I sighed. I was not going to find someone to fill the void that Lord Beck had left inside of me, if I failed to lose Ser Willoughby first. Bonding over sabotage and self-loathing didn't help that goal. And if I did not lose Ser Willoughby? If I did not find the kind of company I was seeking? There was no promise I would not explode from pure devastation. But then, I considered the next step if I did.

I hadn't been with anyone since the Marquis.

'The best way to get over a man is to get under someone else,' I'd heard too many men say before. And not just men, but knights. Oreian knights, the smartest of the smart. And specifically, Ser Willoughby had been present a time or two for the conversations I overheard. And, when I sat down and thought about the words, they were decidedly good advice. To surmount the gravity and guilt and upset that was Lord Beck's and I's sudden separation, I would have to find another man to lay beneath. It was simple. Sex was what I had given him; sex was what would rob us of the uniqueness of our connection. It was the only solution that made sense. I was a woman of sense.

Even if I tore myself apart with insecurity every second, I had to bear myself that way again.

But what would I even say to the man I'd hope to bargain with? How would I convince him to spend the night with me? To never mind who I was? Maybe if I said I was nobody of consequence? But that felt ominous, and why would I be worth the social dividends of sex without marriage if I was nobody?

"Ugh, it's useless," I whined. I exhaled, wedging myself through a man and his friend. "Excuse me, my pardon, my pardon," I sang, but as I tripped, I had to grip the looser bits of his blouse. I lifted myself but came closer to his body, completely unaware of my error, until he smiled and looked down at me far too curious.

"I would beg your pardon," he started.

His statement cracked with half the intent to laugh, but before I could release the linen of his shirt, his hands laid over mine on his chest.

"But I ain't one to deny a pretty girl a dance."

"Gah, I—" I gasped; he was older than Mr. Henrik. I snatched my fingers from his and bolted them to my dress' bodice. "No!" I shook my head. A curl or two fell out of the weave of my side-braided hair. "No, I–"

As I had hoped, Ser Willoughby sailed past the would-be shield and me. Beyond the man's shoulder, I saw the moment my knight realized I had vanished and his excitement to find me. I was suddenly unsure of if I had achieved a victory or not.

"Well, let's have it then, m'lady," the man chimed.

He stepped closer, and I dipped back, my spine nearly the letter C. I twisted around, pretending to admire the peacoat on the nearest bloke.

"Oh, how quaint!" I hurried. "I should buy one!" But I wasn't sure anyone had heard me over the ascending violins.

Before I knew it, the man had caught my wrist and spun me around into his bubble. A hand at the small of my waist had me sucking in enough air to power the whip of mine to his cheek and with such a force that there was a dampened crack beneath the whole Apple Faire's melody. His friend gawked. He let go, touching the sting of where I'd struck him. His flushed skin grew pinker and pinker by the second. I stumbled backward into somebody else. There was a loud protest out of the collision, but I didn't dare take my eyes off the other to look, and nothing more came of it.

"I don't want to dance," I told the stranger.

"I meant no harm, miss," he said. He displayed his palms at me, proving he was abandoning the idea. There were trees carved into the green hide tied around his arms. Bracers.

My heart was racing.

"I don't know you," I muttered, but I did know the cuffs as armor. He was a Sword of some sort. He was wearing armor. I worried he was a mercenary.

"No." His face softened with the word. "No ill will. I meant ya no harm, m'lady."

I nodded. Then he turned back to his friend, and they trudged off. Their voices faded with their figures.

I looked around for Ser Willoughby, but I couldn't find him. After twenty minutes of scouring the market for his dumb square head and ridiculously dull spring attire, a real accidental camouflage, I swallowed my defeat. The revelation hit me. It weighed on me like a sack of stones upon my back.

I was alone.

I was unescorted in the Capitol, I was lost, and I was very vulnerable! Anyone who recognized me, anyone who didn't– They could rob me! At any point! My mother had been robbed once! I was a stupid girl! Just like she had been! Stupidly stupid!

Nothing looked familiar! There were banners and signs that covered the names of restaurants and landmarks that I could've used for reference a day before but were mysteries then. Even with my mother's dagger strapped to my thigh, I felt impossibly dense. Why had it not occurred to me until that moment that to use a dagger beneath my skirt, I would have to hike the skirt to even hope to reach it?

It was a terrible place for a weapon on a woman wanting to avoid access to things beneath her skirt!

I tried to swing my dress to practice how I would draw it, but it was nothing like the sword Elías had taught me to use. It was too difficult to find beneath the layers of wool fit for Autumn, and I was starting to question the integrity of the makeshift sheath I had used to secure it. What good would a belt and pouch do if it was too tightly fastened?

A woman brushed me with her market haul, and I near-jumped out my skin to parry it. Her face bent with valid concern, but she kept moving, and I? I had no choice but to keep venturing into the noise as well. Be it to find my knight, or saunter home, or– no.

No! I thought.

I stood taller, forcing myself to remember why I had come, why I had taken the dagger in the first place, and the belt. Why I had dared defy my brother's request to stay close. I had risked an eternity in an empty tower with nothing but my books should he break away from his painter long enough to discover and then reveal my sins to Mother, and not for naught! By God's hand or mine, I was going to seize the reins of my injured vanity and prove once and for all that I—!

I didn't know what I was proving.

I didn't know what I wanted to prove. Not really. I wanted relief, I thought. Hope? To believe that that one night with a man that I was madly in love with had not forever ruined me? That a woman was more than the laws of virginity and that she could rightfully agree to the embrace of a man if she should want it and not be damned by her 'loose morals' when it was granted?

Whatever wrong Lord Beck had inferred from our encounter, well, I... My thoughts were scrambled.

I was alone, and I was lonely. I wanted to see Kristjan, even if I did not wish to admit it. Even if I knew it was a bad idea. That he would only hurt me, reject me, turn me away. A part of me hoped that I would find him at the faire. That he would take one look at me, terrified and forgotten in the square, and he would realize he'd made a mistake in abandoning our future.

Night and day, I sat on the window sill of my forgotten tower reading. Romances and fantasies and I looked out upon the gardens, and I wished to see his carriage arrive from beyond the mountain's face. I longed to watch him pass the ivory mares of our iron gate, march up to my father and finally ask him for my hand.

And I hated myself for it. I hated that I still loved him after... He left me. Without signal, without sorrow, without hope, and...

I still wanted to hear his voice. It was low and warm like melted butter, and when it would visit my thoughts, even in a negative capacity, I felt comforted by the friend. I wanted to feel his skin on my skin. To feel his kiss. His parted, clover-round mouth against mine, and I wanted to make love to him. Not like that night, but better. Sweeter. I wanted to remedy whatever it was that broke between us.

But lovemaking was what had broken between us. Wasn't it?

I hadn't seen it coming. The moment I thought must have been an act of commitment led him to comments of loose morals and realizations that I was not fit to be his wife.

I shook the misery.

The Apple Faire was the only major event surrounding the Season that wasn't tainted by my broken heart. It was the only place that did not store a reminder of the Marquis, and it was the only place where I would breathe life back into my lifeless coil. It was where I would find a man willing enough to warm a bed with me for the evening and, with that heat, thaw my wounded, icy heart to regain enough feeling to move on... and properly.

'The best way to get over a man is to get under someone else,' I repeated.