Alfred stood next to Matthew at the castle doors, watching as the boy from earlier stepped back when he was asked for his name. If he looked like he was angry before, he was furious now. But as the man approached, Arthur as Yao has announced, Alfred noticed he looked more terrified than Matthew. He could understand why, at least Matthew had him, but Arthur was almost being forced to leave his family behind. Yao walked behind Arthur as the two of them walked toward Matthew and he. Arthur glared at Alfred as he walked up to him.
Yao looked between the three for a moment before commanding them to follow him into the throne room to meet the previous Queen. Alfred walked close to Matthew, looking around the gallant castle walls. Yao opened two large blue doors, a spade painted between them. Inside, two thrones sat, one slightly more extravagant than the other, but not differing in royal shades of blue and practically covered in spades. On the slightly smaller throne to the right, sat a women of about fifty or sixty, smiling with a wrinkled face, mirth gleaming in her eyes.
She was the prettiest women Alfred had ever seen. Not aesthetically, he'd seen much fairer girls being courted throughout the city. But the Queen, or former Queen, smiled a knowing smile. A true happiness shined in her eyes, as if saying 'it may not seem so great now, but you will be a great reign'. Alfred had only ever saw the Queen once before, when he was six and before his father had died.
"You will make a great impact on Spades, I can see it in the bond between you three."
Alfred was confused by the statement, what bond did Matthew and he have to Arthur? Alfred looked over to Arthur for an answer, but found that Arthur looked on at the Queen with an enraged gaze. Alfred didn't know what the Queen had said to upset Arthur, but she hadn't just upset him, he looked like he was ready to kill.
Arthur continued to look at the Queen for a moment, but the moment he opened his mouth, ready to finally speak his mind Alfred lurched into action and grabbed his shoulder, pulling him back towards himself. "What will be our duties as royalty?" he inquired, tightening his grip on Arthur's forearm as he smiled at the Queen.
Arthur had wanted to say something to the Queen, but was abruptly stopped by Alfred. He winced at the tight hold on his arm and jerked it away. His eyes were still on the Queen who just smiled at them.
"Well," The Queen started, "nothing at first. But before anything officially happens my Jack needs to give you three some simple lessons on Spade's history of royals and quick training. The Ace will have separate training from the King and Queen. The jobs are very different so we will have a different training process for you." She smiled at Matthew before shifting her focus onto the two other boys. "After all the lessons and training the formal coronation will take place. Since my King is sadly no longer here, Yao will work with the new King to show him what his specific duties are. I will work with the new Queen. Their tasks are very different from each other so I'm not exactly sure what your duties are. I only know the Queens."
She stood from her throne and elegantly walked down the stairs leading from the thrones and stood in front of all three. Her smile was sweet as she told them they will be great rulers of the kingdom. The Queen then ordered for the Jack to show the three their new rooms as she went off to attend to some private matters of her own. The Jack bowed to her as she left and told the boys to follow him. As they were shown the way to their rooms the Jack spoke to them about many things, but Arthur paid no mind to them. He was angry and confused about everything that had happened.
'Why me?" Hethought. "Why was I chosen to be Queen? I'm nothing special and I sure as hell can't run a bloody kingdom! I don't understand any of this…'
Arthur's thoughts stopped when he reached two large doors and was told that this was where the King and Queen would sleep together and the Ace's sleeping quarters were just down the hall. This instantly caught Arthur's attention
"Wait a minute." He said getting the others attention. "You expect me to share a room with him?" He pointed to Alfred. "I barley know him and I refuse to share anything with him. Especially a room."
"I'm afraid there isn't anything I can do. You two are going to be the new King and Queen. Therefore you two must share a room." The Jack informed politely and Arthur glared at him before letting out a tired sighed.
"Whatever. I'm too tired for this. If there isn't anything else I'm going to retire for the night." Without another word Arthur opened the door to his shared room and walked in before slamming the door shut behind him. He rubbed his hands over his face trying to calm down. It wasn't even a few minutes before he heard hesitant quiet knocking on the door.
"Go away." He called. When the other person ignored him and opened the door anyway, Arthur turned around and yelled. "I said go awa–" He stopped when he saw who had entered the room.
Alfred stood at the door, having lost way to his own guilt when he saw how much Arthur didn't want his newly granted position. Alfred had looked to Matthew after Arthur had stormed off, as if asking should I go after him?
In the end, he gave in and decided to follow after Arthur. He knocked lightly, as to not further irritate the Brit. "Go away," was the immediate response, but he wouldn't let that deter him. After a moment he opened the door, he heard Arthur protest, but it died on his lips as he saw Alfred enter the room.
"Hey," Alfred said, albeit awkwardly. He looked at Arthur, who continued to scowl at him, but didn't say anything more in protest as he fully stepped into the room. "So look," he started, only to realize he didn't actually know where he was going with it. He just wanted Arthur to feel better. He wasn't sure why, but he coudn't stand to see the guy down or scared. When he was angry, however, Alfred found that it was quite comical. He hadn't known the new Queen very long, but he felt a strange draw towards the man.
