over her and the other dropped gold-painted rose petals on her.
‘Let the doors be thrown open and the news be carried to the furtherest part of his kingdom that the Prince is married,’ the Archbishop intoned. ‘Let the trumpets sound and great joy be amongst the people.’
From her kneeling position Ionanthe couldn’t see the doors being opened, but she could see the light that poured into the cathedral.
Max reached down and took hold of Ionanthe’s hands, which were still folded in front of her.
Ionanthe looked up at him, ignoring the warning she had been given that it was forbidden by tradition for her to look at her new husband until he gave her permission to do so.
Also according to tradition she was now supposed to kiss his foot in gratitude for being married to him. Ionanthe’s lips compressed as she deliberately stood up so that they were standing facing one another. The triumph she had been feeling at breaking with tradition and showing her own strength of character and will was lost in the Archbishop’s hissed gasp of shocked breath when Max stepped forward, clasping her shoulders and holding her imprisoned as he bent his head towards her.
When she realised what he intended to do Ionanthe stiffened in rejection and hissed, ‘No—you must not kiss me. It is not the tradition.’
‘Then we will make our own new tradition,’ Max told her equably.
His lips felt warm against her own, warm and firm and knowingly confident in a way that her own were not. They were alternately trembling and then parting, in helpless disarray. He had undermined her attempt to establish her independence far too effectively for her to be able to rally and fight back. His lips left hers and then returned, brushing them softly.
If she hadn’t known better she might even have thought that his touch was meant to be reassuring—but that couldn’t possibly be so, since he was the one who had mocked her with his kiss in the first place. Had he perhaps confused her with Eloise, assuming that she was like her sister and would welcome this promise of future intimacy between them? If so he was going to be in for a shock when he discovered that she did not have her sister’s breadth of sexual experience. It was too late now to regret not taking advantage of the ample opportunities over the years when she had preferred her studies and her dreams to the intimacies she had been offered.
‘It is not the custom for the Crown Prince’s bride to stand at his side as his equal until she has asked for permission to do so,’ the Archbishop was saying, with disapproval.
‘Sometimes custom has to give way to a more modern way of doing things,’ Ionanthe heard Max saying, before she could react herself and refuse to kneel. ‘And this is one of those occasions.’
‘It is our custom,’ the Archbishop was insisting stubbornly.
‘Then it must be changed for a new custom—one that is based on equality.’
Ionanthe knew that she was probably looking as shocked as the Archbishop, although for a different reason. The last thing she had expected was to hear her new husband talking about equality.
The Archbishop looked crestfallen and upset. ‘But, sire….’
Max frowned as he listened to the quaver in the older man’s voice. He had told himself that he would take things slowly and not risk offending his people, but the sight of Ionanthe kneeling at his feet had filled him with so much revulsion that he hadn’t been able to stop himself from saying something.
The Archbishop’s pride had been hurt, though, and he must salve that wound, Max recognised. In a more gentle voice he told him, ‘I do not believe that it is fitting for the mother of my heir to kneel at any man’s feet.’
The Archbishop nodded his head and looked appeased.
The new Prince was a dangerously clever man, Ionanthe decided as Max took her arm, so that together they walked down the aisle towards the open doors of the cathedral and the state carriage waiting to take them back to the palace.
An hour later they stood on the main balcony of the palace, looking down into the square where people had gathered to see them.
‘At least the people are pleased to see us married. Listen to them cheering,’ said Max.
‘Are they cheering as loudly as they did when you married Eloise?’ Ionanthe couldn’t resist asking cynically. She regretted the words as soon as they had been uttered. They reminded her too sharply of the way she had felt as a child, knowing that their grandfather favoured her sister and always trying and failing to claim some of his attention and approval—some of his love—for herself. Her words had been a foolish mistake. After all, she didn’t want anything from this man who had been her sister’s husband.
‘That was different,’ he answered her quietly.
Different? Different in what way? Different because he had actually loved her wayward sister?
The feeling exploding inside her couldn’t possibly be pain, Ionanthe denied to herself. Why should it be?
The scene down below them was one of pageantry and excitement. The square was busy with dancers in national dress, the Royal Guard in their uniforms—sentries in dark blue, gunners in dark green coats with gold braid standing by their cannons, whilst the cavalry were wearing scarlet. The rich colours stood out against the icing-white glare of the eighteenth-century baroque frontage that had been put on the old castle.
The church clock on the opposite side of the square, which had fascinated her as a child, was still drawing crowds of children to stand at the bottom, waiting for midday to strike and set off the mechanical scenes that took place one after the other. Eloise had always been far more interested in watching the changing of the guard than looking at the clock.
Ionanthe closed her eyes. She and her sister had never been close, but that did not mean she did not feel any discomfort at all at the thought of taking what had been her place. Tonight, when she lay in Max’s arms fulfilling her sacrificial role, would he be thinking of Eloise? Would he be comparing her to her sister and finding her wanting? They would have been well matched in bed, her sister and this man who somehow remained very sensual and male despite the formality of the dress uniform he was wearing. It caused her a sharp spike of disquiet to know that it was his sensuality, his sexuality, that was somehow foremost in her mind, and not far more relevant aspects of his personality.
Max watched the crowd down below them, laughing happily and enjoying themselves as they celebrated their marriage—the same crowd that, according to the Count, would have threatened to depose him if he had not followed the island’s tradition and accepted its cruel ancient laws. Once again he had a wife—this time one who had been blackmailed and forced into marrying him. Max wished he knew Ionanthe better. Eloise had never talked about her sister or to her, as far as Max knew, other than to say that Ionanthe had always been jealous of her because their grandfather had loved her more than he did Ionanthe.
Had he known her better, had he been able to trust her, then he might have talked openly and honestly to her. He might have told her that he loathed the way she had been forced into marriage with him as much as she did herself. Told her that as soon as it was within his power to do so he would set her free. And, had he thought there was the remotest chance that she would understand them, he might have revealed his dreams and hopes for their people to her. But he did not know her, and he could not trust her, so he could say nothing. It was too much of a risk. After all, he had already made one mistake in thinking he could trust her sister.
