Princess Freckles

29. Sweet William

"Well, I can't seem to think of anything I can do. The banquet is going on, and I can't be around her without feeling like I am pressuring her. But neither can we be out in the open for a good deal of this."

Will sat at his desk, his elbows propping him up as he hunched over it. His fingers were working on his temples trying to open some form of enlightenment for his situation. It didn't appear to be working.

"I remember what it was like to be young and in love, Will. Don't worry. This is perfectly normal. When your uncle and I married we had a few issues communicating what we expected of each other. Intimacy is a new thing for most couples... And I expect it is harder for her to accept."

He didn't look up, but felt comforted at the words. He waited for the epiphany to come, but it seemed he'd wait a while.

"But what can I do? I told her I'd wait until she was ready, but in the mean time I feel like a brute for wanting to move things along."

A light chuckle floated across the room to him.

There were no guards outside, and Alfric was the only one who knew they were meeting. It did come as a shock to him though. He'd have a hard time not telling his intrusive and perceptive twin.

"William, I think your trouble lies not in wanting her, but in misunderstanding her reason for desiring a cadence to all this."

He peered through his fingers.

"What do you mean?"

"Her mother died giving birth to her. She has a fear of intimacy that could lead to pregnancy. She doesn't want to abandon her child the way she was abandoned."

He frowned at that. Of course she'd know this when no one else could tell him these things.

"So...I need to get her to feel comfortable opening up about such things to me?"

"And cold baths. With ice. Several of those a day."

He nodded, wondering why he hadn't thought of that. They'd been excellent for his recovery when he'd worked with the Order of the Daffodil to become a swordsman.

"Thank you. Honestly, you're the closest person to me, Auntie."

She snickered.

"I haven't heard you call me that in a while."

He smiled wistfully. Their years of working side by side, all the tutelage, the long days spent together in the gardens, it had all meant something to him beyond her station. She'd been there for him almost more than his father had been before he passed.

"Perhaps I'm feeling nostalgic. You've been more of a mother to me than anyone else."

"And I'm always here for you, my Sweet William."

Her shadow darkened his door once more and then she was gone.

...

Chammielle couldn't sleep anymore. She needed to wake from this dream.

Flowers were in her path. Monkshood and deadly nightshade mingled together. If she stepped upon the latter, it shriveled and sent a black ink up her dress, turning it to black all over. If she stepped on the monkshood it reached up to drag her down a dark hole that opened up in the ground. She ran through the path, her gown growing a deeper and deeper shade of darkness, and her ankles being pulled at by hundreds of shooting vines that snapped as she ran.

It was too much. The pressure was too much. She tossed and fell with a gasp from the clutches of the dream.

"Chammielle, shh, it's alright."