♪ Little girls always grow older
Your story is a long way from over ♪
{FLETCHER—Princess}
EXPLICIT warning for the song
In its late October glow, the canary yellow hued castle almost didn't appear so threatening. Its appealing vine-covered window frames didn't showcase the vipers that once crawled behind its walls. Or the spiders that crept under its creaky floor-boards. Its alluring but faded grassy surroundings didn't divulge the plots that flowed from its roots and spiraled up to its slate-colored roofs like veins awash with poisoned blood. For a few moments, the Torrinni Castle appeared as a safe, sweet-scented, happiness-infused dwelling. A place where any royal would have loved to grow up, and any noble would have loved to attend court.
But Princess Cordelia of Totresia wouldn't be fooled. Not when she knew the truth beneath the faulty charm and the lies still spewing behind the glimmering facade. Not when she'd received her fill of the drama and fled it all, close to two years ago, and hoped to never return.
Yet there she was, standing before the stone steps, bracing to breathe in the toxic, overbearing air of Torrinni Court.
She sighed as she tried not to glare at the massive wooden entrance doors, behind which awaited the golden, gleaming entryway. It was apparently, renovated, but she hadn't been around to see it. The building seemed to scowl at her like a lioness waiting for its ever unsuspecting prey to come closer. And though her body willed her to turn tail, to retreat and cower in the bushes to evade the claws, her brain moved her forward.
I have no choice... the King summoned, and I must obey.
Cordelia retreated from Torrinni Castle in early eighteen-hundred, at her mother's desperate summons. She was frail, ill, stuck in bed with a horrific cough and a few broken bones. She'd written to her only daughter in agony, hoping for her help in nursing her back into shape. And though Cordelia was concerned for her mother's health, she couldn't deny that any occasion to leave court was welcome—for her own health.
At first, King Antoine had begged her to let his best physicians take care of their ill mother instead. He'd almost been compassionate, when pleading with her to not go to the Torrinni Palace, hours away from the court he'd wanted her to mingle in. Cordelia wondered if he'd believed her, at the time, when she came to him with a formal petition during regular hours. She'd garbed in her finest silks, pouted her lips, and clasped her hands to urge him to let her attend to the ailing Dowager-turned-Duchess Clémentine.
After all, why would he—or anyone else, for that matter—believe that Cordelia would want to spend time with Clémentine, sick or not? The woman, though pardoned by her family members, orchestrated most of the schemes that brought on all the current issues in Totresia. She'd hidden true identities, conspired with enemies, organized unwanted marriages, enabled assassinations, and harbored unnecessary hatred towards the wrong people. Though allowed to roam wherever she pleased, she rarely came to court anymore. Not because she was banished from it, but because many younger nobles there regarded her with disdain, despite Antoine and Marguerite's warnings to treat her with respect.
Cordelia was one of the wounded parties from Clémentine's nasty games. Clémentine had played with her life, too, and made her vulnerable to sordid schemes, kidnappings, and near-death situations. Cordelia still couldn't hear or read the name Charlotte without bile rising to her throat and shivers cascading down her spine.
But vile-intentioned as she'd once been, Clémentine had reformed, especially in Cordelia's eyes. She'd stepped out of the center scene, permitted her sons to live their lives by accepting all three of their marriages. And she'd begun tending to matters that a Duchess of her standing should. She'd even started to look for a decent husband, someone to be the face of the Torrinni Palace... while she operated in the background, of course. Before the woman's illness became known, Cordelia visited her often at the Palace. She listened to her tales, to her and Mary bickering about new fashions and trends and tea flavors that bordered on ridiculous. And of course, to the political or stylistic rumors from London and Paris.
So when news came to her that Clémentine had fallen ill—literally fallen from a terrible coughing fit that made her collapse down the stairs—she'd felt obligated to attend to her.
"But she is our mother," she'd said to Antoine, after he'd planned to refuse her departure. She'd started shaking. Then tears filled her eyes as he and her two other siblings stared down at her, standing among the commoners. "And I am certain your physicians are skilled, and I know Mary is there for her. But Mother is a handful on a regular day, and you know it."
All three men—the King and the Princess—exchanged glances then. Queen Marguerite, resting on her throne, likely trying to keep her words to herself, twitched her lips back and forth. Princess Céleste and Princess Harriet, less involved in Clémentine's life, kept to the shadows and looked at their feet. But none could deny that Duchess Clémentine wasn't one to trifle with, nor would refusing her request be in anyone's interest.
Only once he noticed her packed trunks and carriage did Antoine acknowledge that it was real; that his beloved sister, the last hope for the royal family to make a decent alliance through marriage, was moving. Granted, the Torrinni Palace was only a few hours away, and she'd be accessible via a quick horse-ride or a letter... but Antoine never went there if he could help it. The only times he ever saw Clémentine were the rare moments she showed herself at the castle, for big events that required her attendance. For meetings she was obligated to show up for, and not Mary, who often came in her stead. He'd officially pardoned her... but in his heart, he'd never fully forgive her transgressions, Cordelia knew.
