Royally Marked

Chapter Fourteen

A/N: small edits

I thought making contact with him would be the hardest part. I didn't anticipate the thick wave of anxiety that would hit me as soon as August hung up, as soon as I really, really realized what I was in for.

Del has a hand on my shoulder. I think she heard most of the conversation, though I'm not sure.

"Okay," she says, studying me intently. "Let's go home, okay?"

"Yeah," I say, my mind whirring frantically. "Yeah, I just - "

"It's okay - "

"I have to do so much research," I finish, and she looks a little taken aback.

"What?"

"I mean, I have no idea what I'm getting myself into, Del," I say. "If I'm going to do this - and it looks like I'm doing this - then I'm sure as heck not walking in there with a massive disadvantage."

"Well, how was your conversation?" Del says, trying, as usual, to rein me back in.

"Do you have any idea the expectations that will probably be on August's bride?" I ask. "Not that we're getting married, but soulmate is a heck of a lot more permanent than just a girlfriend."

"They'll get to know you, and I'm sure they'll like you," Del says, and that's what sort of... breaks me.

"No, they won't," I burst out. "I mean, August probably won't even once he actually meets me, because let's face it, I'm nothing! I'm weird, and pale, and awkward, and he is a literal prince -" I stop for a breath. "His parents are going to tear me to pieces. The media is going to tear me to pieces."

Del looks like she wants to say something, but I forge on. "But not if I'm prepared. I'm going to be so prepared."

I'm almost shouting, now, and Del's looking around like she's just realized we're in a very public place. "Time to go," she says, hustling me out and onto the street.

I'm deep in thought, buoyed by a new sort of determination. Because I don't fail at things. If I'm going to do this, I'm going to do it right.

Thinking about what August had said - how he'd hinted that maybe his parents didn't want to acknowledge me - makes something curdle in the pit of my stomach.

It wasn't my choice to be his soulmate, and logically, no one can blame me for it. But I know that people often don't work logically.

The trip home is spent mostly in silence. I don't think Del knows what to say, and I manage to convince her that she doesn't need to come home with me.

I need to talk to my mom. Alone.

Nerves take up residence in my stomach like a pit of snakes as I make my way up our front steps. I don't know why I'm so nervous - okay, that's a lie.

Everything's changing, and I don't know what my world is going to look like when the shaking stops.

I step inside the front door, and make my way into the living room. Mom's not there, but something's different.

I could have sworn that the painting on the wall - one of mom's - was a garden landscape, one of her cheerful, bright pieces, full of flowers and bumblebees.

The painting that hangs above the couch today, however, is a dark piece, a storm-tossed sea battering a lighthouse. It's also not a painting I've ever seen before.

My mom comes in through the back door, cheeks flushed from the cold, and I point at the painting.

"Did you put a new painting up?" I ask, hoping she'll say yes.

"No," she says, and there's something tight in her face. "That is one of mine, though. They move around, sometimes. They know their rightful places."

Mom says this kind of stuff a lot - the magic has never thrown her off the way it does to me. But something's different this time. She looks worried, tense, like something happened while I was gone.

The snakes in my stomach have decided to throw a party.

"There was a call for you," she says, eyes on mine.

I frown, confused, and check my phone.

"On the landline," she clarifies.

"What?" I ask. We still have a landline, for some unknown reason - mom won't get rid of it. She has a cell, that she barely uses - most of her friends know our home phone number.

"Do you want to tell me why the Queen of England is calling you?" Mom says. The question isn't rhetorical. She knows about August, but as far as she knows he doesn't know about me.

"He called me today," I say, sitting my suddenly-shaky body down into a chair. "He - he warned me that his parents might do something like this. But if they wanted to talk to me, I don't understand why they wouldn't have called my phone. It's the number on my Registry profile."

"I think they wanted to talk to me," my mother says, that same careful blankness still present in her voice. "I don't think calling the house was a mistake at all."

"What did they say?" I ask. She's scaring me, a little. I didn't expect this, not so soon - I wonder what they wanted. I wonder how they found out so quickly.

I wonder if August just told them, in the end.

I wouldn't blame him if he did. They are his parents, after all.

"Your presence has been requested," she says, the words oddly formal like she's quoting someone. "At the palace.

I freeze. "What?" I whisper, the words not computing.

"As soon as possible, apparently," she clarifies. "I gather it would be in the best interests of you and August to cooperate."

She doesn't have to say that it wasn't a request - I can read it in her face.

Her eyes are steady as they meet mine. "Obviously they can't make you do anything, Casey," she says, her voice gentle. "But if you want a future with August, one where his parents accept your relationship, you have to accept their world as well."

She takes a step closer, hugging me. "Remember," she says, "you have choices, here. And you're still my kid. You don't have to go anywhere you don't want to, but - if you want to, I'll support you. Whatever you want."

I don't have any words. August said - but I didn't think he meant this.

I didn't think he meant this soon.

But even as I reel from this, I know what I have to do. For both of us.

After all, I promised I'd give us a chance.

I guess I'm going to England.

A short one - but things are getting exciting! 

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