Lady Smoke (Ash Princess Trilogy #2)(41)

“Small bites,” S?ren whispers to me. “Sta’Criveran cuisine takes some getting used to.”

I smile my thanks but after weeks of hardtack and dried meat, it’s difficult to heed his advice. I want to devour it as quickly as possible, but I force myself to eat slowly, savoring each spice and texture. I must not eat slowly enough, though, because Avaric watches me intently, leaning forward with bright, curious eyes.

“Did they starve you in Astrea?” he asks me.

I swallow the bite of fish I’d just taken. “No, never,” I say. “At the palace, I ate the same as any Kalovaxian courtier, though most of my advisors spent years in the mines, doing grueling physical labor on meager rations. And they’ve gotten worse in the last few months, I’ve heard.”

“Of course,” Avaric says, trying and failing to look sympathetic. “But…well…your aunt told us so many stories of your suffering at the hands of the Kaiser.”

I buy myself a moment by dabbing at my mouth with a napkin, fighting the urge to glare at Dragonsbane.

“It was a very difficult decade,” I say slowly, hoping it will be left at that.

But Avaric doesn’t take the hint.

“Were you beaten?” he asks. “That must have been awful. How often did it happen?”

“Yes,” I say, anger seeping into my chest. I’m more aware than ever of my scars, on full display, how harsh and barbaric they are amid all the Sta’Criveran beauty. I wish the dress had sleeves of some sort—some way to hide them, to hide the story they spell out on my skin. My arms begin to grow warm and I fight the urge to scratch at them. It feels the way it did when I woke up from my nightmare to find my sheets burned. It feels like fire is pressing against my skin from the inside, desperate to seep out. It’s not real, I tell myself, as if I can will myself to believe that. I force myself to breathe through the anger; I imagine ice in my veins.

These people don’t care about me. They only care about what happened to me, like it’s some kind of sick story written to shock and horrify and entertain them. I grip the arms of my chair so tightly that my knuckles turn white, though at least it distracts from my tingling arms and hands. I keep my face soft, ducking my head and looking up at the Prince through lowered eyelashes.

“I’m sorry,” I say, letting a hint of tears work its way into my voice. “It’s still so difficult to talk about. But it happened often enough that I fear I will always bear the scars of it, both physically and mentally,” I admit with a mournful sigh. “I survived, thanks in large part to my advisors and my aunt.” I give my aunt a sad smile that she isn’t remotely moved by. She sees right through it, but the Sta’Criverans don’t.

“That’s so awful,” Lilia says, clutching the string of pearls wrapped around her pale throat. Her Astrean isn’t as fluent as the others’, still a little sharp around the consonants. “I cannot imagine how horrid that was.” She pauses briefly. “What was used?” she asks, lowering her voice. “A whip? A cane?”

My jaw clenches and I hold her gaze for a few seconds before answering. “Whatever was handy,” I say. “Though I suppose the whip was the Kaiser’s favorite.”

I feel a glimmer of satisfaction when she drops her eyes away from me and goes back to her food without another word.

“And, of course,” Avaric continues, “your aunt also told us what the monster made you do to…what was the man’s name who died?”

“Ampelio,” Dragonsbane answers without hesitation, her voice level. “Guardian Ampelio.”

My grip on my chair tightens more until I fear I’ll break the arms off altogether, and I can’t seem to relax my hands. I can’t talk about Ampelio; I can’t give them that piece of my heart, no matter what they are giving me. What happened is between him and me; I haven’t even told Blaise much more than the basics. I can’t exploit what I did for these people’s entertainment.

Something warm rests on top of my left hand and I look down to see S?ren’s pale, rough fingers covering mine, though his eyes stay firmly stuck on his food. He doesn’t understand most of what’s being said, but he heard Ampelio’s name and I suppose he can guess the rest. He was there, after all, when I drove the sword into Ampelio’s back, and maybe he didn’t understand then what kind of torture it was, and maybe he still doesn’t know that Ampelio was my father, but he still saw firsthand how awful it was for me.

“The Kaiser made it clear that it was his life or mine,” I say slowly, struggling to keep my voice soft. “Necessary as it might have been, I don’t think I will ever forgive myself for it.”

The table is quiet for a moment, though it’s a pregnant kind of silence that hints at worse things to come. I busy myself with my dinner, hoping that I’m wrong and that the subject will be dropped.

“The Kaiser is a demon incarnate,” King Etristo says finally. “For what he’s done to you, he will surely spend an eternity suffering in the underworld.” He pauses, but there’s a weight in the silence that implies he’s not quite finished. He looks at me like he’s measuring my every inch with his gaze. “Are you still a…” He hesitates, searching for the word. He must not find it in Astrean, because he switches over to Kalovaxian. “A virgin?”