“I’m beginning to think that princes have far too much time on their hands.” Luci shot back.
His laugh was wild and free, lacking the constraint that the rest of the world suffered through. Godmothers and magic pumpkins alike knew that he was beautiful when he laughed. More than any man had a right to be. She had known men to be rugged and handsome, but Prince Ira was undeniably beautiful.
“I’ll just be on my way then,” Noah said.
Oh, Noah. For a minute, she’d forgotten about the healer. Giving him a small smile as she leaned to look past Prince Ira’s figure, she waved a hand.
“Thank you for what you said earlier. I needed to hear it,” she said.
The words were truer than she could admit. Already she felt lighter than before. Some of the weight was shed in the night.
He nodded his head before bowing it and murmuring a goodbye to Prince Ira, who rudely ignored him, his attention on Luci.
She shook her head and gave an exasperated sigh.
“What?” she asked.
“What did you need to hear?” he asked.
“So princes are nosy too,” she said, grabbing the potion and ignoring the heat still clinging to the glass.
The slight burn was a good reminder, though, of what she couldn’t have said.
“Only when it concerns you,” he said.
She could feel his eyes on her back while she carefully poured the now amethyst liquid into three separate vials and placed corks on each one, careful to seal them. Her heart thrummed obnoxiously in her chest, and she was quite ready to be done with the entire day.
Lifting the vials, she turned and shoved them into the prince's chest, careful not to meet his eyes.
“They will either help with your allergies or kill you. Noah is fairly confident it's the former, though. Ingest at your own risk,” she said.
With nothing left to work on, she huffed out a breath and faced the hard truth.
“I’m going to bed. Feel free to stay here,” she said.
“I think you give more orders than I do,” he said.
“Wasn’t an order.”
“It felt like it,” he said, following behind her.
“Well, you clearly aren’t listening,” she said.
The open door led to the burning lanterns of the castle that illuminated every gold-trimmed wall. Sure enough, the prince was in fact not listening as he came up beside her, vial tucked away into his pockets.
“Don’t you want to know if the one I just took kills me?” he asked.
Luci stopped, her heart stalling in the process. She stared open-mouthed at the idiotic man before her who grinned like a fool.
“You took it already?” she asked.
He reached into his pocket and held out an empty vile before flipping it into the air and catching it.
“Wasn’t I supposed to?”
“It was still warm,” she said.
He squinted, “Thatwasa bit strange, but overall it tasted nice- floral, but sweet.”