On the days that followed, Rowan tapped completely into the role of a gentle wife of all nods and smiles. When the tailor—a Nyphillie—came to her, she asked for simple dresses of pale colours and most of all, as the Duke wanted, modest. Since the day he had confronted her in the garden, the Duke had been strangely agitated.
He had been the one to ask her to meet him ‘on the morrow’, something she thought to mean he would play along with her for just a little while more. Or so she thought, until he stormed off seeing her in a dress from the wardrobe he had personally filled, saying it was frivolous and sent a passing page boy she had been talking to scampering away.
She looked into the mirror, her scalp itches from the new wig she had Marie replace. Different from the previous, its curls mirrored her own, bouncy and silky, made from real Fulgels’ hair. One could easily mistake it as one grown from her own scalp if it was not silver. Her skin suffocated once again under a layer of gold, this time waterproof, thanks to the bee wax Marie had mixed into her usual concoction.
From her new wardrobe, she pulled out a simple dress of white. Its baby blue sleeves were semi-transparent with shimmers of silver that complements the moonstones and opals sewn intricately to form the patterns on its bodice. With white laces that covered every inch of her skin up to the length of her neck, she looked the part of an innocent Fulgel princess.
Just like Anastasia.
“Is anything the matter, my lady?” Marie paused halfway dabbing the cream of honey and pearl onto her cheeks. A worried look crossed the younger girl’s face at the abrupt change in her mistress’s demeanour.
When Marie had returned to her bedchamber the day Rowan confronted the Duke, she had found her mistress alone in a daze. She sat on her bed, her brows furrowed as she stared at her hands. It was only on the third call that she had responded to Marie, her eyes glazed over.
Her mistress had been strangely calm since.
“Nothing.” Rowan shook her head, plastered on her sweetest smile and faced the perplexed young Fulgel. “That would be all, Marie. Thank you. You may go now.”
The girl parted her lips, about to say something when Rowan shook her head and dismissed her. Dipping into a clumsy curtsy, Marie straightened and left. Her gaze lingered on her mistress’s back until the doors closed before her.
Rowan watched the girl leave in the mirror. A sardonic smile found its way to her lips as she stared at her own reflection. A strange feeling fluttered up her throat. She had almost forgotten how she originally looked. No matter how far she had ventured from Lockhart Castle, she was still the princess’s shadow.
No. How she felt did not matter. Not when her brother remained unavenged, his murderer roaming without a care. She shook her head and drew herself straight. If the Duke wanted her as Anastasia’s replacement, a replacement she will be—the best at that.
Magus or not, he was still a man, one who had not seen a female body for over centuries. He would come to want her just like the men before him. If there was something she was surer about than the sharpness of her claws, it was her ability to seduce. Never once had it failed her. Rowan Lockhart was anything and everything from sweet tongued to seductive lies but she was never a tempered escapee.
Determined, Rowan stopped in front of the Duke’s study, her head held high, the picture of a perfect princess as she nodded to the Nyphillie page boy she had seen a week ago. He bowed his head low, eyes darted to her face once, twice, as if puzzled by the familiarity in the face he had seen but said nothing in the end.
She had thought the servants had grown to her over the weeks. But over the past few days, they seemed to make avoiding her one of their primary tasks. One of which they did with surprising enthusiasm too.
Shrugging, she pushed open the doors to the Duke’s study.
The smell of freshly chopped wood and dust cloaked the air, mixed with the smell of sandalwood that had extinguished in the hearth of the fireplace not far away. A wisp of smoke curled from the charred wood, adding to the mist of white that clouded the room. None of which could escape with the windows shut tight and latched.
A lone man sat amidst splinters of wood. Beads of sweat clung to his forehead and sawdust dotted the part of his forearms that were bared with sleeves rolled up. Dark strands of hair fell over his face, escaping from the loose ponytail he had tried to subdue them with.
Once every few hack of wood, he would push them behind his ears, irritated, only to have them escape again. But he seemed too preoccupied with his work, unwilling to break his rhythm to bother with them.
Wooden statues, most indiscernible with features half formed stood in a circle in the heart of it all. She could make out some of them. The beak of a falcon joined to a single wing, a pair of slit eyes carved into a featureless face, lethal claws grew out of paws of hard wood—all unpolished.
Unlike the roses in the garden.
Rowan stepped around his scattered works and stopped behind him. As soon as she gathered his hair in her hands, he dropped his tools and whipped around. His icy gaze met hers, piercing her with loathe so strong, she could feel the chill down her bones—as if he felt her touch repulsive.
She straightened her back, hiding her quivering hands behind her and replied with a smile. “I just thought it would help to tie them back for you, Your Grace.”
