Wanted: Royal Wife and Mother

by Marion Lennox

  She did know what to do. The history of gold-mining was littered with tragedy and she knew enough now to prevent mindless tunnelling from parents desperate to reach their children at any cost.

  But it wasn’t her role as historian that these people were reaching out to, though, she thought as she dug. It was her role as royal.

  Like Matty, standing white-faced and grim just out of reach of the diggings. Every other small child had been hauled away, well out of danger. Matty had a right to be here.

  Matty’s duty was to be here. He knew it. It’d been instilled from birth by those around him. Today he’d acted with a gut instinct that seemed almost inbred.

  ‘My people need me.’

  Royalty might be anachronistic, totally outdated, unfair. But right now it was what these people needed.

  She dug on, and the picture came to her again of the young King during the Second World War, touring the diggings. Winston Churchill with his cigar, standing on a heap of bomb site rubble with King George beside him. The King and the Prime Minister, with the people they represented.

  If she left now…if she took Matty, as was her right, and left this place, left the digging to others…

  It could be done. She could give orders as to how to shore up the tunnel they were working on. She could take Matty home, cuddle him until the colour came back into his face, maybe play with Rafael’s toys until he forgot…

  She could never do such a thing. Because Rafael was under there? Because Rafael had kissed her?

  Yes, but more than that.

  Because there were twenty children and their teacher trapped?

  Yes, but more than that too.

  Matty was right. What he had was an age-old heritage-the leadership of his people. And, by marrying Kass, she’d inherited it as well.

  Sure, she could walk away. Royals had done that since time immemorial-had walked away from their royal duties, had elected to live a normal life.

  But…But…

  But the good ones stayed.

  ‘The sounds are getting clearer,’ someone yelled. ‘There’s more’n one alive.’

  ‘That’s great. So slow down,’ she yelled. ‘And let’s increase the rate of supports. No unnecessary risks.’

  ‘No, ma’am.’

  The good ones stayed. Queen Elizabeth, taking on the throne as a young mother, a young bride. Overseeing change in the monarchy so the people had a say in the government, so monarchy wasn’t an absolute.

  Doing what she saw as her duty, no matter what. And in times of crisis…

  Giving a focus. A sense of leadership. A sense of continuity, regardless of personal grief.

  Kelly’s hands had blisters on blisters. She could stop. Men were taking turns. But the fact that she was beside them was driving them forward with renewed energy. She didn’t understand it, but the fact was that monarchies had endured for century after century and here she was, a princess…fighting for her two princes. One behind her, staring at his mother as if he’d like to be part of her. He’d be digging in a heartbeat, she knew, if she let him. Matty. Mathieu. Her own little prince.

  And below ground…

  Rafael.

  They weren’t digging indiscriminately. As every layer was worked through they probed cautiously before they dug, just in case…just in case…

  In case Rafael hadn’t made it. In case he was trapped before the entrance to the basement. In case his body was caught up in this mass of mud and sludge and mess.

  The thought had her choking and fiercely hauling her arm across eyes that welled with tears before she could stop them. She paused, fighting for breath.

  ‘Are you okay, Your Highness?’ a man asked beside her and she turned and saw his eyes were red and swollen.

  ‘You have a child down there?’ she whispered.

  ‘Two,’ he muttered. ‘Heidi. She’s eight. And Sophie, who’s six.’

  ‘Then we have no time for tears,’ Kelly managed and wiped her face again, this time with a savage determination she knew would stay with her to the end. ‘We only have time to dig.’

  And in the end…

  In the end it happened so fast she could scarcely believe it. One minute they were digging, the next they’d reached what seemed a vast, solid door. Six feet across, eight feet long. Mounded with debris.

  They’d dug across and down, but not tunnelling. They were open cut mining, completely removing the mass of dirt above and shoring the sides. It made things slower but surely safer. To tunnel in these unstable conditions would be madness, Kelly had decreed, and the red-eyed men and women around her had agreed.

