by Emma Chase
“We rise together or we don’t rise at’all. I will not put the burden of defense on the lower class alone. That is how revolutions are seeded.”
I tap the table with my fingernails, all frustration and nervous energy.
“Get Bumblewood on the phone—I want to speak with him. No—I want a meeting, face to face.”
“You can meet with him all you like—it won’t do any good. Only one thing will change Parliament’s mind.” Sheffield raises a meaningful eyebrow. “And that is the act that dare not speak its name in the Council Room.”
And then two weeks later, as it always seems to work, things go from bad . . .
“Princess Miriam has eloped.”
. . . to fucking disastrous.
“With a footman.”
I’m going to kill her.
Not literally—but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have a whole new understanding of my ancestor’s penchant for fratricide.
That damned footman—the one from Father’s deathbed room. I should have sicced Winston on him.
Since my coronation . . . no, since Father’s death, actually, I haven’t seen much of Miriam. I should’ve kept a closer eye on her, made her more of a priority. But she has her own duties and I’ve been so very busy.
I fold my hands, resting my lips against them.
“Where are they?”
“Italy.”
“Have them brought back immediately. I can declare the marriage invalid. She’s seventeen and did not have my permission.”
“The people are overjoyed for Miriam.” Alfie gestures to the newspapers on the table and the celebratory headlines across every front page. “They think it’s all very romantic.”
“Invalidating the marriage will not be a good look for you politically,” Thomas advises.
“Why not?”
He opens his mouth to reply . . . and hesitates.
Norfolk jumps in to fill the silence.
“You’re gaining a reputation as cold . . . bitter. An ice queen, Your Majesty.”
“I’m not bitter!” I argue. “I’m bloody delightful, considering all I have to deal with around here.”
Norfolk continues. “If you dissolve the Princess’s marriage, you’ll become a destroyer of true love as well.”
Wonderful.
“There is another, more grave matter we must discuss,” Christopher Alcott, the Duke of Sheffield, says.
“Of course there is.” I sigh. “What is it?”
“According to my sources, there are murmurings in Parliament and other dark corners of the government about replacing you on the throne, Queen Lenora.”
“Replacing me with whom?” I bite out.
“Your sister.”
And I laugh. Out loud.
“Miriam? On the throne? Miriam is . . .”
“Malleable,” Norfolk supplies, his face grim and hard like a rock. “She would be easy to control. Those are not characteristics you are known for, Queen Lenora.”
“The fact that she is married will strengthen the case for her,” Uncle Warwitch adds.
“The fact that she is married to a commoner disqualifies her from the line of succession,” I counter.
“Actually,” Sheffield lifts his finger, “that’s not accurate. The laws regarding the requirements of virginity and royal lineage or a natural-born citizenship refer only to the future wife of the king. There is no such language in the law regarding the husband of the queen.”
This cinches it. The men who wrote those requirements were the absolute worst.
Norfolk picks up the thread. “Theoretically, a case could be made that Princess Miriam is perfectly within her rights to sit on the throne with a footman for a husband.”
I rub my temples. “You have got to be joking.”
Norfolk stares me dead in the face.
“I never joke, Your Majesty. About anything.”
Frustration pounds through my veins like lava. I stand up and pace, wanting to explode. “This is treason.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” Old Radcliffe nods.
I thought things like this only happened in books.
Or . . . England.
Even Tweedledee and Tweedledum look grim.
“Is my life in danger?” I ask.
“You are a monarch,” Radcliffe answers in his shaky, ancient voice. “Your life is always in danger. At the moment, your position is solid but not secure.”
“If Princess Miriam has a child before you are married, it could lead to a full-blown constitutional crisis,” Norfolk says.
And that just caps it all off.
I turn on them, smacking my hand on the table. “This is absurd! There must be something we can do to quash this immediately.”
“There is something.” My uncle stands, looking as agitated as I feel. “But you’ve forbidden us from discussing it.”
“Not that! You don’t get to use this situation to back me into the corner you wanted me in all along. I will not be a pawn in these ridiculous games men play.”
I stamp my foot—like a child refusing her bedtime.
“I am the Queen of Wessco!”
A lion doesn’t need to tell anyone it’s a lion . . . so if it does, you can bet it’s really in trouble.
“Then act like it!” my uncle shouts.
For a moment we stare each other down, eyes sparking like the clash of swords.
“What did you say to me?”
He shakes his head and adjusts his tone. “You are my Queen, you are my brother’s daughter . . . but this is not how he raised you.”
“I do not want—”
“Your wants are immaterial! The only thing that matters is your duty—your responsibility to Crown and country.”
The room is silent, frozen with icy tension . . . and the cold truth of his words.
“Your people want a wedding. Parliament demands a marriage. You are not the first monarch who has been nudged down the aisle and I swear you will not be the last. If getting the government functioning again means you must be the royal sacrificial lamb, then that is what it means. You don’t wear the crown to do what you want—you wear it to do what must be done. Because you are the only one who can.”
