by Erin McRae
“Someone with terrible manners and no discretion sent an accidental candid to the papers?” Amelia suggested.
Her mother looked unconvinced. “Do be sure no one gets the wrong impression. And my goodness, you shouldn’t be so familiar.”
Amelia made a despairing noise.
“Also,” her mother said thoughtfully, glancing at the picture again as she set the tablet down. “He’s twice your age.”
“Mum!” Amelia protested. One innocent conversation was being blown entirely out of proportion, and apparently she was going to reach new depths of embarrassment before the holiday was over. “It wasn’t a big deal. I met Prince Arthur. Who Charlie is friends with. We were in the Royal Box. We talked for fifteen minutes about horses and then I escaped. I’m not trying to get with the Prince. I’m just trying to get into graduate school and flee everything wrong with my life!”
Chapter 3
PARADE OF MARRIAGEABLE WOMEN VISIT BUCKINGHAM
10 January
Year 21 of the Reign of King Henry XII
Back at school. Upside: Mum no longer asks concerned questions about my prospects and what my plans are for the future. Downside: I have nothing to do but homework and worry about my prospects and my future. I’ve started applying to jobs, too — research assistantships, mostly — because I desperately need a backup plan in case I don’t get into any schools. For my sanity. Sure, I could live with Mum and Dad and Charlie would find me a job doing filing somewhere, but I don’t want any of that. On the upside again: At least I’ll be able to spend the summer working, or preparing for school if I do get in, instead of doing all that while also trying to manage the headache of wedding planning
*
“Oi, mail!” Priya, Amelia’s flatmate, hollered as she strode into their apartment with a cardboard box clutched to her chest. The curtain of her sleek black hair swung forward into her face as she dropped the letters on their all-purpose kitchen table/study area/mail repository. “I think you got invited to one of those royal garden parties or something,” she said.
“What’s in the box?” Amelia asked as Priya set it down in the kitchen. Their apartment comprised five tiny rooms: their bedrooms, the sitting room, the miniscule kitchen, and the bathroom. With London real estate being what it was, they’d been lucky to find this space even with their families’ means. After the sprawling under-heated splendor of Kirkham House, Amelia was grateful for the cozy rooms and radiators that actually performed their office.
She was less grateful for the collection of pictures Priya had stuck on the fridge. The Bollywood stars and various Indian models, Amelia didn't mind. In fact, she strenuously approved of the shirtless photo Sidarth Malhotra. What she did mind was the picture of Arthur, sitting tall astride a horse on his estate. She wanted to ask Priya to take it down, but doing so would only invite questions.
“Stuff I’ve left at Raveesh’s house and half his liquor cabinet,” Priya answered Amelia’s question, rifling through the box.
Amelia picked the cream-colored envelope off the table. “Are you breaking up with him?” she asked as she slit it open. She had no idea what it was, but its appearance was at least interesting.
“We’d have to call it dating first, but seems like.”
“His idea or your idea?”
“Mine, thank you.”
“Then why’d you take his booze?” Amelia asked.
“Because I could?”
“Fair.” Amelia looked down at the card in her hands.
The Lord Chamberlain is commanded by
The Prince of Wales to invite
Lady Amelia Brockett of Kirkham
to a private Tea
at Buckingham Palace
on Monday, 16th, Year 21 of the Reign of King Henry XII, at 2 pm
Not a garden party. Not, in fact, something that made the slightest bit of sense.
*
Amelia waited until the next day, when Priya was at a lecture, to call the phone number on the card. Not to RSVP; her pleasure at accepting the honor of such an invitation was something that had to be registered on paper. But because she still didn’t entirely understand what she was looking at. And while Priya had showed no interest in the invitation, Amelia didn’t want to encourage curiosity or create a need for explanations. Not until knew herself what was going on.
The phone rang exactly twice before it was answered by someone young, officious, and Welsh.
“Um, yes, hello.” She had no idea where to start and had clearly forgotten all of her phone training. “I’ve received an invitation to a tea, a private tea, and mostly I am confused and also concerned it’s been misdirected.”
“May I ask who I’m speaking with?”
“Oh, yes, right, sorry, hi. Amelia Brockett.”
She listened to the sound of typing and felt faintly cheered the Palace seemed to have a database of these things. Databases got things wrong all the time.
“Lady Amelia Brockett?” the voice asked after a moment.
“Yes, I’m afraid so. I’m not the Lady Amelia you’re looking for, am I?” She tried to ignore her own faint sense of disappointment, which was inappropriate and useless. Speaking with Prince Arthur at the races had been enjoyable until Charlie had interrupted. Another opportunity to do so would have been somewhat pleasant.
“Actually,” the voice said, “You are. And I can assure you, since I suspect you’re about to inquire further, the accuracy of our record keeping is very good. Now,” he said, clearing his throat with some drama. “You should consider me your royalty customer service representative. Is there anything else I can help you with regarding the occasion?”
Amelia laughed, relieved at the offer and at finding someone with a sense of humor about whatever strangeness was afoot. Mr. Jones, as it turned out her royalty customer service representative was named, did his utmost to help. But most of the matters she was curious about were not things he was privy to. He could not, for example, tell her the reason for or subject matter of the tea. He could only advise her on what to wear, which they agreed she probably already knew how to handle, being an earl’s daughter and suchlike.
