It hardly mattered. Ariana let one of the servants fetch her a drink, and then she waited until everyone had seen that she’d entered the room. Maga ran to her immediately, and her parents followed, no doubt ready to give a very public and very emotional welcome to her, but Ariana held up her hand to stop them.
Clutching her drink, she addressed everyone in a loud voice. “As this dinner is given in my honor since I have returned, I thought I’d give a small speech to thank you all for welcoming me.”
That sounded good, didn’t it? All around her, everyone was smiling and nodding in approval.
Excellent. Ariana cleared her throat. “Except for the fact, of course, that I’d rather not be welcomed at all. While I was away, I discovered that the man who’d been courting me, the Duke of Risciter, was actually a violent pervert who attempted to violate and kill me. I was present when he slaughtered an entire brothel full of women, and if it hadn’t been for the actions of one very brave man, I might have died. That man is Keirth Transman, and he’s been wrongly arrested for a crime he didn’t commit. His only crime was to protect me.”
At this point, Ariana’s mother was trying to shush her. “Ariana, please.” She turned to the other people in the room. “She’s been through quite an ordeal. I’m sure she doesn’t know what she’s saying.”
But Ariana only spoke louder, doing her best to drown out her mother. “He does not deserve the treatment given him, and I do not wish to stay here. Keirth and I are in love, you see, and before he was arrested, we were to be married—”
But she didn’t get any more of it out, because her mother, her father, and a cadre of servants propelled her from the parlor and away from the guests.
* * *
Ariana sat in a chair in one of her family’s studies. Her father had a drink, which he rested on the mantle of the fireplace. Her mother was sitting in a chair opposite Ariana. She’d been crying, but Ariana didn’t care.
“You’ve upset your mother terribly,” said her father.
“It was completely inappropriate, Ariana,” said her mother. “How could you say things like that in front of our guests?” She twisted her hands in her lap. “They’ll all be talking about it, that’s for sure. The scandal. You won’t be able to show your face for months, and your family will be just as tarred with your broad strokes of disaster. What were you thinking?”
She’d been thinking exactly that, of course. If she could get the word out on Keirth’s innocence, maybe it would help. It was the only thing she could think of to do. Now that it was done, she didn’t much care what her family thought or what society thought either. Ariana sat rigidly, refusing to answer.
“We didn’t have to travel all the way from Wendo to welcome you back, you know,” said her father. “When we learned you were here, we came to you, we organized this dinner in your honor—”
“On short notice, too,” added her mother, “and you know how difficult such things can be.”
“—and this is how you repay us,” her father finished. “We didn’t raise you to be so ungrateful.”
Ariana could barely get her head around this. Her parents could not seriously be so concerned with appearances that they scolded her now, did they? She narrowed her eyes. “What could possibly have made you think that the appropriate way to greet me after what had happened would be a dinner party?”
Her parents both looked bewildered.
Her mother fluttered a hand at her chest. “Well, there wasn’t time to organize anything more elaborate. It was the best we could do.” She looked up at her husband. “She is ungrateful.”
Ariana squeezed her eyes shut. “Not something more elaborate. Something less elaborate. I’m sure you scoured the nets while I was gone. You read what they said was happening to me.”
“Well, we thought you were dead, darling,” said her father. “Your mother sobbed for days. She was inconsolable. Having you back alive, whole and unharmed, was the best news we’d ever received.”
“So, you decided to throw a dinner party?” Ariana realized she was furious. Her parents didn’t seem to care about her well-being one bit. If the nets were to be believed, she’d been through a horrific experience. And while the news stories didn’t have all the details right, Ariana had been through hell. The last thing she needed was for everyone to pretend it hadn’t happened and keep on as though things were normal.
Her mother’s lip trembled. “Oh, Ariana, they were saying horrible things about you. And then you were dead, and I thought...” She reached for her. “Of course, I’m glad to have you back, but how we’ll salvage any of it, I don’t know. When this all started, you were practically engaged to Risciter, the most eligible bachelor in the sector, and now, after everything, well, I simply don’t know what kind of life you’ll have. It’s not the life I would have wanted for you. I don’t want you dead, of course. I want you alive, but...”