He was brought up like a sailor, a pirate of the streets, stealing booty, booze, and dirty magazines.

She was coddled like a princess and promised as a bride. Lady Jeckyl had a secret life to hide. So through the window she’d creep when her father fell asleep.

He never made an honest buck, she only borrowed from the truth. They were the greatest match that hell had ever seen.

It’s the devil’s first man and a drunken runaway.

She bats her eyes and lies about her ring. He used the coin he stole to buy the drinks. Never thought they’d find love drowning sorrows at the pub.

The whiskey, the liar, the thief.

Lady Jeckyl—or Michelle, as she preferred to think of herself—was brooding in her room again.

One month until her life ended. One month until her marriage to that dullard Lord Henry Terragan. Oh, he was a fine enough Lord, with plenty of wealth to give in dowry. It was why he had been selected as her husband, after all, in a marriage arranged a decade prior. It was why her parents were floating on air—their daughter, the sole heir to the throne of Albion and future Queen of the Seven Realms, would soon be married, and would be able to produce an heir.

“Is something wrong, milady?” It was her nursemaid, Vivian, a heavyset woman well into her sixth decade and still going strong; Michelle’s deepest confidante about all things, except the one.

“I’m just thinking of Henry again,” she said with a sigh. “I don’t want to marry him; a man such as he does not deserve but a sliver of our beautiful land, yet I and my womb are promised to him!”

“Aye, but it is the way of things, princess.” Vivian herself sighed, a frown appearing on her face as she moved behind Michelle and began plying her fingers through her flaxen hair. “He does not deserve you, but politics trump all, as we have discussed many times.” Deftly, she wove the princess’ hair, forming braids and working her own magic unknown to even the wisest sorceress of their queendom.

“Yes, I know. But still, I do not love him.”

There was a pause, then, Vivian’s fingers faltering. Then, her voice lower. “You love another, then? Perhaps a man you have been seeing when you escape at night?”

Michelle drew in a breath sharply. She knows about that?

As though reading her thoughts, the nursemaid clucked, “Oh, I know all about your little adventures. Bridgette told me several months ago when you borrowed a change of her clothes to sneak out of the palace. I thought it was good for you, which is why I’ve said nothing until now.” Her fingers again continued their magic. “However much I’ve wanted to ask what you did. The guards I asked to keep an eye on you had an unfortunate tendency to get distracted by the whores you apparently ended up among.” More clucks. “I’m not one to judge, though I am curious what my princess has been getting up to for the last six months.”

Falling in love, she thought, but her lips said, “Drinking whiskey, mostly. Some gambling. Learning tricks from whores for when I’m married.”

“Best be careful, or there’s other tricks they’d teach you that aren’t fit for a queen to know.” She finished her braiding, procuring a teal ribbon that she quickly tied around the end of Michelle’s black hair. “I bring it up because now that your betrothed is again in town, you must stop your sneaking out. It will not become a married lady such as yourself.”

“But—”

“No, milady,” Vivian said, setting a hand on the princess’s shoulder. “But tell me this, is there another man?”

Yes. “No, of course not. I may have flirted with a few, but I am not a whore, Vivian. My maidenhead is still quite intact, as the physicians who checked me when they prepared me for my wedding day made sure of.”

That roused quite a chuckle. “As though there aren’t ways of lying or hiding that. Frankly, my dear, I would have expected you to have taken a tumble with one of the guards by now; your mother did at your age, before she married your father.”

The knowledge shocked Michelle. “She what?”

Vivian tugged here and there on the dress that Michelle was wearing—a simple teal one matched by the ribbon, with white lace accents, the skirt loose and flowing—to make sure it looked its absolute best. “Your mother was quite the adventuresome girl as princess, though in a different way from you. And still she stopped once she’d been prepared to wed your father, just as you must stop.”

Michelle sighed. “Yes, Vivian. I’ll stop sneaking out at night.” Given other circumstances, it was not as much a loss as it could have been. But not wanting her quick compliance to raise suspicions, she asked, “Does all the castle know of my ... excursions?”

“Just about,” the nursemaid said with a low chuckle. “You are not as good at hiding it as you might think. But you needn’t worry; your parents are thoroughly ignorant.” One final brush of the skirt. “And you should keep it that way.”

Michelle nodded, standing up and sighing. “I just wish I could have said goodbye.”

