Page 61 of A Crown of Hopes and Sorrows

Sunshine spilled in through windows, bouncing off walls and making his emerald irises sparkle despite the sadness draping over him. “What was your plan, then?”

“I’d talk to my father about us.”

“And if he didn’t approve?”

“Then I’d leave. You and I… we can go somewhere else, start a different life together. You once told me you’d love to have a chance to go where no one knows you. Maybe that’s my dream as well.”

His brow furrowed. “You’d give up your family? Your father and your brothers? Your friends? Everything?”

I hesitated at that. I loved my family. And they loved me too, deeply. I wasn’t sure I would give them up. But I didn’t believe they’d disown me. I couldn’t imagine my father casting me aside forever. “I’d give up being a princess without hesitating.”

His frown deepened, and he leaned away from me. “So, you’d plan to join me as part of the working class? Have you truly considered what a life always fighting against falling into poverty entails? Will you learn to mend clothes and do without? How would you look at me when your hands cracked and bled from cold and work? When you lost your friends from my reputation? When you suffered,” he said so fiercely I trembled, “and I couldn’t do anything to ease it?”

“I wouldn’t care if that happened because we’d deal with it together.”

He dropped his face to mine. His nose brushed my cheek, and his lip quivered against my flesh. “You would care,” he whispered so quietly it scarcely rose over the chewing, shuffling sound of the horses. “You just don’t know it yet. I’ve seen my mother suffer like that because of me. I won’t see that for you.” He moved back again, the warmth of him receding, and bowed his head. “So, yes, I regret last night. Because you deserve far better, and I acted on my emotions, compromising your reputation and status out of selfishness.”

“So, you plan to just stand by and watch me… what? Marry Lord Galeson?”

A muscle in his jaw jumped, but he nodded briskly. “Yes, Epiphany. That’s exactly what I plan to do.”

I stared at him, my mouth gaping. “So, last night meant nothing to you, then?”

“That’s not how I intended that.”

“No. You’ve made everything very clear to me. You feel guilty for sullying the wife of Lord Galeson. That’s all I am—even to you—isn’t it?” He parted his lips to speak, but I cut him off, anger sluicing its way through me. “A princess, a trading piece, a political move for the kingdom.”

“That’s not what I said.”

“You’ve said enough.” Fury thrusted through me, like a phoenix catching on fire and taking flight. Over everything. Over my childhood of meeting no one’s expectations. For the way my father and brothers hovered over me like I was some sort of gem to protect rather than a person. Because of the way Temi had pushed me out of her life that morning. And now Valerian. After the previous night, it was the ultimate betrayal.

He’d just taken a memory that had been perfect in my mind and ruined it, shadowed it with his guilt and regrets.

Gods, that’s what I was to him.

One giant regret he wished to get away from.

I was never just Epiphany to anyone.

I was always something else.

A princess.

A mortal.

A sister.

And I was fucking tired of it. “Saddle my horse.”

Valerian’s eyelashes fluttered. “Can we talk about this? I don’t feel like I’ve come across the right way and—”

“No.” My voice firmed, ice and steel sliding into my bones. “I’m the princess as you’ve insisted on continuing to remind me. And I just gave you an order.”

“Pip.”

“Do not. You have no right. Do as I say. Saddle my horse.”

Valerian’s eyes widened, some mixture of terror and worry swirling over them. “Let me alert your guards, so they can get their horses ready.”