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This was it. The proposal she had desired for over a decade. The proposal that she had let, willingly, be her ruination. And here it was. Handed to her now, when it was the one thing she was desperate to avoid.
Once, she thought it would feel like salvation. Now, it makes her stomach turn. Something in her shatters, but she’s been broken for a long time. She’ll press her hands to her wounds and hope the blood doesn’t pour, as she always has. But right now? She laughs. She can’t help herself.
She’s aware that she must look peculiar, bent over and cackling. She can feel Alfonso’s gaze on her, his eyes wide with shock. She can feel Cesare’s confusion and disdain, rolling off of him in waves. She can’t bring herself to care. Such cruel irony is deserving of the theater stage, indeed. But this is not a theater stage. She cannot stagger back, revealing her wounds. She cannot let her story be a tragedy much like the plays Etruscan nobles enjoy. Not again.
She straightens. Conceals. Tries to keep the fury out of her voice as she rejects him.
“Count de Como, I’m afraid your silver-tongued flattery will not avail you.”
She arranges her pretty words and hopes each one will fall upon their target like a shard of glass upon soft skin.
“Your heart sways as lightly as reeds in the breeze. I know it all too well.”
She knows more of his heart now than she did in her past life, but does she really know him all that well? Has she studied his greedy heart; does she know every crevice of it like she once thought she did? She doesn’t, but that hardly matters now.
“You, Count de Como, are better off free, rather than letting a woman like me tie you down.”
He mutters dissensions that she hardly hears.
“. . . And, for that matter, what could be lacking in a woman like you?”
Alfonso steps in front of her, now.
“Count de Como. You will shut your vulgar mouth at once. Do you think yourself worthy of proposing to a dignified lady such as her? . . .”
She’s lost, in a haze of guilt and self-pity. She looks to Alfonso, with his furious, stormy eyes and rage in his voice. Then she looks to Cesare, who is gritting his teeth in anger and raking a hand through his hair.
Hair that she used to love. Hair that she once compared to rubies, but now she can only see it and think of blood. Blood, slippery and metallic. Blood on her cheek. Blood in her hands. Blood spilling out of her as the sword pierces her flesh.
“. . .Legitimizing a sordid bastard like you would only invite chaos into the kingdom!”
Alfonso spits the words out, and the effect is instantaneous. Cesare is contorted by fury - controlled by it. His hand has formed a fist and he’s striding towards Alfonso. She knows Cesare enough to know that violence is his only intent, his only prize. One she will not let him claim.
“ENOUGH!”
Everyone freezes.
“Alfonso, let us be on our way. We have more important matters at hand, do we not? We still have to find Lady Lariessa.”
The last part breaks her heart to say. She can hear Cesare curse, and yet his voice doesn’t make her feel as triumphant as she thought it would. She still has to force a smile onto her face, to force herself to pretend her feelings don’t exist. She still has to push through an overgrown pathway with legs like lead.
Alfonso’s voice breaks the silence they have been walking in for quite some time, and it’s uncertain as he explains why Lady Lariessa is here.
She’s not sure what to say. She’s not sure what lie would be enough to mask the ugly feeling in her stomach. If there even is one.
“Ari.”
He says her name, as he has so many times. This time, though, it sounds like a plea. His desperation makes her heart feel as if it is being cleaved in two.
Again, she grits her teeth. Wills herself to be numb. Emotions are, after all, a luxury she can scarcely afford. She cannot let them get in the way of her goals. Alfonso is nothing to her but a means to an end. That stopped being true long ago, but she cannot let herself act on that.
Feelings are volatile, awful things. She knows that. They are like a millstone tied to her throat, pulling her deeper and deeper into ruin.
It is with shaking hands that she puts on her mask. With every word of happiness she offers, her heart breaks a little more. With every breath, she makes herself promise.
She will never, for as long as she lives, allow herself to fall in love again.