Ok, so, just ahead of time, I want to say:
I am SO, SO sorry that I haven't updated in forever, I have no excuse except Research Papers for English (well, actually, only one)
I don't agree with hunting – I think that if we're going to treat pigs, cows, chickens, and everything else inhumanely in little meat factories, then package their over-chemicaled dead muscle, it makes no sense to go out and kill the wildlife whose homes we have already polluted or paved over. Just saying. I wouldn't have even used it, except it was the only plot device I could think of.
I have NO idea what a formal dinner party would be like in the middle of the last 1000 years in Europe, which is where most fairytales are set. Or whatever this is. So, if you happen to be studying something like this and nothing in the next chapter makes sense, then just pretend I put them there on purpose. It's part of Drinsan culture!
Recap: Princess Arnalia of Opyll is acompanying her father on a trip of the country of Drinse, and on her first night has disobeyed her Father and embarrassed herself in front of the Prince.
Chap. 4
Prince Griffon of Drinse looked around at the temporarily empty Hall and sighed resignedly. He slouched deeper into his chair, shifted in his stiff tunic, twisted his tight belt, tugged on the strings of his 'light' cape.
He hated formality. He hated spotless tunics and salad forks and balls. Ugh. So, of course, fate had slotted him as a Prince. A Prince with a would-be matchmaker for a mother. And if the Queen liked someone, it was almost guaranteed that Grif would hate her. There was no romance in an arranged marriage. It was awkward from the start, unless one person was overly aggressive, in which case it was scary. Grif shuddered. Lady Lara.
Griffon had, of course, expected to have to appear at this dinner, ever since his father had announced that he would be holding the Hunt. All the expected guests were scheduled to have arrived by now, and they would be departing the next morning, so, as tradition dictated, his father was throwing a feast.
That wasn't the bad part; the Prince might have to sit through a few stories about 'that elk who just wouldn't stop running, even with three arrows in his leg' or something; it wasn't anything he couldn't tune out.
But this? This was ten times worse. This he couldn't tune out.
Princess Arnalia was here. Well, not quite here, in the Great Hall, somewhere out in the hallways or something, but soon enough the great doors would open and a herald would rush in and announce 'Princess Arnalia of Opyll' and Grif would have no peace until she either left at the end of the hunt or they were married.
He glanced, resigned, at the suspiciously empty seat next to him. He just knew it was the Princess's, even without a nameplate. His mother, and a number of the servants, had memorized the seating charts. She thought it was tacky to place nameplates, and it gave her a chance to 'greet the guests and get them personally situated' as she led them to their seats personally. Well, as she led the really important ones to their seats personally. Most of the time, she simply smiled graciously at her guest and called a servant.
Grif looked up at the giant clock at the other end of the room. 6:58. Two more minutes until his doom. His mother waved him up, out of his chair, toward where she and his father were standing near the doors, ready to greet whoever came through first.
The clock chimed 7. A few moments later, the grand doors were swung open and a servant rushed through.
"Presenting Lord Randall of Enton, Sir Michael of Enton, Sir Peter of Enton…" The man went on to name six or so knights, who entered one at a time, bowed to the royalty, and were led to their seats by the Queen. She always seated the first guests herself.
A few minutes later, the King of Enton arrived with his son, then some Knights from Ilian, and a group from Grantle. Soon, the Prince had stopped paying any attention to who was bowing and simply nodded automatically, thinking instead of ways to avoid another one of his mother's matrimony schemes. This would be the fourth. And, if there was anything that he'd learned from past experience, it was to expect the unexpected.
The first girl had been as uninterested in him as he was in her; she just wanted an excuse to stay at court until her true love, who was in fact her secret fiancé, could arrange their elopement. Grif had actually ended up helping them.
The next one was a visitor from the Kingdom of Lingan. She had come for three months to visit family, and simply left when the three months were up and it was obvious that she wasn't going to end up a Princess.
But Lady Lara, the most recent fiasco, had been determined to marry into the Royal Family. She had followed him everywhere, squeezed out invitations to things she couldn't simply follow him to, and eventually even the Queen began to dislike her. In the end, the Queen had found some excuse to send Lara away from court, and Grif had thought that that was the last of her match-making.
