𝚂𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚌𝚑𝚎𝚍 ✔

Chapter Twenty-One

I decided to leave Thomas after the conversation had grown empty. Though that was due to me wishing to be anywhere else than with him. So, after trading our goodbyes, I swiftly left the garden before he could ask to escort me and made my way back to my room. I wanted to tell Cordelia what had happened and seek her counsel to help settle my raging emotions.

I started to wonder if I had overreacted a bit, because I had thought the same thing that he had said. Yet despite that, with him saying it like he had, and accompanied by his abrupt shift in attitude, it made it seem like everything between the two of us up until then had been nothing more than a game to him. However, I was the one who started this game with him when I began to entertain his flirtations and advances in hopes of securing his affections. So perhaps I did not have the right to get upset at him trying to win it.

Fear started to well up in me when I began to question if devouring me whole was the only thing he thought about when it came to me. That if once he completed such goal, would he, like he had the rest, discard me? Had he not seen me romantically like I had once thought? Had everything that I had thought we had started to build together been only one sided?

Had my feelings been the only ones to grow?

I knew that marrying for love was not an option for me, though I had wished that one day we could have found it together, even if it took years to foster. But that was but a childish wish. In truth, I just needed to keep him interested, and the queen impressed, if I was to win the courting and my freedom. So, if love came after all was said and done, then I would have happily accepted it.

It was time, however, to let go of that childish fantasy of love, for all it was going to do was get in my way of completing what I had come to do.

I had been firm in my stance, unwilling to allow anything else to sabotage my chances at winning, but still, my heart ached despite my attempts to harden it.

As I made my way down the hall to my room, desperate to think of anything other than Thomas, something colorful to my right caught my eye. Curiously I turned, noticing that the doors to the drawing room had been left open and inside sat Rheda, quietly and alone, near the far side of the large ornate space.

I looked at Rheda, thinking about how I hadn't spoken to her since our first meeting with the queen. And with me having been preoccupied with Thomas since then, I had completely forgotten about the altercation that had taken place between us and Castellana.

I hesitated, wondering if I should have left her be and instead found her later so that I did not disturb her peaceful solitude.

I bit my lip, silently mulling over whether I should or shouldn't until I finally convinced myself to go ahead and talk with her. Slowly, I made my way over to Rheda and took the seat to her right. "How have you been since last we met?" I asked, causing her to jump since she hadn't noticed me arrive.

"Oh, Emma." She smiled, despite the hand she held to her chest in an attempt to calm herself down after my scare, "I have been quite fine, how are you?"

"A little disappointed in my meeting with Prince Thomas, but that is hardly important. I have, as of late, been rather worried about you." I watched her, waiting for her to reply.

"Me? Why is that?" She cocked her head to the side. "Has something happened that I have yet to be informed of?"

I swallowed hard, realizing how vague I had been. And so, I started to get nervous because although I had been worried about her, I made her worried about nothing at all for absolutely no reason.

"The things that Castellana had said about you the other day," I tried to salvage the conversation the best I could by being concise, "has been weighing on my mind and I wanted to make sure you were alright." I sighed.