Prince Rainier
It's midafternoon when I get the wake-up call. Late nights by the window isn't something I should be making a routine. Midafternoon and I am hit upside the head. I open my eyes and look up. Father is standing over me. I look around for what it is he's hit me with. A half-eaten apple is on the sheets.
"What is it?" I ask.
"Look out your window," he says.
"I do," I say. "All the time."
"Obviously not as recently as I have though," Father says, picking up his apple and slouching out the door. I frown at him and sit up further. What was that all about?
Now that I'm awake there's no point trying to fall back asleep. It's already late in the day. I get cleaned up and dressed, then head downstairs. The cook is starting to hate me. This new sleeping pattern means that my breakfast gets served later. I'll have to try and get to sleep earlier at night so I don't make the lady want to kill me.
It's when I pass one of the windows that I see it. Or rather her. I pause, turning back and peering through the glass. There she is, clear as day, wondering through the garden.
I don't feel so hungry anymore.
I dash out into the flowers, hurrying up the path. I sincerely hope this isn't some sort of trick of the mind. I've had too many of those already.
"I hate orchids, you know," she says when she senses me near her.
I frown at the orchid bush she's staring at. "Really? But you said they were your favorite."
"I wanted to upset you," she says. "Because they were the only flower I couldn't see here and I wanted to get under your skin."
"Well, you didn't need the orchids to do that," I tell her.
She seems like she might almost smile. I hold out my arm. She takes it without hesitating and we proceed up the path. She doesn't feel the same. Her eyes are still tired and her skin is still pallid, but there's something here within her that seems to have blossomed.
"So if orchids were not the ones, than what is?" I ask.
"You'll laugh," she tells me.
"No, I won't."
"Yes, you will."
"No, I won't."
"You'll laugh me out the door."
"I promise I won't."
She bends down beside the cherry blossom tree and picks a buttercup from the grass. She holds it out for me to see. I'm sort of floored. We don't even plant buttercups in this garden. They're so common and simple that they just grow here on their own.
"This one seems more like you," I say. She leans against the tree, watching the petals flutter in the breeze.
"I need you to do something for me," she says.
"What do you need?" I ask.
"I need you to place someone in the Allendale line of succession," she says. "Someone who is not an Allendale."
"Carve someone into the family tree?" I ask. "I can do that. Who?"
"Edward Finchley," she says.
"The coal boy?"
"My friend. Royce Manor needs to go to someone. It has to stay in the family…but I don't want it anymore. I'll never stop seeing it the way I do now. But maybe someone else might have better luck with it."
Recognize a legal adoption into an ancient noble house. I can do that. And for a moment, I pause and turn to ask her where she is planning to go, but then I see her eyes. That's what's changed. Her skin is pallid and she has bags but her eyes are sparkling as bright and exhilarating as the day I first saw them and they make me shiver the way they did the first time and I smile because I know exactly where she's planning to go.