  So now they had a trench thirty feet long, starting at the edge of the mass of debris and working in, dropping fast, so the sides were twelve, fourteen feet high. The trench was big enough for two men to work side by side, while those behind cleared and passed the rubble back.

  And now…The last few spadefuls had exposed the slab. The men in front edged shovels sideways, exploring.

  Hitting wood.

  ‘It’s holding the whole mess off us,’ a man’s voice called weakly from below, and Kelly’s heart seemed to almost stop. The voice was muffled but finally they could make out words. And the voice…the voice was surely Rafael’s.

  ‘Your Highness…’ someone called.

  ‘We’re okay. Take your time. Get it right,’ he called.

  ‘Madame Henry?’ The man beside Kelly-Heidi and Sophie’s dad-could barely speak through tears as he called down to the schoolteacher they hoped was still safe.

  ‘The children are all here.’ The teacher must be elderly, Kelly thought. She sounded little and acerbic and frightened-and also just a wee bit bossy. ‘Prince Rafael got down here just in time before the mess came down. When it started moving he blocked the door so it couldn’t crash through but then the stuff moved again and he was caught…’

  ‘Rafael was caught?’ Kelly demanded, tugging loose debris free with her hands. They were so close…

  ‘I’m fine,’ Rafael called from through the rubble but she knew from his muffled voice that he wasn’t.

  ‘We have to get this free.’

  ‘We take our time.’ It was Sophie and Heidi’s dad, pulling her back, putting both hands on her shoulders and setting her aside. ‘We don’t undo Prince Rafael’s work-your work-by moving that slab until we’re sure the land will hold.’

  ‘Y-yes.’

  ‘You’ve done enough,’ he said gently and then looked at the seemingly impenetrable slab and sighed. ‘And so have I. Everyone behind us is willing. We let those whose hearts aren’t behind the slab make the decisions from now on.’

  He was right. It nearly killed her but he was right. She was ushered out of the trench. Matty was waiting, staring at the entrance to the trench as if by will alone he could bring them out alive. She hugged him close. She was soaked to the skin, coated in thick, oozing mud. Women came forward carrying blankets. They would have ushered her away but she’d have none of it.

  Rafael…Rafael…

  But finally her prayers were answered. Finally the slab was moved. They inched it from its resting place with almost ludicrous caution, moving with so much care that it took them three long hours-hours when Matty and Kelly seemed to turn to stone.

  But finally it was done. There was a growl of satisfaction as the trench stayed intact, that the shoring timbers held. And then the first child-a tiny girl, coated with thick, oozing clay, was handed up through the gap. She was grabbed by willing hands. A faint scream sounded behind them as the child was handed back, hand over hand, until she reached the end of the trench.

  The last hands to reach her were her parents.

  ‘Evaline,’ a woman’s voice said brokenly, and there was the sound of a man’s hoarse sobs.

  But those in the trench weren’t hearing. Already more children were being handed out. Speed was of the essence here. This mass of mud and debris was unstable to say the least. It only needed one more earth tremor…

  They had a ch
ain operating. The children were being lifted out. There was no talking-just solid effort.

  They seemed okay, Kelly thought, dazed. She’d left Matty with the women again and was at the neck of the trench where it narrowed down into the cavity under the slab. But she wasn’t strong enough to be part of the chain handing back the children, so she slipped back to lean against the shoring timber and simply watched. Every face appearing at the hole under the slab she watched with terror. She’d forgotten to breathe. She’d forgotten to do anything.

  So few injuries…There were cuts and bruises, but most of the children could put their arms up to be lifted. Most could cling to their rescuers. Most could reach out to their parents and sob and hold and sink into their parents’ embrace as if they’d never let go.

  One or two were hurt. There was one small boy with what looked like a broken arm. He whimpered as he was pulled out, but he still managed a smile when his mother whispered his name. There was an older boy with a nasty laceration to his cheek. ‘I had to help Prince Rafael move the door,’ he said with weak bravado, and it looked doubtful that he’d let such a wound be stitched. His parents were clasping him with pride and there was a shining pride in his own eyes. This was clearly a hero’s wound. He’d helped his prince save the children.

