“Well… I learned much about Balladaire.”
Luca’s lips quirked. “I admit, that is the one fault of a Balladairan education. We can only teach so much about Qazāl. I could use a few lessons myself.”
Malika raised an eyebrow and looked over at Touraine again, then back to Luca. “I only hope it fares better than past initiatives to educate Shālan children.”
Luca’s hand went tight on the stem of her glass.
Then quickly, smiling as if she hadn’t just insulted the Tailleurists, the Droitists, and the Sands all at once, Malika turned the subject. “One hears you can read Shālan? Our host gift is a book of poetry by one of our dearest poets. My mother also sends a scarf she hopes will suit your tastes.”
Her eyes trailed once more to Touraine before she bowed and returned to the crowd.
CHAPTER 13
A DANCE
Touraine had felt strong at Luca’s back until Beau-Sang approached them. She’d felt elegant in her new clothing, felt pride even, at the approving nod General Cantic had given her as she passed by.
During the two days between the modiste and the ball, Touraine had scrambled to find her place in this new world. Exercising gently in the morning with Lanquette and Guérin was the easiest bit to adjust to, because it was the moment that felt most like home. The two guards weren’t Tibeau or Pruett or Aimée, but they respected her skill even if they never laughed or wrestled just for fun. （Touraine secretly thought that Guérin had never had fun in her life.）
When Touraine hadn’t been training or stacking papers, Luca had drilled her in courtly etiquette.
Touraine had thought she knew how to deal with dignitaries and nobles. Say “yes, sir” or “madame” or “Your Highness.” Bow enough, salute as necessary, and let them overlook you.
“That’s all wonderful for a soldier, I’m sure,” Luca had told her in the beginning, “but you’re not a soldier anymore. You represent me personally, not the empire. People will ask you things to get to me. Stop making that face.”
Dread had tugged Touraine’s face down. She fixed it back into the polite, formal, but pleasant expression Luca had been coaching her in.
“You can hate this as much as you’d like, but I shouldn’t know it.” Luca pushed Touraine’s hand away from her belt—where the baton used to rest. Luca’s hand was cool and dry. “And sky above, stop trying to reach for a weapon.”
The rest of the house hadn’t been spared preparations for the ball. The town house felt like an army camp getting ready to march. Furniture was packed away like tents. Luca barked orders like Cantic, swinging a pen instead of a sword, spattering ink instead of blood. Clerks scribbled majestic invitations to colonial nobility on paper that cost more than a month of a Sand’s allowance, and messengers ran them from house to house throughout the city like couriers between companies.
Touraine felt the same deep-belly dread as she did before marching, too.
Guard Captain Gillett took the two other guards aside several times to talk about the house’s defenses. He only grudgingly brought Touraine into the discussions when he realized Luca was going to keep her close.
Three days before the ball, Touraine hadn’t thought she’d be alive in three days. Now she stood at the princess’s side, with the high-society types she used to make fun of with her friends.
And then, in a single sky-falling second, the bastard comte had stripped all of that comfort and her growing confidence away, and Touraine had become just a Sand again.
Just a Sand. She had never been ashamed of that before.
And she had stumbled. She’d done worse than show her hand. She couldn’t help it. She wouldn’t forget his comments at Cheminade’s dinner anytime soon. Seeing him only made the anger from that first night bubble back up all over again. At least Touraine had kept her mouth shut. Add to it the princess—Luca was even more furious with Touraine than she had been this morning. She could see it in the sharp set of the princess’s shoulders and the way she refused to look Touraine’s way.
And if Luca hated her, she was royally fucked.
Touraine recognized the young modiste when she approached the dais, but this time, she kept her head forward. In her peripheral vision, though, she saw the woman watching her.
When the modiste insulted the Sands’ education, she was ready. She ignored it.
Still, the all-too-familiar bitterness in it caught her attention, and when the woman retreated, Touraine stepped up beside Luca. “May I be excused a moment, Your Highness?”