Hers From The Start: A Collection of First In Series Reverse Harem

by Laura Greenwood

  “Majesty, please calm yourself…” I said quickly.

  Too late, he was already bringing his hand forward, and I stifled a gasp as I waited for the sharp point of a knife that never came…

  In his fingers, he held four pearls.

  What?

  I watched as he brought them up to Cassandra’s smiling lips and pressed them softly there. She gave him a look that insinuated she rather it be his mouth than the pearls. “Thank you,” he whispered. “For letting me borrow these for a spell…”

  Oh, my…

  I frowned, feeling heat rise up to flame my pale cheeks. She hadn’t been lying… Oh, how infuriating!

  The prince turned to me with a smile on his face and before I could register what was happening, he dropped the pearls into my palm. “Make sure these get put back in their proper place, Maudey?” He winked and the rage that bubbled up was nearly unbearable. The smile that Cassandra shot me, the one that said “I told you so” was even worse.

  “You gave the queen’s pearls to him?!” I demanded angrily. In truth, I may have been angrier at being tricked, instead of really angry about the pearls. But that stupid grin on the prince’s face was so...so…

  Ugh!

  “What’s wrong with me, now?” the prince smirked. “I am royalty, after all.”

  “A royal pain in the ass is what you are,” I muttered before I could stop myself. Too late, the words were out and the prince was looking at me the way he’d looked at Cassandra just a moment ago. Like I was a mouse he was planning to pounce on.

  “Is that any way to speak to your future King, Maudey?” he teased.

  I groaned and marched over to the table and yanked his mother’s dress into my arms. “You are a miserable, childish oaf!” I practically shrieked. “Selfish little boy!” The words were spilling out of my mouth now, and I had absolutely no control over them. Never in my life had I ever insulted the royalty that kept me fed and alive.

  But damn if it didn’t feel good.

  “What did you call me?” he asked, more amused than upset, and that made me all the more angry.

  “You heard what I said, prince. You and your brothers are a selfish lot. I can’t believe you’d risk her position in the household because you wanted to play with your mother’s pearls. What did you use them for, anyway?”

  He smirked. “A game of marbles with my brothers.”

  “Marbles!” I scoffed. “Insufferable, childish lot.” I hmphed rather dramatically and pierced Cassandra with a glowing glare before turning on my heel, dress and pearls clutched tightly in my hands, and marching up the staircase. I passed through the kitchens without a word, though I was fuming enough that I could have lit their pots and pans.

  I navigated my way through the hallways of the castle home, holding the pearls so tightly in my palm that it hurt. I didn’t care. All that spun through my mind was the anger shaking me. It was all I saw. I didn’t pay attention to my surroundings as I stormed about the castle.

  Only when I felt a hard tug on my arm was I jerked back into my senses. I was whipped around, and let out a small gasp of surprise when I found, once again, the prince before me. I glared and jerked back.

  “What do you want?” I snapped.

  He looked at me with genuine confusion. “What’s wrong with you? Why are you so mad?”

  I scoffed. “What a good question! Why am I mad? Well let’s see…” I tapped my finger against my chin in a sarcastic gesture before exclaiming loudly, “Ah! I know! Could it be because in your selfish need to play you could have cost both Cassandra and I our positions in the household?”

  He snickered. “I wouldn’t have let mum throw you out. You know that.”

  I glared. “No, prince. I don’t know that. I know nothing about you except that you put your own selfish pleasures before anyone else.”

  He frowned then, and if I weren’t so angry, I would have thought the gesture adorable. “That’s not true…”

  “Really? Do you have any idea how long it will take to sew these pearls back onto the dress? Do you know the work it will take to make it look perfect once again so that the Queen doesn’t question it? Do you know how much string it will take to use? How many candles I might have to use to burn through the night, losing precious hours of sleep, to fix what you destroyed?”

