Chapter 145: Causes and Concern.

Thank you so much,@ Sarebee for the Golden Tickets.

Thank you so much,@ Dovhunová_Nicole for the Golden Ticket.

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Rosaline sat so still that, for a moment, she almost forgot how to breathe. Xandros’s hand remained at her waist, warm and entirely too comfortable there, as though he had every right to keep it in place while they sat among the royal family of Everbloom. He continued listening to King Lucien’s conversation with the same calm expression he had worn throughout dinner, occasionally adding a comment when the discussion called for it. Nothing about him suggested that he was doing anything unusual.

That, Rosaline decided, was the most irritating part.

She shifted in her chair, hoping he would take the hint and move his hand. Instead, his fingers followed the movement, settling against her waist once more. She turned her head slightly to look at him, but he was still looking towards the king, his expression composed. If he noticed her glare, he gave no sign of it.

Rosaline pressed her lips together.

What exactly is wrong with him tonight?

She tried moving again, this time sitting a little straighter and shifting her chair away from him. It made very little difference. His hand followed her as if he had anticipated the attempt, and before she could turn to confront him properly, his fingers began moving slowly against her back.

A shiver ran through her.

She stiffened at once, her eyes widening as she stared at the table in front of her. It was not the sort of reaction she could afford to have in front of her family, especially when she had spent most of the evening trying to behave as though nothing about her husband’s conduct had surprised her. Yet Xandros seemed determined to make that impossible.

She reached down to catch his wrist beneath the table, intending to pull his hand away herself. Unfortunately, the movement made her lose track of the conversation for a moment, and when she tried to draw a quiet breath, it caught unpleasantly in her throat. She coughed once, then again, the second cough coming harder than the first.

Every attempt to suppress it only made matters worse.

Rosaline raised a hand to her mouth, bending forward slightly as the coughing continued. The conversations around the table faltered. Someone stopped speaking in the middle of a sentence, and the clink of cutlery against porcelain seemed suddenly louder than it had been a moment before.

"Rosaline?" Xandros turned towards her, his hand finally still. "Are you all right?"

She lifted her head and stared at him.

For a second, she could only look at his face, completely wide-eyed. The question was so absurd that she almost forgot she was coughing. He was looking at her with apparent concern, his brows drawn together as if he had no idea why she was suddenly struggling to catch her breath.

Are you serious?

She wanted to ask him that. She wanted to remind him that he had been the one distracting her in the first place, that she had been perfectly capable of sitting through dinner before he decided to make a nuisance of himself. But another cough escaped her before she could say a word.

Xandros reached for the glass beside her plate and held it out.

"Here. Drink some water."

Rosaline accepted it, though not without giving him another look that she hoped conveyed everything she could not say aloud. She took a few careful sips, waiting for the irritation in her throat to settle. Xandros kept one hand at her back, rubbing it gently, and the gesture was so considerate that anyone watching might have thought him the most attentive husband in the world.

Anyone except Rosaline.

She was beginning to suspect that he knew exactly what he was doing.

"Take your time," he murmured.

She lowered the glass, trying to recover her composure. "I’m fine," she managed, though her voice came out a little rougher than she intended.

Across the table, Adrian Valerian had already reached for a napkin. He leaned forward slightly, holding it out to her with an expression of genuine concern.

"Here, Your Highness. You may need this."

Rosaline had barely begun to reach for it when Xandros moved.

He knocked Adrian’s hand aside with a quick, sharp motion. The napkin slipped from Adrian’s fingers and landed on the table, just beside his plate.

The movement was so sudden that Rosaline froze.

Adrian looked at his now-empty hand, then towards Xandros. For a brief moment, the two men looked as though they might say something to each other. Xandros, however, did not even turn to acknowledge him. He simply picked up his own napkin and brought it towards Rosaline’s face.

"Hold still," he said quietly.

Rosaline blinked at him. "I can—"

"Just hold still."

His voice was not harsh, but there was enough certainty in it to make her stop speaking. He gently wiped the corner of her mouth, where a little water had escaped while she was coughing, then checked her face to make sure she was clean. His movements were careful, almost annoyingly so, and he seemed utterly unconcerned by the fact that everyone at the table had just witnessed him dismiss another man’s attempt to help his wife.

"There," he said, lowering the napkin. "That’s better."

Rosaline stared at him again.

He gave her a small nod, as though the matter had been settled, and returned his attention to her with an expression that was almost reassuring.

"It’s all right now."

His hand that was settled against her waist moved to pat her back. Rosaline had no idea what to do with herself. She was grateful that he had helped her, of course, but that gratitude was being thoroughly undermined by the memory of his fingers against her back before she had started coughing. She could hardly accuse him of causing trouble when he was sitting there behaving as though he had just rescued her from some terrible misfortune.

And she certainly could not explain any of it to the people watching them.

Rosaline drew a slow breath and turned towards the rest of the table. The king’s advisers had fallen silent, and even the servants standing along the walls seemed to have become more attentive. She wished, with a sudden and desperate longing, that she could disappear beneath the tablecloth and remain there until dinner was over.

Instead, she straightened her shoulders.

"I’m sorry for interrupting dinner," she said, managing a small, polite smile. "I didn’t mean to cause a disturbance."

Queen Vivienne was the first to respond. She dabbed at the corner of her own mouth before setting her napkin aside, her expression softening into the sort of pleasant concern Rosaline had come to expect from her.

"There’s nothing to apologise for, dear. These things happen." Her gaze moved briefly towards Xandros, then returned to Rosaline. "You should take care of yourself. You wouldn’t want to fall ill while you’re home."

The words were kind enough, but Rosaline could not help noticing how easily her stepmother had made the conversation sound ordinary. It was a gift Queen Vivienne possessed: the ability to turn almost anything into a pleasant little exchange, provided it did not require her to show more concern than was expected of her.

Rosaline inclined her head. "Thank you, Your Majesty."

She glanced towards her father.

King Lucien had already returned his attention to the table. He neither asked whether she felt better nor offered any words of reassurance. His expression remained as it had been throughout most of the evening, distant and difficult to read, as though the interruption had been nothing more than an inconvenient pause in a conversation he would rather continue.

Rosaline waited for a moment longer than she should have.

Perhaps he would say something once he noticed she was looking at him. Perhaps he would at least ask whether she needed to leave the table.

He did neither.

She lowered her gaze, pretending to be interested in the glass she was holding. She had known better than to expect much from him, and yet some foolish part of her still seemed to wait whenever an opportunity presented itself. It was a habit she had never quite managed to break, no matter how often he reminded her that she should have stopped expecting anything from him a long time ago.

"Are you sure you’re all right?" Frederick asked.

Rosaline looked up.

Her brother had leaned forward, his attention fixed on her rather than on the conversation the others were trying to resume. There was no elaborate smile on his face, no polite phrase designed to satisfy the people around him. He simply looked concerned.

"You were coughing quite badly," he continued. "Do you need to rest? We can have someone bring you something if your throat is still bothering you."

For a moment, Rosaline did not know what to say. The question was simple, but the difference between Frederick’s concern and their father’s silence was difficult to ignore. Her father had sat only a short distance away, close enough to hear every cough, and had not said a word. Frederick, on the other hand, had noticed and asked without needing to be prompted.

It was a small thing. Perhaps to anyone else at the table, it would have meant very little.

To Rosaline, it meant more than she wanted to admit.

"I’m all right, Frederick," she assured him. "It only caught me by surprise. Thank you for asking."