Princess - A Love Story

Chapter 16

It was five days to their wedding and Philip was so busy he barely had time to spend with Emily. No matter, they would get a week to themselves afterwards. He was looking forward to that. It had been a busy morning, with greeting ambassadors who had arrived to attend the ceremony. He had some free time and was wondering if Emily would be free for lunch. As a last-minute addition to the wedding party she had asked the Pallis twins to stand with her at the ceremony. Lady Pallis was beside herself with glee and there was much debate and discussion on outfits and duties and what not. He was about to go upstairs to look up Emily when a grim-faced Mr. Norris came to him.

"Your highness, you have been called to the meeting room."

Philip frowned. The meeting room? It was where formal meetings, that needed to happen outside the parliament took place. Stumped he followed. In the room his grandmother sat at a large round table. Matthew who stood stonily and expressionless. Hi grandmother looked tired and old and defeated.

He went there and was shocked to find core cabinet members there along with Lord Stylianou. His grandmother looked pale. "Philip, Lord Stylianou has brought us something he believes we need to see."

She held out a large envelope and Philip took it. He pulled out an A4 size document and stared at it in shock. It was a photograph of Matthew and Emily from the night of the bonfire. They were wrapped up in each other. He would have denied everything except they were clearly in a state of blatant disrobe. He looked at it in shock. Everything around him seemed to fade away.

"This is a family matter," the Queen was saying firmly. There is no need for all of you to be present.

"Yes there is. This is not just a family matter. You are the Queen, he will be our King and we cannot allow such a person to be our Princess."

"This is completely untrue," Matthew insisted from the corner he had been forced to sit in. Philip noticed him for the first time and his eyes turned to him almost red rimmed with anger.

"It's not what you think," Matthew snapped, "though this lot will probably have you convinced otherwise before long. You already look like judge and jury."

Phillip wordlessly sat down. The world had shifted under his feet and try as he might he wasn't able to straighten it up. The insecurity was there. The familiar bitterness rose in him. Even as he desperately fought to believe that his friend and Emily would never do such a thing, when faced with such strong evidence, his familiar insecurities rose to the surface.

Matthew was smarter more outgoing more handsome more overtly affectionate and all in all perfect for Emily in a way that he would never be. And didn't Emily once say to him she made a deal with grandmamma and she meant to honour it. Nowhere did she say she was going to love him. Philip.

The door to the library opened and Emily walked in with Marie.

"What do you have to say for yourself, Princess," Edmund Wright snapped at her as he contemptuously tossed the photographs in her face. Unforgivable behaviour towards a future queen, especially by a minor member of Parliament, who by all purposes shouldn't even be attending a meeting of the core cabinet. But today was a bit unusual in all ways. Marie picked up the photos and gasped then frowned as she handed them to Emily.

"What..?" Emily exploded. "This is crazy. Philip..." as her eye sought his, the words died on her lips. Philip couldn't help the haunted and accusatory look.

"I would speak to Philip alone," she demanded.

"That is not possible," Lord Stylianou spoke now. "As we have informed the Queen, matters regarding the crown cannot be treated as ordinary family matters. You will have to answer the cabinet."