“Caro!” Eliza hissed, looking over her shoulder once more at the two guards who followed them. “You are in Alucia! On the palace grounds! You can’t go round calling Leo names.”
“And the second is the Alucian gentleman with the hook nose,” Caroline continued, as if Eliza hadn’t spoken. “You remember, don’t you, Hollis? I pointed him out to you at the ball.”
“Did you?” Hollis asked, her brows knit as she tried to remember. “Oh! Yes, I remember—the gentleman who never once looked at you. Is that the one you mean?”
“The very one!”
“It was his loss, darling,” Eliza said soothingly.
“It was, wasn’t it?” Caroline asked weakly. “Thank you for saying so, Princess Eliza.”
“Princess? Or is it duchess?” Hollis asked curiously.
“I don’t really know,” Eliza said with a flick of her wrist. “They’ve told me, but I can’t remember. What does it matter? One is as good as the other to me.”
“Well, that’s just the thing, Eliza—one is better than the other,” Caroline said. “How can you not remember if you are to be addressed as princess or duchess?”
“I think if we just address her as Your Highness, it covers all of them,” Hollis suggested.
Caroline rolled her eyes. “Very well, Your Highness, but you’ve been Eliza to me since I was three and you six.”
“For heaven’s sake, Caro, I don’t care what you call me,” Eliza said. “My only request is that you not speak of Leo with such disdain. It’s impolite and badly done when you’ve been a guest of his family for a full month.”
Caroline couldn’t argue with her logic. All the other thousands or millions of Alucians had been quite welcoming, and she was being rude. “You’re right, as is usually the case,” she said with a sigh. “All right, then, consider him utterly forgotten.”
That wasn’t true, and knowing herself as well as she did, Caroline supposed she would probably continue to be rude as far as he was concerned. But she’d keep it to her private thoughts. Arse of Alucia. The pouty prince. Leopold the Rude.
“It’s just as well, darling, as the king means to formally announce his engagement soon.”
“His engagement!” Caroline said, perhaps a bit too loud. “But Beck said he’s returning to England.”
“Yes, he’s returning to England to pack up his things and whatnot. He’s due to return by the end of summer when it will be formally announced. But all the arrangements have been made from what I understand.”
Caroline was stunned into silence. For a moment. “Well, good luck to the lady. She will desperately need it. She’ll be a royal princess or duchess or what have you, but she’ll be married to him. They may call her Your Highness, but she’ll have him to look at across her breakfast table.”
Two women approaching them on the walk stepped out of the path and curtsied as the three of them passed. Caroline looked back at them, still amazed that Eliza Tricklebank could elicit that sort of response from anyone.
“Truthfully? I’d be very happy to be known simply as Mrs. Chartier,” Eliza said.
Caroline couldn’t help but laugh. That was Eliza—never one to pay much mind to social conventions. “You’re impossible, darling! Why should you not embrace your new title and wear it proudly? How will we ever leave you to your own devices?”
“Well, I have Bas now,” Eliza said, and her eyes shone in that magical way they had since her prince had come to fetch her from her father’s house in London.
“It’s not the same,” Caroline insisted. “He will flatter you and never find any fault with you.”
Eliza looped her arm through Caroline’s. “I will miss you both terribly, but I will manage. There will be someone at every turn to tell me what to do.”
“Then what am I to do without you?” Caroline asked, and felt herself turn a bit misty. “Who will find fault with me? God knows I need it from time to time. Who will compliment the dresses I make, whether or not they’re the least bit good? I need that even more.”
“Beck,” Eliza said.
Caroline gave her a look of incredulity, and Eliza and Hollis burst into laughter. “Of course not Beck,” Eliza said gaily. “Hollis will, of course!”
“Hollis! She has her nose in that blasted gazette.”
“If you help me, Caro, I vow to compliment you all you like,” Hollis said. “But never mind that—I’m desperate to tell you both that I have the most amazing on-dit. This morning, I had my tea on the terrace outside our room. And who do you think I saw flirting shamelessly with the Alucian prime minister?”
“Oh dear,” Eliza said. “What is his name? Lord Cebutari?”
“Yes,” Hollis confirmed. “They were here, in this very garden, having a walkabout.” She stole a look at the guards over her shoulder. “They were so close she was very nearly in his pocket. I can’t swear for certain that her hand was not in his pocket.”
“Who?” Caroline demanded.
Hollis quickly glanced around, then whispered, “Lady Russell.”
Eliza and Caroline gasped at the same time. “No,” Eliza whispered hotly. “He’s fifty if he’s a day, and she’s so young.”
“They disappeared behind the hedges,” Hollis whispered. “And when they emerged, her hair was mussed. She is smitten, I tell you. Isn’t it ironic that her husband is rumored to be the next prime minister of England? I hear Peel will be gone soon.”
“If she is smitten with the Alucian prime minister, what will she do when we return to England?” Caroline whispered.
“What does any married lady do when she finds true love? Tell her friends, naturally,” Hollis said. “And then try like the devil to keep her husband from finding out.”
They walked along for a few feet, each of them lost in their thoughts about this new development. “My feet are killing me,” Eliza complained. “I’ve been on them far too much this week. I should like a bench to appear just now.”
“Your Grace.” One of the guards came forward. “If I may, there are benches just there, beyond the bend,” he said, pointing to the path ahead. “There is a small clearing in the hedgerow with a fountain for sitting.”
All three women stopped and stared at the guard as he moved back to stand with his companion, the both of them at attention.
“Ah...thank you,” Eliza said. She turned back to the walk and linked her arms through Hollis’s and Caroline’s and yanked them close. “Have they heard everything?” she whispered.
“I don’t know!” Caroline whispered back. “Lord, how long is this business with the guards to go on?”
“Forever?” Eliza answered uncertainly.
“There you are, Eliza!”
The familiar voice of Prince Sebastian startled them, and they drew to a halt and looked down a path that intersected the one they were walking on. Prince Sebastian was striding forward, ahead of Prince Leopold, Lady Eulalie and the queen. Behind them, more guards.
“Be kind,” Hollis muttered. “That’s her. She’ll be his fiancée.”
“What?” Caroline muttered back as they sank into curtsies before the queen.
“I’ve been looking for you, darling,” Prince Sebastian said. He took Eliza into his arms and kissed her. Caroline’s heart fluttered madly, and she inadvertently glanced at Prince Leopold. He was looking at the ground, his hands clasped at his back. He looked a little green around the gills, she thought. So green that if she poked him, she’d wager he’d fall over. It took Caroline a moment to realize that Lady Eulalie was looking directly at her with a funny little smile on her face.
“How are you, dearest?” the queen said to Eliza. As Eliza began to speak of her good health and whatnot, Caroline shifted her gaze to Lady Eulalie again. “Good afternoon,” she said with a polite nod.