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My wolf bristles in anger. “I want that maid fired.”
Harriet nods. “She also had a hard time keeping food down. If you intend to keep her alive, I want you to give her this.”
She holds out a small vial filled with a blue liquid.
“What is it?”
“An antidote. I—” She hesitates. “When I was working under your mother in the espionage team, I came across a poison in the East. It rots away the insides of a wolf shifter over a period of time, forcing the consumer to be unable to digest food. The girl’s symptoms are the same. I believe she was poisoned repeatedly.”
“I see.” My hand wraps around the bottle. “And you are sure this is the antidote?”
“I’ve seen it used. It is now produced in-house and has been tested.”
She stands to leave, but I stop her. “I plan to keep her, Harriet. She will be the queen.”
Harriet blinks slowly. “I see.”
“If what you say is true, then I cannot leave her in the hands of the other maids. I want you to be her maid. You’ll still maintain your duties as the head maid, but you are the only one I want by her side. I also want you to keep an eye on her. I don’t trust her.”
“I understand. And the mating ceremony?”
“It will be done quickly. Tomorrow. I have things to do, and I’m not going to waste time on some grand event.”
“Very well. I’ll have the chef make food that will be easy on her stomach. I’ll also have a healer come in and take a look at her after the ceremony.”
“He just needs to make sure she can bear heirs.”
Harriet glances at me. “And the queen’s involvement with the kingdom?”
I gesture with my hand. “Keep an eye on her. If she does anything suspicious, report to me. I’m just interested in her ability to produce the next king, nothing more. Let her amuse herself as she sees fit.”
Harriet exits the room, but I linger, looking around. This was my mother’s sitting area. It has been years since she and my father were assassinated by the rebels in the Eastern Kingdom. Despite the fact that Harriet cleans in here weekly, I can still smell that familiar scent of roses. My mother loved roses. Her sitting room was always adorned with them.
I get to my feet. There’s no point in lingering in the past. There’s nothing useful there anymore.
Tonight, I’ll sleep. And tomorrow, I’ll deal with the woman lying in my bed.
Because whoever that woman is, she is not Princess Vivian.
Chapter 3
Leanna Avery
My body aches as awareness flickers through me.
I’m pressed against something hard, and I feel warm and comfortable. I don’t want to wake up. I snuggle deeper, not willing to relinquish this source of heat. My wolf is comfortably curled inside the recesses of my mind, content for a change.
It’s the quiet growl that makes my eyes fly open. I am instantly looking into a pair of mildly annoyed, amber eyes set in a face that has been chiseled by the gods themselves. A startled “eek” slips from my mouth as I scramble backward, get tangled in the sheets, and fall off the side of the bed onto the hard floor.
Groaning, I try to sit up but fail, my lower back hurting.
The bed creaks, and the owner of the face, the king of the Northern Kingdom, walks around the foot of the bed toward me.
“I’m sorry!” Petrified, I try to move away from him, but he just ignores me, lifting me—sheets and all—and dumping me back on the bed.
“You sleep like the dead.” His voice is cool and unaffected, those sharp, amber eyes studying me.
“I–I’m sorry.”
A flash of irritation crosses his face. “Stop apologizing.”
I clamp my mouth shut, not knowing what else to do.
He’s wearing nothing but a pair of dark pajama pants, his upper body bare. The hardness I felt was his bulging muscles. His hair is jet black, with messy curls that make him look dangerously handsome. I tamp down the flare of attraction within me, horrified that I can think of something like that at a time like this.
King Cedric stares at me for a long moment before dragging over one of the chairs and settling down in it, facing me.
“Do you know why I’ve brought you here?”
“To execute me?” I venture slowly.
He gives me a look as if he considers me incredibly stupid. “You think I bathe and feed all prisoners who are to be executed?”
My body tenses. This is it. This is where he’s going to tell me he plans on torturing me. Just like—
“You are a political prisoner of sorts. I don’t wish to rule the Eastern Kingdom. You, Princess Vivian, have offered to marry me to keep the peace between the two kingdoms.”
My eyes widen in shock. “What?”
“The mating ceremony is in a couple of hours. Harriet will—”
“I can’t do it!” I burst out, terrified. It would be so easy to keep my mouth shut and go along with this, but if he finds out the truth down the line, it will be so much worse for me. I can’t live in fear of him discovering my true identity.
The king has fallen silent, so I continue, lowering my head. “I’m not—I’m not the real Princess Vivian. I just look like her.”
“I’m aware.”
His words throw me for a loop. Shocked, I lift my eyes to meet his. “You are?”
“You don’t have the mark of the royal family of the East.”
I gape at him. “If—If you know, then why—”
“My reasons are not your concern. The real Princess Vivian was found dead, her corpse mangled almost beyond recognition.”
My eyes widen in horror. I was sure she would make it out. She knew all the secret passageways. She was being guided by her most trusted maids.
“I want to know how long you’ve been a stand-in for the princess.”
I twist my fingers, trying to absorb this bombshell news. “Ever since I was five. She found me on the street. I was an orphan, and she brought me to the palace. I have studied under the royal tutors in place of her, taken etiquette classes alongside her—”
“She trained you as a duplicate,” Cedric recognizes.
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