The Runaway Princess

  He examined the chamber critically. “Yes. This will do.”

  It would do. The dust she could handle. A closet she could not. Breathing a sigh of relief, she sagged against the wall.

  Walking to the window, he put his hands on the high sill and looked out, then looked back at her. “It’s a sheer drop, with jagged rocks at the bottom. Tsk,” he said with spurious sympathy. “There’s no escape that way.”

  Automatically sarcastic, she said, “Maybe I can fly.”

  “No. I’ve clipped your wings.”

  His certainty jarred and infuriated her. Clipped her wings, had he? He couldn’t even begin to know of what she was capable—and she wasn’t going to tell him.

  “You’ll need a bed,” he decided.

  “Please, I don’t want to inconvenience anyone. Let me sleep on the cold bare floor.”

  “Or the table,” he pointed out amiably. “It’s long enough. I could shove this coil of rope and those gardening tools off, and you could sleep there.”

  “You are such a swine.”

  He took her by the arms and swung her around.

  She clenched her teeth. “Have you decided to take vengeance?”

  “For what? Because of what you think? What a woman thinks is the most insignificant part of her. No, I only care what you do, and I direct your actions now.”

  He steered her stiff, protesting figure into the center of the floor, then hooked a short stool with his foot and dragged it from under the table. “Sit.” Allowing her no choice, he pressed her down.

  Driven to protest by a last, weary remnant of defiance, she said, “It’s dirty.”

  “The dress is beyond redemption. Now sit still.”

  She looked down at her lap, at the beautiful, stained skirt, and stroked it lightly with her fingertip. She was—had had to be—a thrifty soul. She could turn the fabric and find enough unmarred material to make a shawl. Or . . . a handkerchief.

  He left the room and didn’t see her swift rush of tears, and she controlled them promptly. Not for anything would she show him weakness now. Instead, she propped her elbow on her knee and sank her chin into her cupped palm to contemplate escape. But only because she felt she had to. Without help, there was no way out of this convent, and besides, where would she go? She was in the middle of nowhere.

  From out in the entryway, she heard a splash from the well, then the rattle of chain and the creak of the windlass as Danior brought up the laden bucket. Returning, he blocked the doorway and contemplated her, the bucket dripping in dark splotches on the wooden floor. Then he walked toward her with the intent and purpose she’d come to recognize.

  She was a hedge that needed shaping. He was the shears.

  He put down the bucket and knelt before her, eye-level, and she stared at him with as much menace as she could contrive. He whipped off the cravat that hung limply around his neck. He dipped it in the water, wrung it out, cupped her head in his hand and washed her face with speed and efficiency.

  When she emerged, sputtering and damp, she gave voice to a sudden, horrifying suspicion. “You have children!”

  He rinsed the limp cravat in the bucket. “Why do you say that?”

  “Because you scrub like a parent!”

  “We have a number of orphans in Baminia.” He wrung out the cravat again.

  She flinched back.

  Taking her hand, he cleansed it thoroughly. “I occasionally serve in the orphanage.”

  She had to know without a doubt. “So you’re not a parent?”

  “I have had only a few liaisons, and with those I took much care. I have fathered no children. You will not have to bring up my bastards.” He watched her with too much comprehension. “I am not my father. Is that what you wanted to know, Evangeline?”

  Yes, although not because she disliked the thought of raising a strange child. Rather, it was a sudden, unnamed distaste at the thought of Danior’s closeness to the mother of that child.

  He smoothed the cool water up her arm, and his ministrations felt almost good.

  So she rushed to divert his attention. “Why do you work in the orphanage?”

  “Because I, too, am an orphan and know that occasional attention can make the difference between a king and a . . . revolutionary.”

  She examined him from several angles. He appeared to be serious. “I’ll bet they hate to see you coming if you wash faces like that.”

  “Only the little ones, and they forgive me quickly enough when I carry them on my back.”

  As he had done her. Of course he had to deliberately remind her of that, and inadvertently remind her of how very grateful she would have been if someone, an adult of any kind, had taken even a passing interest in her when she lived at the orphanage.

