Azalea loved the huge clock and bells at the top of the palace, creaking through the hours and chiming in off-tune peals. It made the palace feel alive, something she desperately needed now that everything had been stifled.
“The King wouldn’t allow it to be stopped,” said Azalea, helping Kale onto her chair. “Mother loved it too much.”
At the mention of the King, the girls grew quiet. Flora raised a dainty finger, as though she were in lessons.
“Lea,” she said. “Do you—do you think he meant it? When he said—”
“Of course not,” said Azalea, giving her and her twin, Goldenrod, an encouraging smile. “He’s just aggrieved. Like in one of Eve’s storybooks.”
“I don’t know.” Eve stared at her plate. “In storybooks the children call their father Papa.” She removed her spectacles and rubbed her eyes.
Azalea paused. They had never been exactly close to the King, but he had always come to breakfast and dinner, at least. It was a rule they had, to eat dinner as a family. Now, these past several days, he had remained in the library, tending to Royal Business and ignoring them all.
“He’s missed every meal since Christmas Eve,” said Delphinium. “And he’s not coming now. I feel like an orphan.”
As if on cue, the King’s voice echoed down the hall, stiff, firm words that were indiscernible but most definitely out of the library. The girls lunged for the doors, but Azalea held them back.
“Brush down your skirts, everyone, hands in your lap. Clover, make them presentable. Bramble and I will fetch him. Behave.” Azalea cast a lofty look at Delphinium. “Orphans, for heaven’s sake.”
Through the dark halls of faded wallpaper and mismatched portraits to the entrance hall, Azalea grasped Bramble’s hand. Bramble squeezed back equally hard. Azalea hadn’t thought she missed the King, his hard adherence to rules and his formalities, but the giddiness in her chest proved otherwise.
Arriving at the entrance hall, they found the King outside the library in discussion with a young gentleman. The gentleman looked up when Azalea and Bramble brushed in. Even though the entrance hall was dimly lit, black linen over the windows, light still caught in the gentleman’s warm brown eyes. Lord Bradford!
The King looked up, too, and a frown etched his face. His beard was well trimmed and his suit crisp, but he looked half starved. Azalea felt grateful they would have fish pies for dinner. They filled a person up.
“You’re finally out!” said Bramble. “It’s about time!”
“We’re waiting for you, in the dining room,” said Azalea. “We won’t start without you.”
“Rule number eighteen,” Bramble reminded.
The frown lines in the King’s face deepened.
“I have business to tend to,” he said. Cold, formal, stiff. “This young gentleman is going to stop the tower for mourning.”
“Stop the tower!” Bramble flushed. “What? Sir, you can’t! Mother loved it! She even had a bucky little dance for it—you remember!” She grasped the King’s hand, a plea in her face.
Bramble! thought Azalea. The King’s ice blue eyes grew even harder and colder at the word “Mother.”
“It’s all right,” said Azalea quickly, hoping to smooth things. “I’ll escort him to the tower. You can go to dinner.”
“Very well. You may escort him. And you, young lady”—the King tugged his hand from Bramble’s grasp—“will tend to your sisters, at once.”
Azalea’s chest trilled with hope, right up until the King strode past her to the entrance hall doors, taking his coat from the stand and yanking the door open. Hope sputtered into indignation. He was—he was leaving! Azalea stopped the door with her boot before he shut it, biting back the pain.
“You can’t leave,” she whispered fiercely. “And you can’t stay in the library, either. This is more important than R.B. We need you!”
The King released the carved doorknob and left. In a fit of temper, Azalea slammed it after him.
Why was the King being like this? He had never been the way Mother was, but he had never been like this. Everything was tense and tangled, but Azalea felt she could still manage it all if the King was there. Now she felt abandoned.
Bramble’s chin tightened at the door. She swallowed, then snapped to Lord Bradford.
“You!” she snarled, her yellow-green eyes flaring. “You!”
She dashed down the hall in a rustle of black skirts and deep red hair. Her footfalls echoed.
Only now Azalea realized she had been clenching her fists, hard. She slowly unclenched them, and in the dim light saw the crescent-moon marks her nails had dug into her palms. A bit of skin curled up around each mark, as though Azalea had dug into a bar of soap instead of her hand.
A polite cough sounded, and Azalea flushed, remembering Lord Bradford. She turned.
“I didn’t mean—” he said, in his rich voice. He kneaded his hat rim.
“Of course not,” said Azalea. “Things are a bit unstrung here. How is your hand?”