Chapter 37: Of Shadows Claimed and Histories Rewritten

Lucian’s hands clenched at his sides.

The movement was small—almost imperceptible—but the tension travelled up his forearms and lodged itself sharply beneath his collarbone.

A demon?

Unimportant?

The words echoed through him with a force he did not permit to touch his face.

Lyria was neither.

She had never been.

And the knowledge settled in his chest with a quiet, aching certainty.

He remembered her far too clearly and far too differently for Jacinta’s contempt to erase her so easily.

The soft way she used to linger at the edge of rooms that were not meant for her. The careful distance she kept from everyone. The deliberate quiet, as though she feared even the sound of her own presence might offend people.

He was painfully aware of the cruel irony of it.

He had been one of the boys—the only one, actually—who had made that quiet necessary.

Lucian lowered his gaze for a fleeting moment.

When they were younger—when he was younger—he had not known how to speak to her.

Not properly.

Not without revealing the feelings he harboured for her.

His foolish, impatient mind had settled upon the simplest cruelty it could shape.

If he tugged at her hair.

If he took her masks.

If he made a show of scoffing at her careful little courtesies.

She would look at him.

She would acknowledge him.

And, perhaps, she would stop pretending that he did not exist.

It had been childish.

Wretchedly so, and though she had given him attention, it was not the one he sought or hoped for.

And he had learned too late that some attentions, once taken by force, could never be reclaimed with grace.

His jaw tightened. But he did not dare utter a word about what he felt in the presence of the Queen and her daughter.

He knew better than to expose sympathy in a room where Lyria’s name had already been shaped into something shameful.

If he defended her openly, he would only make her subject to even more harsh treatment, and he could not stomach that, so he remained where he was and listened.

The Queen regarded Jacinta quietly.

"What, precisely," Her Majesty asked, her voice even and carefully measured, "has Lyria done to warrant you such distress, my dear?"

Jacinta drew in a shuddering breath.

Her fingers tightened convulsively in the Queen’s skirts.

"She disobeyed me," she whispered.

"She was given an instruction," Jacinta continued weakly, lifting her face only enough for her lashes to tremble prettily. "And she refused to follow it."

The Queen’s lips pressed together.

Lucian felt the shift in the air before it fully settled.

The gentle warmth of the withdrawing room—its porcelain cups, its embroidered cushions, its softly glowing hearth—seemed suddenly strained beneath something colder.

Jacinta’s voice grew thinner.

"Mother..." she murmured.

Her hand slid higher, gathering more of the Queen’s gown.

"Is she not meant to be my shadow?" she asked. "Is she not meant to stand behind me whenever I appear in public?"

The Queen exhaled slowly through her nose.

"There is no uncertainty in that matter," she said at last. "When you present yourself before society, Lyria is to remain in the background. She is to stand in the shadows."

Lucian’s brows drew together before he could stop himself.

He lifted his head.

"Forgive me, Your Majesty," he said quietly, with all proper deference, "but may I ask why?"

Both women turned toward him.

The Queen’s gaze lingered upon him for a while before she spoke.

"Because it is fitting," she replied.

Jacinta’s mouth curved faintly, and the Queen continued.

"It is a corrective," she said. "For a young woman who has grown dangerously careless with her understanding of her place."

Lucian’s confusion deepened.

"A corrective?"

"Yes," the Queen said gently. "If she is made to observe Jacinta continually from a position beneath her—if she is reminded, day after day, of where she belongs—then perhaps she will cease to imagine herself entitled to what she is not."

Her gloved hand rested upon Jacinta’s hair affectionately.

"Watching Jacinta," the Queen added, "will teach her humility, especially since she only has the opportunity she has now because her mother seduced my husband."

Lucian hesitated. It was the same word again.

"But Your Majesty," he said carefully, "from what I have always understood..."

The Queen’s eyes lifted and sharpened as she looked at him.

"...Lyria’s mother did not seduce the King."

Jacinta froze at his words, while the Queen stared icily at him.

"That," she said, with measured precision, "is what occurred."

"And any account that contradicts it," the Queen continued softly, "is mistaken."

Lucian knew, even without being told, that the Queen was threatening him. He might be related to her, but that did not make him spared from her cruelty.

He inclined his head at once.

"My apologies, Your Majesty."

The Queen regarded him for another quiet moment.

Then her expression smoothed.

Jacinta stirred, choosing that as her sign to continue her tale.

"I tried to correct her myself," she whispered brokenly.

Lucian’s gaze flicked back to her.

"I sought to remind her of her proper role after breakfast," Jacinta continued, her voice trembling with careful restraint. "I spoke to her gently too. I explained what was expected of her."

Lucian doubted Jacinta knew what gently was, but he said nothing.

Her lashes fluttered.

"But she would not listen."

The Queen’s fingers tightened faintly in Jacinta’s hair.

"She told me no," Jacinta whispered.

The word was shaped as though it wounded her to speak it.

"She looked at me," Jacinta said, her voice rising just slightly, "and told me that I had no authority over her."

Jacinta pressed her face closer to the Queen’s knee.

"She said," Jacinta sobbed, "that she would not obey me and that I had no authority over her."

"She said that?" the Queen asked her.

Jacinta nodded. "I wouldn’t lie about something like this, Mother. She did."

"I only wished to remind her that she serves me," she whispered. "That she exists for me, and she insulted me."

Lucian felt something twist sharply in his chest.

He kept his face composed, but he felt irritated at the blatant lie being uttered by Jacinta. One thing he was certain of was the fact that Lyria would not do what it was Jacinta now accused her of. It was obvious—but the Queen, ever gullible to her daughter’s lies, seemed to believe that Lyria had insulted her daughter.