“There are many things in this life that you may wish for, milady, that you do not get. Sometimes, you must accept your fate.”

“And marry Henry.”

“Lord Terragan is a fine man, and will make an excellent consort, an excellent counselor, an excellent bedmate, and a superb father for your children.”

“He’s ugly.”

“There’s more to men than the shapes of their jaws. I have it on good authority that his father was quite well endowed.”

Michelle blushed. “Vivian!”

Her nursemaid smirked. “As I said, princess. You will be quite happy, once you let yourself be. Now, I suppose it is time for you to attend this meeting.”

“Yes, on the latest regulations and taxations on milk,” she replied dryly, “For which the Bakers’ Guild might have my head on a platter for the rising costs of cream.”

Vivian looked confused. “A demand for cream pies, milady?”

“So I’m told. I do not quite understand it, myself—or why my father thinks they are to be reduced in supply.”

A smirk. “Ah, that is probably because you’ve yet to have one.”

The Lady Jeckyl shrugged, sweeping from the room. “Then perhaps I shall have to try one later.”

Michelle was still in not so great a mood when she left the meeting on milk as when she had entered it. It was her duty, sure, and would be more of one once she became queen—but her impending marriage to the Lord Terragan cast quite a cloud over her nonetheless.

Her servants seemed also to gather her cloudy mood, and after she took her lunch and retreated to her chambers, they disappeared. The magic bell she had would summon them if needed; but for the moment, they were nowhere to be found.

So she brooded in her chamber for another few minutes, looking out the window, feeling her castle more a prison than home. She would never again hear Chelsea’s voice, or get slipped a spot of cheese by Maria, or blush furiously at another anecdote of Charlotte’s. Not as a lady hiding in commoner clothes, at least.

Perhaps after being married, she should invite the whores of the tavern to a party at the palace; the guards would certainly—

Her thoughts were broken by the soft knock at her door, followed by its opening despite her lack of assent. “Who dares—” she started, only to stop as she saw the man who entered.

Damian. The man she loved.

“Oh,” she gasped, bringing a hand up to her mouth. Her heart fluttered in her chest, as it did every time she saw him now. That bearded jaw, those eyes burning with passion, that swagger to his walk that belied a deeper confidence. “I didn’t—”

“Expect me?” he said with a bow, smoothly kicking closed the door behind him. “It is a pleasure as always, milady.”

“It is still so weird seeing you in that costume,” she said, getting up from her chair and hurrying over to him. “You look much better in your tavern clothes.” It was indeed a far cry from the outfit she had met him in; here in the palace, he had on servantwear: a green jacket with golden trim and buttons over an elaborate white shirt and cravat, and black breeches above white socks and black boots.

“I would say much the same to you, love.” Their hands clasped, and he smiled at her. “But you know that I couldn’t bear to be apart from you. And this last month working here at the palace has been a dream and—”

“I was told I cannot go out anymore,” she complained to him. “Now that I’m to be married to that ... that ... that man.” She sighed, pulling away from him, turning to the window. She took several steps in that direction, still feeling so heavy in her heart.

“Danielle,” he said, stepping up to her, using the name she’d gone by in the tavern. A hand on her back, sending shivers up her spine. “I feared it would come to that, which is why I came to work here.”

“But you mustn’t be in my room,” she said, turning her head to look back at him. “The only servants allowed in are ladies, lest my honor—”

“We both know that to be a lie, love. And I may have slipped them some coin to make sure we’re left alone a while.”

“Some coin?” she asked, intrigued. “From your wages?”

He chuckled. “I might’ve nicked some from a noble what came through here a while back.”

She frowned at him. “The Lord Anworth? But he’s one of my family’s largest benefactors! You mustn’t—”

“My dear.” His fingers on her arm raised goosebumps as they trailed from fabric to skin. “The man has so much money he’d not miss but a few coins liberated—and think of what good they do in the hands of servants, giving us a few spare moments of time.”

“You scoundrel.” She turned and pulled away from him again, stepping this time towards her bed—a four-post canopy bed, the white sheets made neat and square—trying to reconcile her love for him with his obvious disregard for the law. As always. “Damian, we ... we cannot keep meeting like this. If I’m to be wed, if I’m to be queen, then I cannot have a secret lover. Were word of a tryst such as ours to get out among the commoners...” She shuddered at the way the monarchy itself might be shaken.

