Moon Drunk: Origins

A Burgundy Gown

The doors to the dining hall open when she reaches the bottom of the stairway, and her sisters join her then. She leads them toward the king, who is talking animatedly with his men.

"I'll allow nothing silver in all of the Three Kingdoms," he says loudly, his voice slurred from drink. A snort of laughter erupts from the men gathered around him. "In fact, if you find an Agincourt, you are to skin them alive. I will pay a handsome price for their hides."

Felicite is horrified; despite her own emotion, the terrified gasps of Dulce and Cosette are enough to remind her she must look after them. Cosette clings to her skirts, but Dulce is staring at the king with an expression of wide-eyed terror.

"Felicite, will he...he wouldn't...he could not..." Dulce stammers.

Felicite bends. "No true king would ever truly commit such atrocities," she says, raising her eyes to ensure the king has heard. "And so I am certain a great man such as King Julien could never say those words and mean them."

He turns to them, but his face does not falter. 

Felicite takes the measure of Julien Fleming with a clear blue-eyed sweep. Her first impression is that he is not nearly what she has expected; he is tall, surely the tallest person in the room, and lean, with broad shoulders and a muscled chest. She recognizes the blonde shaggy hair that drifts into his face, despite his crown, and the arrogance of his smile from his coronation procession. But she had been unable to see his eyes clearly. They are a piercing, deep blue, clear and sharp and they observe her with such clarity that she struggles to resist the urge to look away from his gaze. 

Felicite gulps, forcing her thoughts to the king standing before her and away from the king rotting upon the battlefield. 

She expects a monster of a man, a terrible beast, to appear before her eyes; the tales of Julien Fleming are told to frighten children into behavior, and she is almost surprised that he appears before her as a human and not in his werewolf form. Everyone knows that his mother, Queen Saoirse of the Isles, comes from a line of direwolves, and they are far larger and more monstrous than the shapeshifting Bretons. Julien is not a giant, nor a monster. He is merely a strong werewolf male, slight of build, tall and lean but undeniably powerful. 

His eyes narrow on her and suddenly, she feels a pang of sorrow for this man. To have spent his life in the terrible north, in the Norselands.  To have only won his kingdom by a stroke of luck, obtaining his crown through acts of betrayal. To know that most of the people of the kingdoms of Briony, Bruges and Bourbon hate him and that they do not celebrate his luck on the battlefield. To know the woman he must marry will never love him, because her love and devotion will only ever lie with his dead enemy, the rightful king. How sad and troubling his life must be.

He has not actually acknowledged her yet, choosing instead to greet Anjolique with a polite bow. When he stands upright again, his smile is strained, guarded; as well it should be, for he surely knows he is in the den of his enemy.

Julien's eyes land upon her again.

She nods in acknowledgement, hoping this will suffice for manners. His silence about their marriage tells her that he has no more interest in marrying her as she does in marrying him; and, to her horror, that hurts her. 

She studies him as he studies her, each of them observing the enemies they have imagined for so long. Her face flushes as she stares. She wonders for a moment if each day of her life will be spent wishing for his death.

"Good evening, Your Grace," she says politely. She sweeps an immaculate curtsy, dropping straight down, but her head remains up, and she rises as though she is already the queen, meeting his direct gaze with a challenging smile. He takes her hand, bowing low, and kisses her fingers. To her surprise, he draws her to him when he returns to stand upright, kissing first her left cheek, then the right, in the custom of Bruges and Bourbon. A pretty display of manners that mean nothing to Felicite but everything to the people of his court. The bright alertness of his gaze focused on her makes her tremble with trepidation and fear, but with something else, as well, something she cannot identify.