The Paper Crown

9. The Crown

Dowager Duchess Maria wants to speak with me.

The message comes through her French-speaking secretary, who does not twitch a single hair of her arched eyebrows when she finds me prone and mostly-naked on the cool tiles of the bathroom. I have been here most of the morning. The bed has been stripped of its deceiving sheets, and Mariusz half-slumbers greenly on the chaise. Twice, he has evicted me from my refuge to attend his own needs. Now, my stomach is empty, but the pounding in my head can be soothed only by the coldness of the bathroom floor.

"Je suis malade," I protest.

The secretary is unmoved. "Her Grace had the suspicion it was so. She suggested perhaps your highness would be made comfortable in a tea gown."

"I am comfortable here."

"Her Grace believes it is very important to speak with you."

"But now? I'm sick, I told you."

"Yes, now," the secretary says. "If you are very ill, perhaps her Grace could come here. I will ask her."

"No!" I don't want her to see me like this. "Give me an hour. Please."

"As you wish. I will send for your maids."

The secretary leaves and I crawl back into the bedroom. Mariusz is half-asleep on the chaise. I pour myself another glass of water and drink slowly. This time, it stays down and softens the acidic edge to my stomach.

"What does your mother want?" I ask in my own language.

"I don't know," he says without opening his eyes.

"How will I talk to her? Does she speak French?"

"A little. Enough, I think."

His eyes are still closed and he still has not donned a shirt. I track my eyes over the planes my hands traced last night. A down of light brown hair covers his chest and arms, darkening in a thin track over his lower belly and disappearing below his waist band. I know what was meant to happen last night. I thought I was prepared for it.

I am not.

I adjust a folding screen to make a corner of the room more private. "I'm going to get dressed."

I am already in a fresh slip and halfway into a tea-gown when my two dressing women arrive. One presses the cold backs of chilled silver spoons to my puffy eyes while the other brushes and tidies my matted hair. I do not have time for a bath, but clouds of perfume help disguise the scent of champagne seeping from my pores. Mariusz sneezes himself awake on the sofa and shoots me a dirty look as I pass him.

The Dowager Duchess's apartments are in the west wing of the palace. When I enter her sitting room, I find an unexpected crowd. I recognize Lord Tarnuv, the prime minister, and Mariusz's little brother Dominik, who hovers hopefully by a cake stand. The others, mostly ladies, were at my wedding, though they were not among those who stayed for the after-supper dance. Prince Konrad sits at a distance from them, a cup of tea by his side and a half-open book in his lap which appears, yes, to be poetry.

No one else is in a tea-gown. No one else has puffy eyes or wild hair.

Despite my dishevelment, those who were sitting stand up, and those who were standing bow or curtsy. Perhaps I should not have made any effort at all. Perhaps I would have appeared more important and uncaring if I had come here in my wedding slip with the quilt wrapped around me for decency. My stomach quivers acidic at the sight of the cake tray, and I wish I had not come at all.

Duchess Maria is in conversation with Lord Tarnuv. Their expressions are intent and they speak in undertone. I do not wish to interrupt, but I feel a fool standing here alone while around me the others slowly resume their conversations, everyone paired up, even Prince Konrad with his book and Prince Dominik with his cake stand.