Chapter Sixteen

I am born for the happiness or misery of a great nation, and consequently must often act contrary to my passions.

—King George III (b. 1738, r. 1760–1820)

"MAISIE," I HISS AS WE creep toward the doorway that leads into Windsor's white drawing room. "Maisie. We shouldn't be doing this."

"Since when have you had a moral objection to eavesdropping?" she whispers, pulling me closer to the threshold. Though she and I are sneaking around like we're thieves in the night, our protection officers walk normally behind us, both looking vaguely bored by the whole thing as Helene's rising voice reverberates through the open door.

"…all over," she cries. "Everything I've worked for, every terrible thing you've done that I've excused or ignored or endured—"

"This is hardly the end of the world," says Alexander's measured voice, far quieter than Helene's. "Does it truly matter if everyone knows you and Nicholas are a couple? You live together, after all, and that was hardly going to stay a secret forever—"

"No, of course not. How could it, with you parading her around?" snaps Helene, and it's only when I catch a glimpse of my mother's auburn hair through the doorway that I stop caring about being spotted. With Maisie still attached to my arm, I'm the one leading us inside the room now, over the threshold until the whole miserable scene is laid out before us.

My mother's seated with her back to the large bay window, facing an easel and a canvas I can't see, paintbrush poised in her hand even though it isn't moving. Nearby, Alexander sits unperturbed on one of the white-and-gold sofas beneath a massive portrait of some long-dead queen, and Helene paces frantically in front of him. Her thin frame is rigid and her silk skirt catches between her knees, and no amount of concealer can hide the dark hollows beneath her eyes—which, every time she turns toward the window, are glaring daggers at my mother.

"Oh, lovely," says Helene when she catches sight of me near the doorway. "Precisely who I was hoping to see at this very moment in my life. Shall we tell your secret family about all our private affairs, Alexander, and call it a day?"

"You're being unreasonable," he says, which even I could tell him is exactly the wrong thing to say. Sure enough, Helene sputters and whirls on him again, her face twisted into a caricature of its usual beauty.

"I'm being unreasonable? I didn't get a say in any of this, Alexander. I was twenty years old when I agreed to marry you—twenty. I didn't know what I was getting into, and you certainly didn't tell me you were in love with someone else."

"You knew it was an arranged marriage," says Alexander in a tired voice that makes it clear this is an argument they've had countless times before. "You knew you weren't the first woman I proposed to. And we both knew we didn't love each other—"

"So that made it all right for you to sneak around behind my back?" she snarls. "That made it all right for you to ruin my life barely a year into our marriage?"

Alexander is quiet for a moment. "Why is it," he says at last, "that whenever something goes wrong for you, you insist on laying it at my feet?"

"Because everything is your fault," she explodes. "You never tried to love me. Nicholas was the only one who ever paid me any attention, and—"

"When did your affair start, Helene?" says Alexander, now deadly quiet. She stops in her tracks, her face draining of color beneath her makeup.

"That has nothing to do with—"

"We both know that's not true," says Alexander. "If you want to have this argument here and now, then we will. But I don't think you do."

Helene swallows convulsively, and for a moment I think she might actually scream. "You didn't love me, Alexander," she says, so pitifully that I feel like an intruder. Which I am, but with my mom so close to the line of fire, I can't back away now.

"Yes, I did," he says. "Just not the way you wanted me to."

"Not the way you were supposed to," she counters. "Not the way you promised to."

"I loved you the only way I could," he says. "I'm sorry it wasn't enough. I mean it—I've always been sorry. And I'm especially sorry it's come to this."

"So am I," she says, and there's such an undercurrent of bitterness beneath her words that I take half a step back, nearly running into Maisie. She shifts beside me, and we stand shoulder to shoulder in the doorway, watching our parents have the fight that's been brewing for twenty years.

"I'm sorry, too, Helene," says my mother softly. "What we did to you was inexcusable. You deserved better, and we will never be able to make it up to you."

"No," she says. "You won't. Neither of you can give me my life back, can you? And we're all stuck now. There's no wriggling out of any of this."

At last Alexander stands, his entire body heaving with a sigh. "I'll tell Doyle to draft a statement announcing our separation."

Helene's mouth drops open. "Alexander—no. You can't. The entire world will blame me—"

"I will make sure he is very clear on when, precisely, our separation took place," continues my father. "And that we are still deeply devoted to the country and to our family, despite this egregious intrusion into our private lives."

There are tears in Helene's eyes now, and she doesn't bother to wipe them away as they roll down her cheeks. "The details won't matter," she says. "Everyone will think it's my fault."

