Page 31 of Immortal Rose

I glared past the brass-finial-capped fence that stood between the coach and the looming palace. Shaped like a horseshoe around the grand courtyard, each wing was supported by ancient columns, said to have been taken from the temple of the ancient fairy sun god Solarius.

Rather than approach the central gate and the emerald-green-uniformed soldiers posted there, the coach continued along the road, turning when it came upon the one running along the northern face of the palace.

Only two of the King’s men were at the discreet entrance, and both rushed out from the cover of their sentry boxes to drag it open. The long white plumes of their hats drooped, slapping against their faces with the force of the rain.

The gate clanged shut behind us, speeding my pulse.

Foxcourt pulled a fob from his jacket and checked the time as the coach eased through an archway into a short arcade overlooking a series of pale fountains and a garden. Ivy climbed the walls, giving the passage a feeling of being half forgotten.

Eventually, after another turn, we found our way into a smaller courtyard, this one shielded from the outside world’s view. The coach slowed to a stop near a nondescript door.

“Here we are,” Foxcourt said.

He stepped out first and, apparently enjoying how much it aggravated me, insisted on handing me down.

I hurried to the cover of the walkway surrounding the courtyard, breathing in the competing scents of heavy rain, wet animal, and the ivy’s earthy green.

“Return to the house at your leisure,” Foxcourt advised the coachman, his topper doing little to shield his face from the slanting rain. “We’ll take one of the palace curricles back.”

Cartwell doffed his own hat and was off.

We entered through a deserted servants’ corridor, a fact that I didn’t think to find strange until I saw how easily the earl was navigating the maze of nondescript hallways. As if he had come this way, rather than the grand entry, hundreds of times.

I stubbornly quickened my pace, but I couldn’t match Foxcourt’s long, powerful strides as we made our way up a flight of stairs, then another. My understanding of the situation was upended again, this time by the realization we were staying in this wing of the palace rather than going to one of its receiving rooms.

“Where,” I panted when we’d turned down the fourth successive hallway, “are we going?”

At my breathless question, Foxcourt finally slowed his determined march. I almost laughed when he abruptly turned to the door at his left. Of course it hadn’t been for my benefit. We’d finally arrived at our destination.

Foxcourt glanced up and down the hall one last time before he raised a fist to rap lightly against the door.

Unexpectedly, a soft, feminine voice called out, “Come in.”

With one last attempt to smooth a few rogue curls that had already escaped the confines of the bonnet, I followed Foxcourt inside.

A bedroom, one hardly bigger than my rented room, unfurled around me, and I recoiled at the heat that infused the air and the wretched odor it carried.

Sickness—desperate, lingering. The smoke from the lit hearth was a relief from the musk of unwashed hair and skin, but it only antagonized the pervasive stink of floral decay, as if a fine bouquet had been left weeks too long in old water. And there, looming like a half-forgotten nightmare, a note of yarrow and angelica.

My stomach turned over itself. I might have stayed in that doorway, caught in that breathless moment of the past colliding with the present, had Foxcourt not placed a firm hand on my back and ushered me forward.

The room was crowded further by an overly large four-poster bed. Heavy tapestry curtains hung from the oak frame, concealing all but a fleeting glimpse of the frail body beneath the mountain of bedsheets. A young woman sat stiff-backed in a chair at the foot of the bed.

At the sound of the door opening, she rose and turned, smoothing her gloved hands against the wrinkles in her ivory dress. The gold woven through it caught the firelight and gave her light brown skin an almost unearthly glow.

Her essence murmured across my awareness: perfumed silk, wax seals, bergamot tea, an intriguing hint of leather, the glitter of cold diamonds, and the penetrating woodiness, like ancient trees, of a steely will.

I stared at her, my disbelief growing with each soft tick of the mantel clock, cataloging her features the way so many papers and scandal sheets had. I hadn’t realized how very young sixteen was until that moment, seeing the softness of her face and her unjaded gaze—all radiant hope and untarnished potential.

She had the promise of a proud, handsome beauty bestowed upon her by her mother, a minor princess from Vitalia, her face defined by her dark brows, her high cheekbones, and the strong point of her chin. Dark springs of hair had been artfully piled high on her head and tamed by ivory silk ribbons. Around her neck, a gold key gleamed from its simple chain.

I knew who she was even before Foxcourt said, “Your Royal Highness,” and bowed.

After a moment, Foxcourt took my arm in a loose grip and tugged down on it, a silent, unwelcome reminder of protocol. I dropped into a feeble attempt at a curtsy.

“I was beginning to worry,” Princess Eleanor said. Her voice had a natural husky quality to it, only enhancing her beautiful elocution.

She swept one of the heavy bed curtains aside, revealing a gaunt man half hidden beneath a pile of heavy bedding. Bringing a delicate hand to his shoulder, she gave it a firm shake. “Uncle? They’ve arrived.”