The Paper Crown

9. The Crown

I hover conspicuously near a group composed of two of the women who awoke Mariusz and me this morning and a third woman yet unknown to me. They continue their conversation in Selician, darting cool glances at me. Perhaps it is me they are speaking about. I dare not move away now. I examine a nearby antimacassar as though that was what brought me here all along.

One of the women breaks from their conversation to look directly at me. "Would you like tea?" she asks in French.

"Thank you, yes."

"We serve ourselves at these gatherings." She points her long nose towards the tea table. "It is quite informal."

I go to the tea table as an excuse for removing myself from their unwelcoming company. Prince Dominik takes a step back from the cake stand.

"Do you speak French?" I ask.

He shakes his head, proving the lie, and goes to the other side of the room where he sits mournfully in an armchair like a dog waiting for its supper.

I pour myself a cup of tea. It is something to occupy my hands, though I cannot bring myself to drink it. Every conversation in the room seems closed and hostile to me. I consider Prince Konrad in his armchair. He was friendly to me once, though I have not spoken to him since.

I sit down near him. He raises his head from the page for a moment, then continues to read. I think he is ignoring me too, but he comes to the end of his page, closes the book, and looks up at me.

"Good morning," I say in French.

"Good afternoon," he says in my own language. "It is nearly two o'clock."

"Yes. Of course. I woke late."

"To be expected. I am afraid I grew tired last night, and left after the supper, but I hear the celebrations went on for most of the night."

It is polite, boring conversation, but it is conversation nonetheless and in a language I can speak.

"They did, yes. Longer than I liked, if I am honest. I find crowds difficult, most particularly when they are all strangers."

"Even when they are known to me. I am afraid I have not my cousin's gift of conviviality. I often find myself alone in a room full of people with only a book for true company."

"Perhaps I am intruding then?" I glance at Dowager Maria, but she is still talking to Lord Tarnuv. She talks to him the way a confessor talks to a priest, all hushed tones and lowered gaze.

"Not at all," Prince Konrad says kindly.

But there is little to say after that, and I want desperately to move on. My cup of untasted tea cools in my hand. I look around the room for a topic of conversation. Everyone is occupied in groups of three or four, talking fluently in Selician. Except for the little boy, Dominik, who has finally snatched a piece of cake and is sitting on a chair eating it with solemn enjoyment.

"We are not the only ones who find it difficult," I say. "Dominik is also alone."

"Ah, yes, poor boy." Prince Konrad smiles sadly. "He has no friends his own age, just a playmate, really, in one of the servants. It is a grand pity. I had hoped, when I came to live at the palace, that my son would become friends with Dominik, but Dominik is... too shy, I think."

"Your son?" I had some vague idea that Konrad had a wife, but I did not know he had children. "You are too young, surely, to have a child Dominik's age?"

"I married young. Too young, perhaps. I was seventeen and my wife was many years older." He shrugs eloquently. "She died three years ago."

There is no sadness in his voice. It is a simple recitation of fact. It might as well be someone else's wife who died.

"I thought I met your wife at my wedding. There was a woman with you..."

"I remarried. Little boys need mothers." His gaze moves to Dominik, still steadfastly eating his way through the slice of cake. "And friends."

Beyond Dominik, Lord Tarnuv bows to Dowager Maria and moves away. It is my chance to speak to her.

"So they do. Excuse me, Prince Konrad."

I leave my chair and make my way across the room to the dowager duchess. She deposits two cold kisses on my cheeks. The eversame worried, hostile expression is in her eyes, but she tries to hide it with an unpracticed smile.

"You speak a little French?" she says haltingly in the language.

"Yes. A very little."

"Me, I do not speak it well. I do not have... I do not have the facility with languages." Every word, when she comes to it, is perfectly correct in pronunciation and grammar, but it takes her a long time to come to them. "I apologize for the audience. I intended to speak with you earlier."

"I was not ready."

"No. My secretary said you were... indisposed." The way she says the word is cold and unsympathetic. "Mariusz has a habit of... over-indulgence. It would be unwise of you to attempt to keep pace with him."

In other words, I drank too much. My queasy stomach cannot argue with her, but my pride necessitates it.

"I was nervous last night. I had reason to be."

"Of course." Her eyes do not soften. To me, she does not speak like a confessor. She meets my gaze boldly. "I called you here to say without.... without interference that I am proud of you. For a woman it is not easy to go to the marriage bed."

My cheeks burn.

"I embarrass you. But you must understand, you are not only a woman. You are the duchess. Last night, you acted as one who bears the crown must act. For that, I am proud of you."

She has no idea of the deception that Mariusz enacted, and every word she says makes me more determined to maintain it.

"Thank you, your grace."

"You are welcome." A cold silence sits between us for a few breaths. "I will give you one piece of advice, as a married woman. There is nothing, and no one, more important than the crown. Remember that. It comes before your marriage. It comes before you."

"It comes before Mariusz?"

"Always." The chill in her eyes becomes icy. "It comes before the two of you, or it will come between you."

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2024-04-19: Oh no, is that, could it be... foreshadowing?