The Prince of the Republic

The Proposal

"I'm surprised she said no."

Custard Cookie and Mille-feuille Cookie had sent their children to bed, deciding to return to the bay outside of Oyster Manor, conversing with each other about the great argument they had just endured.

The vanilla-scented elder huffed a laugh from his cream beard. "Yes, well, that's Oyster Cookie. A blackmailing politician with morals."

"Ha! You don't hear that every day, do you?"

The pair sat in silence, watching the ships sail across the rolling sea.

After a few moments of letting the sea salt breeze cross her face, Mille-feuille Cookie began to smile and spoke, "Financier Cookie would agree to a proposal."

Custard Cookie turned sharply to his fellow elder, unconvinced she was being serious. "Would she?"

The dark-haired elder nodded. "I spoke to her just before bed, telling her how honorable the act would be!" Mille-feuille Cookie laughed heartily. "She'd do anything I asked of her. She is the most loyal paladin in all the Republic. Nearly acting like a lost cake hound looking for an owner to rely on!"

Custard Cookie grinned, but it soon faded when he remembered his son's qualms with the proposal. "Clotted Cream Cookie has quite the infatuation with Oyster Cookie's prodigy... I worry that it ventures past the boundaries of a mere bond between friends"

Mille-feuille Cookie scoffed and waved a hand in dismissal. "Oh, please. That young Cookie is an effeminate excuse for an heir to the throne. I heard a rumor that he isn't even Oyster Cookie's real son!"

There was a long pause between the pair.

"An illegitimate son, you say?" Custard Cookie was intrigued.

"Mhmm. Have you never heard the legend of the knight's son?" Mille-feuille Cookie adjusted her cream-colored shawl to avoid the growing breeze.

"Is it popular?"

"It's popular with the lower city. The Cookies below us like to believe in Cinderella Cookie stories so that they can have hope that they, too, will achieve fame and fortune as we have."

"What is the legend anyway?" Custard Cookie pressed.

"In simple terms, a couple of Cookies from the Dark Cacao Kingdom could not raise the child, so they sent him away to a promising nation, dropping him off at a doorstep of a Cookie who looked as though she could take care of him."

Another pause. Waves crashed and birds cried in the evening air.

"What are you trying to say, elder Mille-feuille Cookie?"

"I am simply providing a guarantee that Clotted Cream Cookie will not say no to the proposal. If he truly values Royal Milk Tea Cookie as deeply as you believe he does, he will do anything to protect the Oyster heir and his family's reputation."

Mille-feuille Cookie was right. Sure, it was immoral, but Clotted Cream Cookie was a pawn to be played with, not a sentimental family member to consider the feelings of. To ensure that House Custard remained at the top throughout the years to come, elder Custard Cookie would have to find some way to simply become more powerful, and joining two houses was the perfect plan.

After letting her colleague stir in the plot, Mille-feuille Cookie spoke once more, "I believe we have an agreement, do we not?"

"Yes. I will discuss it with Clotted Cream Cookie in the morning. He won't be happy with having to marry the young bodyguard as opposed to his close friend."

"Oh, posh. Many of us have sat in marriage deemed miserable for years just to get where we are now. He shall learn to do the same or he is not fit to become the Consul of the Republic."

The two turned to each other, providing a simple handshake and a nod before turning to leave, and returning to their homes.