‘I’d not parade you half-naked before the peers of an entire province, Phèdre.’

‘I know,’ I whispered. ‘Hyacinthe, that’s the problem.’

I don’t think, before that moment, that he truly grasped the nature of what I was. He knew, of course; had always known, and had been the one person who’d never cared for what, but only who I was. I saw him comprehend it now, and feared. It could change everything between us.