[dedicated to Em for being a beautiful writer]
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I've never quite been a fan of dresses. I had always preferred my comfortable jeans and a simple top to anything that was associated with being fancy because it made me uncomfortable. Dresses were gorgeous things to wear but after a couple of hours of donning on one it gets irritating and I'm not the one to adjust my dress every few minutes.
But staring at one of the wardrobes that adorned one edge of the room I couldn't help but marvel the beauty of them all. They were of different colours, different and alluring shades and hues of attractive colours that undoubtedly would suit my fair complexion. My fingers brushed against the soft fabrics of the dresses, feeling the different materials - silk, lace, soft cotton and so many other different materials that I wasn't able to identify due to the dazed state I was left in when I opened the dress wardrobe.
There was a knock on the door that pulled me out of my reverie almost immediately and I instinctively fisted my hands before I took a couple of breaths in order to calm my slightly panicked state. I wouldn't have been this paranoid if the recent events in my life didn't take place but they did and so I had every right to feel paranoid, even if it was only the slightest bit of paranoia that kept me on high alert.
Keeping my hand in a tight fist I called out, instead of making my way to the door to answer it, "come in."
I half expected a tall, dark and towering man to emerge from behind the door but Alastair Ignacio was nowhere in sight. Instead of Alastair stepping into the room, a curvy dark skinned maiden made her way into the room, closing the door behind her. She looked at me, a genuine smile on her lips and even though her smile was genuine I saw the slight tendril of anxiousness flicker through her bright, brown eyes. Maybe she thought me to be my father. I wasn't exactly aware of my father's behaviour or how he presented himself but by the way he lashed out on Alastair yesterday I had gathered enough information to categorise him as powerful, dominant and rather rude.
"I'm Bronia Eastway," the woman that stood before me said, giving me a low bow before raising her head and saying, so respectfully that I had to hold in my godsmacked expression, "your Royal Highness."
"Gosh," I said instantly, "don't call me that. Gen will do."
Her eyes widened and while I was certain that my words made her feel shocked, I wasn't sure if she was shocked that I was nothing like she expected or that I asked her to refer to me as Gen rather than that high-class, ridiculous term.
"I'm afraid I can't do that, your Highness. It's disrespectful to call a member of the Royal family by their name in their presence," she said, her voice lower that it was, almost as if she was embarrassed to be put into such a situation. "Unless we are well acquainted with them. If not, it is highly disrespectful."
"Well," I mused, a glint of mischievousness in my eyes, "isn't that disrespectful? If you don't call Royal members of the family by their name in their presence then it's only right that you don't do so when you're not in their presence."
I sensed the immediate panic that shrouded her aura in an instant. She opened her mouth as if she was ready to give me a reply but then she closed it again, biting on her lower lip as worry shone clear as day in her eyes.
"Don't worry," I chuckled and her eyes widened when she saw that I was amused at her troubled state. "I'm not going to throw you into the cells, or dungeon, or whatever is used here - I'm very hazy with all the details about Deidrif, as you can see."
She blinked a couple of times like she couldn't really believe what I had just said. "You're not what I expected," she blurted and instantly she looked to the ground. She must have thought that she was embarrassing herself but I found her cute and maybe a little inexperienced when it came to teasing.
Intrigued, I tilted my head the slightest bit and asked out of genuine curiosity, "what did you expect me to be like?"
Her eyes widened yet again and she looked like a small, innocent deer caught in the headlights. I couldn't fight the urge to smile. This girl, Bronia, was quite something. I made out from our short conversation that she got easily flustered in my presence and I knew well that it was solely the fact that I belonged to Royalty.
When I was a mere child I'd dream about Kings and Queens, Princesses and Princes, and I would let the false hope of all those little television cartoons and animation movies whisk me away into wonderland. I wished to be Royalty. The pretense that the television provided made me yearn to be part of Royalty. If my kid self was told that she was a Crown Princess then she would be delighted. But now, having Bronia stand before me and absolutely flustered and worried in my presence amused me but it also made me feel out of place.
I was never used to attention.