Arthur cleared his throat loudly, refocusing Alfred. "You were saying?" He sounded irritated, but not the funny kind. Alfred felt his cheeks warm slightly, and hoped it wasn't as blatantly noticeable as it felt. He looked at Arthur a moment before gulping and gathering his thoughts.
"It-" he stopped, it what? "It may not seem it now, but I think that before we can say that the decision is wrong, we should try and play it, right?" He looked at Arthur, hoping for any type of reaction. When he received nothing but an unimpressed stare, he decided to continue. "We're about the same age right? We don't know what we wanna do when we grow up, what our passions are, who we wanna spend the rest of our lives with, right? Well now we have bigger selections. Sure, if we're gonna be the royalty of Spades, we can't go into other professions, but that doesn't mean that we can't spend all of our free time doing what we love. Now that you're royalty, Arthur, that pretty girl that you'd liked for a long time now, but was a duke, is now in your range of courting."
He doubted that Arthur would have any trouble courting any class, judging by his mannerisms and his clothing, he was already upper-class. While Alfred and Matthew, they were middle-class, living comfortably; but not so comfortably that they could hire servants and didn't have a budget.
Arthur looked at him thoughtfully, but he didn't look angry or sad anymore, which relieved Alfred more than he would've liked to admit.
When Arthur saw who was at the door he wasn't too happy to see Alfred, but he was glad it wasn't Yao. He felt the Jack would be giving a lecture or some other nonsense that Arthur did not want to deal with right now.
He listened to what Alfred had to say, and by the end of it he sighed. He was so tired and just wanted this day to end. Arthur shook his head at the other boy and walked over to the bed to sit down.
"First of all, for your information, there is no girl. I don't want anything like that. Second of all, I never wanted this. I never wanted any of this. Why was I even picked? If I hadn't gone to the Finding I wouldn't be in this mess. Someone else who would be a much better option for this position would have been picked. I'm a horrible choice for a Queen." He ran his hands through his hair and took a quick glace over at Alfred. He noted that the boy looked a little uncomfortable. Probably because of Arthur's complaining.
"I'm sorry. I don't mean to be yelling or complaining to you." Arthur normally wouldn't be so open with his emotions. Normally he would bottle them up around people and then let them out when he was alone. It was different with Alfred though, but he wasn't sure why.
"Aren't you angry about this?" Arthur suddenly asked. "Your whole life is being thrown away and you cant do anything now. You're trapped. Don't you want to do something for yourself or go out and explore the world? Aren't you angry about this whole thing? You even said yourself that we cant do anything else. We have to run this kingdom now no matter what. We can't pass this to anybody else."
He watched Alfred shuffle around a bit, it seemed like he was trying to come up with an answer to his question. It was that or he was still uncomfortable around Arthur and his complaining. He honestly wasn't making the best first impression on anybody today.
As Arthur explained himself, Alfred became slightly uncomfortable. It wasn't because of Arthur talking about his doubts, but because he'd had these same thoughts not to long ago himself. The only way he'd gotten over it, was by telling himself that this wasn't by chance. He was chosen as King because he was fit to rule, and Arthur was chosen because he was fit to rule too. He just wished he could convince the man to have more faith in himself.
He paused, looking at Arthur's expression before he even attempted to answer his question. What had he wanted to do with himself? That's right, he desperately wanted to be an astronomer. His mother had always been supportive, but even he could tell that she thought that his dreams were too ambitious to ever be achievable.
"I wanted to be an astronomer. Back at my old house, we had the clearest view of the night sky. Every night since I was little I sat outside and watched the stars until I would almost fall asleep outside from exhaustion. Sometimes I did! I look up at the sky and I don't see stars in the sky, I see white dots on a black canvas! A large open sky with thousands of stars millions and millions of light years away staring down at me, asking- calling me to them! A vast and endless sky, full of vast and endless opportunities that are just waiting to be discovered!"
He was in love with the sky, the only thing that still seemed impossible to reach; even from the tallest towers of the world. He loved everything about the stars, from the way they looked after a rain, the way they seemed only to shine brighter on bad day, everything. He wanted so, so badly to spend the rest if his days in the stars, simply gazing at them.
But he couldn't. Not now. Alfred felt tears start to sting in his eyes, blinking rapidly to push them back. Arthur was speechless, frozen by Alfred's sudden speech.
Alfred looked back, "I- I had dreams too. We all did. But that doesn't mean that this is a mistake. As much as I wanted to be an astronomer then, it was still out of my reach. I only had the liberty to do so then, liberty that may now be inaccessible. But, I'm King now, so maybe being an astronomer or studying astronomy isn't so much out of reach as it is a problem with time.
"We are royalty, and there's nothing we can do about it, whether we like it or not. But I don't think you're not right for Queen, and I don't think I'm wrong for King. We just need to learn. Learn to rule, learn to work together, and learn to live. I like you, Arthur, I don't think you're a bad guy." Alfred flushed, he didn't mean it like that, he just thought that Arthur was a cool guy and he was getting of topic where was he? "A-Anyways, I think we should catch up to Yao and Matt now!" He rushed out of the room, only sparing a fleeing glance at Arthur as he ducked out of the room.
Oh God. Oh God, he was an idiot!