Oh My, I Messed Up the Story

The blizzard continued for another three days. In that time I stayed out of Mariela's way and she never called for me so I assumed she was still processing what had happened and was trying to figure out what to do alongside her husband.

With no one able to enter or exit the palace due to the snow, I wasn't even expected to have tea with anyone since neither the queen nor Rosenia were interested in me when not keeping up appearances in front of other nobility.

Al and I were left entirely to our own devices, which got very, very boring.

We built about fifty card houses, played more than a dozen rounds of every game I had taught him, read books until our eyes glazed over, and went to the kitchens for treats twice.

I really wanted to talk to Marcy about what she knew regarding the palace's inner network but I would need to do that when no one else was around.

There had to be a way to meet her alone outside of the kitchen.

Maybe I could try and find her the next time Al took a bath. This was a conversation I did not want him to be a part of.

She was a good actress, I'd give her that. Both times we met her Marcy was bright, cheery, and chatted lightheartedly like the incident had never happened.

None of the other kitchen staff thought our interactions were strange either. Good. I hadn't blown it.

If I did nothing else in this world, I had to at the very least make sure the commoners got representatives in the court.

That was the biggest plot point other than the romance. And honestly, I didn't know if it was even possible to make that happen anymore.

I was nearly certain Al was in love with me by now. His overprotectiveness after I found out what sorts of things went on during power struggles in the palace kind of clinched it for me.

He said he couldn't bear to lose me. If that's not love…

In order to figure out how to proceed from here I needed to know how he felt.

If he truly was in love with me, wouldn't it be cruel to try and push him onto another woman? I would have to find another way. What that other way was…I had no idea.

Playing Truth or Dare ought to do the trick. I hadn't done this since a sleepover when I was in sixth grade.

I didn't want to tell who I had a crush on because his twin sister was present so I did the dare and got mayonnaise smeared all over my face.

I nearly puked from the smell. They didn't have mayonnaise here so I should be safe.

I explained the rules to him and he seemed intrigued since he was just as bored as I was.

"You go first, show me how it works."

"Okay…pick either Truth or Dare."

"Truth."

"What is the most embarrassing thing that has ever happened to you?" I asked.

"Sigmund dunked my head into a bowl of soup when no one was looking during a banquet when I was ten. A piece of carrot got up my nose and the doctor had to extract it in front of everyone. Is that the sort of thing you're looking for?"

So he was always evil. Figures. "Yeah. That's pretty terrible though."

He shrugged. "That sort of thing happened all the time. No use worrying about it now. Truth or Dare?"

"Dare," I said confidently.

Telling the truth here was nearly impossible with all the secrets I was keeping.

"I dare you to drink an entire pot of jasmine tea," Al said with a wicked glint in his eyes.

While I was horrified at the prospect of choking down that much tea, I couldn't deny that he really understood the spirit of Truth or Dare. I made a bunch of inhuman faces but did as I was told.

We went back and forth for a while like that. Al varied his choices but I consistently picked dare.

I found out that his weirdest childhood habit was wearing his pants backwards and that he could do a handstand for a full minute.

He made me shove an entire éclair in my mouth in one bite and spin for five minutes straight.

Now that he was warmed up, the next time he chose Truth I asked my loaded question.

I didn't want to make it too obvious so I used my head. Marcy was his first love in the novel.

Since I had sort of taken her place, I figured it was better to ask "what is the name of your first love?" than "are you in love with me?"

Surprise lit his eyes for a split second before he ran a hand through his hair in agitation.

"You tricked me into playing this. This was what you really wanted to know all along, wasn't it?"

I hadn't expected him to see right through me.

"Answer the question Al. If you back out, the dare is for you to run out into the blizzard barefoot for a whole minute."

It was obvious he was debating which was the lesser of two evils.

All this time he kept playing the friend card, presumably so he wouldn't scare me off. Our deal didn't include romance.

He teased me about our marital status occasionally but wasn't willing to push it because he had promised me that he only wanted someone to keep him from going crazy with boredom and I was holding him to it.

Eventually he held up his hands in surrender though his face was redder than a cherry tomato.

"Fine. My first love was a radiantly silly debutante who offered to run away with me after we had only met twice by the name of Katie du Pont. Happy?"

I rocked back slightly from my position cross-legged on the floor and pointed at him accusingly. This was one instance where I wasn't happy about being right.

"I knew it! You liar, you never wanted friendship from me!"