"Well," she started, keeping those eccentric brown eyes of her trained on the floor which was tiled and smooth, a rich colour of milky white with delicate wisps of faint brown adorning it in a random pattern. "I expected to you to be, uh, a little more..." she trailed off, words failing her at that moment. Or maybe she didn't want to say those words out loud because they'd only lead her to further embarrassment so I decided to help her out.
"Sophisticated? Elegant?" I supplied, "rude?" I never knew teasing could be fun. I always thought teasing was rather mean but seeing Bronia all flustered showed me just how much she valued her job so I opted out of teasing her and offered her a kind smile.
"You don't have to worry about anything, Bronia," I said, sincerity lacing itself around my voice, "just act like I'm a normal person. Like I'm a maid like you are."
She gaped, her brown eyes wide with surprise. By her features I could tell that was older than me, maybe by a few years. "But you're the Princess," she sputtered, "it would be an insult if I didn't treat you as such."
I couldn't help but smile at that. I was actually enjoying the conversation that I was having with her and I would have loved to continue it but she was here to aid me, to be a servant, a maid, and someone as me, I didn't grow up with such facilities because my mother's allowance could not allow it, I felt uncomfortable to have someone do some mere chores for me. I didn't need a maid. I was fairing perfectly fine all these years without one. "Bronia, you're lovely. And it would be great if we could be friends," I started and I could see in those warm brown eyes of hers that she knew exactly where I was taking the new turn of conversation to. "But I don't need a maid. I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself-"
"If I can interrupt, my lady, I must say that things work a little differently around here. Servants and maids aren't all that bad. Some actually do enjoy their jobs and the King is very fair. He treats us well and even offers us accommodation in the castle if we cannot provide for our own. And I cannot disobey Ronan. He is my King, after all, and he had instructed Alastair Ignacio to choose a maid for you-"
"Alastair chose a maid for me?" I asked, my curious voice laced with slight confusion. Alastair, no doubt, knew the circumstances that I had grown up with. Did he really think that I'd accept having a maid? Then more curious as another thought entered my buzzing mind, I asked, "why did Alastair choose you?"
After I voiced my dubious thoughts I felt stupid. I should have worded it differently but Bronia didn't show that she felt the slightest bit offended by my words if she felt so. Instead she smiled, a sad but hopeful smile - like she was remembering a brief but joyful memory - and said, her voice soft and laced with a tone so bittersweet, all nervousness and worry gone, "I used to be Alastair's older brother's best friend."
She didn't say anymore and I silently willed her to. My eyebrows subconsciously flitted together in confusion. Alastair hadn't mentioned having an older brother. He had said, on that date that we both went on - on that date that left me feeling lighthearted - that his family consisted of his dear mother, his loving father and his annoying younger brother who was named Archie. He hadn't ever mentioned an older brother and now my mind was whizzing with questions as they always did.
Why didn't Alastair mention he had an older brother? Had something happened to his brother? He had a personal fight with Thorin. I remembered when I asked him in the Jeep why he spoke of Thorin - my supposed uncle who had a personal vendetta against Ronan, my father, because Thorin was deprived of a birthright which left him angered and burning with rage - with such hatred. Had Alastair's brother been victim to Thorin's plans? Was the reason behind his anger with Thorin about his brother?
I erased the confusion from my face as fast as I could and asked with curiosity in my voice because that was one emotion I could not keep at bay, "Alastair's older brother must have been amazing. I think he mentioned him once." I pretended to be deep in thought as if I was racking my brain to remember an important detail that Alastair never even told me of, before saying, "I don't think I can remember his name, though. What was it?"
She smiled then. It wasn't nervous or worrisome. It didn't even resemble the smile that played at her lips few seconds ago. It was a knowing smile, one that said she knew what I was up to. "You don't know anything about Alastair's older brother, do you? He hasn't told you about him, has he?" Bronia asked and for the first time she looked different. She didn't look like someone who was worried about pleasing me - she was acting as such a couple of minutes before.