Still, he stepped to her, this time a hand on her shoulder. “They would know you to be as human as they, and would love you all the more.” He stepped in front of her, leaned in, his dark eyes smoldering with desire. “Almost as much as I love you.”

He leaned in and kissed her, and she could not keep herself from kissing him back. They had done that several times, what passed for a beard on his rugged face scratching her each time. They had not gone farther, not when her honor was at stake in this marriage. But she could not resist him, not his smokey smell, not his burning touch, not the utter well of charm she found herself sinking into each time she was around him. He attracted her much as the north attracted a lodestone, and she could not pull away from him as that same lodestone could not avoid north.

Finally their lips parted, her desire barely sated, her body burning with the need for more—a need she had often ignored in the past, and she knew she needed to ignore again. She had been promised a virgin on her wedding night to Lord Terragan, and intended to keep that promise. “I love you too, Damian, but ... we mustn’t.” She tried to push him to the side, but he refused to budge.

“Mustn’t we?” His hand trailed up her back, sending shivers up her spine in tandem with fingertips. “I know of things lovers do, my sweet, and if we are loves, then should we not also be lovers?” His fingers found the braid her nursemaid had made that morning, trailed back down it. He leaned in, his voice low, his forehead on hers. “Perhaps we can make an arrangement with your husband-to-be. He can pretend to rule, while you the queen are satisfied in ways he never could.” The teal ribbon yielded to his touch, becoming undone, much as her defenses were becoming undone against his unyielding silver tongue.

“But—”

“Shh,” he said, kissing her again, running fingers through the braids, undoing the nursemaid’s work. She whimpered into the kiss, and he began to maneuver them, right to the very bed that she wasn’t ever to share with anyone until she was wed. “You are far too beautiful,” he breathed between interlocks of tongue, “To not be appreciated by that boor.” Closer to her bed they got, and she could not bring herself to stop him. “He would have no idea what to do with you, not like I would.”

Fingers played against lace and ribbon, his hands picking the knots and ties of her dress much as she’d seen him pick locks and doors. It was not the first time he had encouraged her nudity—but it was certainly the most aggressively he had ever before. Her breath caught as his kisses turned to her neck, and she arched he head up involuntarily, letting his mouth meet her unblemished skin. “Damian,” she tried to protest further, bringing her hands up to his chest, trying to push him, even as she felt a layer of her dress be shed, like a starling molting in the summer.

“Danielle,” he replied, his fingers still busy at work. “Your skin is as flawless as an alabaster vase carved by the gods themselves.” His lips were making her breath faster, her chest heaving. “I simply must see more.”

What was the harm in it?

She could not believe she had the thought, but it was there, her body’s need overriding her propriety. They’d talked before, had flirted. Had shared kisses and touches, but never like this, never with his mouth so close to her—

Now his fingers finished their magic—for there was more magic in it than just deftness—and her breasts were bared for him. She stepped back in shock, more of her dress falling off in panels and fabric—and his foot was there, in just the right way, his hand guiding her as she fell back onto her bed.

She had imagined it so many times, but now, it was almost a dream.

With haste, he stripped off his own shirt—despite the layers of servantwear, he was bare-chested before she could react to her new position. And then she was transfixed by his chest, rippling like iron melting in the forge. He climbed onto the bed, kneeling beside her, leaning over her, and she involuntarily reached up, touched that bare skin. She could feel his heat, the pulsing of his heart beneath his flesh—and each pulse sent a shiver up her arm.

His own hands returned the favor in kind, exploring the tender flesh of her breasts—first lightly, and then with a little more firmness. Her breath caught as his palms rubbed against her nipples, and he squeezed gently. Her imagination had never been as good as this, not in all the times she had explored her own body.

“You are more magnificent than I ever could have imagined, my sweet,” he said, his voice low, his kisses again on her neck, continuing their path down further. “Would that only I had time enough to admire you in all that glory.” Lips upon her breasts, at her nipples, and another intake of breath without meaning to. “But the sun in its jealous sky bids us haste, does it not?”

She was so very torn. “Damian,” she moaned, unable to articulate herself. Because she knew they should stop—should have stopped! She should have called for someone when he was there, gotten him away! But also, his lips—his tongue—his fingers, trailing down her sides, to her stomach ... and then beneath her undergarments, to that secret place no one had ever touched before. Her skin tingled as he did, making her tremble as she had never trembled.