Starrlings 1: House of Fire

chapter 8

A R I

There was a few days left before classes began, and in that time Ari needed to figure out exactly what Katja expected of Ari. Ari had been instructed to wake the princess every day with a coffee and a copy of the New Hamilton Star, which she needed to collect from the stack delivered to the school library every morning.

It meant waking up at least an hour before she usually would, so she could dress and be ready, run across the dewy grass to the library, grab the paper, make a coffee in the house kitchen, and tap gently on the princess's chamber door.

"Oh, good morning Ari," Katja said with a smile, the first morning after she'd arrived. "That's so nice of you."

Ari had been hoping Katja might say, "you don't have to do this every morning!" but Katja just sat up in bed and accepted the cup of black coffee, and laid out the paper in front of her.

Ari left the coffee pot on the sideboard and turned to leave, but as she did Katja said, "Oh... the New Hamilton Star. Don't tell anyone I said this, but it's a horrible paper."

Ari turned back to the princess without comment, and Katja smiled. "Come and sit. Is there any more coffee? You should have some!"

She relented, taking another cup from the sideboard and pouring herself a cup of the steaming black coffee, before sitting gingerly on the edge of the princess's bed.

"Raph adores it, of course. He thinks everything his father touches turns to gold," Katja laughed. "And I don't want to burst his bubble. It's nice that he still thinks of his father as some kind of god. I wish I was able to see my mother like that."

"Raph... Raphael, the prince?" Ari asked.

Katja laughed, and Ari was entranced by just how perfectly straight and white the princess's teeth were.

"Of course, what other Raph would there be?" she grinned. "We've been dating for over a year. We've kept it pretty casual, although the Star got wind of it when he took me to the opera as his date last year. And he visited Norrlund in early summer, which was lovely."

Ari had a familiar feeling of vertigo, to realise that the world around her was so much bigger than she could ever imagine. She spent so much of her time with her head in a book that she forgot that other people had huge rich lives. Ari hadn't even known the princess of Norrlund and the prince of Lombardia were dating.

Katja leant back against her pillows. "This is good coffee, Ariane. My last ward made good coffee, too."

Ari took a sip.

"My last ward was a beautiful girl," Katja went on, smiling. "Norrlish. Very good coffee. But she acted so strangely every time I talked about Raphael. I found her a few times in places she shouldn't be. She was trying to get noticed by him, I think. She was in love with him. Obviously I don't blame her, but, to tell you the truth, I really didn't want her working for me. Unfortunately, she failed her exams and now... well I guess she doesn't work here, anymore. Such a pity."

Katja smiled sweetly at Ari.

Ari stared at the princess, shocked.

"But I'm sure," Katja said, and her tone grew hard. "I'm sure you will work very hard, won't you? Because you wouldn't want to fail... your exams."

"Of course not," Ari stammered, but her heart was beating fast at Katja's words. It was a thinly veiled threat. Yesterday she had seemed genuine, kind, and the way she'd slung her saddle over her shoulder and marched down to the kinnhouse had impressed Ari, and changed her opinion of the princess.