"I cannot erase those pictures, or go back in time and stop them from ever being printed," says Alexander. "But I will do everything I can to place the blame squarely at the feet of my affair, and to make it clear that the accusations of infidelity against you are baseless. I will also ask the courtiers to inform the press that I wholly and happily support your relationship with my brother." He glances at my mom. "In a few weeks' time, when we're ready, the four of us will make a joint appearance together, and we will all look happier than we ever have in our lives. Is that acceptable?"

"What?" I blurt before either my mother or Helene can say a thing. "You want to make a public appearance with my mom? No—"

"That's something for me and your father to discuss," says my mother, but I hear the apprehension in her voice, even if it doesn't show on her face.

"Mom, please—it's too dangerous," I insist. "The press will eat you alive—"

"I know," she says so quietly that I can barely hear her. "Evie, please, it's not the time—"

"Evangeline's right," says Helene suddenly, and I'm so taken aback that I fall silent. "The media will insist it's a cover-up, and they won't just go after Laura. They'll make up stories, call me horrible names, claim I'm some—some villain who went after your brother for revenge. They'll destroy me, Alexander. Everything I've worked for, everything I've ever wanted, everything I've had to put up with because of you—"

This time, she rounds on my mother, and I automatically move forward again, my pulse racing. Maisie's there beside me, though, her fingers curling around my elbow, and a hint of pain twinges below my shoulder.

"You should've left us alone," says Helene tearfully. "You should've never let him back into your life. You've ruined everything, all because you two had to have your way, consequences be damned. My family—my life is now a joke because of you, and—"

"And we will pick up the pieces as best we can," says Alexander, a few steps closer to my mother now, too. "Our marriage may have fallen apart, but we are still bound together, Helene, and I will not let you crash and burn."

"How can you possibly save me?" she says with astounding vitriol. "You can't even save yourself. Your reign is in tatters, Alexander, and history will hate you. Your people already do."

"That is entirely their prerogative," says Alexander, but I can tell this blow has landed.

Helene turns to me now, and the force of her animosity is so strong that only Maisie's grip keeps me in place. "None of this would've happened if you'd just stayed where you were," she hisses. "That was all you had to do, Evangeline. Live your life as far away from mine as possible. But you couldn't even manage that much, could you?"

"We all know I've never been very good at following directions," I say dryly, even though I feel like I'm staring down a rabid bear. "But all you had to do was learn to lock the door."

Maisie looks at me sharply, but it's Helene whose fingers twitch like she's itching to wrap them around my throat. "I was right the first time," she says thickly. "You were a mistake."

"That's enough—" snaps Alexander, but I'm already speaking over him.

"Maybe I was," I say. "But so were you."

Helene's face turns a sickly purple, and she pulls her shoulders back, drawing herself up to her full height. Slowly she turns to Alexander, her expression strangely unreadable.

"You're absolutely right, Your Majesty. It is enough. And if you can't protect me anymore, then I'll just have to protect myself."

She curtsies, a mocking gesture that oozes contempt and revulsion, and then storms straight toward me. Maisie finally lets me go, and I quickly step aside, knowing damn well that Helene will win this game of chicken if I play.

Sure enough, she breezes past me at speed, so close that I can smell her perfume, and only when she reaches the door does she pause. "Coming, Maisie?"

My sister, who hasn't said a word during this entire exchange, is staring at Helene like she's never seen her before. When she finally looks at me instead, I can see the apology in her eyes, but I don't try to stop her. Obviously she's always going to choose her mother.

And so, like Constance's dog trotting after its master, Maisie follows Helene out of the white drawing room and into the long corridor beyond, leaving Alexander, my mother, and me on ourown. Or at least as on our own as we'll ever be in a place with footmen, courtiers, and protection officers lurking in every corner.

"That wasn't your fight, Evan," says my mom, finally setting her paintbrush down. "You shouldn't have gotten involved."

I shrug. "Helene's always going to make it my fight, too. I might as well get a few hits in while I can. Are you okay?"

I'm speaking to my mom, but I also watch Alexander. He's already sunk back onto the sofa, his hands clasped and his lips pressed together so hard that the skin around them is colorless. My mother nods, but he doesn't respond right away, instead taking a deep, shuddering breath that seems to burrow into his soul and expel something with it.

"More than all right," he says with a hint of forced cheer. "Now none of us has anything to hide, and that's all we've wanted, isn't it?"

I manage a nod, but I'm not convinced. And as I glance at the empty doorway once more, dread nags at me, bringing with it a sense that somehow, this is about to get a whole lot worse before anyone finds their peace.