Ordained

Chapter Thirty-Three

It was a very long morning. Sitting with Ottilie in the garden he felt surrounded, as if by colourful birds. Ottilie's ladies shared her love for giggling and inane gossip. The group hanging off his every word, and filling every silence between with talk. Endless, uninteresting talk.

Dresses, and gossip, and travel, and accessories, and more gossip, and events that were coming up, and then more about what dresses they would wear. On and on. Cassius tried his best to appear engaged. He knew that women often talked about these topics, and if he were to gain a wife, he must grow accustomed to such talk. Yet, that didn't make it any easier to stomach when Ottilie once again bemoaned the lack of decent dress shops within his family's duchy. "Something I will do once I am duchess will be to invest in trade." This statement had caught his off guard, impressed him almost, but before the admiration could grow to anything more than a tiny flickering flame, Ottilie extinguished it. "We must insist that people bring good dresses. Fashion makes people happy, therefore we must allocate funds to ensure that towns in Marcellia have a proper complement of dress shops."

Without his permission, his mind began to wander when the ladies began to discuss the upcoming ball of Emily Augustine, newly married to Baron Monts. The name sounded familiar, but he wasn't very interested. The women's gossip just irritated him. Who cared if there was an age gap between the couple? Baron Monts was in his forties, yes, but it was hardly out of the norm for a noble to take a younger wife.

Cassius instead thought of Emmeline; she had been wearing one of her riding outfits, something he found particularly distracting. He tried to recall exactly what it looked like as he studied Ottilie's outfit. Mistaking his staring for interest, Ottilie puffed out her chest a little, her corset doing an excellent job of showing off her... assets. Cassius smiled, more out of humour, than admiration, but she blushed pink all the same.

...

"So what do you think of her eh?" Victor asked, his rifle resting on his shoulder as he watched his son line up his shot. Cassius said nothing for a minute, eyeing his target, exhaling, and pulling the trigger. He missed, and felt a strong desire to toss aside the gun altogether in frustration. Could he concentrate on nothing at the moment?

"I find her-" he began, the statement hanging aimlessly in the air.

Victor chuckled, patting his son on the shoulder. "She is from an excellent family. She would ally a powerful house to our own, and her dowry will make your grain project all the more achievable."

Cassius bit the inside of one cheek. Yes, he wanted to try out his new grain distribution program, to store excess grain in centralised locations across the duchy in order for easier distribution during poor harvests. Yet, was he willing to live a life with Ottilie as a wife in exchange?

His duty snapped powerfully into place, telling him yes, before he even had time to properly ponder the question. Yet... He sighed.

"You are right, of course." He drawled lazily, stepping back and putting his fingers in his ears before his father pulled the trigger.

Victor hit the target dead centre. Laughing he handed over his rifle to be reloaded, with a grin. "Of course I am. Marriages are not about love, or affection. That may come later, as it did with your mother and I; but first and foremost they are about securing the future of our duchy, of Marcellia." Cassius had been told this a hundred, maybe even a thousand times, but he still nodded respectfully in agreement. His father was right.

"I know that it must be difficult for you, having Emmeline here." Victor said after a few silent minutes punctuated only by the sounds of gunfire. Cassius stilled but said nothing. "Afterall, she is very pretty. Intelligent too, if Mr Olivers is to be believed. There is nothing wrong at all with the girl herself."

Surprise wiped away all the huffy irritation Cassius had been carrying, clean away. When his father had spoken to him about this last, he and his mother had been clear. Emmeline Elva was not good enough.

"While we could survive a marriage with the Elva's, it would not benefit us. Killian is a clever man, calculating." Victor rubbed his chin as he stared off into the distance. The hills beyond were quite beautiful, illuminated in the weak summer sun.

Cassius let his father think, knowing better than to interject when he was mid-thought.

"If we were to honour the pairing, my brother the king would be pleased. Killian however, would demand a great deal from us. His regard for his daughter is nominal, but that doesn't mean that he won't try and use her to claw his family up another rung on the sociopolitical ladder."

Turning to face his son at last, Victor returned to place a hand on his shoulder. Cassius was both taller and broader than his father; but stood like they were, he couldn't help but feel like a child as his father smiled at him regretfully. "That is why, I need you to push whatever feeling you might have, now, or in the future towards the Elva girl, aside. The Elva's are not a family we can ally ourselves with, not when there are so many better options available to us. Have faith, my son. This will all sort itself out in the end."

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Author's Note:

Hope you are enjoying it so far! 

S x