Read Queen's Heart: An Arthurian Paranormal Romance (Arthurian Hearts Book 2) for Free Online Page A

see me again. I’d die broken-hearted, alone, and not yet twenty-two winters old.
    Eventually the tears dried, my future faded away, and I opened my eyes. Most everyone who had been watching me with pity quickly dropped their stares, focusing them studiously elsewhere, when I looked out over the guests. Only Palomides watched me still, his expression a queer mix of rage and sadness and confusion. I fell into that gaze, grateful for any connection that didn’t shout with pity. Emboldened once again, I dared seek out Drustan. He sat still with his back to the high table, but I caught him casting covert glances over his shoulder. No pity in the way he avoided my eyes, but rather what seemed a curious guilt. And a curious need to not be seen.
    I shifted my gaze back to Palomides, drawing strength till I was certain I could stand and flee without my knees betraying me.
    “By your pardon,” I said to Father, my voice thready and cracking. I didn’t wait for his permission, sure as I was he would not have granted it if I had. Instead, I gathered the skirts of the blue gown I’d worn specifically to call attention to my eyes, now puffed and red and filled yet with unspilled tears, then exited in a graceless rush, terrified that Father would recall me before I made it out the door.
    Once outside, I leaned against the stone wall, welcoming its coolness against my flamed cheek. Brangien came first out the door after me. Her loyalty touched me even through my tears, which had started flowing once again.
    “You look too pretty to be out here,” I sniffed at her, having to carefully articulate each word to make them understandable. “Go back inside.”
    “Nonsense.” She draped a comforting arm across my shoulders. “You shouldn’t be alone right now.”
    “She isn’t.” Mother’s voice was warm steel in the night. She gestured to Brangien and her own handmaid, Elaine. “Leave us for an hour. We’ll need your comforts soon enough. Right now, Yseult and I need each other.”
    With a gentle kiss on my wet cheek, Brangien withdrew, disappearing back into the hall with Elaine.
    Mother’s arm replaced Brangien and she guided me towards my room. “I begged your father not to do this. Neither entreaties for your honor or my brother’s memory moved him. He loves you, Yseult. But he loves Ireland more. And it’s Ireland you must think about too. You are the sacrifice that will broker peace between Cornwall and Ireland. And perhaps your union with Mark will produce the sacrifice to unite all the bickering tribes around.”
    She stopped me in the courtyard and leaned her head into mine. A part of me registered surprise that somewhere in time I’d grown taller than she. “I know what it’s like to be that sacrifice. I know the hate and the resentment—the feeling of betrayal that will at some future time turn into resignation and acceptance.”
    “And regret,” I agreed.
    “No.” She took my face between her weathering hands and stared me eye-to-eye. “Not a moment of regret for a union that produced a child as beautiful as you. Not a moment of regret for the lasting peace forged between North Ireland and South. I don’t—can’t—regret my duty. I did mourn that which I thought I’d lost for many years. But when I finally understood what my sacrifice had won, not just for the men who arranged it, but for the world itself, I came to celebrate the role I’d played. Few people are born who can effect so much change by their actions. Fewer women still who have that power.
    “I don’t expect you to stop thinking of yourself right now. Just as I don’t expect my grief at your leaving to diminish any time soon. It’s natural for our hearts to despair and rage against Fate and kings’ edicts and God Himself. To spit on words like duty and honor . But for all that I hate your father right now for what he’s doing to you , I have to admire him for putting Ireland first. Just as for all I want to hate King Mark for