  She imagined the scrawny children with their odd-colored eyes riding on his back, and thought how they must adore him. If she weren’t careful, the scrawny orphan she had been would come to adore him, too. “You treat me like a child.”

  “You almost nodded off in your barley. You’re not capable of taking care of yourself.”

  A sputter of laughter escaped her. “I’ve been taking care of myself for more years than I can remember.”

  “Of course you have.” He washed her other hand, then lifted it and placed it on his mouth. “Your Highness.”

  His lips formed the two words, his breath touched her fingers, and each syllable felt like a kiss pressed to her palm. She snatched her hand away, but his face remained level with hers. Weariness ringed his eyes with dark, yet still he challenged her. And although she desperately fought, she slid toward the warm, deep blue comfort of his gaze.

  “Mother Leopolda says it is permissible to lock Miss Scoffield into the storage chamber.” Soeur Constanza’s voice broke the bond and conveyed disapproval, all at the same time.

  Evangeline sprang back and bumped her head against the table.

  Danior whipped his head around and glared through narrowed eyes.

  Rubbing the sore spot on her skull, Evangeline contemplated her luck. If Soeur Constanza and her companion had been a mere minute later, she might have committed herself to Danior’s madness. But much as Danior might wish to, he couldn’t command Soeur Constanza to leave them alone.

  Torn between satisfaction and relief, Evangeline said, “You can’t bully a nun.”

  He looked back at her, his gaze lethal, which she took as an agreeable sign that she’d annoyed him.

  And of course, he couldn’t let her savor her trivial victory for long. “You have the key, Soeur Constanza?”

  The elderly nun lifted the heavy iron key dangling from an equally large and forbidding ring.

  “We’ll lock her in, then.” He rose, took the key, and tried to slip it into his waistcoat pocket. The key could be wedged in; the ring could not.

  Evangeline grinned. How lovely to see him frustrated about this, at least.

  Soeur Constanza gestured at the young nun who stood behind her, eyes fixed downward in an excess of meekness. “We’ve brought food for Miss Scoffield in case she grows hungry during her incarceration.”

  Evangeline’s grin faded. “Incarceration?” Nothing about this was really funny. They were going to lock her in.

  “We also have a pallet for her which must be brought down,” Soeur Constanza said. “Perhaps, sir, since you are the one who has made this unusual request, you could trouble yourself to carry it?”

  “It’s the least I can do.” With a threatening frown at Evangeline, he followed Soeur Constanza.

  Evangeline breathed a sigh of relief as he left.

  “He is overpowering.” The young nun seemed to read Evangeline’s mind as she carried the tray into the room and placed it on a clear spot on the table. “He breathes all the air in a chamber.”

  “Yes. Yes, that’s exactly it!”

  The girl appeared to be sallow, but perhaps that was the effect of the unrelenting black robe and the long gray scarf over her head. Tufts of hair stuck out at her forehead, giving
her a fey appearance, yet now that Danior had left she seemed sure of herself.

  “Not that I’m in awe of him.” Evangeline struggled to her feet. “Only he saps at my resolve, and he offers these nuggets of temptation . . . but you don’t know about that.”

  “I’m a nun, not a saint.” The nun lifted her gaze to Evangeline’s.

  Serephinian eyes. The memory of Danior’s words jumped out at Evangeline. Serephinian eyes, just like her own.

  Suspicion sharpened Evangeline’s voice. “Who are you?”

  “I’m Marie Theresia, a postulant here at the convent.” She tucked her hands into her sleeves, looking totally at home with her impending vows of poverty and chastity. “Who are you?”

  Evangeline’s brief rush of conjecture died. The girl was almost a nun. “I’m Evangeline Scoffield of—” Exhaustion struck her hard. She’d been saying this for so long. No one believed her. Right now, she almost didn’t believe herself. Sinking down again, she put her head on her knees. “I’m nobody.”

