“Also, I’m going to be needing another thank you soon.” She crossed her arms, certainly pleased with herself now that she felt she’d gotten a sincere apology out of me. Then she pulled a book from her sack and rested it on her knees, opening it facing toward me so I could see.

“You planning to bore me back to sleep my reading this to me?” I asked, though Blaise’s sacrifice in the gesture wasn’t lost on me. Blaise was literate, but reading had never come easily to her, and it almost always resulted in a pounding headache.

She shook her head. “No. I’d like to beat you over the head with it, though.”

“Fair.”

“It’s the third volume of ancient fae law code. I’m reading through the section on fae bargains, specifically how they can be broken. I think that if we can find an ancient law that serves us, maybe we can get you out of your bargain with Ellie. Then,” she said, pulling out what looked to be a directory of the entire world given its size, “we can use this to find Cinderella.”

Instinctually, I reached for the directory, my heart listening even as my head pounded at the thought of finding her.

Blaise jumped backward, wagging the directory just out of reach. Normally, I would have snatched it from her, but she had carried me home last night, so I supposed I owed it to her not to.

Plus, I was so achy it hurt to move.

Blaise clicked her tongue. “Nope. You’re not getting your hands on this until we find a way to sever your bond with Ellie. I won’t have you going after another woman while you’re engaged, or worse, if we fail, married. I love you, but I’d rather not be disgusted by you.”

That comment stung more than I thought she meant it to, but then again, maybe that was exactly how she meant it. She was clearly still angry with me about last night, and for good reason.

I sighed. “I hope you know I would be faithful to Ellie if we can’t figure a way out of this bond.”

Blaise shifted in her chaise, reading the ancient law book and pretending to ignore me. Probably so she didn’t have to answer.

After last night, no, she did not know what I would or wouldn’t do.

Out of habit, my fingers reached for Jerad’s ring but met only flesh.

My stomach twisted as I felt its absence.

His absence.

“Did you happen to remove Jerad’s ring while I slept?” I asked, my throat dry.

Blaise only answered with a look. The knot in my stomach morphed into a hole.

When she tossed volume IV of the law book in my direction, she aimed for my groin.

She didn’t miss.

CHAPTER 14

ELLIE

I’d been under the impression my future was ruined.

I’d been wrong.

Apparently, my future was to be cut short.

Breakfast the next morning was tense, to say the least. I’d expected as much, which was exactly why I had begged Imogen to inform the family I was ill and could not join them.

It hadn’t worked, of course. Blaise hadn’t shown up for her morning duties, and Imogen had tiptoed around my request. I was fairly certain she really did want to please me, but we both knew who employed her. At the end of the day, she certainly didn’t want to get on the king’s bad side.

I couldn’t exactly blame her.

Though, had I possessed the foresight to thrust myself onto the king’s bad side, I might not be in this situation.

“I can’t lie for you. I’m their servant,” she had reminded me.

“It’s not a lie. Ill can mean a lot of things. Besides, I feel ill. I look ill.” As evidence, I pointed to my puffy eyes, which had almost sealed shut from all the crying I had done the previous night after Blaise had left me alone to grieve the loss of the life I’d dreamed for myself.

Even if Blaise believed my life here wouldn’t be so awful, that didn’t mean she’d convinced me.

I wasn’t so self-centered that I couldn’t concede that I certainly wasn’t in the worst of situations. My mother and I had always laughed at the heroines in faerietales. They somehow always managed to act like being swept out of their squalor and forced to live out the rest of their days as a princess—waited on by a host of servants, never having to eat the same meal twice in one week or run out of steaming water for their bath—was what any reasonable person would consider torture.

Not to mention the way they always turned their nose up at their new selection of dazzling imported gowns.

I wouldn’t turn into the person I’d scoffed at my entire life. I’d relish the hot baths and the exotic, hand-carved soaps and the gem-encrusted gowns and the tiaras.

And who didn’t love a good tiara?

I’d make the most of what the Fates had placed into my lap, sure. But I had been happy in my parents’ cottage, sweating away as my blow pipe warped glass into art, dreaming of my little shop in the art district.

The royal family might have showered me with riches, but they’d exacted something precious in exchange. The feel of the soft parchment against my skin as I read the daily news, the low grumbling of my father as he pretended not to enjoy discussing current events, the crisp scent of brewing coffee mingling with that of my mother’s pastries wafting into our breakfast room from the kitchen.

Would I become a sniveling princess constantly complaining about the weight of the gold and precious jewels resting upon my shoulders?

No, I would not.

Would I pretend to be excited about what was typically my favorite part of the day being spent with a king who reveled in being needlessly cruel, a queen who despised me (understandably so, I supposed), and the reckless prince who had gotten me into this mess to begin with?

Also, no.

There at the breakfasting table I sat, next to the king as I had just last evening.

Except this time, I wasn’t quite so pleasant.

Well, I would have liked to claim I was downright spiteful, a force to be reckoned with, a woman no one dared to spite for fear of her wrath, but if I was being honest with myself, I likely came across as more sulky than anything as I slurped down my meal in silence.

I spent most of the meal ignoring the royal family, most especially the king, as I counted every single speck in my oats. The oats weren’t even that good. Once, as I reached for the bowl of brown sugar, my hand grazed against Prince Evander’s, a consequence of my refusal to look up from my bowl. Our fingers brushed, sending my hand jerking backward and the hairs on the back of my arm standing up. We made the briefest of eye contact, at which point he gestured to his own eyes and frowned.

Did he really have the gall to ask me what I’d been crying about?

Come to think of it, the prince didn’t look so good himself, what with the dark bags underneath his eyes.

I shot him a glare and tried to find the speck in my oats where I’d left off counting.

“Are you enjoying your breakfast? I wasn’t sure what to ask the cook to make for you.” The queen’s voice was cool, impassive.