“Yikes.”
“They haven’t been taken from the Royal Museum yet so you should get to see them during your trip this week,” she replies, reminding me that my royal duties are back in full swing now that we’re home. I don’t want to sound ungrateful, but I’m exhausted and wish I could rest longer. “I’ll arrange for them to be shown you after the unveiling of your royal portrait.”
“Thank you.”
“Of course,” she answers. “Now here are some options I was looking at. Nothing too wild, but silhouettes that would look stunning on your frame.”
“They’re beautiful,” I say while scrolling through the images. “This one with the bows looks like it would fall off if I wasn’t careful.”
“Hmm…” is all she says.
When I’m done with breakfast, she carefully stacks the dishes back on the cart while I go reapply my lipstick. Usually, I wouldn’t be so high maintenance, but God knows who will be at this meeting and if it’s my uncle, he will absolutely share that he’s disappointed in me if I were to show up for a meeting looking so unkept.
When I walk back into the sitting room, the dining cart is gone and Maeve is standing by the door with her tablet in her arms and her cardigan over her shoulders.
“Are you ready to go?” she asks me.
“Sure. Do I need to bring anything?”
“I don’t believe so,” she answers, looking at my ear and not my eyes. Whatever that’s about, I don’t have time for now. I walk back into the bedroom and grab the iron key from where I’d tucked it away and slip it into my trouser pocket before returning to meet Maeve at the door.
“All set,” I reply.
We exit the room and I use the key to lock the door behind us before slipping it back into my pocket.
We walk silently side by side down the hall. Thesilence is not comforting like usual; it’s deafening. Actually, Maeve is almost never silent making this very weird. But before I can comment on it, we’ve arrived at the offices of the King when he is in residence here.
She knocks on the door and he calls out, “Enter.”
It wasn’t so long ago that I was punished in front of everyone who’s going to be at this meeting, in this very office. I feel my heart trip over itself and ramp up its pace as I step over the threshold. It doesn’t get better when I look up because everyone in here is staring at me in a way I know I don’t like. It makes my skin crawl.
“Come here, hen,” Rhys says as he waves me over. I hear the door close behind me and the snick of the lock tumbling into its place. When I get near enough, he grabs my hand and pulls me into his lap. “You know that I love you, correct?”
“You’re scaring me,” I whisper.
“Just answer the question,” he says, pinching my chin and tipping my face so that I’m looking him in the eyes. “You know that I love you?”
“Yes.”
“And you know that I would never do anything to hurt you, correct?”
I nod my head, feeling a rock lodge in my throat before I try to speak. “I know.”
“And that I will always protect you to the best of my abilities…”
“I hope so,” I answer.
“That’s good, hen,” he says. “Because in this life there are many things that we must do even when we wish we did not have to. This is going to be one of them.”
“This is not making me less scared,” I reply.
“I know. We’re going to do a walk-through of the ceremony so that you know what is expected of us, particularly, you and me.”
“What kind of expectations are we talking here? A bloodletting?” I joke.
“More like an anointing,” he says cryptically.
At that, I feel my heartrate speed back up again.