Free Beauty's Curse by Traci E. Hall

she’d wanted to talk about anyway.
    â€œOur family is filled with great healers, and one daughter in each generation is supposed to be able to heal with Boadicea’s magic flowing through her hands. Our generation got two. My older sister, Celestia. She’s very petite and has one green eye, one blue.”
    Rourke frowned.
    â€œAnd my younger sister, Ela, who looks like she’s supposed to. She can see auras. And I—I can play the lute and make perfume. Do you see how this is unfair? My grandmother can heal, and my mother—well, she cannot. But she’s beautiful—so beautiful that my father fell in love with her when he was raiding the Welsh lands and he took her. Which is why she thinks that beauty should be enough. She doesn’t understand that I want to be more. And when I try and explain it to her, she makes me learn another instrument, or bids me concoct another lotion.”
    â€œHow many instruments do you have?” Rourke asked, remembering the light callous he’d felt on her thumb.
    â€œSeven.” She laughed softly. “I used to dream of cutting my hair and running away to join the traveling players. But then,” her sigh was heavy, “I would think of never seeing my family again, and I just couldn’t do it. They love me, and I love them. Oft times that emotion is more binding than chains. Have you ever been in love?”
    â€œNo.” His answer was immediate. Being raised among the court by nursemaids and servant girls hadn’t been horrible, and, thanks to his foster siblings, it hadn’t even been that lonely. He’d always been quick to find the girl who would give him sweets in exchange for a smile, and as he got older, he learned to trade his smile for other things. Love was most often a commodity to be bargained over, and in those instances of true love, it was a weakness.
    â€œI have never been in love either. Although I’ve seen it, and I believe in love’s power, I have never fallen under its spell.”
    Intrigued, Rourke said, “You sound like a jaded court pet.”
    â€œI am not jaded, or spoiled. I, Lord Rourke, am a realist. Because I also believe that a marriage between two people with the same values can last, and perhaps affection can turn into love.”
    Her smoky tones made her a natural storyteller, and her subject matter made her even more compelling. “I’d wager you’d have been a popular minstrel, perhaps even in the king’s court.” Where someone as fresh as she would get trampled, until finding a protector, Rourke thought.
    The sound of liquid being poured came between them, and then Galiana said, “Here, it’s lemon and honey. Careful, though, ’tis hot.”
    He heard her sit across from him, and she took a sip.
    â€œYou didn’t need magic to heal me. My leg is better.”
    Her cup clanked against the saucer, and he imagined her hurriedly setting it aside. “You could’ve died.”
    â€œBut I didn’t.”
    â€œWell,” she paused, “it was only because I was able to follow my sister’s directions. She kept a book of medicines. Although from what I have been reading, your inability to see most likely stems from the blow to the temple, not the cut so close to your eye. Or perhaps the blow to the back of your head.”
    It was the way she said it, so sorrowfully, that made him reach out his hand. “I am sorry,” she said. He was surprised when she joined her hand to his.
    As soon as their fingers touched, he was hit with inspiration. He needed her, and she was bored with her life as a lady in the country. She went on about proposals of marriage for the beautiful people, and yet she was unwed. Galiana had to be one of those passively pretty girls who never called attention to themselves. No wonder she rebelled against a beautiful mother!
    He could tell her just enough to win her assistance, and perhaps she would