  He blinked, looking taken aback. “But...it was only four pearls…”

  “Only four pearls. Ha! Spoken like the true epitome of selfishness. It is only four pearls to you, prince, because you aren’t the one who has to waste your time fixing it. I have other jobs, you know. I have other things I have to do to keep this castle running smoothly and you have done nothing but take time away from my already busy schedule. So excuse me if I don’t find your playtime funny or even the slightest bit amusing.”

  I turned around and started to walk away, when I felt him tug on me again, whipping me back around. His hair curled just over the tips of his eyelashes, and his bright eyes were regarding me with the oddest expression that I didn’t have time to ponder or worry about.

  “Let me go,” I demanded, pulling away.

  “Prideful little thing, I’m trying to apologize to you!” He reached for me again but I jerked back and he grabbed at the hem of the queen’s dress instead.

  I tugged. “Then apologize and be on your way. I have things to do.”

  “Will you hold still so I can do this properly?” He tugged on the dress and I pulled right back. But he was stronger than me, and the force of our struggle tore the dress. The sound of its tearing was like a clap of booming thunder in a dead quiet night. I watched in horror as the strings came undone and one by one, every single pearl on the bodice of the queen’s dress came toppling down.

  Clank.

  Clank.

  Clank.

  They plopped, one after the other, bouncing across the stone castle floors before rolling away. And the prince and I just watched them fall until every last one of them became still. Dozens and dozens of pearls on the ground, and a ruined dress in my hands.

  I saw my future so clearly. The queen was expecting this dress within this week, and now it was ruined. And what would I tell her? I couldn’t very well blame her own son for it. Even if she did believe me, it was still my fault. I’d pulled on the dress. I was the maid. He was the prince. I risked being sacked. He risked nothing. It was my job to make sure things ran smoothly around the castle, and in one single, clanking, ripping moment, it had been shot straight to hell.

  Slowly, the prince dropped the hem of the dress. As soon as he did, I was on my hands and knees, slowly scooping the little pearls into the pocket of the dress, making sure I didn’t miss even a single one.

  I was so frantic in my movements, that I startled when the prince’s hand settled softly over mine. I looked at it, at the intricate details of long fingers and veins against his skin, of the slightest tracings of what looked like ink on his knuckles. I looked up to find him on his hands and knees as well, staring at me softly, tenderly.

  I yanked my hand away.

  “Let me help,” he whispered.

  I could only glare. “You’ve already helped enough, don’t you think? Prince?” I turned my attention back down to the ground and kept scooping up the pearls. His gaze was intense on my figure a moment longer before he finally gave up and stood. I didn’t watch him leave, but I listened to his footfalls, each one echoing behind me like the ghost sound of the mess he was leaving behind.

  Clank.

  Clank.

  Clank.

  Chapter Two

  Adahm

  I was such a fucking dumbass.

  Not many princes were brave enough to admit that kind of thing, but I was. And her angry words had rolled off of me, like water sliding down steel blades. And I loved the way she flushed when she was pissed. I should have been angrier at all the things she had said about me, yet how could I be angry at someone for speaking the truth?

  I knew what I was, and it didn’t matter. I was a go
ds’ damn prince, and a maid’s opinion of me hardly mattered. Except…

  Seeing her on her hands and knees, eyes downcast and worried, had given me pause. For the first time ever, beyond the teasing, beyond anything else, I’d felt a sad sort of clarity.

  Maudey was used to taking what my brothers and I dished out. She’d usually glare and hmph, but she’d never vehemently spat out words the way she had earlier. It was a nice change, to see the fire in her brought to life. But at what cost had that been?

  I ran a hand through the tangles of my curls and sighed as I walked the lonely halls of the castle all the way to my room. When I opened the door, and looked up, my brother Alastair was lying across the bed, one hand across his stomach, the other cushioning his head.

  “Why so glum?” he asked without opening his eyes.

  I knew what was said about the Triplet Princes around our kingdom. We were an odd bunch, and no one could tell us apart—not even our parents—and that we were so in tune with each other, that we could feel what the other felt almost immediately.

  We had worked hard for them to believe that nonsense.

