He had been fishing for bait. For salt to pour upon his son’s wound.

And I was going to give it to him. Even if the aftermath ricocheted and took out the gentle queen.

I mustered what I thought was a pretty convincing smirk, considering my reluctance. “I did claim elderly parents on my invitation, yes. But, truth be told, I had no desire to flirt with a male with a list of bedmates behind him that could probably span the length of this table.”

Evander tensed and muttered another, “By Alondria,” but his reaction was subtle in comparison to his mother’s. The queen flushed crimson, her jaw clenching. “Excuse me,” she said, pushing her chair from the table and fleeing with such haste that she carried her napkin with her.

My stomach churned as the delicate female rushed away.

The king stifled a chuckle with his napkin. If it bothered him that I’d humiliated his wife, he didn’t let it show. “And how could I blame you?”

Evander cleared his throat. “Well, that seems to be my cue. I’m sure the two of you have plenty you’d like to discuss at my expense. Good evening to you both.” As he stood to leave, his green eyes lingered on mine for a moment, and where I expected a nod of approval, an assurance that this was the time to make my request of the king, I found only hurt and embarrassment.

Confused, I swallowed as he walked away.

“You must think me a poor excuse for a father,” the king said, wrenching me from my thoughts.

“Oh, I—” But I couldn’t think of a response. Was Evander wrong about his father’s disregard for him? Did the king feel remorse for the cruel words he constantly directed toward his youngest son?

“Say no more,” he said. “You need not offer me pity or craft excuses on my behalf. I’m aware I’ve done badly with him. You’re a woman who speaks your mind plainly, and I don’t wish for you to dull your words simply because of our respective positions. But I will have you know that your opinion of me would have been greater had you met my oldest.”

My heart sank. The king wasn’t expressing remorse for how he treated Evander. He was concerned about his reputation for being able to raise a suitable heir.

Not knowing how else to respond, I went with the obvious. “I am sure you have all suffered immeasurable loss.”

“Indeed,” he sighed, setting his fork upon his plate, just as the servant arrived with the flanveise, which looked to be some sort of chocolate custard garnished with—Fates, surely those weren’t pixie wings.

“Leave it for Miss Payne,” the king ordered the servant. “I am retiring early.”

“Wait.” The plea burst out of me as he rose. But then I swallowed, because it occurred to me how inappropriate it was for me, a commoner, to make demands of the king.

The king who had been king since before my grandparents were born.

“I’m listening,” he said, though the stillness that had settled over his face conveyed the opposite.

I nodded, squaring my shoulders, as if making myself bigger would somehow make my request more important. I supposed that was how the world tended to work, anyway. “I am under the impression that, as the cosigner of the prince’s bargain, you also have the right to annul it.”

The king clasped his hands together, his face lined with curiosity.

“Your Majesty, surely you of all people understand why I can’t spend the rest of my life bound to your son.”

He raised a brow and waved the servant away with a whisk of his hand.

Taking this as a cue for me to continue, I grappled for my next words. “All I ask for is mercy. Please, Your Majesty. Please annul the bargain. I agreed to it unknowingly, and only because I wished to reclaim the property that was stolen from me.”

“Miss Payne, you have found yourself in a unique position. A position for which many women, and men, for that matter, would kill not only an acquaintance, but probably a favored kin. You are in the position to inherit the queen’s throne one day. Do you understand the power my wife has?”

“I understand that, Your Majesty.” Though I didn’t, really. I didn’t get the impression that Queen Evangeline had much sway in how the kingdom was run, but nevertheless… “I do not desire the throne.”

“Is that so?” The king cocked his head, studying me, and then in a sultry voice, not unlike the one his son so often used, he asked, “And what do you desire?”

I swallowed. I hadn’t noticed until just now how commanding the king’s presence was. How brilliantly handsome he was. It wasn’t attractive so much as it was devastating. Still, I straightened. The king might have been handsome enough to knock my carefully practiced speech right out of my head, but his question was simple, one I might as well have been practicing my whole life to answer.

I knew what I wanted.

