The Silver Crown

35.

"Betrothed? I was supposed to marry him?" I burst out, fury making my voice harsh. "I was five years old!"

Brinian rubbed his face with his hands so he wouldn't have to look at me. "Yes." He said regretfully.

"But I'm not still betrothed to him." I said. Brinian was silent.

"Brinian?" My tone was dangerous.

"It was never officially broken off."

I jumped to my feet. "I have to marry this man that I don't know and no one thought to tell me!"

Brinian stood and walked around his desk.

"Kade, calm down." He brought his hands up as though to grab my hands or maybe my waist, but he hesitated and then put them by his side again. "There is still a chance that you won't have to marry him. And if you do, it's not for a few years yet."

"A few years!" I exploded.

"As children, you two got along really well. He was devastated when you were taken," Brinian soothed.

"Yeah, devastated that he couldn't marry Marek and become king!"

"That is not it, his family is very wealthy and powerful of their own accord. They are the most powerful family in the Cardoran Province and he knows it." Brinian muttered the last part to himself.

"So we got along as children, do you know him now?" I asked.

"Not really. I haven't talked to him since I became captain. He's a year younger than me," Brinian explained.

"He's nineteen years! I'm only sixteen!" I knew that was a futile argument. Dionisa and Peter were six years apart and more than that wasn't uncommon.

"You're only making a big deal out if it because you don't know him." Brinian sat back down behind his desk. "I promise that he will be a perfect gentleman to you. Now I really do need to get some work done. Why don't you go question the prince about him. Or Daivon?"

"Oh." Brinian's words were cold. He hadn't spoken to me like that since the first week we knew each other. "Alright, I'll...see you tomorrow then."

Brinian nodded, already moving on to the next report.

~

My dance lessons were easy. Which was a relief because I could never focus my mind completely on them. Tristan and my perhaps near marriage occupied much of my thoughts, as did the realization that I had been in the palace for almost nine weeks.

It was during my dance lessons while I was learning to waltz that I realized that my years of fighting and training to fight were actually helping me dance. My muscles were strong and my movements fluid and, although I couldn't eat gracefully or even really walk gracefully, I could fight gracefully and so I could dance that way too.

Daivon had volunteered to be my dancing partner, and he was a decent dancer. He did make the lessons fun. His jokes got even Amelle Morgan, the strict and serious dance instructor, to crack a smile.

Maisa had returned to the temple in the city where she lived and worked, feeling that she couldn't spend anymore time away, even though she had been doing charity work.

Sir Charles had left off of the history of the realm and was instead making me memorize names and facts about the guests who were attending the ball. I didn't understand why I couldn't just ask them their names when I met them. "It is a careful dance, Princess!" Sir Charles had said when I asked him. "If you do not know someone's name and position, then they could feel slighted. You represent your family in this. Do not let them down!" It was a lot of pressure.

Maurice and my other maids were spending horrifyingly long hours teaching me the proper etiquette for a ball. I curtsied to men who wanted to dance with me and I practiced sitting down and drinking wine, standing and drinking wine, walking and holding wine. Then I had to go through the sitting, standing, and walking again but with food. Apparently the way that I did all of those activities was crude, rude and indecent. I spent a lot of time rolling my eyes. Maurice had something to say about that too.

They had me have conversation after conversation with men I was dancing with. I had to recite over and over again what was polite to discuss while dancing, what to avoid discussing and how to show and tell a man that I was not interested in dancing again.

Then I would have to dance with Niva or Daria and hold a conversation with them to prove to Maurice that I could dance and talk at the same time.

I loathed the rapidly approaching ball more and more every day. And Tristan hadn't even arrived.

At least one good thing happened because of the ball. The king and queen invited me to dine with them every evening. They explained that I was going to be the heir to the throne and that it would be announced during the ball. Dionisa even told me that Marek was thrilled to not have the duties of the heir anymore.

I wasn't exactly thrilled to take over Marek's duties, but I was reassured that the king and queen were beginning to trust me.

I had been frightened of King Peter for so long but during our nightly meals he opened up some and his gruff exterior melted away. He even gave me a gift of a beautiful knife with a silver sheath and matching hilt.

I began to realize that these two people could love me like a daughter and that they did. It made me feel guilty for fooling them into believing that I was their daughter. It could also have been so long since I had felt love of any kind that I barely knew how react. The feeling was so incredible that I began to imagine what could happen if I truly lived in the palace forever. I didn't think about becoming queen, instead I imagined growing up with a family. A family that had parents, brothers, sisters and friends who loved me and that I could truly trust.

I realized that before when they had been so formal and distant to me, it wasn't because they didn't like me or because they didn't love, it was only because they didn't know how to treat me, how to show me their love.

I began to think that maybe being the daughter of Peter and Dionisa was the best thing that had happened to me and that perhaps I would never ever have to give it up.