Nothing could be further from the truth! The duke loathes hunting. He’s terrible! But it is a useful hobby, I suppose.”

“I see,” says Cal, who isn’t sure he does. Not yet.

“Pity what happened to him, don’t you think? The poor man, assassinated in cold blood by a lowly blacksmith!” the duchess says, as if she read his mind.

“Yes, a tragedy,” says Cal. “But I suppose now the duke doesn’t have to leave you for Renovia, since the grand prince has passed,” he says to the duchess.

“Quite the contrary! He’s leaving tonight.”

“Tonight! Why so soon?” he asks, watching Shadow disappear into the crowd again. “What exactly does His Grace do in Renovia? Manage the grand prince’s estate?”

“I suppose you could say that,” the duchess says lightly.

Cal furrows his eyebrows, feigning confusion.

She goes on. “I will tell you a secret! He is leaving to make sure the insurrection continues as planned!”

“Insurrection? Against the queen?”

Duchess Girt laughs. “Don’t tell me you’re one of those Renovian sympathizers!”

He arranges his face to hide his pounding heart. “Of course not! What is the duke planning?”

“Oh, I can’t say, but perhaps I will give you a hint. By tomorrow there will be regime change.”

Regime change? The assassination of the princess? Of the queen? Is that what this nitwit duchess is talking about? Does the duke plan on killing the queen and the princess while they are in Montrice?

Cal feels a cold shock in his chest; he tries to ignore it and remain calm. “You don’t say,” he remarks, voice cracking a bit. Good thing she’s oblivious, the state she’s in.

“I’m so pleased you understand my predicament, about my husband’s absences, I mean.”

“Yes, I do. It’s clear to me now.”

She presses closer to him. “Then you know it’s a terrible trial for me to stay all alone.”

“I see that,” Cal says.

“Anyway, let’s talk a little more on when you’ll join me when the duke is away,” says the duchess.

Cal agrees, and continues to flirt with the duchess while his mind is elsewhere. The duke is leaving tonight, for Renovia, where if the Aphrasians are successful there will be regime change. Is the duke headed to take the Renovian throne while the queen and the princess are in Montrice? In any event, the plot against the princess is underway. He has to stop it. He has to find the duke.

But first he has to go find Shadow.





CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

Caledon

CAL SWINGS THE DUCHESS BACK toward the edge of the dance floor, where an older gentleman stands alone. “My dear,” he says to the duchess. “I have monopolized your company too long.” Before she can protest, he leaves her and heads into the crowd to find Shadow.

The rooms are so packed and the women’s hats and hairpieces are so monstrous that he can barely see beyond what’s right in front of him.

There is no sign of Shadow or her blue dress anywhere, not in the large ballroom nor the small one, nor in any of the receiving chambers or hallways. Did she leave the party because he was dancing too close to the duchess? He shakes his head. Of course not. She wants to discover the plot against the princess as much as he does. So where is she?