Chapter 1

I was the King's most favored mistress — more indulged than any other woman at court. And yet, after all this time, I still hadn't given him an heir.

That day, just as I lifted the fertility tonic Doctor Rose Saylon had prepared for me to my lips, a string of glowing text appeared out of nowhere, hanging in the air in front of me.

[The hero really does spoil the heroine rotten, letting her waltz in and out of the palace disguised as a physician.]

[Well, our girl doesn't want to be caged up at court, does she? Forget being the King's favorite — he would hand her the crown itself if she asked.]

[Meanwhile the other woman is over here choking down her medicine like a good girl, no idea it's the slow-acting poison the heroine cooked up just for her. Poor thing comes from a military family, and the hero's only using her.]

[And every single time our hero "visits" her, she's actually drugged unconscious first. Then his captain of the guard, Connor Browning, takes his place in bed.]

My head was spinning.

What in the world were these words even talking about?

Had someone found out that I'd been eyeing that broad-shouldered, narrow-waisted guard at the King's side this whole time?

Chapter 1

Steam curled up from the fertility tonic in my hands, its bitterness needling at the back of my nose, but it wasn't the smell that turned my stomach. It was the lines of glowing text hovering in front of my eyes.

Had I been drinking a slow poison this whole time?

The person across from me was a woman disguised as a physician?

And that line still rang in my head: every time the King "visited" her, she would get drugged first, so his guard could take his place.

I went quiet for a long moment. Strangely, the first thing that came to mind wasn't anger.

It was the memory of Connor Browning standing under the corridor eaves a few days ago, shielding me from the wind on my way back to my chambers.

Broad shoulders, a narrow waist, the veins on the backs of his hands drawn tight, his throat moving slightly as he bowed his head to greet me.

I remembered thinking, at the time, that the King's guard was the perfect guy.

And remembering the ache in my legs after every night the "King" supposedly spent with me, I decided my taste hadn't been half bad after all.

"My Lady?" Doctor Saylon's voice was soft. "Your medicine's getting cold."

I lifted my eyes to look at her.

She wore pale blue official robes, delicate and neat, her gaze demurely lowered. However you looked at her, she was a strikingly handsome young physician.

But with those glowing words as my guide, everything about her now looked wrong.

This was the woman the King had hidden away in the Royal Infirmary as his secret love.

And she was also, apparently, the one who'd been poisoning me all along.

I let out a small laugh, then lowered my head and brought the cup to my lips. Shielded by my wide sleeve, I only wet the corner of my mouth before tipping the rest of the tonic into the hidden lining sewn into my sleeve.

"So bitter." I frowned lightly. "Doctor Saylon, your prescriptions get worse every time."

She only saw me drink it. The faint wariness in her eyes dissolved without a trace.

"Good medicine is always bitter," she said quietly. "If my lady wants a child, some suffering is only natural."

I raised my head and studied her fine, delicate eyes. Why hadn't I noticed the hint of defiance there all along?

"Doctor Saylon, you're right. Anything I truly want, I've always known I'd have to suffer for myself."

Her lips curved, as if she were laughing at me for still pining after something that could never be mine. She lowered her head and murmured, "As my lady wishes," before taking her leave.

Once she'd gone, I handed the tonic soaked into my sleeve to my maid, Helen Powell, to have tested, then sat down at my mirror and began unpinning the ornaments from my hair, one by one.

The woman in the mirror had striking features, her eyes naturally tilted up at the corners. However gentle I played myself in public, that underlying sharpness never quite disappeared.

When Helen came back, her voice was shaking.

"My Lady, the fish in the tank. They're all dead."

I nodded. "I know."

She dropped to her knees. "My Lady, let me go fetch the Queen Mother right now!"

"And what good would that do?" I glanced at her, unmoved. "Let the King pick some convenient scapegoat, then hold me and tell me how sorry he is that I've suffered?"

Helen froze.

I set the last gold hairpin back into its case and said quietly, "If we're going to make a scene, we wait until the evidence has grown legs and walked itself right up to me."

I paused, then looked up.

"Go. Bring Connor Browning here."

By the time he arrived, the sky had already gone dark.

He stood in the middle of the hall in his black guard's uniform, the sash at his waist cinching his frame into a hard, lean line, his eyes lowered, not daring to look at me.

