All For Love

Chapter 9: Immensely

Cheery clouds loomed over Paris today. The luminscent glow through wafting air particles clumped together especially shone over the grand palace. Sun beamed on bronze handles, silver awnings and gold chainmail on the elite guards patrolling the checkerboarded courtyards. With the new glory raining down as the forecast, everything was buffed and polished to the most extreme standards. For today, and only today to the fortunate staff, was the open parade of the British emmissaries. Arriving only two hours before high noon, there would be a marvelous luncheon served on new china and French linens just after the two headlining countries- France and England- sign on the dotted line of the hopeful peace treaty.

Drafted by Cardinal Richelieu, it is the only chance for France to reconnect with King James and his people. French armies already scattered on the Channel and the borders to Spain and with a lowering treasury the country was in dire need to bear and grin a mere morning and partial afternoon with rivals.

Oh, what rivals they were. King James had many trusted allies in his kingdom to snoop out any sneaky suspicions on France's part. It was by decree, Lord Buckingham would deliver his ilk to the palace in a fashionable state to oversee as his master's puppet. Antoinette neither liked the man nor the treaty in Cardinal's hand. A peace treaty, as determinable to seek an end, was not the right approach what with Spanish forces aligned with the Pope in Rome, not with Britain.

Once upon a time, England allowed their Church's devotion to Catholicism to win favor of the Pope in his Holy Roman Empire vision. But a visionary was only what he came to be. A century ago in the House of Tudor, the Head of the Church was proclaimed not to be the Pope or Europe's predominant source of religion, but to the current king. If England would sign the treaty, Spain would continue forcing their brutal troops down French barricades and the Pope would take special eye on France's actions. For if France was allied for too long, she could turn over as Protestant.

Cardinal's actions were meant to tack the peace long enough to backdoor England with allying secretly with Spain, thus upsetting the balance of an entire continent of warfare and rage. As admiral he thinks, Cardinal Richelieu knew that as a holy man it is ungodly. However being a man of progress, forwarding France would right over the original sin of betrayal through documentation.

All these ideas battered around Antoinette's head like a ram when attending the Queen privately. Every lady must dress and perfect the Queen separately. The parade day just so happened to top off Antoinette's list of things to think of.

The creme colored brush with the finest bristles with a silk touch ran over the Queen's wavy hair. With each stroke of the brush, the hair parted from the rest and smoothed out until at the very end the hairpiece curled.

Anne seemed out of place. She usually radiated in her sun soaked private chambers. The ghost of a smile was envisioned in her head.

She cleared her throat. "I am sure Your Majesty is most thrilled for today's parade. The festivites...most extravagant," She chose her words carefully. Taking sides in court were detramental. Can't take back what you done or said. Speaking with the Queen on certain subjects was no exception.

Antoinette once recalled a story of one of the older ladies chiming about German clocks and the cuckoo cuckoo birds within them. Little did Lady Brunhilda knew ever since she was a child, Queen Anne had nightmares of German made clocks and so had every clock in Vienna sent away to the countryside, where she would less likely travel.

The Queen made no movement other than one blink and to soften her lips with a balm. Her attentiveness in her appearance wasn't as focused as yesterday.

"Quite,"

Her voice quieted afterthe brush set besides her. The clang of barrettes and pins grabbed in between hair foliciles, staging her hair in the premiere French twist. A whalebone barrette clipped the hair in the back with few curly cues of hair matting on each side.