"You should be more careful." Leo kissed up the length of her spine, making her shudder.

"So should you. All the men and women were staring at you." Rave twisted in his arms and pulled his face to hers. "Maybe you'll find someone better to sleep with.

"Never." Leo kissed the edge of her lips.

Rave pushed him off. "Prove it." She wrapped her legs around his waist. "I need more than words."

Leo shot her an insolent grin before pinning her down. Rave giggled and squirmed as he bit her ear.

But before he could continue, a loud gasp cut through the room. Rave shoved Leo back, pulling a blanket to cover herself. Her arousal was gone.

"What happened?" He whined.

"Someone is watching us." Rave scanned the room. "I heard a gasp."

"It was nothing."

Rave turned to him, he was pitifully hard. And red. "I'm not in the mood anymore. You know how to take care of yourself."

Leo groaned, but he got up. When Rave was no longer in the mood, nothing could help her. It seemed as though the walls were full of vermin. Rave laid back down and sighed. Thinlin was a different playing field. Both of the countries she had been an emissary to were exclusively dealing with just Bellayong. But Thinlin had close ties to Duaetive, who had a long history of injustices against Bellayong. It all went back to the patron gods of each of the countries of the continent.

Leo returned quickly and climbed into bed with her. "Do you really think someone is watching us?" He whispered to her in Bellan.

"Yes, I wouldn't put it past those Duaetiveans," Rave replied, nesting herself in his arms.

"Don't worry, I'll protect you. Even if you left me to pleasure myself while knowing I prefer your hands." He grinned at her.

"Behave yourself, or I'll do much worse." She playfully pinched his cheek.

Rave smiled politely as each of the nobles introduced themselves. She was faintly aware of Lina sulking in the corner. Clearly, she usually entertained the crowds. How could she not, when everyone here was either old or had never seen an entertaining woman before?

Prim and Ib, her ladies-in-waiting were making conversations with the other ladies. They were actually gathering information on who was with who, who was looking for the queen's favor. Marriageable ladies for cousins of the royal family.

She was here to plan a more with the more 'suitable' sister, as Taiskin had described it. He wanted a pretty little Thinlinyte wife. One look at the ladies and she knew they wouldn't do. She had to consider Rina too, but Rave felt she was too soft for Bellayong and far too easily swayed by gossip.

"Do you dance, Princess Rave?" Lina asked.

"Why of course I do, lady Lina," Rave replied.

"Not in the animalistic ways of Bellayong, but in the proper ways," Lina smirked.

Rave smiled coldly. "We in Bellayong do have cultured dances, but I was taught yours- well, Thinlin's." she corrected herself. "Ballroom dances, I believe."

Lina's face turned red. "Reed, please play a tone for us."

Rave had danced to ballroom music countless times, it was a part of her education as a princess. She took the hands of the closest nobleman and led him into a more complicated style of it. She studied Thinlin before coming here. The dance also came easily to her, for she had done this hundred times by the sea with her fiancé.