Chapter 74: Words Through a Wall
Chapter 73: Words Through a Wall
Lyria’s POV
The Duke left after that, his footsteps fading into the distance as he walked away.
And then there was just the courtyard’s distant murmur, the smell of mold, and Lucian, standing outside the gatehouse window, not leaving.
I waited.
He did not leave.
A soft knock came against the stone wall of the gatehouse.
It was gentle. Almost hesitant. Nothing like the Duke’s cheerful rapping of earlier.
"Are you all right in there?"
I blinked in shock.
Of all the things I had expected Lucian to say once the Duke had removed himself from the situation, that question had not featured in any of my considerations.
"I—I beg your pardon?" I said.
"I am—" He stopped, then started again. "I am asking genuinely. Are you all right? In there. Are you—is the space tolerable? Are you hungry?"
I blinked at the wall as though it might provide an answer to that.
"You have been in there for several hours," he said, and there was something in his voice that I could not immediately categorise. Something that sat between discomfort and genuine concern and was clearly not used to being in either position. "And... are you well? In... in general?"
"Why," I said carefully, "is that any concern of yours?"
There was silence after that, but then he spoke up.
"Because," Lucian said, "I know that I have offended you."
I said nothing.
"When we were children," he continued, "and the last time we met, I know that I offended you. Both times... numerous times. I am sorry about that."
"I came to this palace for you," he added. "Not for the Princess. And I am genuinely sorry for the pain I caused you. For the hurt. For all of it."
I stood with my back against the cold stone wall and stared at the narrow window and said nothing, because I did not know what to say, and I had learned, over years of navigating situations where the wrong word cost more than silence, that silence was usually the safer territory.
Lucian continued.
"I would prefer to say this to your face," he said. "And I will, when we have the chance. But I wanted you to know regardless."
He paused.
"I am sorry for not treating you with respect. For not treating you with dignity."
Another pause.
"For laughing at your speech."
Something tightened in my chest at that.
"For insisting that you call me by my given name," he continued, "when I had not yet sought your forgiveness for any of what came before. That was wrong of me. I should not have done it."
He was quiet for a moment.
"You already suffer a great deal," he said, and his voice had dropped slightly—quieter, as though these words were not for the courtyard at all but for the stone wall between us specifically. "At the hands of your own family. I should not have added to that. I should not have treated you as though you did not deserve dignity. As though you did not deserve to be treated as—as a person."
He stopped.
I was not breathing particularly regularly.
"I am sorry," he said again. "For everything."
Lucian.
Of all people.
Lucian, who had taken my masks as a child and laughed with his companions while I stood exposed and burning with humiliation. Who had blocked my path in corridors and made me walk around him. Who had laughed at my stammer with the effortless cruelty of someone who had never once considered that the thing he was laughing at was not a performance but a person.
That same Lucian was standing outside a forgotten gatehouse in the South Courtyard, asking if I was hungry and telling me he was sorry.
I did not know if it was sincere.
I could not read his posture. I had spent years learning to assess sincerity from the small physical tells that people could not fully control—the minute tension around the eyes, the set of the jaw, the quality of stillness in someone’s hands. All of that was unavailable to me right now.
What I had was his voice.
And his voice was not performing.
That was the honest assessment I arrived at after turning the words over several times. It did not have the quality of a speech carefully constructed for effect. It had the quality of something that had been carried for a while and had finally been put down, and the putting down of it was not comfortable for the person doing it.
Which did not mean I trusted it.
Trust was not something I distributed casually. I had been shown, repeatedly and with considerable emphasis, what happened when I extended it to people who had not earned it.
But I could acknowledge that the words did not feel false without committing to anything further.
Lucian sighed.
It was a quiet sound. Genuine in its exhaustion.
"I know," he said, "that forgiveness is not something you owe me. I know it will not come quickly. If it comes at all." He paused before he continued. "But you said nothing, and I would rather you said something. Anything. Do not leave me standing here in silence."
I considered the wall between us.
Then I spoke. "Duke Aurelgrave. I have always been all right," I said. "And I will continue to be all right."
I paused.
"But as you said yourself—it will take quite a while before I am able to accept your apology."
He did not respond immediately.
"Furthermore," I continued, "you have spent some time arguing that you did not wish to land me in trouble. Standing outside this building for an extended period is rather counterproductive to that goal."
"The Duke of Blackmere had the good sense to leave," I said. "I would suggest you do the same."
The silence stretched for several seconds.
Then I heard him swallow softly.
"I understand. Take care, Lyria," he told me. "Hopefully, we’ll meet again."
After that, I heard footsteps leaving the gatehouse.
---
It took close to an hour.
The courtyard emptied in the gradual, unhurried way of places that had held a great number of people for a long time and were slowly returning to themselves. Voices faded. Footsteps receded. The scrying mirrors at the edges of the space caught the late afternoon light and held it, still and silent.
I watched from the window until I was as certain as I could reasonably be that the space outside was clear.
Then I moved to the door, opened it carefully, and made sure to check that the coast was clear before moving.
I slipped out, closing the door softly behind me, and made my way along the edge of the wall with the quiet precision of someone who had spent far too much time avoiding being seen.
I did not know—
Could not know—
That I had been seen.
One of the candidates had remained behind, having returned briefly for something forgotten.
And he had seen me. But I had no idea. I made my way through the servants’ passage and slipped back into the palace.
---
I thought about Lucian’s words for the rest of the day, which passed by in a blur.
While I carried out Jacinta’s orders and while she spoke about how dreamy Baron Redwick was, I thought about Lucian’s words.
While I aired her gowns and swept her antechamber and endured Kyia’s commentary on the inadequacy of my work, his words were there.
I was not accustomed to people noticing the suffering and naming it plainly and treating the naming of it as something that required a response from them.
It unsettled me in a way I could not entirely account for and did not have the time or the privacy to examine properly.
By the time night fell and the palace had settled into its particular after-dark quiet, I had managed to push the words to the periphery of my thoughts through sheer force of sustained effort.
Then I snapped myself out of it entirely.
I had things to do.
I removed my mask and set it on the writing table. Changed out of the clothes I had been wearing since before the competition—the servant’s dress that smelled faintly of mold and cold stone after hours in the gatehouse. I washed my face and hands with the water in the basin.
Then I opened the small chest beside my bed.
The mask I had worn on the night Duke Thorncrest had seen me on the street was there, exactly where I had left it. Simpler than my usual one.
I put it on, securing the ribbon at the back of my head with practiced hands.
Then I pulled my cloak over my shoulders, drew the hood up, and checked the fastenings twice.
I had work to do. I had not visited the bar for a while now, and that was how I gathered money. Helen would be mad at me, but she would also understand. Besides, she was kinder than my own family—the ones that should have been family.
