Out in the hallway, Prudence had left her sanity, her composure, her poise—but alone at last, she let the shells of her pretense crumble.
Two steps into the stale-smelling office, she dropped to her knees as tears poured from her eyes. She muffled her wails with her hand, and prayed Céleste and Sébastien wouldn't hear her and try to hug her again. Hugging meant accepting their sympathy, and accepting their sympathy meant accepting the situation—and that, she couldn't. Not yet. She, Princess Prudence of Giroma, had become the last living member of the Giromian royal family. Which meant she would be Queen regent, and govern this country that she called home, but didn't know.
Somehow she gained the strength to stand, and wobbled about the room to light candles and sconces, to illuminate her deceased father's office. Like when she'd first stumbled in, thick coats of dust peppered the oak bookcases, the rich mahogany desk, the borders of paintings, the rims of the pots that once contained plants.
She marched to the desk and pulled out the auburn velvet chair that once belonged to her father. Tall, commanding, regal, it was as she'd envisioned him. Had anyone sat in it since his death?
"Death," she said, licking her lips as she peered up at the canvas of her family.
There it was, in perfect lighting—her father, her mother, her brother, and her. She and Romain were tiny babies, held by a mother who harbored secrets, and a father who would soon take off on a journey he'd never return from.
Tears plummeted down her cheeks again, but she shook herself, standing up straight. "I have no time to dwell on the past." She lowered onto the seat, and a layer of dust shot up from the cushions, causing her to sneeze. She sneezed again after wiping a hand over the desk's grimy surface. "Only the future matters. My future, as the sole inheritor of all this."
To her surprise, paperwork clustered in corners of the desk. She scanned the papers—blowing on them, sneezing, reading, sneezing once more—but detected nothing of worth. Last-minute travel plans to France, summons to other counties, a love-letter from Pauline—that, she slipped into her bodice for safekeeping.
She searched the drawers, yanking them open one at a time. Some squealed, their inner workings rusty; some were near glued shut, having been closed for so long. She extracted everything, and analyzed every document, noting that her father's handwriting was like Romain's.
Once finished with the drawers, she inspected the bookcases, and a few armoires overfilling with old scrolls and crumpled parchments.
Stacking the papers she'd seen value in on the desk, she settled on the chair, cracked her knuckles, and stretched. "Here we go."
***
After what felt like hours, Prudence adjusted her slouched position. The candle before her still burned brightly, its wax dripping onto the plate, its flames flickering in and out of focus.
Out of all the notes and letters she'd read, two stood out, though she wasn't certain they'd prove Cornelius' guilt. They gave well-needed answers, and set up more questions.
She held the first in her left hand as she re-analyzed it.
December the eleventh, seventeen-seventy-six,
To Whom It May Concern,
I, King Gregor of Giroma, request to give full heir status to my daughter, Princess Prudence of Giroma, should anything happen to my male heir, the Crown Prince Romain of Giroma. I would like to install her as true heir, meaning she can ascend to the crown whether or not she has married, and whether or not another male heir shares our blood. She would be Queen in her own right, and govern in her own right, the first woman in Giroma to do so.
She'd gasped so many times reading the note that she had little breath left in her lungs. The words, dry, flaking off the page from age, meant so much. They meant her father had prepared for any eventuality before he departed Giroma with her, unaware he'd be leaving for good. He'd wanted to fully legitimize her. He'd loved her.
Wiping the dampness beneath her eyes, she continued.
It is a big matter, and so we should all discuss it, first. Let us convene in a few months, once I come back from my tour through Giroma and the bordering territories.
Return this letter to me, signed, to show your approval.
Several signatures spread across the bottom of the note, though not all nobles had been reached. She recognized a few of the names, but when she spotted Duke of Spestein, her heart skipped a beat. Whether it was her cousin or her uncle's signature, she had no clue; but her direct family, her blood, had acknowledged Gregor's intent.
To her disgust—yet with no surprise—she viewed no seal from Terter, no Schwartz scribbled anywhere.
The start of bitterness between our families... is that a potential piece of proof?
She lowered the paper onto the desk. Why hadn't Romain finalized this when he became King? Until recently, he had no inkling his long-lost sister was alive; but Prudence had returned several weeks ago. Why hadn't he retrieved this document and finished it? Declared her as his heir?