  “Mind your business, Alastair.” I kicked off my shoes and plopped onto the second bed in the room.

  At our age, it was probably strange that we all still shared a room, but Aidan had insisted. Three beds were side by side, mattresses that seemed too small for our body size. My feet hung off the end of the bed, making me feel like I was going to swallow the damn thing.

  “How do you know I’m not Aidan?”

  I shot him a look that he still didn’t see. Lazy bastard. He couldn’t even muster up the energy to open his eyes. “Don’t start with me,” I said. “I’m not in the mood.”

  That’s what made him sit up. The bed groaned under his weight as he leaned back against the headboard. I could feel the heavy weight of his eyes on me so I looked at him. “Mum catch you with the pearls?” he asked.

  I groaned. Not mum. Worse.

  He seemed to read the horror in my eyes. “Did dad catch you?”

  I shot him a look. Even if dad had caught me, he wouldn’t have cared.

  “Then who?”

  The door opened and we both looked up to find Aidan walking into the room, kicking it closed again behind him. He, like Alastair and I, wore black pants and a loose white shirt. We liked to wear the same things. I mean, we were all the same size…

  He stopped mid step, as he took in our figures and then asked, “Okay, what’s up?”

  “Adahm was just about to tell us what happened with the pearl situation…”

  I groaned. I could get away with keeping a secret from one of my brothers, but not the two of them together. They’d remind me that no secrets should exist between us. That was a great philosophy to live by, but I wasn’t sure they wanted to endure talk of Maudey. More specifically, that embarrassing situation.

  I took a breath and just spit it out. “Maude nearly had the laundress sacked for the missing pearls. When she found out I had them, she went crazier than a hybrid.”

  Aidan laughed loudly and plopped over to his bed, propping his head up on his open palm. “Oh I would have paid good rations to see that.”

  I shook my head back and forth. “No, you wouldn’t have. She started shouting at me.”

  Alastair raised his eyebrows. “Maudey never shouts.”

  “She did this time. Pissed about four little pearls…” I grumbled, pressing the back of my hand to my forehead. “You should have seen it… She yanked the dress from me, after I humbly tried to apologize, and then sent all of the pearls from the dress scattering everywhere.” Aidan slapped his knee and started laughing. I turned to him with a glare. “It wasn’t funny,” I defended. “You should have seen the look on her face…”

  “I can imagine it well enough,” Aidan dissolved into a fit of giggles. Okay, as far as me being childish, I could assure Maudey that my brother was ten times worse. We had all adapted to his personality, taken bits and pieces of each other that we wore like masks for the outside world. Sometimes, we would wear them so long, that we’d forget what our own faces looked like. It was only in these moments, in the quiet solitude of our rooms, where we were able to be completely and entirely ourselves.

  We weren’t all as mischievous as we seemed.

  Maybe a little.

  But there were other aspects to us as well, ones that no one outside of these walls knew about. We weren’t just princes, warriors, and trouble making playboys. We were so much more than that.

  Aidan was the oldest, I was the second born, and Alastair the youngest. Aidan lived for music, I lived for art, and Alastair lived for books. These were the parts of us that we didn’t show to anyone else. Secret parts of ourselves that we’d tucked so far deep, it was nearly taboo to bring it out.

  It hadn’t always been this way. It had started off as a little prank to trick mum and dad. The three of us would pretend to be each other, confusing those around us in order to get out of chores, duties, and the like. What had started off as a harmless game of fun, had suddenly expanded as we found ourselves doing it more often.

  Soon, we were playing tricks on the whole castle. The cook, I was sure, hated us the most. “I already gave you a pastry,” he would sniff indignantly. To which Aidan or Alastair would tremble their lower lip, “You gave the pastry to Adahm, not to me,” they’d protest. Voila. More treats.

  It was no longer exhausting to play the role of my brothers. It had been at one point, but after so long, I’d finally gotten used to the sensation that I wasn’t completely myself. I didn’t mind it. I didn’t mind sharing everything with them, from rooms, to secrets, to women. As long as we still had pieces of ourselves, hidden in the corners of this little room, I still felt intact.

