They carried on until the college clock sounded for evening chapel. At which point every boy grabbed his equipment and broke into a run—lockup was in ten minutes.
It was a festive rush, the boys ribbing one another for mistakes made during practice. Fairfax wisely refrained—except to chortle when expected.
They were within sight of Mrs. Dawlish’s house when Wintervale suddenly exclaimed, “What the hell!”
Titus had already seen them. Fairfax glanced up. By the tightening of her expression, he knew she had spied the formation of armored chariots. They were almost invisible now, disappearing into the darkening eastern sky.
“What is it?” asked several of the boys.
Wintervale shook his head. “Never mind. Just the clouds. My eyes were playing a trick on me.”
“What did you think you saw?” Kashkari persisted.
“Your sister kissing the chai-wallah,” said Wintervale.
Kashkari punched Wintervale in the arm. The other boys laughed, and that was the end of it.
Except for Fairfax. She had been both exhausted and exulted; now she looked only exhausted.
You will become accustomed to it, the prince had said to her.
She had not yet. The feeling of naked vulnerability was an iron fist at her throat.
“Are you all right?” asked the prince. They’d made it back to Mrs. Dawlish’s before lockup. He’d slipped into her room with her.
She shrugged. At least she didn’t need to pretend with him—the boys had not dispersed immediately upon reaching the house, forcing her to maintain her cheery facade for another quarter hour.
“I lied,” he said softly. “The truth is you will never get used to it. The taste of fear always chokes.”
She flattened her lips. “That isn’t what I need to hear now. You should have kept lying.”
“Believe me, I would like to. Nothing sounds more unsettling than truth rolling off my tongue.” He put a kettle in the grate, opened her cupboard, lifted out a tin box, and pressed a piece of cake into her hand. “I had the foodstuff delivered today. Eat—you will be less afraid on a full stomach.”
She took a bite of the cake. She didn’t know whether it made her less afraid, but at least it was moist and buttery, everything a cake ought to be.
“How did you learn to play cricket so quickly?” he asked.
She had suggested to Kashkari that they run to catch up with the other boys. She then pretended, as they reached the pitch, to suffer from a muscle cramp. That bought her time to sit on the sidelines. Watching the other boys, her hasty reading on cricket the evening before began to make sense. The terminology of cricket had confused her, but the game in play was a bat-and-ball game, and she was familiar with those.
She rested her hip against the edge of her desk and shrugged again. “It isn’t that hard.”
He flipped down her cot and took a seat, his back against the wall, his hands behind his head. “Lucky for us. Wintervale was convinced you were an exceptional player. That was the problem with my trick: the mind finds ways to fill a blank—and Archer Fairfax was a perfect blank.”
She almost didn’t hear what he was saying. The way he sat, all strong shoulders and long limbs—it was . . . distracting. “Is that why Kashkari thinks I’m going back to Bechuanaland with my parents?”
“That is the least alarming of misconceptions. You will be surprised what people thought of you. Last year there was a rumor going around that you had not hurt your leg at all, but had been sent away because you had impregnated a maid.”
“What?”
“I know,” said the prince with a straight face. “I was impressed by the extent of your virility.”
Then he smiled, overcome by the humor of the situation. Bright mischief lit his face and he was just a gorgeous boy, enjoying one hell of a joke.
It was a few seconds before she realized that, astounded by his transformation, she’d stopped chewing. She swallowed awkwardly. “Kashkari asked me a great number of questions.”
This sobered him. The smile, like a brief glimpse of the sun in rainy season, disappeared. “What kind of questions?”
She was almost relieved not to see his smile anymore. “He wanted to know what I thought of the relationship between the British Empire and lands under her influence abroad.”
“Ah.” He relaxed visibly. “Kashkari would want to know your opinions.”
“Why?”
The kettle sang. He rose, lifted it off its hook, poured boiling water into a teapot, and swished the teapot. “Kashkari has ambitions. He does not state it, but he wants to free India from British rule in his lifetime. Wintervale is sympathetic. I am known to be apolitical, so he is secure in the knowledge that at least I am not antagonistic toward his goals. But he is less sure about you.”