  “Nonsense.” Marie Theresia pressed her palm to Evangeline’s shoulder. “We are all somebody in God’s eyes.”

  “No, we’re not.” Evangeline’s breath puffed back into her face, and her skirt muffled her declaration. “Most of us are ardent nobodies, living forever in the shadow of a somebody because it’s easy.”

  “But not you.” Marie Theresia sounded as if she could read Evangeline’s soul.

  “No, not me. I recklessly struck out to become a somebody.” Evangeline confessed her greatest sin. “All my life I prayed to be somebody.”

  “There’s no shame in that.”

  “Yes, but I see now I should have been more specific.”

  Marie Theresia chuckled warmly. “Your companion seems to want you to be who you are.”

  Evangeline lifted her head. “Not who I am. Who he thinks I am.”

  Marie Theresia knelt before her, her round cheeks glowing. “God has brought you here, and I want you to be who you really are. Your companion will, too, someday.”

  “No, he won’t. When he realizes who I really am and what he’s done . . .” Evangeline cringed as she imagined the resulting outburst. Catching the little nun’s hand, she begged, “Sister, would you help me get away?”

  Marie Theresia tugged. “Away?”

  “Yes. That man is half-crazy and half—” Aroused. “Well, he’s half-crazy. He kidnapped me!”

  “He did it for your own good.” Those Serephinian eyes shone with admiration.

  For that beast! Evangeline sat all the way up. “How do you know that?”

  “This convent houses a few Frenchwomen, a few Spanish women, but most of us are Serephinian or Baminian.” Marie Theresia clasped her hands together before her, and smiled a joyful smile. “We know who he is, and we know who you are.”

  Evangeline’s mouth worked, but she had no words to say.

  “Santa Leopolda’s prophecy is coming true. With your help, our countries will be reunited at last.”

  “But I’m not the princess!”

  Marie Theresia paid no attention. “It’s destiny.”

  “But it’s not my destiny.”

  “Everyone has a destiny. My destiny is to dedicate myself to God and renounce all worldly pleasures.” For just a moment, a divine light shone from the young postulant’s face. “Your destiny is to unite the Two Kingdoms, and you haven’t much time to get back to Plaisance before Revealing. You have only three days.”

  “Three days?” Evangeline was horrified. “It can’t be in three days!”

  “I am not wrong about this. The Two Kingdoms have waited one thousand years for this particular celebration.”

  “Three days to Plaisance. Three days to marriage?” To intimacy? “Why didn’t he tell me that?”

  “I suppose he thought you knew. Besides, what difference would it make? With the revolutionaries after you, you have no choice but to go with the crown prince.”

  The defiant orphan answered. “I make my own choices.” Especially now that she knew. Three days! Three days to escape Danior. She was in worse trouble than she had realized.

  As Marie Theresia watched the proceedings, she walked to the window and tried to peer out. It was too high. She grabbed the edge of the long table. It weighed too much. Rapidly she removed the tools, the heavy coil of rope, the bag of rags. She peeked under the napkin that draped the tray and saw a small loaf of bread, a hunk of cheese, and wine. With the care engendered by an always hollow belly, she placed the tray on the floor against the wall.

  She still couldn’t budge the wretched slab of stout oak, and Evangeline glared at Marie Theresia. “Help me.”

  “As you wish.” She went to the other end, and together they dragged the table to the window.

  Evangeline climbed on it. Now she could see—and wished she couldn’t. She looked out the back of the convent, and it was miles to the ground. Straight to the ground with hardly a bump or an outcrop in the entire, breath-stopping, stomach-tightening, sheer and terrifying drop.

  Eleven

  Evangeline sagged against the wide stone sill. She had a better chance of fashioning wings and flying like Icarus than climbing to freedom.

  From behind her, Danior asked cheerfully, “Going to jump?”

  She did jump, smacking the top of her head. She turned, and her gaze went right to him, just inside the doorway. There he stood, bulging with obnoxious strength, holding a cot with as little strain as he had carried her. The muscles in his neck corded as he balanced the wooden frame, but he was neither out of breath nor out of energy.

