A/N Hey guys! Thank you all so much for your reviews/support! I just got back from vacation yesterday and I have just gotten the chance to begin responding to prompts again. Just a small warning though, I have a few other writing ideas that I have so I may be taking longer than my usual one-two day response to a one-shot request. I will be posting another prompt shortly after I finish writing this one, lol.

This one shot was asked for by QueenAnneTudor about George and his wife (this features fictional and completely made up people and titles, please ignore them). George's wife is real though.

Hope you all enjoy.

Until next time,

Fionakevin073

George has been engaged to Princess Cecily of Sweden since he was thirteen years of age.

Granted, George knew that it was a good match and that his mother had chosen well. Her father was fiercely protestant, which would therefore further solidify England's religious status and gain them a Protestant ally for life. George had seen the Princess's portrait as well and agreed that she was a beauty.

But that did not mean that he was happy about the marriage.

George had inherited his father's good looks and charisma and had bedded a few maidens beforehand (though he was awfully careful about it, his mother had instilled in him the danger of fathering bastards outside a marriage and also taught him to be aware of how his lustful actions could affect his wife) but now at the age of 20, he fancied himself in love—or at least in lust— with his current 'partner' Lady Bridgette.

Blonde-haired and green-eyed, she was a stunning beauty. They had met when he had accompanied his brother Mark to the Scottish border where he to meet his wife, Mary Queen of Scots.

He had brought Bridgette back with him.

For a year they had been together—much to his mother's eternal disapproval (though she did not obviously express her distaste, George knew she did not like the arrangement but that she would keep quiet about it until his marriage) but George knew that their time together would come to an end.

Though he was similar to his father in many ways, George had no intention of treating his wife the same way his father had. Though his parents marriage had been happy after his mother had been declared innocent after Cromwell confessed, George was fully aware that that had not been the case during the first few years and that his father's infidelity had almost gotten his mother killed.

He had no desire to ever make his wife fear her position—or for her life.

So with great reluctance in the year 1556, after his bride to be had left Calais to sail to England, George bid Bridgette farewell. His mother visited him in his chambers that evening, a knowing yet somewhat proud expression on her features.

"Hello my boy," she whispered, leaning forward to press a kiss on the top of his forehead. George looked up at her from where he sat, holding tightly onto his cup.

"I sent her away," he told her, though he was sure she already knew.

Sure enough, she replied quickly, "I know." They both sat there for a moment, staring at the flames in his hearth.

"You may grow to fall in love with her," she told him quietly, her voice soft.

George resisted the urge to scoff.

"I know you may find it silly and I know that you. . . find yourself to be in love with that Scottish girl, as you have been with many others. Or at least infatuated with her." A small sound of amusement escaped her lips. "You're a lot like your father in that regard."

"I do not think that I have that luxury," George commented wryly, one of his curls falling onto his forehead, "Even though my brothers have been lucky in that regard."

Mark had married Queen Mary by proxy when he was eighteen and Francis had married his wife not six months past. William was the only unmarried one like him.

"Who knows," his mother mused gently, "You may fall in love with her in the first moment you see her."

This time, George did not stop himself from scoffing.

"I do not believe in such things mother, you know this."

Even though Bridgette had been gone for only a week, his infatuation with her her—the feeling he had deemed to be love— had already begun to recede. He was no longer sure as to whether or not she had dimples when she smiled or whether or not her birthmark was on her left or right ankle. Their nights together now blended into one cloudy memory that he had trouble navigating.

"She may yet change your mind."

"I hardly doubt that."

George carried that doubt with him in his heart right until the day his bride-to-be arrives in London.

He stands next to his mother with his brothers on his right with a crown on his head as he observes the carriage opening, much to the crowds approval. It was a bright sunny day and the palace was wonderfully decorated in preparation for Princess Cecilia's arrival.

There are her ladies that exit and then suddenly there is her.

There is a long, golden veil hanging over her face, matching her magnificent golden gown.

And suddenly—George is nervous. His heart begins to beat rapidly as a number of thoughts swirl through his mind, causing his palms to sweat. And then with baited breath, he waits.

Her gloved hands lift her veil and their eyes meet almost instantly.

And suddenly all his doubt disappears.

He doesn't immediately fall in love with her. For as long George lives, he still does not truly believe in love at first sight. But he openly admits to himself and to her—later, when the time was right— that there had been this instant familiarity.

Almost as if though his soul had whispered:

It's you. It has always been you.