His green eyes flashed with anger, though the rest of his face was subdued. As if he genuinely wanted to understand what he had done wrong, although his feelings were clearly hurt.
Rage unfurled in my chest at the thought. That he should dare to have his feelings hurt after he’d crushed my dreams.
“It wasn’t about owning a shop, or selling pretty glass,” I said. “It was about building something with my own two hands. About the hours I’d have to put in, the glass I’d have to toss, just for that moment of euphoria when I’d figured it out. And it was about other people admiring the beauty of what my hands had made, witnessing the innovation of what my father only ever saw as a material to make windows.”
Evander’s brow furrowed. “There’s a workshop in the back of the cottage. You can still work there, or you’re still free to use the one on the castle grounds.”
“You’re still not listening.” My voice trembled, and I sank to a whisper in a failed attempt to conceal that fact. “Do you know how long it took me to make a pair of glass slippers I was proud of?”
“Two years.”
I bristled. I hadn’t expected him to remember, but it did nothing to diffuse my agitation. “I threw away almost forty different prototypes. I worked by lamplight so many nights just to get up at the crack of dawn the next morning to do it all again, just so I could catch a few hours before I had to work with my father. But you—you said a few words, and then your father’s craftsman had it made in a matter of days. All you did today was prove that my dream, my years of hard work, could be done so much better by someone else. That feeling—the accomplishment, the one where I could finally hold something in my hands, something I’d carried in my imagination for so long, and the knowledge that I’d made it with those two hands—you stole that from me.”
Evander’s mouth opened as if to retort, but then his teeth clenched.
I flicked my wrist. “See? You can’t even bring yourself to apologize. Because you don’t get it.”
“No, I don’t get it,” he said, his knuckles bulging as he held onto my armrests. “I tried to do something thoughtful for you, but you can’t even see that. By Alondria, you can’t even give me the benefit of the doubt, or admit that at least I tried. So no, I don’t get it.”
“No. The reason you don’t get it is because you’ve never worked for anything more substantial than a lay a day in your life.”
Evander’s jaw tightened, and his eyes went wide with hurt. Then his cheeks softened and went sallow. “I’ll take you back to your room. I’m sorry for getting you out just to make an already horrible week worse.”
The bitterness of my harsh words landed in my stomach, souring and churning as I processed the weight of them. “Evander, I—”
“No, you’re right. You don’t have to apologize for simply speaking the truth.” He forced a smile, but his eyes didn’t partake. “Maybe your mother was referring to salt in wounds after all.”
As he pushed me back to my room in silence, the wheels of my chair grinding against the uneven road, I couldn’t help but notice that the gnawing in my stomach hurt way worse than the moment I’d seen my dreams realized by someone else.
CHAPTER 35
EVANDER
I had a pretty good idea what Ellie was doing.
We were seated around the dinner table, and she was ignoring me, while simultaneously flaunting how well she got along with my mother.
Man, she irritated me sometimes.
“Your Grace,” she said, but my mother quickly raised a delicate hand.
“There’s no need for formalities, Ellie. Not with family,” my mother said, her soft smile resting gently on her soon-to-be daughter-in-law.
Ellie beamed.
Fates, she was gorgeous. She knew it too.
“Not quite family yet,” I said, aiming to match Ellie’s grin, though through gritted teeth.
My father coughed, and my mother blinked rapidly. “Why, Evander,” she said, surely intending to scold me.
“Just wouldn’t want to jinx it,” I said, impressed that my smile had not faltered in the slightest.
Ellie simply ignored me.
“Evangeline.” Ellie grinned, saying my mother’s name like it was an honor. “Did I hear correctly that the trade deal between Dwellen and the villages of the Eastern Shores is to be finalized soon?”
My mother set her silverware on the table, and I braced myself for yet another evening of having to watch my mother, my mother, the female who was supposed to inherently prefer me, bond with a woman I was fairly certain hated me.
“How did you hear about that?” my mother asked, though it was clear she was delighted Ellie had even thought to bring up the subject.
“Blaise was in the library earlier and overheard—”
My father’s fork scraped his plate. “Blaise? In the library?” Suspicion furrowed his stony brow. In her youth, Blaise had been known to throw the not-so-occasional temper tantrum during her reading lessons—the ones my father paid for. “That child would do anything to get out of a day’s work, wouldn’t she?”
Ellie’s eyes went wide, and she swallowed. “I didn’t mean to imply Blaise wasn’t working. I only—”
“She was working. For me,” I said. Ellie’s slender shoulders sagged in relief, though she kept her gaze averted from mine.
My father traced circles upon the dinner table with his finger. “Pray tell, Evander, what task of yours is so important that you would encourage Blaise to shirk her duties?”
“Let’s just say she’s researching a certain engagement gift for Ellie.” I kept my eyes pinned on Ellie, and I didn’t miss the way she bristled, preparing herself for where this conversation was inevitably headed.
My mother huffed in exasperation at my disregard for manners. “Evander, you can’t go about hoisting the responsibility of finding a gift upon someone else. It defies the whole point.”
“On the contrary, Mother. I only thought Blaise’s taste might be better suited to the task. Knowing me, I’d probably choose wrongly.”
“Well. I’m sure Ellie would love anything you gifted her, just by nature of it being from you. Wouldn’t you, Ellie?”
