Liv resisted the urge to nobly remind her sister that if she didn’t like her life, she should go back to college or at least learn to live on her trust allowance.
Brit said, “Dad has invited me to stay for a while, and I’ve said I will.”
“Dad? You’re calling him Dad now?” This was the man who, until very recently, had given new meaning to the words absentee parent. Their mother, Ingrid, had left Osrik—and Gullandria—when Liv, Elli and Brit were ten months old. Osrik had kept their two sons, Valbrand and Kylan, then five and three, to raise as kings. Now both sons were dead. And suddenly, Osrik had decided it was time to play Dad to his long-lost girls. It had started with Elli. And now, obviously, he was after Brit. “I don’t like it,” Liv said flatly.
“I’m sorry. I’m staying. I want to see more of Gullandria—maybe nose around a little, too—see if I can find out any more details about what really happened to the brothers we’re never going to get a chance to know.”
There was a moment. The two sisters looked at each other, both of them wondering what their brothers had been like, both of them wishing for what was never going to be: their broken family whole again, their dead brothers alive…
Finally Liv spoke. “I thought Elli had settled that.” Elli had questioned their father. She’d received Osrik’s assurance that there was nothing suspicious in the way either of their brothers had died. Elli had believed him. So did Liv. She wasn’t crazy about the man who’d suddenly decided to try being a father to his daughters. But her brothers had been everything to him. They were the children he had kept—his chance that his own blood would claim the throne of Gullandria when he could no longer rule. If someone had murdered them, Osrik would have tracked the killers down and seen to it they paid for their crimes in a big way.
Brit said, “I want to look into the situation a little for myself.”
“You still think there’s something…not right?”
“I don’t know. I just want to check around some more.”
Liv wasn’t so sure she liked the idea of Brit snooping around a strange country on her own. “What do you mean, ‘check around’?”
“Just what I said. Ask some questions.”
“Of whom?”
“Well, I’m not sure yet—but did you know that Kaarin Karlsmon and Valbrand were an item?”
Liv didn’t. “Before he disappeared at sea?”
“You got it.”
“Who told you that?”
“I asked around. It’s common knowledge.”
The lady Kaarin was jarl—of noble birth—a slim, graceful redhead perhaps a year or two older than the princesses. Kaarin was always meticulously turned out in gorgeous designer clothes and she made herself available to Liv and Brit whenever they asked for her. Cheerfully, Kaarin would accompany them anywhere they wanted to go; she’d provide lively chatter and well-bred companionship.
The strap on Brit’s top had slid down her shoulder. She pushed it back in place. “You have to admit, it’s odd she never even mentioned that she and Valbrand had a thing going on.”
“Oh, Brit. Come on. I can think of several reasons why she wouldn’t want to talk about it. Especially if she really cared for him. It’s probably painful for her, to go into it—and I don’t see how her relationship with him could have had anything to do with his death.”
“I’m only saying, there’s a lot we don’t know—a lot I want to find out.”
“I don’t like it.”
“Well, I can’t help that.”
Liv got the message. Brit had made her decision and no matter what Liv said, Brit would not change her mind.
“Fine.” Liv pointed at the phone on the nightstand. “Call Mom yourself. Now.”
Brit groaned. “Livvy, it’s barely seven in the morning there.”
“So you’ll be sure to catch her. I can’t stop you from sticking your nose in where I doubt it belongs. But I’m not getting stuck telling Mom what you’re up to because you just never manage to get around to calling her.”
“I will tell her.”
Liv only waited.
Finally Brit muttered a couple of bad words and reached for the phone.
Ingrid didn’t take the news well. She insisted on speaking to Liv. Brit was only too eager to pass Liv the phone.
Liv was treated to her mother’s frantic voice uttering an endless series of pleas and demands that she make her crazy baby sister come home. Powerless to do any such thing, Liv babbled a bunch of meaningless placating noises and waited for Ingrid to wind down.
