The wedding ceremony itself was a splashy affair, a melding of traditions from America and Thesolo. Portia had been ordained somewhere online and performed the American portion of the ceremony, funny and moving and full of all the love she felt for her friends, because Portia didn’t hide those things.

Johan was unable to stop glancing at Nya across the aisle from him, dressed in simple white linen that contrasted Naledi’s bright yellow gown. Tears streamed down her full cheeks, appled from her wide smile, and the joy radiating from her was palpable, as it had been when she’d spoken of the wedding on the jet. She caught his eye as she laughed at a joke Portia cracked about food delivery services, and Johan was struck by a thought that almost made him topple over in front of the audience: Is this how she would look at me as we exchanged vows?

No. He didn’t wonder things like that. He didn’t want things like that.

The rest of the ceremony had passed in a blur of affection and readings and dancing priestesses and joy. And now Johan was at the reception, drinking wine and wondering why Nya’s joyful face and shining eyes wouldn’t leave his mind.

He reminded himself of that again as he stood beside a dignitary from Zamunda, the wedding reception whirling around them. The twenty-piece band on the stage, with at least ten of those pieces being rhythm instruments, played a bass-heavy cover of a pop song that had been popular a couple of years before, and Johan tapped his foot in time.

“It is lovely, yes? This wedding?” Mawa, the Zamundan diplomat, asked. “Almost as lovely as the union of our king and queen all those years ago.”

“Quite lovely,” he said. “I hear the wedding of Njaza’s king last month was lovely as well.”

Mawa said nothing and when he looked at her she was nodding nervously. “Ah. Yes. Yes. Quite. Er . . . the bride was lovely! She’s from Thesolo, so Sanyu made a good match for his people.”

Njaza had a bit of a reputation, but Mawa’s reaction did not bode well for his upcoming visit, or Sanyu’s union.

“Did they seem happy?”

“Oh, look, there is my friend, the ambassador from Druk. I have not seen him in ages. Please excuse me!” Mawa executed a quick bow and rushed away toward the man dressed in the saffron robes of a monk.

That wasn’t suspicious at all.

He sidled closer to the next conversation, the group of men he’d been keeping an eye on since they’d settled in the space next to him and the ambassador. He’d found that when you offered the elite free drink, they usually talked about things that they shouldn’t. Johan had a feeling that’s why the rich were always celebrating something or someone with an open bar.

The group of men in the traditional garments of tribal elders sipped their drinks and spoke animatedly in Thesotho. The way they huddled together said they were speaking of things they didn’t want shared.

Johan wasn’t fluent by any means, but he made out “Alehk Jerami” and “bastard” and a few other curse words, which was good. No coups were being fomented in this corner of the ballroom. Then he heard “Nya” and “offense to Ingoka,” which was not good.

“She should not be here,” one man said, switching to English as the upper class in many countries often did. “It is said that she knew of his actions and did nothing.”

“How would she know?” The man next to him raised his dark gray brows. “She is simple, they say. That’s why he hid her away for so long, no?”

“I heard he kept her in a plastic bubble,” added another man.

“That was a film,” the first man said, rolling his eyes. “She worked at the orphanage in Lek Hemane.”

“Even if she wasn’t weak as a fledgling and silly as a fainting goat, no man would ruin himself with a traitor’s daughter,” the second man said, mouth pulled into a grimace.

Johan fumed as he considered all of the ways he could insert himself into the situation and defend her but causing a scene at Thabiso’s wedding was beyond the pale even for Bad Boy Jo-Jo—even if he wanted to kick each one of the men in the back of the knee for their rudeness.

Nya had told him how people thought of her, but Johan hadn’t realized the traits he liked in her could be seen through such a negative lens. She wasn’t weak or silly, but these men spoke as if it were a fact. He supposed to them it was one—that was how things worked. Someone said something with confidence, and then everyone assumed it to be true, and then it was true. That was how he’d become the playboy prince.

His phone vibrated in his pocket, and he pulled it out quickly, hoping it was Lukas, but it was his stepfather. He made his way into a plant-lined alcove and accepted the call.

He hadn’t heard from his brother in days, and the nagging feeling that something was wrong and he didn’t know had been assailing him since he’d stepped off the plane.

“Is everything gutt, Forshett?” he asked, pulling at his collar, which seemed to tighten as the low-level panic that he’d been suppressing ballooned inside of him.

He hoped for the usual gutt from his stepfather to allay his fears, but the king sighed.

“It’s your brother,” Linus said gravely.

Johan’s knees almost gave out, and he leaned back against the wall as casually as he could muster. The corrugations of a reed tapestry pressed into his back, but he couldn’t force his body to move just yet.