“You’re avoiding the question.”
I lower my eyelids and try to appear cowed. “I didn’t want you to find out.”
His Highness raises an eyebrow at that but says nothing.
“I went to visit my old dance instructor.”
He spreads his hand out to both sides. “Because…?”
“I haven’t always been like this,” I say, gesturing vaguely at my person. Ugh! I sound like a bad cinema film! “For example, this isn’t the nose I was born with,” I add wryly.
His Majesty smirks. “Truly?”
I clasp the front of my robe to my chest as though embarrassed and nod, my eyes sliding away from his. “I was only fourteen when we moved into the palace after my father’s inheritance. Before, we lived in the city of Versailles: part of the Sonoman-Versailles culture, but only on the fringes of the actual court.”
“So you had a Parisian dance instructor—move along.”
“Patience, Justin,” I say. “You know my mother, of course.”
He snaps his mouth shut at that. If there’s anyone who despises my mother more than I do, it’s him.
“This,” I say, gesturing between the two of us, “was always her dream, and as an only child I was her sole tool to get it. So imagine her dismay when I entered adolescence, grew far too quickly for my sense of balance to keep up, and sprouted a large and rather crooked nose. And don’t even get me started on my teeth,” I add, almost to myself. The memory of my accelerated orthodontia still makes my mouth ache. “My mother practically hid me for almost two years while she used my father’s new inheritance to mold me into bait. For you,” I clarify when His Highness looks confused.
“How stupid does she think I am? I was never going to consider you,” he says scornfully. “An untitled nobody? What a waste of money.”
My cheeks don’t even redden at his insult. The class system of the court has never meant anything to me. If I had my way, I’d still be an untitled nobody. With my old nose and gangly limbs, to be truthful. The perfect features, impeccable manners, and fey grace I’m known for at court are all as much a disguise as the costumes we wear at masquerades.
But worse, to me they represent the years of subservience I showed to my mother. Pursuing her dream through rigorous and painful methods, when all I truly wanted was to be a part of the glamorous court life, fringes or not. As on the night of Sierra’s murder, I did nothing. I let life happen to me. Not anymore.
“When I was at least acceptable in my sixteenth year, I had my coming out, but I continued to train secretly in grace and poise. I needed it,” I add, letting my lashes lower as though revealing a weakness, not simply baiting his rook with my pawn.
He’s looking bored now, with his hands jammed in his pockets. “As fascinating and admittedly amusing as this all is, what the hell does it have to do with your trip to Paris?”
“My dance instructor. Giovanni is a renowned ballet teacher. My mother spent a small fortune for him to instill in me the grace of a ballerina, without the ballet. I didn’t learn dances; I learned how to walk without tripping.” It’s a simplified explanation. Hours upon hours we spent in Giovanni’s mirrored dance studio, floating from pose to pose, my instructor’s swift hands correcting every angle, every tilt, every curve, until I could strike any pose to utter perfection in an instant.
“I went to Paris to see if he might be amenable to taking up our lessons again. The kingdom’s centennial is coming and I—I’m nervous.” The lashes-lowering thing again. Nervous, ha! I have a half-hour practice routine personally designed by Giovanni that I do every night without fail. I haven’t slid back, but I know the King won’t be willing to offer me that compliment.
Sure enough, His Majesty clears his throat. “While you are, indeed, lovely—no one can deny that, least of all myself—there’s always room for improvement.”
Ah, pride goeth before stupidity. “I was hoping you would say so,” I reply, giving him a coy smile. He narrows his eyes in suspicion, as he was hoping to provoke me. “I fear I’m slipping just a bit, right when I need to be my very best.”
“You certainly do,” His Highness agrees in a stern, magisterial tone that clashes ridiculously with our ages.
“Perhaps weekly lessons for the next month or two,” I suggest. That gives me my excuse for Paris on my GPS. “We wouldn’t want the media to detect anything amiss, would we?”
He grinds his teeth and says nothing. But after a long moment, he sighs. “Send a com, then. Fetch him here.”
“Oh, that’s not possible,” I retort, perhaps too quickly. “I must go to him.”
“I don’t see why.”