It suddenly occurred to Griffon that perhaps his mother wasn't going to try to pair him with Arnalia. Perhaps it was simply a coincidence and she had realized that the only way Grif would ever find a Queen would be if he found her.
And, the Queen had barely even mentioned Opyll – last time, she had been going on for days beforehand about Lara's embroidery and fashion and her astounding skill with a flute. Maybe she had finally…
Another herald ran forward: 7:12. "Announcing his Royal Highness King Geoffrey of Opyll, Her Royal Highness Princess Arnalia of Opyll, and Lady Sophile of Opyll."
Prince Griffon's head snapped up and, had he been eating soup, he would have choked on it.
Arnalia walked in slowly on her father's arm, smiling widely, trying not to look too particularly at the Prince's face. King Geoffrey stopped in front of the royal family and turned to face his fellow King, conveniently enough placing Arnalia directly in front of Griffon. She curtseyed, he bowed, his face pale. They straightened and she looked directly into his face, smiled again, and turned to follow his mother to her seat.
She sat down a moment later and glanced around the Hall. Three tables stretched across it, one which seemed reserved for the royalty, while the other much larger ones held everyone else. A number of trophy heads had been hung around the Hall – mainly deer, but some which were more exotic.
Arna wrinkled her nose for a moment, without realizing altogether what she was doing. She hated to think about what was actually going on at the hunt. And what message was the head of majestic animal on a wall supposed to send? 'Oh, look, I killed this!'? But, around the heads, tapestries had been hung depicting the romantic parts of hunting scenes – noblemen riding out into the forest on tall steeds, strong warriors blowing grand horns or pulling back giant bows.
As the final guests arrived and the all seats filled up, Arna glanced across the table at Sophie, who was sitting next to a rather large, overwhelming knight from Enton, and wondered why the seat next to her was still empty. Surely, he wasn't…
King Andreas of Drinse cleared his throat loudly and the room fell silent. "Representatives from all the Kingdoms of the Union, I greet you on the eve of our great hunt. This year we will have a great sport, not only because of the forests I have kept well stocked, but because of the number and skill of the hunters joining us. I would thank you each personally for journeying here, but I like to keep my speeches short," There was a soft chortle of laughter at this from across the hall, "and I'm sure that you're all hungry. So, without further ado, let the feast begin!"
The King raised his arms and doors at the end of the hall, presumably leading to the Kitchens, opened and carts laden with dishes of all types burst forth as Drinse's Royal family took their seats.
Arnalia pretended to take great interest in placing her napkin just so as Prince Griffon's chair scraped back. Damn. She thought to herself.
Damn. Griffon thought as he slowly sat down. I will never underestimate my mother again.
He glanced over at the Princess, who appeared to be studying her napkin closely. Grif considered his own napkin. Across the table, his mother sent him a look that said clearly 'Talk to her'. Grif pretended not to notice.
"Griffon, where are your manners?" The Queen's voice rang out, startling both her son and the Princess next to him. "Introduce yourself."
Grif forced himself to turn to Arnalia. "Ah… Hello, I am Prince Griffon."
"A pleasure…" The Princess's face was turning red, "A pleasure to meet you, Prince Griffon." She faltered, as if trying not to laugh. "Princess Arnalia."
She held up her hand and, as was customary, Grif kissed it. There was a short, rather awkward silence, and then the food was served. Grif's father began to carve the pig, and the lesser dishes were set on the table in front of the guests. Servants began to rush about, pulling the lids off trays, ladling soup and offering the various delicacies to the guests.
Griffon almost grinned with relief, but managed to cough instead, somehow. It was what he did automatically when he was nervous and doing something un-princely. Like the time he tripped down the stairs and he found himself lying on his back at the bottom, fake-coughing. It was getting to be a bad habit.
Arnalia, next to him, gave a perceptible giggle. Grif glanced over at her, still utterly confused. Why? Why did the only girl who's been in the Stadium for over a century HAVE to be my mother's new fixation? And WHY did she have to sit next to me at a formal dinner the next time we met
And why did he have to fake-coughArna's thoughts spun through her head, doing little to keep her next giggle from breaking out. It was what happened in truly absurd, awkard situations – she broke into uncontrollable laughter. Well, not quite broke, it was more like slowly descending.