I always had.

“To transform my father’s business into something not only practical, but beautiful. Unprecedented…and—”

“Could you not be more successful with the allowance you’ll receive as a princess?”

Allowance. I shook off the interruption. “I know it sounds foolish, but I don’t believe it would be the same, Your Majesty. The joy I receive, the thrill… It’s inseparable from the work, the process, the steady progress. If I were simply given the money… Well, I don’t know that I would find as much pleasure in it.”

“I see. And is that all?”

“Not quite. I—” This part felt silly, and it didn’t escape me how ridiculous it was that I was having this discussion with the King of Dwellen. “I wish to marry for love. It’s a value instilled by my parents, and their parents before them. I can’t marry for money, so I will make it myself. And I can’t take the money from your son, either, for then I’d be robbed of the chance of marrying for love.”

The king stood from the table and advanced. He placed a firm hand on my shoulder, and for a moment, I wondered if it had been wise to desire a private audience with the most powerful male in the kingdom. If perhaps Evander had misjudged his father’s devotion to the queen. I fought the urge to recoil, and he craned his neck ever so slightly. “Hm. You’re an honorable young woman, Miss Payne. I have to say, I admire your values.”

Hope rose in my chest, even if the king’s touch had me reeling. It had worked. The prince—that idiot—he had actually come up with a plan that worked. Maybe he wasn’t as stupid as everyone thought, after all. This mess was going to be resolved, and all it had taken was—

“However, I cannot fulfill your request.”

“I…What?” I asked, losing all pretense of propriety as I followed him across the hall to the door. “What do you mean, you can’t? Wasn’t that the whole point of having you cosign the prince’s bargain?”

The king withdrew his hand and sighed. “Forgive me. I misspoke. What I meant is not that I can’t do as you ask. It’s simply that I won’t do as you ask.”

My jaw dropped. Came unhinged. Decayed and rotted and crashed to the ground, creating a pile of dust for the servants to certainly grumble about. “Why not?”

“Because, Lady Payne, the reason I cosigned the bargain was because I thought it was almost certain that my son would make a poor choice in a future queen. Which he would have, had his bargain not been so poorly and rashly worded. At the beginning of this dinner, I had every intention of undoing the arrangement, after what I was sure would be a long evening of a power- and money-thirsty maiden buttering up my queen and myself with praises of our generosity and compliments regarding aspects of ourselves the maiden was sure to know nothing at all about. Oh, but what a pleasant surprise it was to meet you, instead.”

“I don’t understand…”

“Ah. Let me make it clear for you. I don’t believe my son could ever pick a female as fit for ruling as you.”

I shook my head, as if doing so would dislodge me from this ridiculous nightmare I’d found myself trapped in. “But I don’t care anything about power.”

“Exactly. That, and the fact that you’re clever and possess ingenuity about you, makes you the perfect candidate for a future queen. In the case that I meet an unpleasant end, of course.”

My heart sank. “But what about my father’s business? I…I told you about my desire to marry for love. Why did you ask me what I wanted if you had no intention of holding it in any regard? Surely you’re not going to punish me for your son’s folly.”

The king sighed and, not for the first time, I noticed the weariness, the fog that blurred the edges of those gray eyes. “That, my dear, is the trouble with it all. As much as I hate to punish you—and believe me, I do—my son is as you say. A fool. He has paraded about his entire life as if his actions have no consequence on anyone around him. As he is now, he is not fit to rule. A king must understand this quality, to his very core. That his actions are not his own, but the rudder that shapes the course of every soul entrusted to him. My son must learn that his rash nature is harmful to others. If I fix his mistake on your behalf, how will he ever learn?”

I blinked at the burning tears that were now obscuring the king’s beautiful, horrible face as I tried my best not to break down in front of the only being who had the power to free me. The power to ruin my life.

For all the certainty I’d possessed just a few moments ago, all I could manage was a whisper. “Please don’t do this. Please.”

“My dear,” he said as he turned away, “I have utmost confidence that a woman as industrious as yourself will learn to make the most of it.”