One for Cards

Chapter Six

10/01/20: Also, I'm switching up the cover! Old one's in the multimedia section of this chapter for memory's sake. As always, vote, share, comment! You could totally make my day!

FROM WHERE SHE WAS POSITIONED, ADDIE COULD OBSERVE VERY LITTLE OF THE ceremony, but she heard it perfectly when her name was announced. She was very impressed indeed by the herald; she'd seen him in passing earlier on, and he'd struck her as scrawny. Yet his voice was the biggest she'd ever heard – other than the sound of his cry, all that was audible from inside the Palace was the cheer of the crowds, mad with excitement that their Queen was alive, and that she brought back to the Palace with her a grown princess.

It seemed wild to them that Addie might, for all these years, have hidden right under their noses, while they had all come to accept – begrudgingly, of course – the idea of having the King's brother Thomas as their ruler. It was like waking up from a nightmare: they all hated him well enough, and she supposed it was no surprise. He was a spendthrift wastrel even the good King James made no disguise of his shame over, and now they were going to be free of him. This was certainly cause for celebration.

Queen Anne had already been recrowned, her shiny headpiece finally put back atop her head after nineteen years. Charles Williams stood next to Addie while she waited, just as he'd promised he would, and nudged her gently when her name rang out.

He smiled, though she hardly saw it. "Go on."

His gentle push made her take the first step forward, and then her legs carried on by themselves, her steps like clockwork. The great front doors of the Palace, which were always shut, opened up for her, and she walked out onto the Palace's front lawn, in a new blue dress and her fire-red hair done intricately. She smiled politely as the crowd roared for her.

Waiting for her there were her parents, beaming proudly at her. Beside them were a priest and a cushion. Not just any priest, she realised on closer inspection; the high priest of the royal church. Of course. It was only to be expected that he would crown her.

When she finally came to stand before him, he gestured to the cushion. She was not properly religious (something her mother always chastised her for), but she knelt anyway. He extended a Bible to her, and she placed her left hand on it.

"Adelaide of Carmonte," he boomed, his voice somehow echoing across the lawn, and the people went silent. "Do you swear, on your life, your allegiance to this country?"

"I swear it." Her voice was not nearly as loud as his, but she reckoned it was the loudest she'd ever spoken.

"Do you swear to act, always, on the kingdom's best interests, regardless of your own?"

"I swear it."

"Do you swear to serve the people and crown of Lastyria, till God calls you home?"

"I swear it."

"Then, by the power vested in me by the Lord above, I crown you Princess of Lastyria and heir apparent to the throne." He withdrew the Bible from her, picking up, instead, a crown, and placed it on her head. It was beautifully bejewelled, but heavier than anything she'd ever worn in her life.

In a split second, the crowd went wild, screaming, hooting, and chanting her name. It occurred to her, then, that these were her people. That her duty was to them, that they were the reason she now carried a weight atop her head. Her responsibility was not some abstract obligation to God and country; it was real, a chorus of cheers, a crowd that stretched as far as the eye could see.

The high priest bowed to her and retreated. In his place, her father came to stand before her, and helped her to her feet.

"Congratulations," he said warmly. "I'm very proud of you."