I lay awake long after the lantern dimmed, staring into the dark as if it might offer answers as sleep refused to come.
Apparently, I didn’t know whether it was fear tightening my chest or something far more dangerous, perhaps anticipation as tomorrow loomed in my mind like an unavoidable reckoning. Meeting the King and Queen, standing beside Liam, and being truly seen was another feeling for me.
On the contrary, my body was exhausted, but my thoughts refused to slow.
Every time I closed my eyes, my mind conjured images of polished thrones, judging gazes, and whispered ridicule.
‘What if I embarrassed myself?’
‘What if I embarrassed him?’
‘What if this fragile tolerance Liam had begun to show shattered the moment I stood beside him in public?’
I rolled onto my side, then onto my