He clenched and unclenched his teeth, ignored her and turned back to his work. Without a change in expression, Rowan marched to a nearby table, poured a glass of water from the canter and set it on the windowsill behind him.
She was used to it by now.
The Duke’s temperamental nature was no news. She had been seeing the Duke lesser these days, with him cooped up in his study even during dinners—of which she lamented. Why would she need to force herself to swallow Fulgels’ food when there was no audience she needed to act for? Besides, if he had known she was a Nyphillie, why had he asked for her to dinners in the first place?
The Duke’s peculiarity knows no bounds.
She took her seat on the reclined couch across from him, one she had asked Walter to bring in, pushed to the far end of the room.
The night after his outburst with the page boy, she had joined the Duke at dinner as the Fulgel princess once again. Her skin a flawless gold and hair silky silver, her tone the perfect demure princess of Lucidus as she courteously addressed him ‘Lord Darkwoods’.
His immediate response was to rise, sent his seat skittering across the marble floor before storming off without a word. Since then, his endearments were rendered non-existence just as she became invisible to him. The increasing amount of Fulgels’ food spread over the dining table was probably an indication of his annoyance with her.
Rowan picked up the embroidery work of red roses she had begun days ago. The wooden hoop sat quietly in a basket of pale coloured yarns, untouched since she had departed before daybreak.
At least this way, he would be forced to spend time with her—make him regret not finishing her off when he had got the chance to. Though the Duke had not spoken to her, she knew he would. Eventually. She was so close to it just yesterday.
“I went into the kitchen today,” she began, threading a red thread through needle of silver. “Thought I could make you something myself, maybe a pie or soup.”
The Duke continued hacking away bits from the log, never once had he acknowledged her with a nod or a sound of agreement. But she continued anyway.
“I would had never guessed Walter was the one who’d made all those splendid dishes if I hadn’t seen him there myself.” It was not entirely a lie, she was surprised. All her life, she had never seen another Nyphillie except for the King’s lapdog. Seeing one who willingly stands behind a stove was more than a surprise.
Silence.
Rowan tapped her fingers lightly to the Duke’s working rhythm, her mind churning as she watched him work on the feathers of a falcon.
She had tried many ways over the week. Talk about the weather, the food, the arts, and the music—anything a proper princess, everything Anastasia had always chatted about. Yet, not once had he responded to her with more than a glare.
It was high time that he did.
“The pattern of roses would suit our future daughter don’t you agree, Lord Darkwoods?” Rowan raised the embroidery work and faced the Duke.
Of course, a child was impossible between the two who had never shared a room, much less the bed. Not that the child of a Nyphillie and Magus was heard of either. She just happened to notice the slight tremor that passed his face each time she mentioned a child. The look on his face from yesterday was still fresh at the back of her mind.
The falcon toppled to the ground with a loud thud. Its neck snapped off clean from its body just as the Duke whipped around and nailed her down onto the couch. Her work of embroidery rolled from her grasp to join the severed head of the once imposing creature.
With a single hand wrapped around her wrists, he towered over her. His dark hair brushed against her bare neck, enveloping her senses with his woodsy scent. His eyes blazed a dangerous silver that burned into hers.
She could feel the energy crackling behind him, lifting particles of wood that misted the air like a pair of invisible wings unfurling. Alarms buzzed in her ears, as clearly as she could feel his breath on her lips.
“Whatever you are thinking of, stop,” he hissed, his voice feral with barely restrained emotions. Anger rolled off him in thick waves and coiled around her limbs, rendering them useless.
He hated her. The realization rang in her head as she forced herself to smile and bat her lashes innocently at the Duke. If he wanted to intimidate her, he would find himself sorely disappointed. “The embroidery, Your Grace? Or the talk of our child?”
She had expected him to hate her the moment she had accepted to be sent in Anastasia’s stead. After all, he had asked for the present Lockhart princess, not her adopted sister. Rowan was sent only because old Davor had found a loophole in the Duke’s demand and made her a makeshift princess of Lucidus.
Marrying her reaped the Duke of his chance to wed his true beloved. Of course he would be mad. His reaction now was not even an ounce of what she had expected.
But no matter how she reasoned with herself, a voice resembling her ‘sister’ echoed in her mind. The haunting voice reached from the deepest of the darkest places in her mind and choked her from within. Just a shadow. The thought sent a jab of pain that crushed her more than the Duke’s weight crushing her wrists.
“You—”
The Duke inhaled sharply. His gaze burned through her but only for a moment longer before his eyes shut tight—as if he too felt her pain. With a deep inhale, he released her and rose a little awkwardly. All she could remember moments before the doors slammed shut, was the startling silver of his eyes.
And she remembered how an unnamed fire of determination seemed to burn in them.
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