Scarlet Princess: An Enemies-to-Lovers Fantasy Romance (The Lochlann Feuds Book 1)
Scarlet Princess: Chapter 5

As soon as he shut the door behind him, I regretted my answer. Not because I cared what he thought, but because saying the words out loud made me think of my Avani.

And I couldn’t afford to think of her right now, couldn’t face the possibility that I might never see her again.

Taking a deep, calming breath, I tried to ease the tightness in my chest before heading toward the food tray.

My mother always told us life looked better on a full stomach. At the very least, it couldn’t look much worse.

I was so thirsty that I downed a cup of the steaming tea first, ignoring the way it left a trail of liquid fire all the way down my throat. Just as I was pouring another one, there was a timid knock. Sighing, I set my cup down and went to open it, assuming the lord had forgotten something, and was surprised to replace a young woman standing there instead.

She was several inches taller than me, with broad shoulders and deep brown hair. Her red, boxy dress had puffy sleeves and a white apron over it that told me she was probably a maid of some sort.

A visible shudder went through her when her blue eyes landed on my hair, and she did something with her hand that I was fairly certain was meant to ward off evil.

“I help you bathe and dress,” she said with a much thicker accent than Theodore’s.

What I wanted was a moment alone to eat and collect myself, but I had no way of undoing the laces at the back of my gown without help. I had left my ladies maid behind in Hagail, and had been wearing this dress ever since.

Besides, there was no point in further offending our hosts when our lives apparently hung in the balance.

“I would be grateful for your assistance,” I said, stepping back to allow her entrance.

She closed the door behind her, laying what appeared to be draperies on the foot of the bed, and gestured for me to turn around, still avoiding looking directly at me.

“What’s your name?” I asked, trying to coax some conversation out of her.

“Venla.” The word was clipped, effectively dissuading me from further conversation.

She made quick work of my laces, and my dress fell to my feet just in time for her to give a horrified gasp.

Surely it wasn’t modesty, when she came in here with the intent of bathing me. My brow furrowed, and I turned to see her widened eyes fixed on the dagger sheathed at my thigh.

I wasn’t sure if she was more scandalized by the fact that I was armed or by the dagger itself, a golden, bare-chested siren carved with careful attention to detail.

“It’s just an heirloom,” I explained, but her wide eyes told me it made no difference to her.

With a sigh, I unbuckled the leather straps of the sheath, setting the whole thing close enough to be within grabbing distance, and climbed into the tub. The warm water seeped into my core, finally thawing my frozen center. I shivered, and slipped further down in the tub, grateful to finally be warm again.

The relaxation part of my bath was short-lived, however, when Venla came at me with a rough cloth, scrubbing my body as if it was caked in layers and layers of mud. When she got to my hair, there was a reproachful silence, a visible hesitation.

Was it the color she found so offensive, or were curls unusual here, too?

It wasn’t in Lochlann, or at least, not in my family. I had four sisters, one older and three younger. Every one of them had the same fiery shade, though mine was by far the curliest.

For the first time since the cave-in, I allowed myself to think, really think, about my family.

My mother, the renowned Warrior Queen, and my father, the legendary war hero, who had reunited and rebuilt a kingdom all while raising five daughters.

They had already lost one child, their only son, the same week he was born.

My older sister Avani had married the love of her life only to lose him a year later, and the younger three girls were growing up in the shadow of death and grief and sadness.

What will this do to them?

No one knew where Davin and I had gone that day, not even my lady’s maid. Would they assume we were dead, that the rebels who refused to be rooted out of Hagail had gotten ahold of us?

I thought about my father’s plea not to do anything stupid, about Lord Theodore’s question.

Why take the risk?

It hadn’t seemed like a risk, not really. A tunnel that should have been stable, a smuggler we had dealt with a dozen times.

Yet, here we were.

“You get dressed now.” Venla’s blunt words pulled me from my thoughts, which was just as well.

What was done was done. All I could do now was focus on staying alive so that my family wouldn’t have to grieve me in truth, and that left no time for sinking into despair.

As soon as I was dry, I fastened my dagger back to my thigh. Venla tracked the motion, but said nothing, only helped me into the heaps of fabric she had brought.

A cream-colored underdress connected from the high neck all the way down the front with tiny gold buttons. She struggled with the buttons around my bosom, muttering something under her breath that sounded suspiciously like a Socairan curse word.

Next came an emerald overcoat, the velvety fabric so heavy I nearly stumbled under the weight of it. She pulled it in so that it covered my chest, lacing it with a ribbon.

Despite the fabric being stiff and unwieldy, the dress would have been beautiful, were it not several inches too long. Venla shook her head, pulling out a needle and thread from her apron. I stood precariously still while she attacked the dress with quick, sharp stitches in a few targeted places, bringing the hem up enough that it only barely scraped the floor.

“Thank you, Venla,” I told her sincerely.

It would have been beyond embarrassing to drag my skirts around like a child all evening.

Instead of responding, she wordlessly shot my hair a wary look, motioning for me to sit in the chair. I watched her work in the vanity mirror, noting the way she cringed as she attacked my curls.

After what felt like hours, she wrangled it into a version of the demure bun she was wearing, only mine was partially concealed by a tall headband resting in front of it, covered with cream and emerald fabric that accented the colors in the dress.

Even without my red curls, I would have stood out among these people. Where their skin was swarthy and rich, mine was fair, like my father’s. And while Theodore and Iiro’s eyes had been a deep, hazel shade of green, mine were bright spring green like my mother’s.

I glanced back and forth between our reflections in the mirror and couldn’t help but notice that while her bun was neat and functional, mine was…artfully unruly.

At least, I hoped that’s what it looked like. Though I suspected it was closer to resembling one of the fancy strawberry cakes Cook always made back home.

The soft, impractical slippers she placed on my feet served as the final confirmation of everything I had begun to suspect about Socair.

Like this dress that was impossible to move in, like these shoes that would crumple upon actual contact with the ground outside, women here were supposed to be ornamental. Quiet, demure, and unassuming.

Well, my father had always said I couldn’t behave if my life depended on it. It looked like we were about to replace out.