How to rule a king

оди́н

Ronja:

Today was the day. All my life I had been prepared for it. Raised for the sole reason of making my mighty grandfather proud. At least that was what my guardian wanted me to believe. To live to bring honour to our family name, making sure our empire survived yet another generation.

Truth be told, I had never wanted any of this. I had never wished for being handed over to a stranger just to bear his heir. I had never longed to play the perfect wife in public while being the perfect punching bag behind closed doors. Then again, a normal life never seemed to been in the picture for me. How could it have been when my granddad's men eliminated every guy daring to look at me. None of this mattered anymore, I would no longer be attending university since gramps had decided it was time to make good use of me by marrying me off to said stranger, so that he could take over the empire that should have been mine. Well, it would have been if I had been born with a dick instead of two perfectly fine tits.

110 minutes. That's how long I had been running already. Away from our mansion, past the well-kept estate grounds, into the woods. Yet, I hadn't made it to the boarders of my family's housing. Thanks to its size of 100 hectares that was impossible. Even if I would make it to the boarders the men guarding the estate had orders to shoot everybody down coming near them. See, escape wasn't an option, not with those men standing in my way and the only thing waiting outside our borders being the cold Siberian woods rather than true freedom. With my body being officially stuck here the only option left for me was skipping through the woods as fast as I could so at least my soul could fly free. I was entering my own world, leaving our estate behind. Nothing and nobody could get to me here. For once I was free, more than free. I was the queen of this world, ruler over everybody and worst nightmare to those who defied me.

In my mind palace my beloved grandma was still alive, protecting me, tutoring me, raising me and preparing me for the day when I finally grew up from being my grandfather's puppet. Here, Nikolai would be sitting at the kitchen table teaching me how to reload a gun correctly. Andrei would be watching me taking dance classes everyday commenting on every word Mrs Bourbon would say. I'd be happy. Truly happy. Many people would imagine their mind palace to be exactly that: a palace filled with untold riches and all the other material stuff their hearts desired. However, growing up in a world filled with overprized purchases and love only being shown through expensive presents instead of a home-made cake for my birthdays, I rather quickly banned nearly all overprized products from my mind palace, having reduced it over the years to a small cottage hidden in the woods, save from people like my grandfather.

Today however, my soul just didn't seem to be interested in leaving the dreadful place I was supposed to call home, no matter how fast I ran. Even after a month of sleepless nights I still kept wondering why now. Why now? Why had my grandfather all off sudden decided it was time for me to marry that stranger? A man he had never even mentioned before. This couldn't possibly be about money. Even if gramps would have spent the last two years fucking every prostitute on this planet and paying maintenance for 150 children we would still be loaded. Another thought crossed my mind: what if my granddad was threatened by the same man buying me? But then again, we own a private army. Nobody would be dumb enough to threaten us.

A couple of years ago, there had been a guy trying it once. Keyword trying. I believe his name was Federico Amorati, an Italian drug lord. He had thought he could hire a few mercenaries to raid our estate while my granddad was off to the States to sign some business deal. He couldn't have been more wrong. Our men killed all of Amorati's mercs keeping only Federico himself alive. Once my grandfather returned he skinned the drug lord alive. I still heard Federico's screams in my nightmares waking up with the taste of his rotten odour on my tongue. After being done with Mr. Italian my Grandfather ordered his men to display the corpse in Federico's yard, a warning for all our enemies. After that nobody had threatened my grandfather's reign over the Russian drug scene ever again.

So, what was the agenda behind this bullshit? I just couldn't wrap my head around the fact that he was willing to sell me off without any apparent reason. Not that I should be surprised, he had never cared much about me. This again must have had something to do with the fact that I was born with tits instead of a dick. Nevertheless, selling me off took things to a whole new level.

Whoosh.

Fuck. What did just happen. Seconds before I was running around as fast as Edward from Twilight looking as good as David Hasselhoff in the Baywatch intro and now I was lying on the leaf covered ground holding onto my ankle, spitting out a few leaves, swearing just like Andrei had thought me. That's what you get when you are running through the woods without looking.

"No need to kneel in front of me."

What? Whose voice was that?

Looking up I spotted a couple of men dressed in combat clothes staring at me.

"Who the hell are you? How did you make it past the guards?"

Thanks to the immense pain I was in I managed to sound rather impressive and strong while deep inside all I felt was a terrifying amount of fear. What if those men were another bunch of mercenaries trying to overthrow my gramps? I would be royally screwed. I hadn't even told anybody I was going out for a run before leaving, hoping to get a few hours alone before my life was supposed to change forever. It would take our guards ages to even realise that I was gone.

"I'm Alexei Volkov and we are here to do some business with your grandfather, принцесса", said their apparent leader.

I certainly wouldn't mind doing that hot stuff.

What the hell was I thinking? I was spending way too much time with my best friend aka sister Elizabetha, also known as "Eliza the Great" thanks to her towering height of 6,1ft. But her voice in my head was right, in any other situation I would do that guy. Or would at least imagine doing him.

Once upon a time he must have had the face of a true cover boy. Striking blue eyes, lips just full enough to let them appear kissable without looking female, a few days' worth stubble growing on a strong jaw, an ever so slightly crooked nose, probably from an earlier fracture and let's not forget about that dark hair in desperate need of a brush. Thanks to its length I could even style it with quite a few braids, but somehow Alexei didn't strike me as the type who would enjoy a young woman braiding his hair. Also, his towering height of 6,4ft didn't help his case of making him any less scary. However, the most scaring part of his appearance wasn't the dark brooding look upon his face or the fact that he projected me by a foot. No, what truly made him terrifying were the scars scattered all over his skin. I could only take guesses on how many of them he must have been collecting over the years since his feet were stuck in black combat boots, his legs were covered by black leather pants and his torso was dressed in a dark green combat jacket. But even all these clothes couldn't hide the scars on the back of his left hand or the crossed ones I spotted on the right side of his neck halfway covered by the green army jacket. The worst of them all was making its way down from his left eyebrow to the right corner of his mouth disappearing beneath his stubble making his once otherworldly beautiful face appear cruel.

"Are you going to keep staring at me or what?"

Shit.

"I wasn't staring", I said, trying to put some of my weight on my hurt ankle, wincing as soon as my foot touched the ground.

Great. Just great. It's probably strained again.

"Do you need help, принцесса?", smirked the man standing beside Mr. Volkov.

Even though he seemed to be in his late 50s his bulky muscles screamed strength and readiness to fight. It didn't even look unnatural.

Maybe Silvester Stallone should spend his fortune on this guy as a personal trainer and not steroids produced in China.

"I'm fine, thanks."

"Great, let's roll boys."

With that, wannabe-knight-in-shinning-amour started walking towards our mansion, the rest of the men following his lead like well-behaved little schoolkids. All except Mr. Volkov. He was still staring at me as if I were the first woman he has ever laid eyes on. Then, all of the sudden, he turned around and left. Just like that. No "Can I help you walk back?", "Do you want me to get somebody for you?" Nothing. He just turned his back on me and disappeared into the woods.

Asshole.