First she'd be giggling, then maybe she'd stop for a few minutes, and then something small, not even funny, would happen and she would have to clamp her mouth shut to keep from guffawing. Like, worse that just laughing. And eventually, it would build up until she couldn't hold it in anymore, and then she would explode.
Arnalia took a deep breath, searching quickly through her head for something serious, something calm. She imagined a lake – pristine, smooth, mellow blue and green. She took another deep breath. She really should have tried this before – it really worked. Another breath.
Then again, this happened so rarely, only when something was really out of the ordinary – she could remember maybe six times. Another breath. So, it wasn't so surprising that she didn't know how to deal with it. Another breath.
She heard a cart roll up behind her and turned to accept a carefully laid out selection of marinated vegetables.
Griffon ate his meal in silence, looking up occasionally to make sure that his mother wasn't watching him. She was, conveniently enough, being entertained by the King of some country. Grif could never keep them straight. He believed that it started with an L or something. Or maybe that was the King's name.
He spent the entire time thinking – what was he supposed to say to her? Could he avoid saying anything at all? Could he possibly convince his mother that he had a sudden stomach-ache? Maybe he could get out of the Fencing Tournament and go on the Hunt…
He practically had a headache by the time the final course – desert – was served. It was a humongous, glazed, sugar-thing. Glazan. In the shape of a deer. Grif hated those. Not just the ones in the shape of deer. Glazan were a Drinsan delicacy, dating back hundreds years since before Drinse had really been a country. Apparently, the first one had been made in the shape of a crown, to trick some evil lord or other who was trying to steal the realcrown. Griffon had never really understood why they had tricked the lord with a fake crown made of sugar. It was a pretty weird thing to use.
But anyway, the ones today were either filled with carefully molded pastry or pie-filling type bits of fruit. Regardless, it was pretty impossible to eat. You were supposed to use a fork, but that never really worked, and Grif either just left it on his plate or scooped at it with a spoon when no one was looking.
And sometimes, you got pieces that were just pure sugar.
Arnalia suppressed the urge to wrinkle her nose at the sight of the huge Glazan-deer. And they ruin the whole shape, hacking pieces off of it.
She gracefully accepted her plate – the very top of one of the antlers. Splendid.
They couldn't ever have fit anything in there except for sugar.
Arna glanced over at the prince as he received the top of the other antler. He glanced over to her plate and rolled his eyes, then immediately let out a fake cough.
Arna felt the tips of her mouth start to stretch, and the back of her throat felt all bubbly. Oh no, not now. It's almost over! She clamped her mouth shut, taking a deep breath through her nose that was cut off by a snort of laughter.
And suddenly she couldn't stop laughing – it all came bubbling up her throat and bursting out of her mouth. She started to rock back and forth with her laughter, barely aware of what she was doing. Arna started to slip out of her chair, and whatever part of her brain that wasn't laughing made her arm shoot out to grab the table to keep from toppling over.
Unfortunately, she missed the table and caught the table cloth. Although her tug didn't move it much, what with all of the heavy dishes and silverware and slightly drunk Kings with their elbows on the table, she made everything shake. And this wouldn't have been so bad if it wasn't for the giant, unstable deer.
The deer began to tremble, shaking pieces of sugar onto everyone near it. Then it started to wobble, and then rock a little, until it finally fell over with a wet crash onto the six kings sitting around it – and particularly on King Andreas. There was a sudden, stunned silence, with only the sound of Arnalia's oblivious laughter.
Then the scrape of a chair as Sophie got up, ran around to her friend, grabbed her arm and pulled her, still giggling uncontrollably, out of the Hall.
Griffon stared, dazed, as a servant opened the doors, rather automatically, and the two girls ran through. Maybe I won't have to marry her now.
By the time they had reached her room, Arnalia had stopped laughing. And, as her laughter slacked off, she started to think again.
She opened the doors to her room, walked in, and sunk down in a chair.
"What have I done?" She practically crumpled.
Sophie closed the doors. "Well, good cover-up, anyway. He didn't have a chance to choke on his soup."
