He looks well.
He is as tall and broad and straight as ever. He looks like a soldier, not a king. A man of arms, not brains. The golden hair slicked back over his head is still thick, though he is past fifty now. It does not grey, but fades in streaks to a dull darkness. His face is tanned and its lines show the ghosts of more smiles than scowls.
But he cannot smile at me.
"Lord Fauser, take these men and wait in the next room. I will call you if you are needed."
"Your Majesty, Princess Alexandra is a prisoner."
"I will not let her escape."
Lord Fauser's beady eyes dart nervously to my hands. "For Your Majesty's safety, I beg allow me to leave two soldiers behind."
"My niece is no danger to me. I will call you."
With one last nervous glance, Lord Fauser leaves and the soldiers file out after him. Uncle Edmund and I are alone. I cast my eyes around the room.
"I could take up that poker and hit you with it," I say. "Or I could break the windows, and stab you with shards of glass."
"Are you going to try? I will call the soldiers back, and we will have this discussion without the comfort of privacy."
"I have no wish to discuss anything with you."
"You don't even know what I am going to say."
"You will ask me to forgive you. And I will say no."
His eyes shadow with sorrow. "Then that is answered. But that is not the only thing I have to discuss with you, Alexandra. I have come to offer you a deal. A second chance."
I know I should refuse – King Edmund never offers unbarbed favours – but I cannot make myself utter the words. I spent three years waiting to die, waiting for my execution to be legal, for under Rothalian law, no one may be executed until they reach their legal majority. I knew that when I tried to kill the king three years ago, but I never expected to survive the attempt. I thought his guard would kill me then and there. I did not expect my uncle, blood flooding through the hands he pressed over his heart, to shout, "Don't kill her! Don't kill her! By the crown, keep her alive!"
Nobody died that day, despite my best plans. The body of a sixteen-year-old girl is too weak to drive a dagger deep into a grown man's flesh. The heart of the man is too weak to let her die, as she should.
And I am too weak now to smother the flicker of hope within me.
"A royal pardon?" I ask. "Do you think I deserve one?"
"I have found an opportunity for you to earn one. The Duke of Selica is in need of a bride. I made a political alliance with his father last year. I took his kingdom under my protection and had it consolidated as a semi-autonomous duchy under my rule. Our alliance is to be sealed by a dual marriage. His eldest daughter will marry my eldest son. And I will send one of my daughters or nieces to marry his. I would like to send you."
Of all the things I might have expected my uncle to say, I would never have imagined this. The flicker of hope within me grows to a flame. I school myself not to smile. This must be a trap. If my uncle is involved, there is always a trap. I try to recall what I know of Selica. A tiny mountain kingdom, rich in silver, somewhere on the north east border. I cannot recall the name of its king or princes.
"Why me?" I ask suspiciously. "Why not Viktoria, or someone... prettier and less..."
"Troublesome?" King Edmund smiles for the first time. "Perhaps I see the opportunity of getting rid of you."
"Without the expense of a state funeral?"
His smile fades. "There are other reasons, Alexandra. Selica is yet wary of my rule. The old king killed himself four months ago. He regretted his decision to cede any power to me. He thought he had been weak, that his people could not forgive him. His son is only young and unpracticed at ruling. If I am not careful in my choice of bride for him, Selica may try to segregate again."
It is my turn to smile. "You think I am the careful choice! I'm a failed murderess and the daughter of a traitor to the crown."
"Exactly. If I send Viktoria, the people of Selica will feel my presence too closely. But you have publicly declared your hatred for me, you have tried to kill me. Because I cannot trust you, they might accept you."
It is a flimsy excuse. I see well enough that the real reason is that my uncle does not want to execute me. This gives him a way out. He can pretend that I am being useful to the crown while hiding me out of sight, in a tin-pot duchy in the far reaches of his kingdom.
But it gives me a way out too.
I go to the window and look out over the city. In the far distance, a haze of pink over the mountains hints at approaching sunrise. I feel dizzy staring at the vastness of the sky. For three years now, I have had no view but what I can see through my tower window, framed by iron bars. That sky could be mine. I could own tomorrow.
At the price of doing my uncle's bidding.
I twist the chains around my wrist until the bleeding starts again. I cannot forgive my uncle. He had my father executed for his crimes. If my father was not deserving of royal pardon, then nor am I.
"I would rather die." I force the words out through my teeth. "I would rather die than marry to please you."
It will be quick, after all. The guillotine will drop and I will be no more. My chest is tight. Perhaps my heart is preparing to stop already.
"That is not the alternative, fortunately." My uncle's voice is steady, unsurprised; he knew what I would say. "One minute before midnight last night, a new law was sealed in parliament. Delayed execution is no longer a valid sentence for any crime committed when the perpetrator was below the age of majority. If you choose not to accept my pardon and marry, you return to the tower – for the rest of your life."
The air rushes back into my lungs and I have to grip at the window frame as the dizziness threatens to overwhelm me. No wonder the crowd was so angry tonight. I will not go to the guillotine. Not tonight. Not ever. I take in a huge, rattling breath. Three years I have waited to die. To be free of the palace, the king, the tower. Free of myself and my memories.
"I hate you."
"If I earn your hatred through saving your life, then I can live with it – as can you."
His voice is cold. Perhaps he hates me too, now. He once loved me. He once hugged and kissed me, and laughed at my jokes, and taught me to dance though I stepped on his toes. I shake the thought away. More memories I do not want.
I know what he wants of me. Because I know it, I want to do the opposite. I want to tell him that I will return to my tower, and live out the rest of my days there, a hidden cancer in his royal court. But I cannot form the words. I have spent three years in the same bare stone room, without seeing a face except my own, without hearing a voice, or holding someone's hand. It was only a month before I went mad. That was when they fixed the bars to the window, just in case I tried it again. After that, I survived, somehow, by reading books, pushed through the flap in the door with my three daily meals, and singing to myself, and playing with dolls like a child, imagining all sorts of impossible worlds and impossible people, before returning to reality to sit at the window and stare at the city through the bars.
I could not survive another three, or thirty years. I cannot survive another night.
"What is the prince's name?"
"Mariusz."
The sounds are unfamiliar to me. I do not attempt to repeat them. "I will marry him."
"Thank you."
"Do not thank me. You give me no choice."
"Well then. I won't." He crosses the room and opens the door wide. "Lord Fauser. Your witness, please. I give my niece, Princess Alexandra, my royal pardon." He turns back to me. "Come here. There is one last thing."
I remain by the window, unwilling to take an order from him. He waits for a moment, then comes to me and takes my hands in his. I shudder at his touch. He pauses on seeing the fresh wounds where the chains have sliced into my wrists. Then, with his bare hands, he wrenches the first chain apart. It slinks to the floor. The second snaps like a blade of dry grass in his hands.
"Princess Alexandra, I release you from imprisonment. You are granted clemency."
"I still do not forgive you," I say in a low voice, so that Lord Fauser, hovering suspiciously by the door, cannot hear. "I will never forgive you for killing my father."
"I know." Hurt sparks in my uncle's eyes. "I know."
I turn away from him and go out through the French doors onto the lawn. For the first time in three years, my feet touch the chill damp of solid earth. In the distance, the first rays of sunlight slip over the mountains.
__
2024-04-04: Going to post the first few chapters over the next few days. They're shorter chapters for this story, but fast paced.