Eventually, not wanting to ask if the royalty customer service representative joke was even something he was allowed to say, she gave into her own terror and whispered down the phone, “Is this about the thing at the races?”
Amelia could practically hear him smile. “I’m sorry ma’am, I wouldn’t know which thing, or which races, or what His Royal Highness’s considerations regarding you are.”
Amelia barely stopped herself from blurting Don’t you read the Daily Observer?
*
Given the word tea on the card, Amelia expected to see at least a few other guests at the gate. But when the guard checked her invitation and waved her through, there was no one else in sight. At least no one who looked like they were there for a tea. With a sudden terror that she was late, Amelia glanced at the time on the card and then at her watch. No — she was a few minutes early. Where, then, was everyone else?
She was escorted by a liveried footman from the gate to a reception room, where she was handed over to another footman who led her, not toward the ballroom that she’d been to on occasion before with her parents, but around a corner, up a flight of stairs, and down several more hallways.
They finally stopped at a heavy oak door. Her escort knocked, then opened it at a sound from within.
“Your Highness,” the escort said. “The Lady Amelia Brockett.” Amelia glanced at him, hoping for a hint of what to do. He tipped his head, ever so slightly, toward the room. There was nothing else for it. She stepped through the door.
In terms of the scale of the rest of the palace it was a small room, which meant it was about the size of the private dining room at Kirkham House. The walls were painted a mossy green, there was intricately carved molding around the high ceiling, and large windows hung with heavy velvet drapes looked down on the brown lawn and the sweep of the Thames, steely dark under a heavy winter sky beyo
nd.
Instead of the gaggle of people in afternoon dress milling about drinking tea and eating tiny sandwiches, there was only one person in the room. Prince Arthur himself sat at a small table facing the window, his profile turned toward the door. His long legs were stretched out under the table, and a fireplace crackled merrily in the gloomy January afternoon.
He glanced up when Amelia walked in and for a moment looked as startled as he had when Amelia had banged into him out on the balcony at Kempton Park.
“Your Highness.” She curtsied gracefully this time, thank goodness.
He stared at her for another moment and then fumbled to his feet. He banged his knee on the table in the process and had to put a hand on the back of the chair to keep it from tipping over.
“What are you doing here?” he demanded.
“I was hoping you could tell me. Especially since you’re the one who invited me,” Amelia said, showing the invitation she still had clutched in her hand. She glanced over her shoulder at the door, but her escort had already closed it again. It was just her and the Prince, on opposite sides of the room, staring at each other in mutual confusion and something that, as it went on, began to feel like a challenge.
Prince Arthur opened his mouth as though he were going to say something else, stopped himself, closed his eyes, and took a breath. When he opened his eyes again he said, “Forgive me, Lady Amelia. I must have gotten my appointment schedule confused. How are you today?”
“More confused than I was five minutes ago, which is saying something.”
Prince Arthur waved at the chair across from the one he’d been sitting in. “Please, have a seat. And hopefully I can explain.”
Amelia sat down carefully, crossing her legs at the ankle and tucking them under her chair as ladies should. The Prince returned to his own seat and flipped open an ornate leather folio, putting on a pair of reading glasses as he did so. They gave him a bookish air, and Amelia scolded herself for finding the professorial look appealing. But the Prince was handsome, and now that Amelia wasn’t dying of embarrassment and awkwardness, she could indulge herself in looking at the strong lines of his jaw and the richness of his brown eyes behind his glasses. She noticed the faint nick of a razor under his ear and wondered if he’d done that himself or if he had a barber who shaved him.
“As you’re probably aware, my father the King is in ill health,” the Prince said as he turned the pages over, not even looking at her. Amelia tried to read them upside down until he raised his gaze to her face.
She snapped her eyes back up to his. “Yes, I’m aware. I do live in Britain.” Headlines like that were impossible to escape.
“Which puts me closer to the throne than the royal genealogists tend to prefer a childless widower to be.”
“You take what the royal genealogists say seriously?” Amelia asked blankly. Breeding horses was one thing. The unsavory implications of the work tasked to the genealogists quite another.
“Lady Amelia,” Prince Arthur said. “I need a wife and an heir. My sister is next in line after me but she will recuse herself once Princess Georgina turns eighteen —
“Why on earth would she do that?” Amelia asked before she could think the better of it.
The Prince fixed with a stern gaze and continued. “The country needs youthful optimism and a clean line of succession. But thrusting an unmarried teenager into the role of heir apparent isn’t ideal either, especially when she only has her younger sister, the Princess Hyacinth, and then rather distant cousins to succeed her.”
“Sir —” Amelia tried to break in again. What the Prince was telling her was tantamount to state secrets. He should absolutely not be admitting to — or even discussing — potential weaknesses in the line of succession, especially not with a daughter of the northern nobility who could still be accused of plotting against the Crown just for breathing.
Amelia did her best to push down her fear. With a dawning sense of disbelief and horror, she could almost see where this conversation might go. Except that such a thing would make absolutely no sense.