Liv hung up the phone. “I’ve got a splitting headache and I’m going back to sleep.”
Brit took the tray, her laptop and her M&M’s and tiptoed out.
Liv scooted down and pulled the covers over her head. Lord, what a weekend. Elli had married a huge, tattooed Viking berserker, she herself had spent the night in a field having wild sex with a virtual stranger, and Brit had pushed their mother to the verge of a nervous breakdown. What more delights might be in store?
Liv didn’t want to know. She spent the remainder of the day and the evening in her rooms, avoiding any possibility of running into Finn, nursing the queasy end of her hangover, feeling totally fed up with herself and her sisters and the world in general, longing only for the next day when she’d be on the way home.
Liv woke in the middle of the night. Her eyes popped open—wide. She was going to be sick again.
With a miserable cry, she threw back the covers and sprinted for the bathroom.
Brit found her a few minutes later, hugging the toilet—again.
As she had the morning before, Brit stayed close. When it was finally over, she turned on the light and handed Liv a cool wet washcloth.
Liv bathed her face, then chucked the washcloth toward the bathtub, flushed the toilet a final time and pushed herself upright, grabbing the edge of the wide sink basin when she swayed a little on her feet.
“Livvy, maybe you shouldn’t—”
She gestured for silence. “Toothpaste,” she said. “Toothbrush…”
Brit helped her, getting the tube and squirting a line of paste on the brush while Liv clutched the sink rim and wondered why her head wouldn’t stop spinning.
“Here.” Brit took Liv’s right hand and wrapped it around the base of the toothbrush.
Liv looked down at the bristles, the neat line of mint-green paste. Doubtful, she thought. Her hand was shaking.
“Oh, Livvy. What’s the matter? What is going on?”
Liv was wondering the same thing. Her hangover had faded hours ago. So she must really be sick now. Terrific. Just what she needed with a long flight ahead of her: a bad case of some awful stomach bug.
She looked over to tell Brit not to worry. She was okay, just a bug of some kind.
But her mouth stayed shut. Her fingers went nerveless; the toothbrush clattered into the sink at the same time her other hand let go of the rim. Then her knees gave way. She sank to the cool smooth tiles of the floor as, far in the distance, she heard Brit frantically calling her name.
Chapter Three
Liv opened her eyes. She was flat on her back on the bathroom floor.
Brit was bending over her. “Livvy?”
Liv frowned as she studied her sister’s face above her—upside down and way too pale.
Brit said, “Can you hear me?”
So strange, Liv thought dazedly, the way a mouth looks when it’s moving upside down, as if the top were the bottom and the bottom the top.
Brit’s turned-around mouth continued asking questions. “Do you know what happened? Do you know who I am?”
“I fainted. You’re Brit.”
Brit’s upside-down mouth formed what must have been meant as a smile. “Welcome back.”
“Why are you grinning?”
The forced smile flattened out. “Damn it, I’m trying to be reassuring.”
“Well, it’s not working—and really, I’m okay.”
“I’d better get a
—”
Liv grabbed Brit’s arm before she could jump up and rush off. “I don’t need a doctor.”
“But—”
“I mean it. I am fine.” She did feel a little warm. She fumbled at the silk frogs that buttoned her pajama top.
“Here.” Brit scooted around beside her and gently pushed her hands out of the way. She unhooked the first three frogs—and then she gasped.
“What?” Liv popped to a sitting position and looked down at herself.
Her Chinese-style tangerine silk pajamas gaped. She could see her upper chest, the shadows of her breasts. Everything seemed to be right where it was supposed to be. She looked closer.
Liv felt her mouth drop open. “Omigod.”
Beside her, Brit said in an awed whisper, “My sentiments exactly.”
Liv met her sister’s astonished eyes. “It can’t be.”
“But Mom always said—”
Liv didn’t let her finish. “Help me up.”
“Are you sure? You just fain—”
“Help me. Now.”
