Fairy Tale Wedding (Book One: The Road to Ever After)

Chapter Eighteen

She stepped towards him and asked, "And what is your name, sir?"

"Jarryd," he replied.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Jarryd," she said with a twinkle of a smile. Her heart lifted a chord as she noticed his reaction to that meager grin. He inhaled a chest bursting breath of air, though there was no change on his stolid face. His disciplined exterior remained the same. But a tiny touch of kindness caused some physical reaction. Adeline hoped it was an effect of pleasure, and not disapproval.

"Have you always lived here, in this castle in Distress?" she asked.

"Yes," his baritone voice replied. Did his eyebrows lift a little there or am I imagining things, Adeline pondered.

"I'm so sorry. It must have been an awful way to grow up."

"Perhaps. I didn't know of any other way to be brought up, so it hardly mattered."

Adeline observed him carefully. He talked tough. He looked tough. But was Jarryd as hard-hearted as his body language indicated? There was something not quite right, something a bit off in the harmony of his image. He was no beast shut away from the world for his own sins. His jetblack hair was greased back from his handsome face. Every line was etched to masculine perfection. Women would gladly swoon over such strength and beauty. Jarryd made Prince Darrik's good looks appear inferior and juvenile. Prince Charming of the Year would have been an easy title for him to win, excepting the actual charm factor.

It did not look like Jarryd intended to be curt and ruthless. Something, what was it about him assured her he could never hurt a fly? That harmless quality was there, deep down and yet right before her eyes. But then he opened his mouth and the picture got blurry. Was he evil or not? How could he be anything but a monster with Lady Jacqueline as his mother?

"I don't suppose you were consulted about this arranged marriage," Adeline asked.

Jarryd fingered the bottom of his suspenders. "No."

"Then we're in the same position. Our free will thrown away while forced into a union we didn't choose. At least we can draw some sympathy from one another."

"Oh, I don't object," he quickly stated. "You make it out to be worse than it is."

Adeline gaped at him. She really wanted to protest with red cheeks and flying hair, then she thought the calm, cool method wiser. She had to keep reminding herself that it would be foolish to offend Jarryd so soon. Save that for farther down the line in their relationship.

It was not only her voice of reason that held back fighting words. Something in the air made Jarryd's confrontational words mellow out of existence. Adeline could not resist the desire to figure him out. Why were people deeper than their appearances and titles, even in the land of Distress? The princess inched a few steps closer, her hands evening the wrinkles of her rumpled skirt.

"I suppose you mean..." Adeline fumbled for some explanation, how being forced into one's own wedding wasn't a total disaster, but...nothing came to mind. "No, I'm sorry. I don't see your point at all."

Jarryd looked away for the first time, averting his gaze to the ceiling. "No, I don't guess you would."

The young man stuffed his large-ish hands into his pants and kicked the floor with one toe. It was like a wispy cloud had descended around him. As Adeline watched Jarryd fall into a moping dishumour, she forgot her current woes. The pity in her heart swelled over its peak and washed across to him. She suddenly realized what it was that revealed his true nature. In his eyes was the glaze of innocence, of a child looking for answers and affection in a scary world. He grew into a handsome and well-built man, but underneath...he was still a little boy with countless needs and insecurities.

Adeline looked at Jarryd and, oddly enough, she recognized herself. Was she any more brave and self-sufficient? Did a shaky, little girl not hide behind her mature, feminine exterior? If she had been loved unconditionally as a child, would she be the adult she was now? Would any of this long chain of tragedies ever have happened? She knew the honest answer all too well.

"Maybe, I do understand...somewhat," she broke the silence. "We are all too quick to cry out about the wrongs done against us. We rush to call things unfair when...when really, we aren't as defenseless as we scream. We always have a choice, don't we? You and I, Jarryd, we have a choice too, do we not?"

Princess Adeline was only a foot away from his crestfallen face. She gazed up at him and as her tiny speech ended, he opened his eyes with a flicker of hope. Hope, an emotion poor Jarryd never knew before, isolated in the castle of silent stone and blood-red glass. But he would not be alone any longer. A sweet and serene lady stood before him and in her blue eyes, kind voice and star-bursting smile, he read a promise. This blonde with the baby face might have been an angel to Jarryd; she brought a brightness and freshness to the atmosphere which never existed there before. He would be a simpleton indeed if he objected to this young woman as his match for marriage.

And yet, Jarryd found himself saying, "I am sorry, Adeline...for all of this. You deserve..."

But Adeline stopped his eager apology with three fingers placed upon his lips. It was the first human touch he ever experienced, as far as he could remember. The princess hushed him with her puckered, pink lips. In that instant, he was mothered for the first time. A new reality of gentleness and humility opened up to him. Jarryd succumbed to Adeline's every instruction, mild as a lamb.

"We have to decide right now, Jarryd, that we will never make mention of the darker circumstances of our matchmaking. It doesn't matter what role your mother has played in all this. Blaming her or each other will only make any problems worse. Let's promise to always take full responsibility."

Jarryd nodded with decision and courageously, tenderly took hold of her hand hanging upon his lips. "I promise. Our choices will be our own."

"Thank you," Princess Adeline smiled. The peace glowing in her face was strange in this setting. She was the opposite of what she should be, what she had been only an hour before. Life had gotten about as bad as it possibly could. And then...a prince had been thrown into her story who was just as needy as she. The muddled mayhem she used to know was clearing up. This was not a perfect resolution to her story of loneliness and humiliation, but, miraculously, it was an encouraging resolution nonetheless.

"But why, Adeline," she heard Jarryd asking. His grip on her fingers was strained with emotion. He wanted to hold her beside him and set her free at the same instant. "Why agree to marry me? You don't even know me?"

Princess Adeline was surprised to feel the burn of tears rising in her throat and eyes. She exhaled with a grin and felt her shoulders relax like puddy. The comfort of finally finding a living being who understood her deepest struggles flooded Adeline's soul. Here was a man, a prince, who needed her as much as she needed him. She did not love him, well not yet at any rate, but at least, she could help him and make him happier.

"I know all I need to know," Adeline said sweetly, "You need someone to care about you, and I need to marry a prince. Well, here we are. We can help each other and together, who knows? Maybe as a team, a united couple, we can save Fairy Tale from your mother's wicked plans. I don't know what we can accomplish on that end, but I do know this – If we can't do Fairy Tale good, at least we will do one another more good than either ever could have dreamed."

Jarryd and Adeline sealed their choice with nothing more than a silently contented set of smiles. Prince Jarryd had never witnessed a kiss or a hug, so he could not leap to such divine expressions of loving zeal. And Adeline did not feel cheated in the absence of such a romantic sprinkling. Those actions were exchanged in another kingdom, with another prince and only brought woe. That longing for Prince Charming was lost, never to surface again. Though she had no say, she had made a choice.

Princess Adeline would marry Prince Jarryd, even though he was the son of the infamous Lady Jacqueline.