The Prince kept speaking. “The monarchy may be a symbol of the dying world to some, yet this family of mine still very much exists. We kings and queens have ruled near a thousand years. It must not come to an end on my watch.” He sighed and slumped his shoulders, clearly finished with his script. “I know it sounds ridiculous; I only wish it were.”
“What does this have to do with me?” Amelia was almost afraid to ask, but she was more afraid not to.
“The genealogists put together a list,” the Prince said. “All unmarried women of the peerage, in a certain age demographic, who do not have children and have not been divorced. As you might imagine, it’s not particularly extensive.”
“Why not include commoners?” Amelia asked faintly.
“By what criteria? There’s a nation of those. If someone is going to be subjected to this life, they may as well go in as prepared as possible.”
“Wouldn’t it have been easier to hold a ball?”
Prince Arthur laughed. His whole face brightened, almost like it had at the races. “The treasury’s already girding its loins for the inevitable royal wedding. Best not to run up an even bigger bill in the process of finding a bride.”
"Are you…proposing to me?" She asked hesitantly. And then, more hysterically, “After five minutes? After talking about genealogy?”
"Hardly.” Arthur sounded offended. “This is me asking if you'd agree to meet with me again to discuss the matter of marriage further."
Amelia stared at him. This couldn’t possibly be happening.
“Your genealogy, though, is hardly irrelevant.” Prince Arthur removed a piece of paper from the folio, spun it around on the table and pushed it at her.
“This is my family tree.”
“Yes. We do our homework here,” Prince Arthur flipped through his folio again. “You’re attractive, well-born, and intelligent. Pursuing a graduate degree in the earth sciences, I believe.”
“I graduate in the spring. I’m applying to PhD programs. I want to study climate change,” Amelia managed to say, as if any of those words could be a defense against what was happening.
“All of which is excellent. You also happen to be the only eligible daughter of one of the oldest families of York. Both the city and the ancient house.”
“How is that a plus?” Amelia was wary. Little good ever came of the rare times London mentioned York.
“Political marriages — at least of this form — are rather out of style these days. But the rift between the north and the rest of the country only grows.”
“That’s the Prime Minister’s fault. And Parliament’s.” It was Amelia’s turn to be offended now. “The most recent jobs bill—”
The Prince sighed. “Yes. I know. I agree with you. Yet as a member of the royal house I can hardly engage in politics. At least not on a parliamentarian’s terms. But symbolism is mine. And what I can do is unite York and London — York and Lancaster — in a way they haven’t been in centuries. I know this proposition is awkward, but we could make history, you and I.”
“Awkward?!” Amelia exclaimed. “This conversation is insane.”
Prince Arthur blinked mildly at her. “I’m merely trying to apply the available resources to a set of problems. Before you judge, I suggest you consider the resources that could be applied to your problems were you to choose to help me with mine.”
“You don’t even know what my problems are!”
“I don’t have to, to know we could help each other.”
Amelia wanted to turn away from the intensity of his stare, but she couldn’t. He was magnetic, and there was a sharpness, even a shrewdness, to him that hadn’t been present at the races. His eyes may have been brown, but he was no prey animal. She couldn’t help but lean in ever so slightly. In her mind she cursed both the table between them and this proposed conspiracy.
“Lady Amelia,” Prince Arthur said, “do you want to be Queen
Consort of England, Scotland, and Wales, Her Royal Majesty of Britain?”
“No!” Amelia pressed her feet firmly against the floor as the word came out of her mouth unbidden. The Prince was fascinating, but the question so baldly put was terrifying. Not to mention treasonous for her to answer in anything but the negative. She wondered, fleetingly, if this were a trap.
“Shall I call to have you shown out then?” His words were without rancor, but there was a coldness to them she did not prefer.
She shook her head. “No,” she repeated more softly.
He smiled, and his whole face softened. Amelia had to force herself to make eye contact rather than stare at sensuousness of his lips. “Tell me about that then, if you would,” he said.
She glanced up at the ceiling for a moment, wanting a small respite from the danger of the situation. Just a few weeks ago she had sat on the train and listened to the shifting accents of the countryside and wished for a better fate for her people. That very same day that she had met Prince Arthur for the first time. Now she was faced with an opportunity both completely unexpected and entirely surreal.
Amelia realized she was staring at the ceiling of Buckingham Palace, which didn’t help in the least. She returned her gaze to the Prince. “I’m from York.”
“As we’ve just discussed.”
Amelia took a deep breath. If Arthur wanted to talk about the burdens of destiny and history, they would do so. On her terms as one of the people England had for centuries so brutally tried to exclude from its narrative.
“York was founded by the Romans,” she said. “Emperor Constantine was crowned there. You think your monarchy has been around forever? That it rests heavily on your shoulders in all the terrible things it's done? People have lived in York for two thousand years. We had our own kings — and queens. So, I can’t pretend to be overly invested in the fate of your house. Sir. The lineage of the north predates your throne and will outlast it, all attempts at otherwise aside. I have known this since it was drilled into me with bedtime stories and children’s rhymes told to me by my parents and nurses.”