Brit took her hand and half dragged her to her feet. Together, they turned to the mirror above the sink. Liv pulled the sides of the mandarin collar wide. The skin of her upper chest was a florid red—blotched and welted with a livid rash.
“It can’t be,” Liv said. “I refuse to believe it.”
“But, Livvy. You’re showing all the signs.”
Liv shifted her angry glare from her own chest to her sister’s wide-eyed reflection. “Oh, please. You know very well it’s only a family superstition.”
“Call it what you want. It did happen. To Mom and to Aunt Nanna and Aunt Kirsten, and to Granny Birget, too.”
“So they say.”
“Why would they lie?”
“I don’t know. I’m sure they didn’t lie—not exactly. I’m only saying, it’s a story. A family myth.”
“But your symptoms are exactly the same. You threw up. You fainted. And now, there it is. The rash.”
The Thorson sisters had heard it over and over all their lives: The women in their family—on their mother’s side, the Freyasdahl side—always knew right away when they conceived. They’d all discovered they were pregnant within twenty-four hours of conception. They knew it every time, without fail. Partly, it was a simple feeling of certainty—that it had happened; there was a baby growing within them. But beyond the certainty, there were, each and every time, the family signs: they’d throw up, followed by a fainting spell and then by a bizarre bright red rash across the upper chest.
Liv spoke firmly to Brit’s reflection in the mirror. “I just don’t believe it. I refuse to believe it. It’s a family superstition, that’s all—and besides, he used a condom.”
Brit’s gaze slid away, was drawn inexorably back.
Liv wanted to strangle her. “Will you stop it with all those sneaky sideways glances? You’re starting to remind me of the maid.”
“Sorry—and are you sure? About the—”
“Positive. He’s a Gullandrian.”
Brit blinked. “Right. And that means…?”
Liv let out an impatient sigh. “Remember what Elli told us about Gullandrians? How it’s such a big stigma to be born illegitimate around here?”
Brit still wasn’t getting it. “And so from that we can deduce…?”
“Well, it stands to reason that if you’re not married around here, you use contraception religiously.”
“So you’re saying you specifically remember that he used—”
“No. I’m not saying that.”
“You’re not?”
“No. I mean, yes. I mean, I do remember.” She fervently wished she sounded more convincing. “I do…” She looked at her welted, inflamed chest again and let out a moan.
Brit spoke flatly. “You’re not sure.”
Liv found she couldn’t meet her sister’s eyes. She began hooking the silk frogs, buttoning all the way up, until she couldn’t see the rash anymore, until she could almost pretend it wasn’t even there.
“Liv?” Brit asked carefully. “Are you sure or aren’t you?”
Liv whirled on her sister. Fisting her hands at her sides, she spoke softly through clenched teeth. “All right. I suppose he didn’t. I suppose we were both kind of…carried away.”
Brit said nothing. She was looking at Liv tenderly. Tolerantly. Liv hated that. She was not someone people had to look at with tolerance. Especially not people like her baby sister, whom she loved with all her heart, but who was, after all, a college dropout who’d never finished even one of the novels she’d started, who worked in a pizza joint in East Hollywood and couldn’t be bothered to balance her checkbook.
Brit began to speak. She said kind things, gentle things. “Oh, Livvy. I know everything is going to be all right. Of course, it’s probably just a fluke, your having the family symptoms like this. You’ve been so upset about what happened last night. Maybe tonight, you’re only showing the effects of all the stress, only…” Brit’s voice trailed off. Apparently, she had read Liv’s expression and realized that Liv had heard more than enough.
Liv spoke with grave dignity. “There’s certainly nothing that can be done about it right now.” Better, she thought. She sounded firm. Take-charge. More like herself. She was standing very straight, her head high. “In a few weeks, if my period is late, I’ll take a test like the normal, civilized twenty-first century woman I am. After that, if it turns out I really am going to have a baby—which I truly believe I am not—I’ll start making decisions.” She narrowed her eyes and stuck out her chin at her sister, as if Brit had given her some kind of argument. “And that’s it until then. You hear me? Not another word about it until then.”