Arna glared at her friend. "That was hardly helpful."
Sophie shrugged. "I just felt like it needed to be said."
"Well, at least I won't have to face my father – he'll probably leave before I wake up. Hopefully. He'll just leave a stern note or something, and I'll have to apologize to the
Royal family. I can blame it on travel-induced exhaustion. Really though, I don't see what's so tiring about travel. I mean, we sit in a carriage for a few days. I suppose some people are on horses, but really, that just makes your behind ache. Which isn't all that tiring, really." Arna started to sit up straighter.
"Well, that's a good attitude. If I had dumped sugar…" Sophie trailed off. "Anyway, I agree with you on that whole 'tiresome journey' thing. Really, it gave me a lot of energy. It was getting here that sucked it all out of me."
Arna opened her mouth to say something, and a yawn came out instead.
"See!" Sophie laughed.
Arna snorted softly. "I don't think I'm ever going to be able to laugh again."
"I hope not. That was worse than the time you accidentally splattered that lord with gravy and he didn't notice, then you had to dance with him, and…" Sophie trailed off, laughing too hard to continue.
"And, remember the time I set that drape on fire during my brothers' ball and in the panic Duke Godfrey's fake hair fell off?" Arna started to giggle too.
"Technically, that time you weren't the only one laughing, although no one was laughing quite as hard as you were."
Suddenly, the clock rang nine.
Sophie yawned, and Arna yawned a moment later, as if in response.
Sophie giggled. "That's kind of sad. It's only nine and we're already tired. And I have to walk all the way over to my rooms." Sophie headed for the door.
"Good night."
"G'night."
"Arna, you're engaged!" Sophie burst into Arna's room in only a dressing robe and slippers.
"What?" Arna replied groggily.
"You Are Engaged." Sophie repeated, slowly.
"What!" Arna sprang up, staring at her friend.
Sophie explained quickly. She had been woken up ten or so minutes ago by two maids entering her room to set the bath and lay out her clothes. Thinking Sophie was still asleep, they had started gossiping about the aftermath of the feast. And, apparently, late that night, Arna's father had met with the King of Drinse, and…
"I'm engaged to Prince Griffon!" Arna screeched. She jumped up and would have run out the door in her nightgown if Sophie hadn't stopped her.
"Arna, where are you going?" Sophie grabbed her friend's arm, knowing how well the princess dealt with surprise.
Arna spun away, grabbed her robe, and escaped past Sophie's grasp. "To see my father!" She yelled back, already spinning around the corner.
She ran down the hall and would have pounded on her father's door had it not been open already. King Geoffrey, dressed for hunting, was just about to leave.
"Arna?" He said, surprised.
"I'm engaged?" Arna had to grab the door frame to keep from running into him.
"Well… yes…" The King looked guilty. "You know, you weren't supposed to find out about that until after I'd left."
"Engaged?" Arna whispered fiercely.
"Well, not really." Arna's father said flippantly. "With your enchantment, you can't just be engaged at random, it's really only until I get back."
"Just… until… you get back…" Arna said slowly, catching her breath.
"Yes. You see, after last night, it became obvious that I couldn't just leave you here all alone. A fiancé will work nicely to keep you from getting into any sort of situation. And, once I get back, I will simply break the engagement. It's all part of the deal King Andreas and I worked out." King Geoffrey started walking down the hall.
Arna followed him. "I can behave without a fiancé! And if you didn't think I could, why did you let me come along?"
"I let you come along because I assumed that you wouldn't go gallivanting around the city your first hour here, and because you gave me no peace until I agreed to bring you with me. And if you're trying to convince me that you don't need to be regulated by a fiancé, you're doing a pretty bad job. Do you intend to follow me all the way to the stables dressed like that?"
Arna stopped and looked down at herself. She hadn't buttoned her robe all the way and she only had one slipper on; the other one she'd accidentally kicked under the bed unpacking and it would have taken too long to get it out before.
"But…"
"No buts. You brought this upon yourself, and even you can not deny that."
"But–"
"I'll see you in a month!" Arna's father gave her a fake salute and strode quickly down the hall and around the corner.
"But…"