  Rafael…

  Her heart was whispering the word, over and over. She glanced back along the line and saw Matty. His face was as white as hers. He was seeing all these happy endings but, like Kelly, he wanted his own.

  She should ask. She should say to the boy with the cut face, What of Rafael?

  She couldn’t.

  ‘That’s twenty,’ someone said in a gruff voice that wasn’t quite concealing tears. ‘Just the schoolteacher and the Prince to go.’

  ‘You,’ said a fierce woman’s voice from under the slab, and the weary voice came in reply.

  ‘When you’re all out I’ll be out but not before. Stop wasting time.’

  ‘You’re hurt.’

  ‘Go!’

  He was hurt. She’d known it. Dear God…

  Hands were reaching up, small woman’s hands. The schoolteacher was grasped and tugged free and hugged fiercely by the man who’d pulled her up.

  ‘Romain, I have my dignity,’ the little lady managed in between hugs and the men laughed and ignored her dignity and handed her back along the line as if she was also a child. As if she were made of the most precious porcelain…

  And then…And then…

  One hand came through the gap under the slab. A man’s hand with a signet ring she recognized.

  ‘Both hands,’ the man at the front said, in a voice that was none too steady. ‘We need a grip.’

  ‘One hand.’ Rafael’s voice was muffled and pain-filled.

  ‘You want us to come under and help?’

  ‘No one comes under this slab. Get me out of here.’

  ‘Rafael,’ Kelly cried before she could help herself.

  ‘Kelly,’ Rafael muttered. ‘What the hell are you doing here?’

  ‘Come out and find out,’ she whispered.

  ‘Will we hurt you pulling you out?’ someone asked him.

  ‘A lot less than if this whole thing collapses.’ His one hand was the only thing in sight and he pushed it higher. ‘Pull.’

  Each of the children and the schoolteacher too, had been lifted. But there was no one to lift Rafael. They were tugging him up by his one arm, holding his entire weight as they pulled.

  He was hurt-badly hurt, Kelly thought, listening to his voice. But unless he’d let someone in to him…And he wouldn’t. Their torches showed little-his mud-slicked face and blackness.

  ‘Pull,’ he ordered again and there was nothing to do but obey. And he came. He emerged into daylight with a savage groan, sliding out on to the floor of the trench and lying there, gasping for breath.

  Kelly was in there, scrambling through the mud, on her knees, touching his face, scarcely able to breathe.

  ‘Rafael.’

  ‘Kell…’ he gasped as she wiped mud from his eyes with her shirt, as she wept. ‘Our magnificent Princess Kellyn. Of course. A mine manager. I knew you’d make a magnificent princess.’

  And then he passed out.

  CHAPTER TEN

  R AFAEL’S shoulder was dislocated. His leg was badly gashed. He’d be okay.

  Officialdom took over. The little village had a very competent doctor and two efficient nurses. They carried him into the nearest intact house, put his shoulder back into place, stitched his leg, cleaned him up as much as they could and then ordered bedrest.

  ‘When I’m back at the castle,’ Rafael growled.

  Kelly and Matty had been relegated to the background. They’d sat at the kitchen table while the women of the house plied them with soup and towels and as much comfort as they could. But Kelly’s hands didn’t stop shaking. She was holding Matty and she was aware that he was trembling as well.

  He needed his nursery, she thought. He needed Marguerite and Ellen and Laura. He was clinging to her; she was his mama, but he needed the familiarity of home to ground him.

  Home. The castle. The royal palace of Alp de Ciel.

  They couldn’t get a car there. ‘But I’m thinking a horse and cart,’ the doctor said.

  ‘I’ll ride,’ Rafael countered, but the doctor looked at him as if he were crazy.

  ‘A horse and cart it is,’ Kelly said, and thus half an hour later the royal family made its way in somewhat less than royal state-a sturdy carthorse leading the way, tugging a small haycart. The haycart was filled with mattresses and pillows. Rafael complained every inch of the way but he had a nurse who looked like Brunhilda the Great by his side, there were two burly farmers leading the horse and clearing rocks from their path as they went, and he had no choice but to submit.