Or did he have no idea of its existence?
"Why did no one go through Father's paperwork after his death?" She shrugged and leaned back in her seat.
As it stood now, she was a regent, not an official Queen. But that was only if the nobles didn't accuse her of Romain's murder. And if they chose to place their trust in a woman raised on foreign soil, with no real knowledge of Giromian laws and customs.
"Naïve," she said, clicking her tongue. "So packed with witty responses and snark, yet he never assumed some might want to overthrow him. He did not plan for the future." Her eyes itched, her throat was scratchy, and her shoulders sore from hunching over.
Clouds of stale dust puffed around her as she wiggled her stiff fingers. She glanced at the second note; the one that puzzled her most and caught her attention because of its sender: King Edouard of Totresia.
She reread the paragraphs, and each time, she shivered.
July the eighth, seventeen-seventy-six,
To His Majesty, King Gregor of Giroma,
I will get straight to the point: no.
I will not promise my precious two-month-old Crown Prince to your daughter.
I care not about the ratifications. Nor do I care for the propositions you make and the demands you dare to ask. Though I wished to ally our countries someday, this will not happen now, not after what you did to my brother, the man I looked up to and had to watch die at your hands. I refuse.
My brother, had he been King, would have seen things differently. But not I.
She wasn't sure of Edouard's age at the time of writing. He became King at seventeen, and was eighteen when Antoine was born.
I would never marry one of my kin to the child of the man who slaughtered my family, who broke my parents apart and rendered them so sick, they died after Philippe's death, forcing me to take their place. You are a cold-hearted person, and clearly you have no other concern but securing a proper match for your daughter—who is barely older than my son, might I add—instead of ensuring she grows up to be nothing like you.
Please, give my regards to your wife, who was supposed to be here, in Totresia, with my brother.
Salutations,
His Majesty
King Edouard of Totresia
All those instances when she'd imagined Edouard as a grand man, with grand ambitions, came back to haunt her. Here, he was nothing like that; he was murderous, vengeful, and thirsty to destroy Giroma. Granted, her father's actions were worse, but she didn't, and couldn't, condone Edouard's. He'd lost a brother, but also smashed an opportunity to make peace with the enemy country and avoid further disturbances and unnecessary deaths. He'd missed out on the chance to end a passive-aggressive war that had gone on for centuries. Was that not what a King was expected to do? Hadn't Edouard instructed Prudence in such ways, for years? He'd educated her in politics, military, European standards, but refrained from teaching her about Giroma, because her father murdered his brother. And then he murdered her father. And now...
"Everyone is dead."
She'd never get to ask Edouard why he'd changed his mind and later wanted her to wed Antoine. If he'd despised Gregor so much, and denied the union, why did he later do everything in his power to put her and Antoine together?
Knots twisted in her abdomen when she realized she could get answers—from Clémentine. She knew it all, was involved in it all, as Edouard had told her everything. Or she'd eavesdropped, spied on him, and obtained information by darker means. Yet she'd never revealed the truth to her children—two of which had traveled to Prudence, worried about her safety, and stirred up the Giromian people, and got mixed up in her brother's assassination
Two foreigners deeply weaved into Giromian tragedy?
"Oh, dear." Her blood turned to ice. "They must leave. Fast."
She moved away from the desk as guilt grew in her mind, in her heart. The nobles, when returned to court, wouldn't respond well to Totresians hanging out while Pauline and Romain's murders remained unsolved. The Giromian citizens would never believe her if her only back-up were decades-long enemies like Antoine and Sébastien.
She stuffed the letters into her corset and peeked at the family portrait. How happy her family once was, but always doomed to fall apart. Gregor plotted assassinations, Pauline shoved her dangerous knowledge into a sealed box, Romain was consumed by hatred and blind to his true foes.
And now she, the Princess, the one who should have inherited the kingdom, would see her reign contested.
She extinguished thecandles and sconces, then snatched her lantern and hastened out into the hall.Stepping over debris, she ignored the rumbling in her stomach from lack of foodand water. Her goal was to find Antoine, to debate what she'd located andwhatever he had come up with, then convene with Sébastien and Céleste and makethem all leave.
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