He’s right. Totally and completely. God damn him straight to hell. I have nothing to say, no clever retort that would make it any less true. I’ve avoided doing what needs to be done for as long as I could.
And there is no avoiding it anymore.
“Fine! Bloody fucking fine!”
In a huff of swinging skirts, I turn and walk down to my chair at the head of the table. There, I take a deep, long breath and sit.
As they all just stare at me. Like idiots. Like I’m speaking another language.
“Well?” my voice whips. “I said fine. If marriage is the ransom, then I’ll pay up.” I straighten my back and fold my hands. “So, who’ve you got for me? Let’s hear it.”
It turns out my father had anticipated this day after all. He made a list of potential suitable husbands. An actual list. Who would ever do such a thing?
“Figglescunt. The Viscount of Redmere.”
I stare at Sheffield with dead eyes.
“I’m not marrying anyone named Figglescunt.”
“He’s well respected. Reputed to be highly intelligent.”
“Then he should’ve been smart enough to change his name. Next.”
Tweedledee brings up the royals of Greece. But I strike them from the list with a wave of my hand.
“If one of the goals of this exercise is to raise my status on the national stage, then the future Prince of Wessco and Royal Consort to the Queen must be a man of Wessco. We must be . . . what’s the term?” I snap my fingers. “A power couple. Next.”
And so it goes. For three days. Names are batted around like a tennis balls over a net and then ultimately . . . discarded.
“Lord Lancaster.”
Too stupid.
“The Duke of Portchester.”
Too ugly.
“Rupert Haddock, The Duke of Cavanaugh.”
Too stuffy.
“Sir Dunspotty.”
Too low in rank.
“Baron Ivan Von Titebottum.”
Alfie frowns. “I’ve heard stories about the man. He’s violent. A sadist.”
“Would that be an issue for you, Your Majesty?” Tweedledum asks.
“Yes,” I reply, my tone dry as tinder ready to light. “Actually, it would.”
“Seymour Gilfoy, the Duke of Barburry.”
“He’s old enough to be her father,” Thomas objects, then flips through the papers in front of him. “Possibly her grandfather.”
“As long as he’s still able to give her children. That’s all that matters,” my uncle explains.
And it’s the damnedest thing.
It doesn’t feel like we’re discussing me. My future. My husband. The father of my children. It’s as if my heart has been encased in thick, impenetrable ice. I feel no disgust or resentment or fear.
I feel nothing at all.
Marriage is just mechanics now. Calculated choices and transactional obligations.
“No.” I shake my head. “The people want a fairy tale—that is what we must give them.”
Sheffield agrees. “We need a young lord with an old name.”
“Good luck with that.” Thomas snorts. “The aristocrats in Wessco live forever. Like they all made deals with the devil.”
Alfie stares at Thomas for a beat longer than normal.
“You are a young lord with an old name.”
“Yes.” I chuckle. “Pity I can’t marry Thomas.”
And the whole room goes still.
And quiet.
Someone whispers, “Of course.”
And another. “Why didn’t we think of it before?”
Bertram Tweedle holds up his hands, framing Thomas and me with his fingers. “I can already see them on the tea napkins.”
And the ice around my heart cracks. Blood rushes through my ears and I can feel my pulse convulsing in my neck. I don’t look at Thomas—I don’t look at any of them.
“Well . . .” I stand quickly. My words are chipper and rambling, because denial isn’t just a river in Egypt. Denial is now my best friend.
“I believe that’s enough for today. We’ll resume tomorrow. Meeting adjourned, my Lords.”
And I almost trip over my own feet, running from the room.
An hour later, he finds me in the south garden, on the white marble bench near the cherub fountain that I always thought was bit evil looking.
Thomas sits down beside me, resting his elbows on his knees.
“The cherry blossoms are my favorite,” I say quietly. “They’re never here long, though. Only a few days until the petals start to fall. I try to enjoy them as much as I can while I can.”
I know he’s looking at me, but I don’t turn his way.
“There have been several times in the last few months when I’ve had to separate myself as your advisor and your friend. The two opinions haven’t always agreed.”
“And who are you now?”
“Both.”
Thomas turns his gaze toward the cherry blossoms too. And he sighs.
“I think we should get married, Lenora.”
I nod slowly. Because it’s a bang-up idea. Makes perfect sense.
Except not at all.
“I need to have a child, Thomas. Preferably more than one. We’ll have to . . . sleep together, and I don’t mean sharing a bunk.”
He snorts. “That’s occurred to me, yes.”
“And you don’t find it repulsive?”
He squints. “Remind me, why am I your friend again?”
We both laugh. But Thomas’s chuckle descends into a succession of coughs. When he catches his breath, he’s still smiling.
“You know what I mean,” I tell him.
“Yes. I see massive amounts of awkwardness in our future.”
And then his voice drops lower—a gentle whisper of sincerity.
“But . . . I would work very hard every day to make you happy. It would matter to me, Lenora. I worry that it won’t matter at all to any of the others.”
The beauty of that statement slashes through me, making my throat tighten. Because my whole life I’ve been surrounded by people concerned with my decisions, my plans, my train of thought, my opinion of them.