I leaned back against the couch, chin propped on my hand, studying him for a long while.

I used to believe the King truly loved me. Even though he'd turned out delicate and frail as a willow in the wind, nothing like the man I'd once pictured for myself, I'd never once stepped out of line.

Now that he'd delivered exactly the dish I liked straight to my mouth, it would be an insult to Heaven itself not to accept it.

"Connor." I let the words come out slow. "Look up at me."

He obeyed, though his gaze still stopped a careful inch short of the hem of my skirt, not daring to cross the line.

Very proper.

So proper you'd never guess he'd already been in my bed.

Chapter 2

I laughed once. "Are you afraid of me?"

"I wouldn't dare."

"Wouldn't dare, or don't want to?"

His face went red in an instant.

Watching that small, telling shift in him, I felt a flicker of amusement stir in my chest.

So he wasn't made of wood after all. No one had simply bothered to notice what was going on in his head before.

I waved Helen out of the room, and once the doors had shut behind her, I said quietly, "Your younger sister is recovering from an illness in the southern district. She's living off one dose of medicine a month from the Royal Infirmary, isn't she?"

Connor's expression changed instantly.

"Your mother died young. Your father gambled away everything, and it took the sale of your family's ancestral home just to buy your way into the King's guard. Most of the pay you've earned with your life these past years has gone straight into that bottomless pit."

I rose and walked slowly toward him, reaching up to smooth the front of his collar.

He went rigid as stone.

I smiled, gentle as anything. "Connor. Tell me. What happens to a guard caught in an affair with a royal mistress?"

His throat worked. His voice came out tight. "What is it my lady wants to say?"

I pressed a fingertip lightly along his collar. "Don't worry. I don't want your life."

"If the King can use your sister to threaten you, then I can save her just as easily."

His breath went heavy.

"There's something else." I lifted my eyes to his. "Since you've already been in my bed, changing masters isn't such a difficult thing to arrange."

The bluntness of it made the tips of his ears go red.

"You'd do well to think of your own future. The King isn't a man who remembers old favors.

"And what if Doctor Saylon decides to get rid of me one day by accusing the two of us of an affair? Do you think the King would spare you? That's the kind of treason charge that wipes out a whole bloodline."

Sure enough, Connor fell silent for a long while before finally dropping to one knee.

"What does my lady want of me?"

I bent down and lifted his chin with my hand.

"From today on, I want your loyalty. Only to me."

The glowing words in front of me, the ones that called themselves "the comments," suddenly shook wildly.

[Forget switching masters, this is switching husbands! Devoted guard and ruthless beauty, I am SO into this ship.]

[I came here for the leads breaking free of court rules for true love, but honestly, the King's mistress's storyline is the one that's got me hooked.]

I paid the words no mind and let go of his chin. "Tell me about Doctor Saylon first. Who is she, really, and how does she know the King?"

The room went quiet for a moment.

Connor finally spoke. "Her name is Rose Saylon. She's from Vosvale. Two years ago, the King was attacked during a trip south, near Summerton, and she took a blade meant for him. Afterward, he brought her back to the capital, meaning to bring her into his court as a mistress, but she refused."

"Refused?" I laughed softly. "That does take some nerve."

"She said she'd rather be a shadow at the King's side than a mistress trapped in the back halls."

Connor paused. "The King indulged her completely. He fabricated a new identity for her, borrowed from the deceased young son of the Infirmary's Head Physician, a man named Saylon, and used it to place her inside."

To anyone else, she must have looked like a legend: a woman who wanted nothing but the King's true heart, not a title.

But if she'd truly been above such things, she wouldn't have come to my chambers day after day just to poison me out of her own jealousy.

"Is she actually skilled as a physician?" I asked.

"Somewhat," Connor answered. "The King worried she'd be found out, so he only let her move through the court under the excuse of checking pulses and delivering medicine."

I nodded, then asked, "And the poison. Was that the King's idea, or hers?"

Connor's head snapped up. "The King only told her to switch the fertility tonic for an abortifacient. He never ordered her to poison you."

His face went pale. "But she was the first one to suggest my lady shouldn't be carrying a child at all. And after all, it's been me with you every single day..."

I smiled.

So that was how it was.

