Royally Marked

Chapter Twenty

The magic is getting worse.

I wake up to my room having rearranged itself in the few hours that I slept after Del's call. I have a nice, soft rug now, along with the strange plant growing along the wall. My bed is opposite to where it usually is, and I can't see my mirror anywhere.

Stuff like this has been happening more and more lately, and honestly, it's scaring me a bit.

As is usual for my life, though, I don't have time to deal with any of that. No, I need to figure out the other mess I'm dealing with right now. The public mess. The soulmate mess.

The thing that actually could have a really large impact on my life. I think I've done a pretty good job so far about not thinking about the future, about what "crown prince of England" actually means.

About becoming Queen. Actually, I've sort of actively been trying not to think about becoming Queen. That's something better saved for another time, maybe when I have no responsibilities and can just hyperventilate in my closet for a few hours.

Instead, what I do now is pick up my phone and check my messages. Of course, August hasn't texted or called me. That would be too easy.

He's had nearly an entire day. It's almost lunchtime for me, I'm still in my pyjamas, I've got the mother of all stress headaches and I am entirely fed up with the situation.

So I take a deep breath and dial his number. I only have three rings to think about all of the reasons this could have been a terrible idea - not to mention that the plan was to wait for him to come grovelling to me - when someone picks up.

"August-" I say, cut off by the voice on the other end of the line.

"Miss Anderson, I presume." It's not August. It's a man with an accent like August's, voice low and commanding, and I know with a terrible sinking feeling who it is even before I ask.

"Yeah, I was calling for August? Sorry, who is this?"

The man continues as if I'd never spoken. "It's nice to finally get to talk to my son's soulmate."

My heart drops.

It's the King. It's the King of England. I am currently talking to the King of England on the phone right now, the father of my soulmate, probably the person I'm most nervous to talk to in the entire world.

God, there's probably some protocol for this, right? Is there a way to curtsy over the phone?

"Your Highness," I say, instead of the unintelligible squeak that my mouth really wants to make. "Is - um. Is August there? I need to..." I trail off. I'm sure the king knows why I'm calling. Like I'd want to talk about anything other than that stupid picture.

"My son is currently unavailable," he says, and my mind instantly goes into everything that could mean, up to and including dungeons.

Do people still have dungeons?

Maybe I need to take a deep breath. Or three.

"Okay," I say, because I don't know what else to do. "Um, I guess I'll just - "

"You have no idea what you're doing, Miss Anderson," the King says. "And I sincerely hope you come to your senses before you or August make a mistake you won't be able to come back from."

Am I being threatened? I think that's what's happening. I think I'm being threatened right now.

"I want what's best for my son," the King says. "And what's best for my country. Do you understand, Miss Anderson?"

There's a long pause. I'm not entirely sure I'm actually awake right now. "Yes," I say finally, because I don't know what else to do. Because I'm pretty sure that's the answer that he wants.

"Good," he says briskly. "This is what is going to happen. You are not going to have any more unsupervised contact with my son. You will be in contact with me, or the queen. You will fly to England as soon as possible and we will figure out how to spin this whole mess to the press because it seems like the public wants a Cinderella. We are going to give them what they want, Miss Anderson. Do you understand?"

"Yes," I say, quieter this time, because I kind of feel like falling apart. The words aren't quite registering, but one thing's coming through loud and clear.

August.

I don't get to talk to August anymore. At least not freely, at least not -

It takes me like a minute to realize that I've been hung up on.

No more talking to August. I'd been mad at him, yeah, but this meant no more trying to figure things out. This is exactly what he was trying to protect me from.

I put my phone down on my bedside table slowly and carefully, instead of doing what I actually want to do, which is throw it across the room.

Then I proceed to sit on the edge of my bed and stare at the wall for approximately an hour. I try to remind myself that this isn't the end of the world, it's just a minor setback. It's just kind of insane.

It's just me realizing I don't know what my life looks like anymore.

At some point, I get up and get breakfast/lunch, because at this point it's definitely after noon. Mom's not here. It's the weekend, so she's not at work - maybe she's out shopping. There's probably a note, but I don't have the energy to look for one.

I sit down on the couch and stare at the wall. It feels like everything inside of me is buzzing. It feels dangerous, like I'm a bomb that could go off at any moment.

I dig my fingers into the couch, take a few deep breaths, close my eyes and try to get a hold of myself.

It's not working. It's not working, and I'm trying to stay calm but the light bulb in the lamp next to me must be on the fritz or something because it's making this buzzing noise and I just want it to stop, I just want all of it to stop -

The light bulb explodes.

I scream, lunge backwards. There are shards of glass everywhere, the lampshade is just gone, not torn into shreds or anything, just gone, like it disappeared.

I suck in a breath. Stare at the light, try to come up with a logical explanation that's anything other than the one currently running through my brain.

Because what's running through my brain is... well. It's crazy.

But the buzzing in my chest has lessened, and all I can think about is that I wanted the light bulb to stop and then it did. In a very violent way, but still.

Did I do that?

I close my eyes and take another deep breath. I try not to move, because picking shards of glass out of my hands was not on today's to-do list, and then:

I imagine the lamp like it was before. Lampshade and full, complete, working light bulb and no shards of glass anywhere.

I concentrate on that, remember the texture of the shade and the way the light glowed, and try not to think of how stupid this is and how there has to be another explanation for this.

But then I open my eyes, and there it is:

The lamp, looking completely normal, like nothing ever happened. Like the light bulb wasn't in a million pieces three seconds ago.

I controlled the magic.

I controlled the magic. On purpose. I just did that. That's not possible.

Except it is, because I just did it.

Oh my god.

I can control the magic.

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