  Kelly brought up the rear, riding her lovely mare. Matty, whose bravado had disappeared about the time Rafael had been declared safe, had crumpled into a little boy again. He was cradled before her, almost a part of her, clinging as close as he could get. His own horse and Rafael’s stallion were being led behind.

  It was like a scene from hundreds of years ago, Kelly thought, dazed. A wounded prince returning from battle, his lady following behind.

  Rafael’s lady…

  For that was what she was, she thought wearily as she followed the steady hoof-beats before her. Rafael’s lady. Some time in the last few dreadful hours that was what she’d become.

  Princess to Rafael’s Prince.

  Princess to this country.

  ‘I thought you couldn’t ride,’ Matty whispered. Some time this dreadful day his allegiance had shifted as well. She was suddenly his mother. Yes, she’d always been that, but in his eyes she’d also been one of many people who’d flitted through his five years. Laura and Crater had been caught up at the hospital. Without his aunt, he’d needed someone to hold him, and that someone was his mother.

  ‘I can ride,’ she whispered into his hair. ‘I chose not to because I was fearful of taking risks. But today…I think risks are something to be faced with courage. Not stupid risks, but those risks that need to be faced. Like being a part of this royal family.’

  ‘You want to be royal?’ He twisted a little, trying to see her face. ‘But you can’t be royal if you live in an attic.’

  ‘Maybe it’s time I came out of my attic,’ she whispered. ‘Maybe it’s time I started to live. Maybe…maybe I need to think about putting on that dress.’

  The nurse and the housekeeper whisked Rafael away as soon as they arrived at the castle. Ellen and Marguerite clucked over Kelly and Matty in concern. They were washed. Their bruises and scratches were anointed with care. Kelly tucked a cleaned and fed Matty into bed and watched him close his eyes before he even reached the pillows.

  She was exhausted but there was no way she was heading for her bed. She made her way though the vast passages to the north tower-the tower where the ruling prince had his suite of private apartments.

  When Rafa
el had arrived here after Kass’s death he’d been horrified to find he was expected to use them. Crater had told her that, but he’d also told her, ‘Prince Rafael has accepted he’ll do what needs to be done. He can’t be a part-time prince.’

  So he was ensconced in state. She, however, was dressed in her jeans again, clean but faded. She needed to do something about her clothes, she thought.

  Tomorrow. It was hardly the time for royal gowns tonight.

  But for now…

  Rafael.

  She stood at the vast oak doors leading into his suite and felt almost shy. She’d never been in these rooms. By the time Kass had brought her to the castle he’d long since stopped wanting her.

  Such memories…They were of a different person, she thought. A child bride. A girl who’d fallen in love with royalty before she knew what it was.

  She knew what it was now. She also knew that as soon as she opened this door there’d be no going back.

  She’d turned her back on royalty once before. Yes, it had been Kass who’d shunned her, but if there’d been a choice…Yes, she would have fled. She would have taken her small son with her but still she would have fled.

  Rafael was right through this door. Rafael, who had almost as much call as she to hate royalty but who’d accepted his responsibilities; his duty.

  Anna would go on with the merchandising of his toys, Kelly thought. Rafael would still be able to develop them, but his life had changed. The wealthy Manhattan bachelor had accepted his heritage.

  This wasn’t her heritage, but she loved Matty and because she loved Matty she’d come back to the castle.

  And because she loved Rafael, she’d stay.

  All she had to do was tell him.

  Such a little thing.

  It was so hard to open the door.

  ‘Open the door or go back to your attics,’ she told herself sternly. ‘Go on, Kelly. You can do it.’

  ‘Princess Kelly,’ she whispered back to herself. ‘Princess Kellyn Marie de Boutaine. Open the door, stupid.’

  His bed was enormous-the size of a small room! The four-poster bed was hung with acres of rich velvet curtains tied back with vast gold ropes and tassels. The eiderdowns were in matching crimson and purple and gold, as were the mountains of pillows at the end of the bed.