  “The problem is,” Alastair began in his steady, slow drawl. Bringing me back to reality. “You don’t know how to apologize to women.”

  I sat up and glared at him. “Of course I know how to apologize to women. I apologize to mum all of the time!”

  Aidan snorted and then fell into another fit of laughter. I glared over my shoulder at him before turning back to Alastair. He was fighting a smile, though the corner of his lip was twitching. Smug bastard.

  “Apologizing to mum isn’t the same as apologizing to a beautiful woman…”

  “You think Maudey’s beautiful?” For some reason, a strange sensation that I didn’t recognize, shot through my chest. It was possessive. It made me want to push my brother to the ground and growl ‘mine’ over and over again in his face.

  “The point is, our mother has to forgive us. She’s family. Maudey has no such obligation. You have to woo her into forgiveness.”

  Since I didn’t want to seem overly eager, I narrowed my eyes and asked slowly, “How?”

  “Gifts, man!” Aidan called out. There was a squeaking as he got up from his mattress and started bouncing on it. “Flowers, picnics…” He gave pause to let out a small laugh. “Poetry.”

  Alastair frowned at the obvious dig against him, but responded regardless. He was the youngest, and definitely the calmest among us. “Poetry is one way of accomplishing the job…”

  I frowned. I knew absolutely nothing about poetry. “What the hell am I supposed to say to her?” I demanded. “‘Maudey, oh Maudey, I made you drop the pearls. Maudey, oh Maudey, let me be forever yours.’” I snorted.

  Alastair rolled his eyes. “That was the worst thing I’ve ever heard…”

  “How about, ‘Maudey, Maudey, your eyes are as pretty as your thighs’?” Aidan chortled.

  Alastair glared then. “Have some respect for women, Aidan. Your manners are disgusting.”

  “Oh, like you could do any better, baby brother.”

  I leaned back against my bed and looked between the two of them. They were both glaring at each other, a challenge, a dare. And because I knew them, I knew neither would resist what was bound to come next.

  “I could,” Alastair said indignantly. “I could make her fall head
over heels.”

  A pang went through me at those words. He could. If anyone could make a woman genuinely fall in love with him, it was Alastair. I tried not to feel hurt, to feel that sense of loss in my chest. Because of course, if he wooed her, he would pretend to be me. We were all one in the same. And if she fell in love with Alastair’s words, they’d be a lie. Because she wouldn’t love me for me.

  “Then go forth and prosper, little brother,” Aidan challenged. “Let’s see if Maudey really forgives Adahm with the help of your words.”

  And just like that, the deal was sealed.

  Chapter Three

  Maude

  Four pearls was nothing compared to the hundreds that had fallen from the dress. I’d been working on it for hours already, and it still wasn’t even halfway done. My fingers were bandaged, as I’d pricked them dozens of times already on the thin, sharp needle.

  Daylight had already begun to fade away, so I was relying on the flicker of candle flames. It was times like these that I wished our Kingdom had the same technology as the Ruined City, who were rumored to be rich in it. A few light bulbs would be pretty useful right about now.

  I threaded the needle with green string, slipped in a pearl and began to sew. As I worked, I cursed Adahm to the pits of hell and back. It was well past my time to sleep, and I had so much to do the next day, that I felt even angrier at the fact that I was wasting my time with this task. And it was all his fault.

  A soft knock at my bedroom door sounded, startling me into poking my skin again. I yelped as a pebble of blood pooled out. Grumbling and bringing my finger to my lips, I stood and walked over to my door. I opened it and dropped my hand to my side immediately at the sight of Adahm in the threshold.

  I glared. “What do you want? Isn’t it past your bedtime?”

  He was leaning against the threshold, much like he had been earlier in the day. One shoulder propped against it, arms crossed against his massive chest, one ankle over the other, and that teasing, dimpled grin.