But my true feelings? They don’t really occur to them.
I rest my hand on Thomas’s forearm. Because his feelings matter to me too.
“What about Michael?”
His chin dips and he shakes his head. “I have no illusions about the world we live in. His father is already on him to get married. Michael will understand.”
His hand covers mine on his arm, squeezing.
“My mother is gone; Edward is out there somewhere. You’re already my family. This would just make it official.”
And it’s all there in those gentle green eyes. Warmth, laughter, comfort, trust . . . yes . . . Thomas is already my family too.
“So.” He takes a breath. “What do you say? Wanna tie the knot?”
Slowly, my lips slide into a smile.
“Oh, what the hell . . . I guess so.”
His grin is so bright, it lights up his eyes. Thomas holds out his palm—and I smack it a high-five.
Definitely, “nerds.”
We laugh at ourselves until Thomas starts coughing again. A string of choking coughs like machine gun fire that leave him gasping. He takes his inhaler out of his pocket, puffing on it twice.
I check his forehead, but his skin is cool, clammy, not feverish. “You need to see the doctor. That cough is terrible.”
“I have seen the doctor,” he wheezes. “Nothing he’s given me has helped. I feel like utter shit.”
“Well, see him again. We’ll tell the Council, but we’ll hold off on any public announcement until you’re feeling better.”
WHEN I WAS A GIRL, I didn’t read fairy tales. I know the stories, everyone knows the stories, but the actual reading—I could never finish them. They were too cruel, too sad; no matter how happy the ending might be, it wouldn’t undo the pain the hero and heroine had to go through to reach it. It wouldn’t balance it out.
I’ve always been a practical person, a realist—even when I was a child. I see things as they are, not as I want them to be. Which is why I should have known. I should’ve seen it—it was there in front of me the whole time.
But I didn’t. I didn’t have an inkling.
And that made it so much worse.
Thomas doesn’t get better.
Not the day after our conversation in the garden, or the day after that. In a week, he’s too ill to attend council meetings. In two, he’s admitted to the hospital for treatment and tests.
But I don’t worry, not really. I go through my busy business days, sure that he’ll be well again soon. That he’ll be better than fine.
Because he’s Thomas.
It’s as simple as that.
After a month, when he tells me he’s going home to Anthorp Castle, to properly rest—because it must be the old-man aura wafting over from Parliament that’s making him ill—I laugh and agree with him. When he promises to knock this sickness on its arse and come back as soon as he can, I believe him.
Because I’m a double-damned idiot.
My idiocy continues right up until the head physician of Royal Hastings Hospital comes to my office to brief me on the results of Thomas’s tests. There is no right to medical privacy here—and as the sovereign, it’s my prerogative to know the health of the men who serve in my government. Normally, this information would be conveyed to a secretary, a staff member—but again, this is Thomas.
So the esteemed Dr. Nevil sits across my shiny, new desk and explains the situation.
“Large-cell undifferentiated carcinoma. There is a mass in each of his lungs. Inoperable.”
And still, it doesn’t sink in.
“I se
e.” I nod, folding my hands on the desk. “And what is the treatment?”
Silly, stupid, foolish, fucking girl.
Dr. Nevil snaps his eyes to mine.
“There is no treatment, Your Majesty.”
“I don’t . . . I don’t understand. How will the Duke recover without treatment?”
The doctor’s face blanches with sympathy. And something else—an emotion that’s not often aimed in my direction, but I recognize it straight away.
Pity.
My stomach roils, and I think I may vomit on the spot. Because finally, I understand that something is terribly wrong.
“The Duke of Anthorp’s condition is terminal.”
Terminal.
The word ricochets around my skull, before embedding in my brain like shrapnel.
“He’s twenty years old. Twenty-year-old titled, upper-class boys do not get terminal conditions.”
Dr. Nevil’s voice is gentle, but certain.
“Sometimes they do.”
I breathe slowly through my nose, in and out. Contemplating this information. Processing and planning. Strategizing how to control this, fix it. How to bend the situation to my will.
Because I am the Queen now and that’s what queens do.
“You are dismissed as the Duke’s physician. Another doctor will be appointed to take charge of his care. You can go.”
This seems to shock him. “May I ask why?”
I stand. “One does not charge into battle waving the white flag and expect to win, Doctor. Good day.”
He stands and bows, then leaves the room.
And I pace behind my desk, twisting my fingers together, brimming with unspent energy and urgency. I buzz for Cora on the intercom and she enters the room while the sound still lingers in the air.
“Yes, Queen Lenora?”
“I need specialists—oncologists—the best in the world. Make a list. We have to keep it out of the press, but I need them here straight away.”
“Yes, ma’am.” She writes it down.
“Clear my schedule as much as you can, cancel any upcoming engagements and have my bags packed. I’ll be conducting all government business from Anthorp Castle and I wish to leave as soon as possible.”
She doesn’t ask why; she only nods. “How long do you expect to stay at the castle?”
