Royally Marked

Chapter Seventeen

A/N: small edits

You'd think that everything would feel easier since I made my decision. But boy, would you be wrong.

In typical fashion, it only takes until the next morning for everything to go to pieces. I wake to three missed calls and about a thousand texts from Del. I'm about to read them when she calls again, so I pick up, deja vu hitting me hard.

This is familiar. This is very, very familiar, a throwback to that first morning, that day I found out about August.

"Del?" My voice is groggy. I'm not fully awake yet, too busy staring at my ceiling, at the magic that is currently swirling around in little clouds against the blue paint.

My sleepy mood evaporates as soon as I hear her voice.

"You should check your phone," she says. "I sent you an article - how is it that I'm always up before you, Casey, I swear to god - "

She's trying to joke, but I can hear the tension in her voice. The apology.

"Del," I say, and it's quieter this time. Pleading.

I can't deal with anything right now. I cannot. We were just figuring everything out. I was going to go to England, I had some semblance of his parent's approval...

The tone of Del's voice is like a storm on the horizon - dark and heavy. I don't want to know.

She sighs. "Just - look, okay?" There's a moment. "I'm sorry, Case," she says.

I pull my phone away from my ear, check her texts. Most of them are just a string of apologies and pleas to answer her. But in one of the earliest ones, she sent me a link.

There's something deep and dark settling in the pit of my stomach.

The link leads to some celebrity gossip site.

It takes a while to load, but once it does, it's abundantly clear why Del wanted me to see this.

"Oh." I say softly.

The headline, in huge font, reads: Has Prince Charming found his Cinderella?

The picture, dark and blurry and clearly from some party, is unmistakably August. Unmistakably August with a girl in his arms, her eyes wide, his head near hers. I can't see the expression on his face clearly, but the rest of the picture is leading me to a truth I don't want to think about.

"Casey," Del says, both reassuringly and questioningly. "Everyone thinks she's his soulmate."

That hurts. "Is it true?" I ask. "The picture, is it real?"

"I think so," Del says. "I mean, maybe she's his friend or something - Casey, we don't know the whole story."

I don't care about the whole story. I don't even really care about the picture, about the girl, because it's not really the point. I'm still waiting for the point, waiting for the sharp dagger ready to bury itself in my heart. "Has he said anything?" I ask.

"No." Del says. "There's been no comment from the royal family yet. But it's been less than a day, Casey."

There it is. The thing I was expecting. The hurt.

I don't care if August has friends who are girls, or if he was out at a party and some girl threw herself at him. That's probably what happened. There's probably more to the story.

I know that.

But what I hate is how August won't even defend us. Won't even deny that she's his soulmate. His parents didn't even want us to meet but it's fine for some random drunk girl to be perceived as the next Queen?

I try to remind myself that I'm being unreasonable. That I'm just hurt and confused, sore from seeing some girl closer to him than I've ever been.

That I'm jealous. Because I am, and I hate it. I don't want to be that girl. But I feel like I'm in the dark, like I'm trying so hard, and now August goes and does something like this.

I don't know if he realizes how hard this is going to be for me, when the world finds out. How hard it's already been.

"Yeah," I say. "You're right." I'm trying to be positive, for Del. I can tell by the look she gives me that I'm far from convincing.

"Are you going to call him?" she asks.

I shake my head. "No. Let him come to me."

I can practically feel her approval through the phone. "Good," she says. "But - Casey? Give him a chance to explain."

"Yeah," I say, before hanging up. I check my phone again, just to make sure there aren't any missed texts from August, but there's nothing.

It's like 4pm over there. He should have contacted me by now.

I put my phone back down, ignore the fact that my bedside table grew a couple of feet in the night. I can see that the colour of my carpet has changed as well, deepening into a dark red.

Apparently, the magic reacts to heightened emotions. Or maybe that's just me. It's seemed to get more intense lately - my room seems to be in a constant state of flux.

Almost against my will, my eyes are drawn to my Mark. The rose curls gently across my skin, spanning the inside of my wrist. Every time I look at it, its unfamiliar - I wonder how long it'll take to become as known to me as the rest of my body. How long until I can trace its shape with my eyes closed.

I wonder what it would be like to see August's, really see it, not just as a slightly-blurry image on a screen. I wonder what it would be like to meet him, to really know him, to experience that soulmate connection that people write about in books.

I turn and pull my covers back over my head. I can't deal with the world right now - I'm going back to sleep, and waiting for August to call me.

I'll give him a chance to talk to me, to explain. But when he does, it better be a damn good explanation. 

And we're back! Sorry for the long break, guys.

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