"I know he has a younger brother named, Archie," I supplied and even though I knew this bit of information that I uttered with useless I hoped that it would get me more information about Alastair's older brother.
"I'm afraid that it's not my place to tell," she said sympathetically. "His older brother is a very sore subject to him."
Is he dead? was the first question that skittered into my mind and I wanted to slap myself for thinking of something so harsh - especially for Alastair, a man I was becoming deeply fond of even if the rules of Deidrif forbade it - but I was curious and I was always questioning everything that crossed my path. It wasn't an attribute that I was proud of but it was an attribute that I was made with and that attribute was exactly what made me Genevieve Salvatore, a daughter to a dead mother and bastard of a King.
"The King has requested for your presence in an hour's time after his breakfast and he must be dining now so I suggest that you let me help you. I am your maid, your Highness, and it is my duty to aid you whenever you need me and whenever I can." Bronia's sudden words, filled with conviction and an underlying tone of pleading, pulled me out of my train of thoughts. "I really need this job, my lady."
I studied my supposed maid for a few seconds and debated with myself. I didn't need a maid. I knew that. But I liked the conversation that flowed between us, I really did enjoy the company she provided so maybe her being my maid wasn't so bad, after all.
"Alright," I said and she smiled wide, her teeth coming into view with her dazzling smile, "but call me Genevieve. Anymore of the Royal Highness talk will drive me insane."
She nodded and I was filled with a sense of relief. "Of course, your Highness," she nodded her head, more violently and then, as if seeing her mistake, she began to shake her head more violently than she was nodding it and instantly corrected herself which earned a chuckle from me, "Genevieve! Sorry, this is just different from what I usually deal with."
"And what is it that you usually deal with?"
She looked hesitant for a moment like she wasn't too sure if she should be sharing this piece of information with someone like me - someone who, unfortunately, belonged to Royalty - before her face broke into a grin. "Woman bossing me around and threatening to report me if I make a mistake," she said, her voice lighthearted yet there was still that cautious tone to it and I couldn't blame her. I was a part of this world, whether I liked it or not, and with the title that I bore - the title I didn't want in the first place - came fear, respect and different manners of approaching someone like me.
I hated how that sounded; someone like me. And then again, for the hundredth time, I wished I was John, that fellow classmate that was caught in Thorin's men's plot to get to me.
I didn't like feeling this way. I knew I belonged to this world and yet I didn't want to be part of it so I decided to distract myself, not think about this and not be jealous of John, someone I was most certain I would never see again, because it was worthless and time consuming. So I shifted my gaze to dress wardrobe and back to Bronia, a smile hanging off my lips before I said, "well, where should we start?"
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I had often dreamed of meeting my father and in those said dreams I imagined him coming home when my mother was cooking dinner for her date which she told me would be a surprise and only later on would I find out, as they cuddled with me on the sofa and browsed through their pictures together, that he was my father and that he hadn't really left my mother and I on purpose. That he had an important reason to leave but he was here to stay now, and he would talk lovingly to my mother and I, and that would convince the both of us to give him the second chance he deserved.
Those dreams, after waiting hopefully for years, disintegrated until nothing but anger, hatred and utter disgust was left at the thought of my father. When my mother surprised me that day by coming over to my apartment - a few days before she had been murdered - she talked of my father for the first time and spoke of him with such a loving tone. I didn't know what to think. She told me that he couldn't stay with us because that would only arouse suspicion with Thorin - it didn't take a genius to figure out that all of Ronan's moves were being monitored by Thorin's spies - and that Ronan wasn't to blame, that she had lied about him abandoning us for my own safety because she knew just how much of a big mouth I was when it came to questions.
That didn't stop me from being angry at him. Ronan was my father. He was supposed to bring me up, he was supposed to act as a father-figure when I needed him, he was supposed to show me love and care. I never got any of that and even though my mother told me she had lied about him abandoning us it still felt like that was exactly what he did because even though he didn't abandon my mother - Alastair had told me in the Jeep a few days ago that he met up with her - he did abandon me and that hurt and made my heart clench in raging anger and disgust.