  Damn him. The more exhausted she got, the more animated he seemed to be. It wasn’t fair, and when she had slept about twenty-four hours straight, she would do something to turn the tables.

  Behind him, Soeur Constariza held a mattress and bedclothes folded in her arms, and she stared as if Evangeline were making a fool of herself, perched up on the table.

  And perhaps she was, but she refused to recognize it. “No jumping today,” she answered, and climbed off the table with as much gentility as she could manage.

  Danior maneuvered the pallet against the wall. “There,” he said, dusting his hands. “Miss Scoffield will be comfortable.” He smiled at Marie Theresia, exerting a charm he hadn’t bothered to exhibit for Evangeline.

  The postulant didn’t move. Instead, she watched him as if he were some alien creature from a world beyond her own. As Danior stared back, his smile disappeared and his brow knit.

  At a sharp command from Soeur Constanza, Marie Theresia woke from her contemplation and hurried to help make the bed.

  “Why was she staring at me?” he muttered.

  “Because you’re an ugly brute.”

  “No, that’s not it,” he answered without an ounce of concern. “The poor thing probably hasn’t seen a real man for so long she’s fascinated by me.”

  Evangeline sputtered with a laugh. “Do you even know the meaning of modesty?”

  “What?” He spread his big hands in bewilderment. “Did I say something wrong?”

  Unable to stop herself, Evangeline laughed again. “I guess that answered my question.”

  He gave an exasperated snort and pointed to the short stool again. “Soeur Constanza says they’ll find you some boots for our walk tonight. I’ll trace your feet for the size. Sit down.”

  “Don’t you ever ask?” Evangeline inquired resentfully.

  “That would get me nothing but a refusal.” He stepped toward her, and she sat down promptly. “No, it takes a firm hand to deal with you.”

  That statement brought both nuns’ heads around, and they studied him as he knelt before Evangeline with a long, charred stick and a board to trace on.

  His shoulders twitched, and he lowered his voice. “They’re watching me again, aren’t they?”

  “They probably don’t see a real man for weeks on end,” she mocked quietly, “and when they do I doubt if it’s as spoiled a man as you.”

  He slipped off her ta
ttered slipper and placed her foot on the board with rather more vigor than the simple task required. “I am not spoiled. I am sober, hardworking, rational, and intelligent.”

  “Large, overweening, arrogant, and too sure of yourself.”

  He thought about that as he outlined her toes. “Yes,” he decided. “All of those things. But not spoiled.”

  He ran the stick along her arch to her heel. Her breath caught. Her toes curled. Quickly, she relaxed the tiny, betraying movement.

  With considerably less force, he removed her second shoe and placed it on the board. “I do not drink to excess, nor fight unless cornered, nor debauch innocents.” A lock of black hair thawed the severity of his brow as he looked up at her, his position servile, his manner assured. “I am, in short, the husband of your dreams.”

  How he irritated her! Did he never think of anything but his goal? Did he have to turn every conversation into a crusade? “You’re anything but short,” she snapped.

  Precisely, he outlined her other foot.

  Without volition, her toes curled again. Immediately she moved to distract him. “They know you’re the prince. That’s why they watch you.”

  His hand tightened on her ankle. “They do not!”

  “They think I’m the princess.”

  “You are.” His grip eased. Sliding a glance over his shoulder, he found the nuns tucking up the last of the covers.

  Evangeline could almost see his mind working, turning the knowledge to his advantage.

  Standing, he handed the board to Soeur Constanza. “You’re Serephinian.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He glanced at the younger woman. “Both of you are. I can tell by your eyes. I know you understand how important it is that we get to Plaisance before Revealing. I treasure your assistance with the shelter, with the food, and with my dear princess’s boots. Her every need is important to me, even though she, like all shy brides, balks at the wedding night.”

  Evangeline lurched to her feet. “I do not!”

  The holy women twittered.

  His smile sat ill on his rugged features. “Of course not, my love. That’s why I have asked for a lock for your door—to contain your love for me.”