At Our Wedding Feast, My Husband Introduced His Mistress, So I Asked the Bishop for an Annulment novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Bitter Almonds

Isaline knocks the goblet from Sidonie's hand and calls it poison, the Margrave confirms it by smell, and the duke sends his wife to the north wing, where a fresh poured goblet waits beside a farewell letter in her own hand.

Isaline hit the goblet with the back of her hand.

It flew out of Sidonie's fingers and burst on the stone edge of the dais.

Red wine went everywhere.

Down Sidonie's skirt. Across the white cloth. Over the duke's gold shoes.

Somebody screamed.

Sidonie stood with her hand still curled around nothing and her mouth open.

"You struck her," Lothaire said.

He sounded almost pleased.

"You struck my lady at my own table."

"I hit a cup," Isaline said. "She's welcome to count her fingers."

"Have you lost your mind?"

"No. Somebody poured poison into my wine. I'd rather not watch it kill a guest."

The word went down the hall.

Poison.

At the nearest tables, people set their own cups down very gently.

Lothaire threw back his head and laughed.

"Poison," he told the hall. "My bride's been reading novels."

Isaline nearly laughed back at him.

"Smell your sleeve," she said to Sidonie.

Sidonie looked at her like she'd asked her to bark.

Then she lifted her wet red cuff to her nose.

Her face changed. She didn't know what the smell was. She only knew it was wrong.

"It smells like marzipan," she said slowly. "Gone off."

"Bitter almonds," Isaline said. "Laurel water."

Behind her, the maid's place was empty.

The maid's jug stood on the sideboard by itself.

Isaline hadn't heard her go.

A bench scraped at the bottom of the hall.

The man in the green coat was walking up between the tables, and the guests leaned out of his way without being asked.

He was even taller standing.

He had grey at the temples, though he couldn't have been much past thirty, and a face the wind had worked on for years.

He climbed the dais steps.

"Halvardt," Lothaire said sharply. "Sit down."

"The king sent me to witness your wedding, Marbrecourt," the Margrave said. "I'm witnessing it."

He crouched and picked up the biggest piece of the goblet.

He held it under his nose.

He breathed in once, slow.

Then he looked up at Isaline.

His eyes were grey, and very steady.

"Laurel water," he said. "In the Greymarch we soak meat in it and leave it out for wolves."

"Does it work?"

"Every time."

"Then somebody thinks I'm a wolf."

"Somebody thinks you're dinner, Your Grace."

He stood and set the shard on the cloth beside her plate, carefully.

The hall had gone so quiet she could hear the candles.

Lothaire's face went from pink to white and back.

"This is hysteria," he said. "My wife is overwrought. She poured something in her own cup to make a scene."

"Did I?" Isaline said. "Then where's my maid?"

Nobody answered.

Her father rose beside her.

He put one gentle hand on her back, the way he had when she was small and had a fever.

"Your Grace," he said to Lothaire. "Forgive her. It's been a long day, and she was always delicate. I'm so sorry."

Isaline turned her head and looked at him.

He gave her a sad little smile over his gold spectacles.

Lothaire took a breath and found his voice again.

"Since my wife would rather count days than be a wife," he said, "she can count them in the north wing."

A murmur went round.

"Sidonie, you'll take the duchess's rooms tonight. They're yours."

Sidonie was still looking at her sleeve.

The novel wanted Isaline in the north wing tonight, whatever she did with her hands.

Fine.

The north wing had its own stair to the kitchens, and nobody watched a stair.

"Gladly," she said. "Is it far from your rooms?"

"As far as the house goes."

"Perfect."

She picked up her skirts and stepped down off the dais.

The Margrave moved aside for her, and only for her.

"Your Grace," he said, low. "Don't drink anything you didn't pour."

"I wasn't planning to, my lord."

"Or eat anything. Or open a window."

"Are you always this cheerful?"

"Only at weddings."

Isaline walked the whole length of the hall with two hundred people watching her back.

A footman with a candle led her up the far stairs and along a corridor that got colder with every door.

The north wing hung over the river. She could hear the water under the floor.

The footman opened the last door and left without a word.

The bedchamber was cold and neat.

A fire had been laid but never lit. The bed was turned down.

On the little table by the bed stood a crystal goblet, already filled.

Beside it lay a folded letter.

Isaline picked up the goblet and held it under her nose.

Bitter almonds.

Much stronger than the first.

She set it down and unfolded the letter.

The writing was hers.

The loops on the I. The little hook she put on the end of her name.

"I can't bear the shame of it. Forgive me, Father. Isaline."

She had never written it in her life.

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