Now, standing before him while he stood up at his throne, which was undeniably beautifully crafted and this caused an itch to form on the back of my mind when I thought of what it would feel like to sit upon the very throne that Ronan had just stood up from.
He looked similar to the man that my mother had once, long ago, showed me a picture of. He looked older. His brown hair was shorter and his sideburns were greying, white hair taking the place of brown. He had green eyes, the same hue and shade as my very own eyes and I felt a sickening feeling take it's place in my stomach. I had this bastard's eyes. His skin was light, but not as light as mine, and there were crinkles in the corners of his eyes as his thin, pink lips stretched into a smile, a smile I wouldn't have found revolting if I didn't hate the person who beheld that smile so much as I did. His face looked more gruff with age and he now had a small beard, which he didn't sprout in the picture that my mother had shown me but looked strangely fitting to his gruff features. He was strong. At least, his muscular built said so and this made me wonder if Thorin lacked in strength compared to Ronan and if that was one of the reason he was denied the throne.
"Genevieve, I'm so glad to finally meet you!" Ronan said, his smile wide and a part of me wanted to forget about my anger towards him because he looked so delighted to see me but I shouldn't, I couldn't.
I bowed low as Bronia had told me to do so when I met the King but I was sort of shocked when I saw my father with my own bare, naked eyes and when I saw him standing in front of me, alive and well, I paused and my heart stopped beating because a part of me didn't want to believe that the man that left my mother and I - left me - was the man, my supposed father, that stood before me. And so, in my surprised and shocked state, the rule to bow before the King had been forgotten and only remembered when his voice pulled me out of my somewhat furious daze.
I came back up and levelled my eyes with his green ones, the very ones that looked so alike to mine. Instantly it reminded me of my nightmares and panic momentarily seized me before I remembered Alastair telling me, when he had used his gift and viewed my nightmares, that the green eyes and the haunting voice in my nightmares didn't belong to Ronan but Thorin.
"I wish I could say the same," I said, the words slipping off my tongue accidentally and for the first time I regretted speaking my mind because there was a part of me, no matter how small, that feared Ronan. He was the King of Deidrif after all. He had all the power anyone could ever want. He was a King and while I was Royalty - even though I didn't feel it - I didn't compare to him.
His dark eyebrows furrowed together and he stepped away from the throne which meant he was taking a step towards me and even though I wanted to take a step back so we could have a vast space between us I knew that I needed to keep my post so I stood straight, not moving forward and not moving backward, and stared right into those warm eyes that I was most certain was cold as ice and had only used the warmth as a form of concealment.
I tried not to tremble as he stepped towards me. He didn't look scary at all. Rather it was his title that instilled fear within me. "But I'm your father," he reasoned, confusion laced through his voice.
I stood my ground and swallowed the lump that had formed in my throat. "Why didn't you stay with Mum and I?" I forced out and willed my heart to stop beating so fast and hard against my ribcage but the closer Ronan got, the weaker my commands grew and my heart began to beat erratically within the confinements of my chest.
Understanding dawned his face and his confused features changed to show an expression of concern and care. Don't let him get to you, Gen, I instructed myself, he's just playing with you. He's a good actor.
"I couldn't," he started and maybe I was scared of him and maybe he did make me tremble but this searing hot rage was accumulating within me fast and it was slowly overpowering my fright. I was angry at the man who stood before me, at the man who never stood beside my mother and I, at the man who left me. And I had every fucking right to be angry.
"You couldn't?" I laughed an insane laugh, one that highly lacked humour and was filled with bitter wickedness. "I didn't know my King could be such a coward," I spat, my eyes blazing with anger and hatred and all the frantic emotions that were built within me for years slowly came pouring out.
Shock flickered through his eyes before his gruff features hardened and his once soft green eyes were stony. "How dare you talk to me in that manner-"
"I am your daughter, aren't I?" I spat back bitterly.
"You have no right to talk to me in that manner. I am your King and you do not adopt such a disrespectful tone towards your King" - I scoffed - "and you do not talk to an elder, especially your parent like that. Is this how you talked to Marianna? Is this how you talked to your mother?"
