A Kingdom's Expectations & A Shocking Revelation {Sequel}

Chapter 12[Re-Updated]

A.N. I actually lost a chunk of this chapter so this is the updated and slightly re-written chapter. 20 comments (ish) until next chapter.

The hours whiled away and the sounds that were familiar to the Castle faded off into the night. A dread settled in my bones as I considered the interrogation I would receive at the hands of my mother and GrandMonster. Two generations of Taylor women in the same room, united in a common goal.

I shuddered at the thought.

"Are you alright for me to leave you, Princess?" Charlotte asked me dutifully, one of my dresses folded over her arm. I smiled at her. She had been very kind to me: carefully undressing me and releasing me from that dratted corset, wiping my heated brow with a cold compress and alleviating my worries with a light train of conversation.

"Yes, you must sleep," I dismissed her. "You've been waiting on me hand and foot for far too many hours as it is. Have some rest."

"I do not mind, Princess," she smiled. "But if you do not need me further, I shall take my leave. Goodnight Princess."

"Goodnight Charlotte." The girl slipped out of the room: as quiet and unassuming as her nature. I sighed, settling back under the covers. My sickness had eased over the hours, the contortions no longer twisting my insides into questionable shapes. Thank Heaven for that.

I did not in the least understand why they called it morning sickness - when the sickness in question was apt to arrive at any time of day, without the slightest bit of regard for convention. I groaned and squirmed further under the covers as I recalled, with perfect precision, how I had projectile vomited all over the Dining Room floor.

There was a firm knock at the door and I frowned, thinking Charlotte must have forgotten some article or another. I opened my mouth to grant her acceptance into the room - but the knocker did not wait for any such admittance.

"I simply cannot believe you would not inform your own mother of such an event," my dearest Mother stormed into my room, to my greatest dread. Following straight behind her was GrandMonster who was throwing a discerning look as to the contents of my room, as if internally criticising the layout and furniture.

"Mother!" I gasped. "Grandmother! These are my chambers - "

"It is quite reprehensible," Grandmother agreed stoutly, perhaps the only thing they could ever agree upon. "When you are with child, it is your duty to relate this momentous news to all of your family - not hide it as if you were a common unmarried scullion having a bastard child."

"It wasn't my wish to hide it from you - " I attempted to lie, but was cut off soon enough.

"It is almost as if you did not want us here in your time of need," Mother lamented, though the lament itself was a sharp one - and paired with a glare towards myself.

"Bearing a child is the most difficult time of a woman's life," Grandmother added. "One of the most painful and the most trying of times..."

Well Grandmother, try not to make it sound so appealing.

They caught sight of my expression which was perhaps not enthralled by the prospect of such a painful and trying time. "Oh, Rosalia, you must toughen up. I was in labour with you for..." Mother considered, casting her mind back. "Well, I believe it must have been six and thirty hours."

Six and thirty hours! I considered the thought of my body being ripped apart - or at least it felt like it - for six and thirty hours. The concept did not calm me. Instead, I began to feel undeniably worried. And ever so slightly afraid.