“What do you mean, I need protection from you?”
“Your Highness.” The fear faded away. Now he looked only tired. “Why are you torturing me like this?”
She drew back. “Torturing you?”
“Every time I’m away from you—when I’m off duty, taking care of my baby girl, my thoughts are solid. I know myself. I know my heart. I know that my wife is dead, but she gave me a beautiful gift before she left, and I’m thankful for that.” He gulped. “I know that I am loyal to the crown, and I will serve faithfully as long as I can. And I know that I care for you, as … as a guard must care for his princess. And as a friend, I suppose.”
“You are my—”
“But when you’re near,” he continued, and the interruption shocked Levana more than anything else that night. A guard never interrupted a member of the aristocracy, and certainly never a member of the royal family. “… my thoughts get all messed up again. You look like Solstice, and I get confused. My heart pounds so fast around you, but not in a happy way or a loving way. It’s as though my body belongs to someone else and I can’t keep my hands off you, even though I know how wrong it is. Stars above, I could be executed for this!”
“No! No, I would never let that happen to you.”
“But you’re the one doing this to me.”
She froze.
“Aren’t you?” he whispered. “This is all a manipulation. A trick played on the poor, weak-minded guard.”
Levana shook her head and scrambled closer to him, pulling his hands into hers. “I don’t think of you like that at all.”
“Then why are you doing this?”
“Because I love you! And you love me, but you’re too honorable to—”
“I don’t love you!” he screamed, and the words struck her like a thousand shards of ice. “Or at least … I don’t think I do. But you’ve got my mind so turned around I can hardly tell what’s real anymore.”
She attempted a gentle smile. “Don’t you see? That’s what love is supposed to feel like. All these conflicting emotions and bouts of passion that you can hardly control, and this constant twisting feeling in your stomach like you can’t decide if you want to run away from that person … or if you want to run away with them.”
His face was tense, like he was trying to hash out his words before he yelled again.
“You’re wrong, Princess. I don’t know what you’re describing, but it isn’t love.”
Tears pricked at her eyes. “When you said that I needed protection from you, I didn’t think that you intended to break my heart. When I have given … when I would do anything for you, Evret.”
Pulling away from her, he curled his fingers into his thick coils of hair. “That isn’t my intention, Princess. I don’t think you understand what you’re doing, how wrong it is. But this can’t continue. In the end, you’ll grow tired of this charade, and I will be punished for taking advantage of you. Don’t you see that?”
“I told you, I won’t let that happen.”
He dropped his hands. “And you think the queen will listen to you?”
“She’ll have to. She herself has had countless affairs with royal guards.”
“She is not sixteen years old!”
Levana wrapped her arms around herself like a shield. “You think I’m just a na?ve child.”
“Yes. Na?ve and confused and lonely.”
She forced herself to hold his gaze. “And what about beautiful?”
He flinched and looked away.
“You also find me beautiful, don’t you? Irresistible, even?”
“Princess—”
“Answer me.”
“I can’t.”
“Because I’m right.”
He said nothing.
Levana swallowed. “Marry me, Evret.”
His eyes snapped back toward her, horrified, but she plowed on. “Marry me and you will be a prince. She cannot touch you.”
“No. No. Solstice … and my darling Winter…”
Her heart stuttered, and she was surprised at how quickly her jealousy returned, how much it hurt. “Winter? Who’s Winter?”
He laughed without humor, pulling both hands down his face. “She’s my daughter. You believe that you love me and yet you haven’t even asked what I named my one-month-old child? Don’t you see how insane that is?”
She gulped. Winter. Solstice. Though they did not have seasons on Luna, she knew enough of the Earthen calendar to be familiar with how the words fit together. She remembered, too, the little baby blanket, embroidered with a snowy scene.
He meant to never forget his wife. Not for as long as he lived.
“Winter,” she said, wetting her lips. “Your daughter will be a princess, with all the riches and privileges afforded to a girl of her station. Don’t you want that for her?”