The Royal Arrangement

Chapter 7

13/02/2019 (1926 words!)

Ariana's POV

The following couple of months were pure torture. They were full of tulle, decorations, invitations and a lot of screaming, mainly from the witch. It had become a new hobby of hers to yell at any and all employee's due to the slightest mishap, the worst one had been when there was a little bit of almost unnoticeable dust on a vase she had ordered, let's just say that the poor girl that had been holding it at the time must have damaged, if not burst, eardrums. After that incident, all staff had given the witch a wide berth whenever they saw her coming.

During all the preparations my dad and brothers had stayed far away, locked up in their rooms, the gym, or in dad's case, the office. I remember one day when I felt as if I was going crazy and as though I would never see any colour other than every single shade of white in my entire life, I had retreated from the living room and made my way up to dad's office. I was about to knock on the door when I heard him talking. I don't know what made me do it as I was never the eavesdropping type, but I pressed my ear up against the door.

''What do I do Elizabeth? That woman has sold our daughter to the royal family and I can't do anything.'' He forced out between audible sobs, but still continued talking to my mum. ''You always knew what to do Lizzy, and our girl is being so strong, she isn't letting Lucia or Lucy get to her and I can tell she absolutely determined not to go easy on the Prince, he's going to have a hard time with her, love.'' He said with a small chuckle, but still undoubtedly with tears rolling down his face. My dad was a strong man, but even he had to talk to someone at some point.

I wiped away the tears that had been silently falling down my face and turned away from the door. My mum died in childbirth, my birth. I had always felt guilty because of that, but my dad, nor my siblings, never blamed me for it. Dad had actually gone out of his way to make sure I knew it wasn't my fault, but it still hurt that I never got to know her whilst Julia and Max both did.

By that point, I had made it back to the living room and was immediately dragged into even more preparations.

The two months after that past in a blur, and soon I found myself checking into the richest hotel in Gordova the day before the wedding. It took us a long time to get up to our room due to the ludicrous amount of security, but we eventually got to our room, which turned out to be the entire freaking top floor! My friends, brothers, my dad and I all stood frozen in the doorway at the sight of the marble floor and pillars and golden furniture placed strategically around the room.

The witch seemed unfazed by the level of grandeur the suite projected and started making her way to the master bedroom, as directed by the bellboy. She was just about to walk through the open door when dad shook himself from his haze and called out to her.

''Lucia, Ariana will have the master bedroom.'' He said sternly. She whipped around and shot him a look of clear disbelief and shock.

''That is ridiculous Michael, we are the adults, she can go in one of the other rooms, I need my space.'' She said with a patronising tone.

''It is Ariana's wedding, she will have that room as she needs more space then you do.'' He replied slightly bitterly and ushered me over to the bedroom to unpack.

A few hours later, after binging on Once Upon A Time with Max, Hans and Julia, they all left the room and told me to get some rest for tomorrow. I buried myself underneath the puffy covers and sank into a deep sleep, hoping beyond hope that something disastrous would happen and the wedding would be called off.

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Something was jumping on my bed, something heavy and annoying. Scratch that, there were at least three things disturbing my sleep. I forced my eyes open and saw my friends staring at me.