The King couldn't bear to give up the Krenion family's military power, and he couldn't bear to give up his beloved either, so to stay faithful to her, he'd sent Connor to give me his "favor" in his place.

Rose Saylon wanted the King all to herself, and to make sure his little act never turned real, she'd gone ahead and poisoned me through the very medicine meant to end a pregnancy.

One playing the villain, one playing the saint.

One handing me favor, the other handing me poison.

Truly, they were a match made in heaven. Two rotten scoundrels, perfect for each other.

I touched the sapphire bracelet on my wrist. "I want you to report to me every single meeting between the King and Rose Saylon, down to the hour and the place."

"And one more thing." I looked into his dark eyes and smiled slowly. "From now on, on any night the King is meant to be staying here at Larkspur Hall, you'll still come to me, exactly as before."

Connor's pupils contracted.

I spoke as if I were discussing something perfectly ordinary.

"I want a child.

"It doesn't matter whose child it really is.

"What matters is that he comes out of my body, that he has a mother like me, and that means he'll have every advantage a future could offer."

Connor stared at me for a long moment before finally rasping, "My lady, you have quite the nerve."

I let go of him and straightened.

"Only just noticing?"

The words in front of me scrolled by in a blur.

[Wait, what? She wants to have a baby with the guard?]

[Holy hell, is the King's mistress staging a coup? Why does their whole storyline suddenly feel so deliciously forbidden?]

[Sorry, it took me exactly zero seconds to accept this pairing.]

[But that's not even how the story's supposed to go. Aren't the King's mistress and the King's guard supposed to get caught in bed together in six months? Then she would feel so guilty toward the King that she sets herself on fire at Larkspur Hall?]

Looking at those words, I could only find the whole idea absurd. Set myself on fire?

That wasn't the kind of thing a general's daughter like me would ever do.

Soon enough, I'd make sure they all learned exactly what happened to anyone who tried to scheme against me.

Chapter 3

Connor turned out to be even more useful than I'd expected.

Maybe it was some lingering sense of loyalty from our night together, but he was the one who first swapped out the poisoned fertility tonic for something harmless.

He also kept me updated on everything the King and Rose said and did, letting me dodge most of her open attacks and hidden schemes.

Before long, he'd even started intercepting the notes the King and Rose passed back and forth in secret, letting me read them first without either of them ever knowing.

Rose was clever. But the biggest flaw of clever people is that they always think they've seen through everything.

She looked down on me, a royal mistress trapped in the back halls, and just as much on the King's occasional empty affection toward other women.

She was certain the King still loved her best, so even when he refused to abolish the harem outright, she always found some excuse to explain it away.

But the more certain a woman like that was of her place, the less she could survive betrayal.

So the first thing I did was plant a seed of doubt.

I made sure a baby's bib embroidered with a tiger's head was in plain sight the next time she came to check my pulse.

I smiled sweetly. "The King once told me our child was destined to be the finest in the kingdom. We even picked out a name together already."

Rose's face was so dark by the time she left.

Sure enough, within a few days, Connor came to report back.

"Rose had a falling-out with the King."

I was reclining on the couch, peeling grapes, and I laughed at that. "Over what?"

"She asked him whether, if you became pregnant, he'd name your child his heir."

I raised an eyebrow. "And what did the King say?"

Connor paused awhile before replying, "He told her not to let her imagination run wild."

I laughed out loud.

A woman like Rose could claim all she liked that she didn't want to be trapped in the harem, but deep down, no one cared more about being the King's "only one" than she did.

The moment she realized his devotion wasn't as solid as she'd assumed, that thorn would work its way straight into her heart.

All I had to do was give it a gentle push, and let it dig in deeper.

The floating comments appeared again in front of me, and this time they were arguing with each other.

[How is the female lead cracking this easily? Does she even have a brain?]

[Our girl is just pure and kind! The evil mistress's fans need to stop dragging our sweetheart!]

[Hey, you! Pure and kind enough to poison the second mistress and offer up a guard for the male lead to sleep with in her place? Is that the kind of pure and kind you'd raise your own kid on?]

[Honestly, I'm getting a little tired of this whole "King's mistress exists to be collateral damage for the leads' romance" trope. If they love each other so much, why does someone else have to get hurt?]