He'd shifted into a bitter, judgmental King in the years since all the drama had unfolded. Yes, Cordelia understood his wariness, his insistence, his bad moods... but that didn't mean she needed to tolerate them. So, a little while later, when he'd stomped up to her as she waited outside for her handmaiden, Clarisse, to join her for their trek to the Palace, Cordelia had been ready for his comments.
"You may stay for a few weeks, get her on her feet, hire extra staff if she needs it... but I want you back at court, Cordelia." His tone had been bossy, choppy—a sound Cordelia had become used to. He was her brother, and she loved him... but lately, he was only a King, and their blood-bond mattered little. He spoke to her as he would any other young lady at court who'd offended him. As if he hadn't known her for eighteen years and trusted her, cared for her well-being.
Now, at twenty, Cordelia stood quivering before the massive doors, reluctant to face her brother's wrath. Because she knew he'd be wrathful. She'd stopped responding to his letters, stopped reading them, and wondered if he'd show up in person to drag her back to the castle himself. She'd been gone for nearly two years. Two of her birthdays had passed, and she'd celebrated them away from the ballroom where Antoine had expected her to be, at the parties he'd thrown for her.
But she wasn't able to leave before then. Clémentine's condition had worsened before she got anywhere near recovery. Her bones wouldn't mend, she could barely walk, or even talk due to her throat being so inflamed. Often she coughed up blood, and passed out for days. Her breathing was so shallow Cordelia and Mary and Clarisse would take shifts watching her chest to make sure it rose and fell, proving she was still alive. Her skin had turned sheet white, flaky, and though she'd never carried much weight, she looked skeletal, fragile, ready to break at the simplest touch. She was touch-and-go for an entire year. And though several physicians—sent by a scathing, seething Antoine—beseeched Cordelia to understand Clémentine's illness was not likely to subside, Cordelia refused to give up.
When Clémentine's cheeks infused with color, and her bones healed, and she was able to amble about with assistance, Cordelia still declined her brother's requests to come home. "She is better, yes; but I worry the sickness will flare up again." She wasn't completely lying, because she did fear that whatever Clémentine had contracted might strike again. But she also wanted to keep as far from Antoine's dysfunctional court as possible. A place where coups were still on the daily list of worries in the meetings, where panic swelled under everyone's fake facade, and where men prowled the hallways in search of wives. In search of Cordelia.
She was a Princess—the Princess, most called her, as she was blood to the King and the Princes. Everyone wanted her, or so the ladies in the Salons and gardens and tea-rooms said. Unwilling to be in the center of such madness, she'd managed to avoid most social gatherings. For a while, she'd been able to steer clear of the halo Antoine tried to push her into. But a few months before she'd turned eighteen, Antoine had made it clear that she would marry, and she would do so fast. The pressure was intense, and it dug into her core, prompting nausea whenever Antoine was near her, or migraines whenever he spoke. He told her he cared nothing for heirs, as he had plenty between him and Marguerite; no, he cared more for alliances. Totresia needed protection from Général Napoléon, whose deadly thirst continued to spread throughout France. And his reach within Europe, and even the tips of the continents below Spain, was worrisome. But Totresia also needed to reel in its own rebels, and to solidify negotiations with Giroma, which had gone nowhere despite Marguerite being its Queen. And to do this, Cordelia needed to wed someone with power. Someone with men. Someone with money.
"We will hold a Season for you, as we did for Séb and Jules," he'd said, on the eve of her eighteenth birthday. She'd been sitting across from him in his stuffy Office, avoiding his gaze by staring at the messy map behind him. All the threads and pins on it had multiplied since he'd married Marguerite, and since Céleste's father had started a rebellion against the crown. "We will find the right spouse for you."
Cordelia had scoffed at that. And she scoffed again now as she finally grabbed hold of her skirts and crept up the steps. The doors opened wide, and the guards saluted her, welcoming her home. She cringed; of course Antoine would be furious, and of course he would bring up the Season. She had no doubt that was why he'd been so adamant, why his letters had gone from bi-monthly, to monthly, to weekly, to daily.
She could hear his voice as she paused near the main stairs. Should she hasten up to her rooms first, to freshen up, take a nap, have a few drinks—anything to keep him waiting?
"You are twenty, now! We have wasted enough time with your excuses, Cordelia! You are a Princess, and it is your duty to marry and produce heirs and secure alliances for your King!"
Seasons weren't as common for ladies as they were for men; but Harriet had had one, and came out of it by marrying Jules. Since then, Antoine hadn't stopped babbling about changing the rules, about making Seasons mandatory for women of a certain standing. No one—not even Marguerite, bless her heart—had the courage to halt Antoine in his ranting.
But Cordelia, recharged and refreshed as she was, after spending so much time away from the toxicity, was bracing to be the first to try.
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