I had an insult right on the tip of my tongue, ready to lash all the furious and harsh words upon him but the words and all memory of them died out as soon as his words reached my ears. They struck me. And they struck me hard.
"You have no right to talk about her!" I exclaimed, my voice rising by a notch and I was sure that he spotted the fury in my voice. I didn't want to talk about my mother, especially with him. If he hadn't sent us away then maybe I would be accustomed to all of this, maybe I wouldn't be this angry at him, maybe she'd still be alive.
This was his fault, I realised. It was all Ronan's fault.
"You're the cause for her death," I said, my voice calm but I was sure the wild emotions in my eyes were swirling around fast and hard like a storm.
My words had hit a sore spot. From the way his features hardened even more, from the way anger blazed within them, from the way his jaw clicked and the noise the click of his tongue against the roof of his mouth produced - it showed me that my words had affected him just as much as his words had affected me.
"Me? Did I kill her? Do you think I would kill my own wife?" His face was hot with fury as he spat these words out to me, his face now close enough for me to see the tired lines that graced his forehead. Ronan was getting old.
I retaliated smoothly. "You're a coward, father. If you weren't then you wouldn't have sent Mum and I away. You would have been brave and protected us till your very last breath. But you're not brave, you're not a hero, because it's a fact that you're a coward. And once a coward, always a coward."
I hadn't ever known myself to be this vile but seeing Ronan, seeing a face that I hadn't ever seen with my own bare eyes, a face that I had come to hate with time - it only made me angry. It made me tick, it made me itch and it made me furious. More furious than I had ever been before. And maybe I was being out of line, maybe I shouldn't have been this angry but I was and I could no longer control the hot fury that boiled within my veins.
I saw briefly the emotion of pain swirl in his green eyes before he looked away and stepped back, sensing that I needed space and if he didn't give that to me I might erupt even more than I already have. This gave me the opportunity to breathe and look away from him, because despite my red, hot anger, I was very much afraid of him and the piercing silence that settled upon us made the fear return.
I looked about me, looking for a distraction, but all I saw was this vast hall. It was beautiful and finely decorated. Pillars stood upright, supported the detailed ceiling that had an intricate pattern on it. A fancy, crystal chandelier hung from the ceiling and the light that shined in from the large windows that had it's rich, deep red curtains drawn aside, bounced off the crystals in the chandelier and lit up the room.
But the room was burning with tension and fury, from both Ronan and I.
"Is this how Marianna brought you up?" he asked, his voice soft and low, vulnerable and open. I hadn't expected this tone from him and when I looked back to him, his gaze wasn't on me but on the glass window that was a few metres away from where we stood in this vast room.
"No," I said and when his head swivelled to me I noticed that my voice sounded just as soft and low, just as vulnerable and open as his had and I quickly tried to cover up, making my face blank as I said icily, "it's just when I see you it brings out the bastard within me."
And before he could ask why - his mouth was open and it was no doubt that he was about to draw a question from what I had just said - I turned my back towards him swiftly and gathered speed as I walked along the red carpet that adorned the middle of the hall, and swept out of the room in a rush, my heart thundering in my chest and roaring in my ears.
Bronia, who was outside waiting for me, immediately stood up from the floor that she was lounging on and looked at me, worry clear in her eyes. "Are you okay?" she asked me, reaching out her arm and touching my shoulder softly.
I knew I was about to break down and by the way I quivered against the warm, caring touch that Bronia provided I knew she knew it, too. So instead of replying to her question I said the only thing I could say. "Please take me to my room, Bronia."
Never had I been thankful to actually have a maid.
A/N:
was that a heavy chapter or what? what are you feeling now? sad, angry, frustrated? there was no Alastair in this chapter but this is one of my favourite chapters to write because of what went down and the characters.
question: i have my thoughts about Gen and Ronan but what do you think about Gen's responses and Ronan's responses. who do you think was wrong? who do you think is actually at fault?
keep the comments coming. i love reading them!
until next time,
-anha xo