The Royals: A Kings Heart

Chapter 41

SASA'S POV_

My cheek stung from where my father hit me. My nose bled only a little. I went to my room, taking out a tissue. It wasn't the slap that hurt the most, my parents have given me hidings before. He made it clear that I had to choose between him and Nkosi. If I chose Nkosinhle, I lose my family. If I don't choose him, I had to let go of my love. I couldn't even cry because if they walk in here seeing me in tears it would earn me a hiding. I can't lie, in this moment I really wanted to choose Nkosi. I trusted that loves me, that he would protect me. But I wouldn't have a family, a home. My children would never meet my father, my sister, my mother. I would walk on stage to graduate, without my childhood cheering me on. My door opened. I quickly wiped my tears. My mother sat next to me.

Mama: "Thembisa, is what your father saying true?" She would obviously take his side on this. I wasn't even hopeful that she would speak for me.

Me: "I'm not cohabiting mama. I live in Res."

Mama: "Are you in a relationship with him?"

Me: "Yes mama."

Mama: "Yoh. Thembisa. That man is a future king." Thanks for the reminder that everyone keeps highlighting. "So what is it now?"

Me: "I don't want to choose mama. I'm in love with him."

Mama: "You know being in love Thembisa? Where would you know it from?" I kept quiet looking at the tissue in my hand that had small stains of blood. "Yoh. I don't know now. Your father is very angry and will not listen." She folded her arms. What did this mean? I looked at her. "Don't look at me like that Thembisa. Are you sure this man wants to marry you? Are you sleeping with him?"

Me: "I'm sure mama. We're not sleeping together yet."

Mama: "Then why is that other princess following him everywhere?"

Me: "She wants to be his first wife. She's the one his father chose."

Mama: "So you want to be a second wife wena? At your tender age Thembisa?"

Me: "No mama. He won't marry her."

Mama: "How do you know that? Have you met kings Thembisa? They can do what they want in case you don't know. And they don't marry non royal ordinary girls like you. They marry other royals. I'm sorry mntanam." I looked at my hands again. What I needed was to make a decision that I didn't want to make. I couldn't do it. I'd have to continue lying to my father but what would that do to our relationship? There's actually no going back on our relationship now.

Mama: "Don't get pregnant, Thembisa. Yoh. It won't help your case. Your child will be a bastard to the throne and you know they kill those right?" My heart hurt at the thought. "Yoh Thembisa. You're stressing me now."

Me: "What do I do mama? Can't you speak to him?"

Mama: "Your father? Eh. He shushed me aside and went out. Now I must get into trouble when I haven't done anything?"

Me: "Why does he hate him so much?"

Mama: "The Royals are cruel Thembisa. The last time a king married a commoner, his family killed her when she gave birth to the current King. They don't want us in their palaces. We are nothing to them. Your father is only trying to protect you." The ancestors once again. Why make our paths cross? Why let us fall deeply inlove with each other if destiny doesn't want us together. Why welcome me in their alter and allow me to be with him if I'm not meant to be with him? "Yoh. Shame. Poor woman. Yazi she was young. She ran away with the king and when they found them, she was already pregnant. They pretended to accept her but..." She shook her head. "It was very bad. The king turned very bitter and evil after she died. He destroyed the village she was born in. I grew up hearing stories about him. If you even looked up at him, he would order you killed. No one was allowed to look at his face. And he never married again after his wife died. They say he once burnt a forest to the ground and at the time a group of virgins were on camp. Burnt them all alive. Yoh. He was very very cruel until his dying days. I remember the relief everyone had when they heard he had passed. Yoh. Heeee, Thembisa." She clapped once.