She Who is King

10 | weak with love

England

THE PLANNING BEGAN the next day in earnest. There was always someone I needed to meet; somewhere I had to be.

I debated the merits of simply disappearing and letting Alfred plan the whole thing, but decided that would be terribly selfish and completely inconsiderate.

So I stayed.

There seemed to be an army of people buzzing around the palace: seamstresses, florists, wood workers, gardeners, jewelers, forgers, chefs, and bakers.

Every time you turned a corner, you couldn't be sure whether or not you would quite literally run into someone and send whatever they were carrying with them tumbling onto the ground in a glorious, expensive heap.

At this point, it had only been a couple hours and I was loath to leave my secluded study.

"Lyra!" Alfred wheezed, jogging down the hallway. It was one of the rare moments I left my wing backed chair, and I was beginning to regret it. I didn't understand the difference between hunter green and forest green because they were both green, but according to the seamstress there was a huge difference, and depending on how I wanted the shading on my face during the coronation, I would need to pick one or the other.

And that was one appointment with one seamstress.

Plus, Alfred had failed to mention until everyone arrived that mail could no longer arrive and depart from the palace, and everyone who became privy to my gender while staying at the palace would be kept in their rooms until the coronation began.

Needless to say, a headache the size of my country was brewing behind my eyelids.

What I really needed was a glass of water, a book, and some quiet time.

"I approved the design for the stage, so everything should begin moving ahead. The jeweler wants to meet with you one more time to make sure the plans are correct, and the seamstress you chose needs to retake your waist measurement, because she cannot seem to find it anywhere. Also, the gardener needs to know if you'd prefer the hedges to be trimmed into animals or not, and if so, which ones."

The poor man was working so hard. Hopefully he was getting paid for all of the work he was doing.

Perhaps a raise was in store for Alfred in the future, once I was in charge of the palace's finances.

"And have you heard from Merlin? I need to know who I'm knighting after I'm crowned, and he's supposed to put on a display."

"He informed me that he had a nonnegotiable lesson with Arthur in the gardens, but after that he should be here for the evening planning session with all of the people you picked to help out. I know we have a ton of extra people wandering around, so I figured they could help execute everything when you signed off on an official plan of action."

At the mention of Arthur, my face flushed, but either Alfred didn't notice or he was too polite to say anything. 

"Anyway, all of the people I told you need something are in the blue parlor, drinking spiked tea. I assume you'd like to get everything done before it gets too crazy. In the meantime, I'll send for Merlin." Alfred winked and spun around, huffing all the way down the corridor.

I sighed, thinking about the freedom of fresh air and wings. Maybe someday I could get Merlin to teach me how to turn into a bird, and I could take a day just to fly and feel the wind in my face.

For now, however, I walked to the parlor as a human to get the designs ready. Because Silas had insisted it was best to move the coronation up, everything had to be arranged at ten times the speed.