Watching the comments swing further and further in my favor, I couldn't help but smile.

After all, I still needed them for spoilers. With their support, winning would only get easier.

Rose, sure enough, panicked.

Within five days, Connor brought me a packet of intercepted medicine residue late one night.

"My lady, she's tripled the cinnabar in the fertility tonic compared to before." He kept his voice low, his jaw tight.

I pinched a bit of the residue between my fingers and brought it to my nose.

Vicious. She was clearly afraid the plan would drag on too long, and wanted me dead sooner rather than later.

I wiped my fingertips clean with a handkerchief. "Go get things ready. The King will absolutely come to Larkspur Hall tonight."

Connor looked faintly surprised. "The King's been in a foul mood these past few days, shutting Rose out entirely. He hasn't set foot in the harem at all."

I smiled and patted his shoulder.

"However foul his mood, he'll still have to swallow his pride and come coax me tonight.

"Half a month ago, I sent a secret letter to my brother, who is guarding the northern frontier. By my count, an urgent war dispatch should be arriving at the study tonight, right around dusk."

The Kharsan tribes were stirring, and the border was on edge.

With no other generals the court could rely on, the only way for the King to keep his throne steady was to lean on the Krenion family's Northern Garrison to fight and die for him.

If you wanted the horse to run, you had to feed it. And the best way to keep the Krenion family loyal was to shower their daughter with favor.

So no matter how much he was still sulking over Rose, tonight he'd have no choice but to spend the night in my bed.

Sure enough, that night, the King came.

There was still exhaustion from the day's affairs written between his brows, but his eyes softened, feigned tenderness, the moment he took my hand.

"My beloved mistress, you've suffered these past few days."

He sighed, all false sympathy. "The border's been unsettled, and the court's kept me buried in work. I've neglected you. I'll make it up to you properly tonight.

"Oh, and didn't you once say you were fond of that red coral tree the foreign envoys brought as tribute? I'll have Connor bring it to you tomorrow."

I lowered my eyes to hide the mockery in them, then handed him the cup of wine I'd laced with a sleeping draught.

"Thank you, Your Majesty. I've been sleeping poorly lately, and I've heard coral helps calm the nerves. Why not send your guard to fetch it right now?"

He waved Connor off with a glance, telling him to hurry, then drank the wine without a shred of suspicion.

Within a quarter hour, his eyes lost focus, his body sagged, and he collapsed onto the bed, dead asleep.

I slipped my hand out of his loosened grip and rinsed my mouth with cold tea.

"Come out."

A dark figure slipped silently out from behind the screen.

Connor had already retrieved the coral. He walked step by step toward the bed, glanced at the King sleeping like the dead, then fixed his gaze on me.

It wasn't the first time we'd done this. But this time, I was wide awake for it.

"My lady." His voice came out hoarse.

I leaned back against the bedpost, reached out, and hooked a finger through the sash at his waist, giving it a light tug.

He sank to one knee at the edge of the bed. His frame was tall, overwhelming up close, and yet his eyes burned with a heat he couldn't quite hide.

"Scared?" I trailed a fingertip along his throat, feeling it tremble under my touch. "The King's lying right there. If he wakes up, it's your whole bloodline that pays for it."

"I'm not afraid." He caught my wrist in his hand, fire in his eyes. "This life of mine has belonged to you for a long time now."

He leaned down, his breath scorching, and closed in around me completely.

Right in the middle of that pull and tug, golden light suddenly flared in front of my eyes.

The rows of floating text began scrolling at a frantic speed.

[HOLY CRAP HOLY CRAP! Danger alert! The female lead's caught them early!]

[Usually when the male lead visits Larkspur Hall, he has the female lead stay over in the side chamber with him. This time he didn't call for her, so she got scared he'd actually fall for the mistress for real, and rushed over to expose the affair!]

[I'm dying, I only just started shipping this and now the King's mistress needs to RUN! Getting caught in bed with another man like this is a death sentence!]

I stared at the scrolling text, my eyelid twitching nonstop.

There was a crash. Someone had slammed open the courtyard gate at Larkspur Hall.

A moment later, Rose's voice rang out through the entire hall.

"Queen Mother! I stake my life on it, the King's mistress is committing adultery in the palace this very moment! His Majesty is in danger!"