Book 3: Chapter 22 – The Challenge [Part 2]
Book 3: Chapter 22 - The Challenge [Part 2]
Velens’ cheeks colored, though his voice was regal when he turned back to Hughes. “You! Hughes, or whatever your name is. I challenge you to a duel.”
For all his petulance, Seraphina could not deny that the Crown Prince cut a striking figure in his fury, regal fire blazing in his eyes.
No! she thought to herself. What is wrong with me!?
“On what grounds?” she demanded, stepping forward, positioning herself before Hughes as if to shield him. A part of the young noblewoman enjoyed seeing two people fight over her.
“Seraphina…” Hughes stammered, his helplessness only adding to her vexation.
“On the grounds,” Velens thundered, “that he has seduced you!”
A hush fell over the circle of girls. One fan snapped shut, another opened with a flutter, and hands covered mouths that formed wide Os—scandalized, delighted, disbelieving.
“Seduced?” a pretty girl echoed, her voice pitched high with astonishment.
Cheeks were flushed with the thrill of gossip unfolding before their very eyes. Already, whispers slithered outward, carried on the quick tongues of eager witnesses. Students nearby leaned in, craning necks. Even some of the older faculty in the gallery turned their heads toward the commotion. The match of Marlowe between Carnation and Dahlia stumbled into irrelevance; what was a bloody game compared to the sudden theater of princes and betrayals?
Seraphina tilted her chin, emerald eyes fixed unflinchingly on Velens. “Seduced?” she repeated, her tone dripping with honeyed scorn. “Next, I daresay you would claim that he has insulted your honor and that you wish to punish him for it. By that line of thinking, should I have the girls in the brothels you visit whipped? Or perhaps they would like that…”
That earned yet another ripple of laughter from the girls, scandalous and unrestrained. And Hughes, pale as parchment, looked as though he wished the ground would swallow him whole. His lips parted, closed again, then parted once more, but no words came.
Velens, however, burned. His face flushed crimson, his nostrils flaring as he jabbed a finger once more at Hughes. “Coward! Will you deny it? You’ve hidden behind her skirts long enough. Meet me in the yard and prove your honor—if you have any.”
“You dare!” Eloise began hotly, but Seraphina raised one hand, silencing her.
She stepped closer, her skirts brushing the prince’s boots, and lowered her voice until only he could hear, though the others strained to catch the words. “Velens,” she said softly, with the sweetness of venom, “if you insist on making a fool of yourself, at least do it with some dignity. At the very least, you could follow the forms.”
Velens stiffened, but pride forbade retreat. For retreat would be an admission of wrong, and a future king could never be wrong. With a sharp movement, he stripped the glove from his right hand and hurled it to the ground before Hughes’ feet. Gasps rippled through the circle as the leather struck the trampled turf.
Hughes stared at it a moment, blinking. Then, with a nervous air, he bent down, picked it up gingerly between two fingers, and held it out toward Velens. “You dropped this, Your Highness,” he said earnestly, as though returning a mislaid possession.
Now, no one bothered to hide their laughter. Velens’ face darkened to a shade just shy of purple.
“Tomorrow, at first light!” he barked, snatching the glove back with a violent jerk. “We will settle this!”
The words carried like a bell tolling. Already the murmur spread outward, like ripples in a lake where a meteor has just struck. The Crown Prince has issued a challenge. Bets would be laid before the night was over; songs might be written before the week was done.
Seraphina, for her part, was already calculating. Through her newspaper, she would ensure that every ear in Aranthia would hear of this spectacle.
As she was thinking this, Lady Rashana de Lehman—against all reason—rose from her seat and moved toward the unfolding drama. Rashana, whose quill in The Oracle had been the dagger Seraphina herself had wielded, now dared to place herself on the stage.
“Your Majesty,” the olive-skinned girl implored, bowing low, “I beg you to reconsider this course of action. It is unseemly for one of your great stature to issue a challenge against one not of the nobility.”
What is going on here? Seraphina thought darkly, her emerald eyes narrowing. Is she trying to douse the fire—or pour more oil upon it? Still, the opportunity gleamed. If nothing else, this would let her twist the knife and make Velens appear all the more a fool.
Seraphina laughed darkly. “If the matter lies in the Crown Prince Velens de Barbierri lowering himself to issue a challenge against a commoner,” Seraphina stated languidly, yet her voice cut through to everyone present, “then I, on behalf of House de Sariens, will take issue with it. I accept this challenge, for it is my House that has been insulted.”
Inwardly, she laughed as Velens’ face blanched, the color draining until he looked nearly as white as parchment.
“And I name my clasesmate Hughes as my champion,” the blonde girl added, her lips curling in a smile that was all venom and delight.
Hughes, poor boy, merely blinked in confusion, lost as powers far greater than himself maneuvered around him.
“Very well, Seraphina,” Velens said curtly at last, his voice clipped and cold. He spun on his heel and stormed away, boots striking hard against the trampled turf.
Seraphina only smiled thinly as she settled once more into her seat. She raised her teacup, sipping as if nothing of consequence had transpired at all. Around her, the girls pressed in, breathless with gossip, eyes shining with scandal. But the blonde girl’s expression remained serene, her every gesture one of languid composure. Only the cruel glimmer in her eyes betrayed her amusement.
For no matter the outcome of this duel, she would be the only winner.