The next morning, the rash was gone. Liv showed Brit. Brit nodded and made a few cheerful, so-glad-you’re-feeling-better noises.
Liv knew just what she was thinking. The rash disappearing fit right in with the way it always happened, according to their mother and their aunts and their grandmother. The rash would appear after the fainting spell and fade a few hours later. The next signs of pregnancy wouldn’t appear for weeks and could be any of the usual ones: a missed period, morning sickness, aversions to certain foods….
“And I feel just fine,” Liv announced with some defiance. “Whatever weird bug I caught, it’s gone now.” With each hour that passed, she found she was more and more certain that the events of last night had merely been some crazy stress reaction.
Liv could go home to her great summer job and her second year of law school and the nice boyfriend who might or might not be able to forgive her when he learned what she’d done on Midsummer’s Eve with the devastatingly sexy Prince Finn Danelaw.
And okay, yes, that would be a problem: figuring out how to tell Simon about the wild night she’d spent with Finn. But she’d manage it. All in good time.
Right now, her job was to get her things together and get to the plane.
An hour later, Brit hugged Liv goodbye and went off to spend the day wandering the charming cobbled streets of Lysgard, Gullandria’s capital. An hour after that, Liv was packing her vanity case in her bathroom, almost ready to head for the airport, when she glanced up and saw a flicker of movement behind her in the doorway.
She whirled, a hand to her throat. It was the maid. “You scared me to death.”
“So sorry, Highness.” The maid curtsied and brought her right fist to her flat chest. “Highness, Lady Kaarin is in the drawing room. She’s asked to speak with you.”
“Fine. Tell her I’ll be right there—and will you please stop sneaking around?”
“Yes, Highness. Of course, Highness. And I’ll tell Lady Kaarin you’re on your way.”
Kaarin Karlsmon rose from a damask wing chair, fist to heart, when Liv entered the room.
“Your Highness.” Liv stared at the beautiful redhead. She couldn’t help thinking of what Brit had said yesterday. Had this woman once been the lost Valbrand’s love? Clearly, now wasn’t the
time to ask. Kaarin was looking very official. She announced, “The king has asked to see you right away in his private chambers. If you’ll come with me…”
Liv had been expecting the summons. Her father, after all, would want to say goodbye. She didn’t exactly relish this final visit. Though Elli seemed fond of the king, and Brit, already, was calling him Dad, Liv still felt she hardly knew him. And she could see no reason that she had to know him in any particularly meaningful way.
She supposed it was classic stuff. In her heart, she sided with her mother against him. Liv felt he’d deserted her and her sisters when they were babies and as yet, he’d given her no reason to forgive him for it.
And that was okay with her. She didn’t hate him or anything. For Elli’s sake, she’d come here. She’d seen her sister married, met her father and looked around the land of her birth.
It was enough for her.
Now she could pay her final respects and go home.
Kaarin led Liv down a series of wide hallways to the massive doors that opened onto the king’s private reception rooms. Her task accomplished, she didn’t linger. With a bow, she took her leave.
The guards pulled the doors wide. Liv went through, the heels of her shoes tapping crisply as she crossed the stone floor of the antechamber.
Her father, tall, dark-eyed, in his fifties and still straight-backed and handsome, stood waiting for her in the room beyond. He was dressed in a fine lightweight, perfectly tailored midnight-blue suit.
“Daughter.” He didn’t smile, but he did, very slightly, incline his proud silvery head. “Please. Join us.”
“Us” consisted, at first glance, of Osrik’s closest advisor and dearest friend, Prince Medwyn Greyfell. Greyfell held the title of Grand Counselor, the second most powerful position in the Gullandrian governmental hierarchy. Liv thought it odd that her father would have the gaunt, white-haired Greyfell present for a private farewell visit with his oldest daughter. But hey. Goodbye was goodbye, Greyfell or not.
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