Dear Prince

Chapter 2 .:Gentle Love:.

Chapter 2

.:Gentle Love:.

            The castle was extremely busy with the birthday banquet preparations. Whereas before, Arphelia had been excited beyond belief for her seventeenth birthday, each passing year came with it the threat of Erith leaving and Prince Wesley taking his place. Everyone seemed to know about her and Wesley’s recent engagement, and wild rumors flew about the mysterious prince. It seemed that no one had ever seen Wesley in person. Erith’s nonchalant attitude about the whole thing angered her even more. But Arphelia knew Erith well enough that she knew that on the inside, he would be boiling with held back emotion. He was sociable on the outside, but quite quiet inside.

            Her maid ran a silver comb through her hair, twittering restlessly about the banquet. Her father had invited people from all over the nation, nobles and tribal leaders alike. Quite elaborate for a birthday banquet, but she supposed that he was celebrating her engagement to Prince Wesley. She was well past the proper age for marriage, after all.

            “Is something on your mind, princess?” Silvia asked, braiding her hair intricately with quick fingers. Silvia was her personal maid, and her closest friend next to Erith in the castle.

            “Would it be so terribly horrid if I missed the banquet?” she wondered softly.

            Silvia’s mouth opened in horror. “No, princess! You mustn’t! If you do—oh, the trouble I’ll be in—but that’s beside the point—it’s your birthday banquet!” She lowered her voice. “Where would you go—what would you do?”

            “Two years,” she whispered.

            “Pardon?” Silvia’s attention was focused on Arphelia, but her hands seemed to have a mind of its own, moving this way and that.

            “Father promised me until I turn nineteen—then Erith will be forced to leave.” She shuddered at the prospect. Sending Erith away so that a rich prince could take his place… so that she might be wed and bring stability to his kingdom.

            Silvia breathed a sigh of regret. “If only you hadn’t been born a princess, your highness… I always say, fate’s a tricky thing. Always giving people what they hate. There are those who would die for what you have…”

            “Or perhaps it’s because I know this life,” she mused. “If I had been born a peasant, I’d be so much more…”

            “Wild?” Silvia suggested. “Uneducated?”

            “Free.” She looked at herself in the mirror: her face was powdered, her hair in perfect braids arranged artfully around her head, expensive jewels adorning it. She despised it.

            “Is Erith really worth it? The prince of Marcaaia… they say he’s a smart fellow, he is. And quite a looker, at that.”

            “There are things more desirable than just looks, Silvia. Erith, more than anything, understands me. And I him.” She quieted. “I don’t believe love can be bought… It’s slowly learned.”

            Silvia laughed. “If you were dirt poor, princess, you’d think differently. My own mother married a man twenty years older than her because she was tired of living on bark.”

            “Perhaps,” she whispered, touching the necklace at the base of her neck. It was a token of her mother’s—a silver-winged butterfly with a slender body wrapped by intricate chains. It was both a source of pain and pride for her, just like Phaelia was. “Or perhaps my ideology differs from yours, Silvia. To me, love moves like honey—sweeter than sugar, and not refined in anyway. Looks, riches, the like… it matters not to me.”