It was hours before Katlin could take the headdress off.
They finally left her, alone, locked behind two sets of thick wooden doors, in what she presumed was some sort of antechamber. Riker and the Prince were in an adjacent set of rooms, arguing.
Katlin slowly lifted the jeweled headdress off, pulling her tangled and sweaty hair out of the beaded rim. She set it carefully on a table in the middle of the dark and somber room. She tilted her head from side to side and her neck cracked in relief.
She could hear the Prince shouting in the other room, but she couldn't make out the words. She pressed an ear to the door, crunching up her skirts in the process, but the voices remain unintelligible. She turned back to examine her surroundings.
Someone had hastily prepared the room for her. The sun had set an hour ago, and the room was lit with flickering candles, and the table piled high with food. Thick embroidered tapestries covered the walls, and between the plush rug under her feet and the canopied seat to her left, Katlin felt positively medieval.
Her stomach growled as she examined the contents of the table. You weren't supposed to eat alien food on an away mission, but Katlin hadn't had anything since breakfast. She reached a tired hand towards what looked like an apple. It felt solid enough, and she brought it to her lips, her stiff ceremonial sleeves making it hard to bend far enough. She took a bite, and while it was delicious, it spurted thick purple juice in her face and down her front.
"Shitshitshitshit," Katlin looked around for a napkin, and, finding none, wiped herself with the tablecloth. The dress remained rather stained, and she suspected her face was equally tinged with purple. Heaving a sigh, Katlin tried the rest of the dishes, eventually settling on some ribs that tasted a bit like chicken.
She was seated in an inglorious flounce of her skirts, nawing at the last of the ribs, when the door burst back open. The Prince and Riker looked equally livid. Katlin scrambled to her feet, brushing her sticky fingers hastily in the folds of the now ruined dress. She hiccupped.
Riker eyed her disapprovingly. "It appears that the Prince may have underestimated your 'duties' as a figurehead."
"Perhaps you should have availed yourself of the most basic tenet of our religion before you brought this – "
Riker interrupted "Your presence is *requested* by the Prince for three days, during which you will bless the crowds and receive dignitaries. At the end of the third day you will ceremonially take your leave and never return."
Katlin shrugged "Ok."
The Prince nodded. "There. Settled. We'll have someone take you to your rooms."
He left, banging the thick wooden doors behind him.
Katlin swallowed. "I think you made him angry –"
Riker spun on her "And I think you are in direction violation of the Prime Directive."
"Me?" Katlin whined. "I didn't *ask* for any of this."
"Your excellence?" A young boy peered through the door. "If you would be kind enough to follow this unworthy one, I will escort you to your suite."
"Thank you," Kaitlin picked up her skirts in two big handfuls and swept out of the room.
"Rooms" was an understatement, Katlin thought, as the servants opened the doors on her suite. The golden chamber was big enough to play baseball in, and it was only the entryway. A cheerful gaggle of handmaidens led her down a hallway, past hanging portraits and woven rugs, into a room that housed a swimming pool sized bath, with servants pouring steaming jugs of rose-scented perfume into the bubbling water.
Before she could protest the handmaids had her out of her clothes and into the fragrant bath. Katlin started to insist that she could bathe herself, but found herself growing more compliant as the hot water eased the crick out of her neck. Her fingers manicured, her hair washed and braided, they slipped her into a silky, jeweled nightgown and tied a thick dressing gown around her shoulders.
It was another long walk to her bedroom, and she was left alone only after a long series of bows and every one of the handmaids had kissed her hands.
She turned to observe the suddenly quiet room. There was a fireplace flickering a cheerful amber glow over the plush vanity, the canopied bed, the tables and chairs, the desk, a wall of books, a marble statue of what looked like a griffin.
The door banged open behind her, and Katlin jumped around, startled.
"Where have you been?" Riker demanded.
"Having a bath," Katlin said, cringing slightly.
"From now on I expect to know where you are, at all times, with no exceptions. One wrong move, one wrong word, and we are BOTH beaming out of here," he loosened his collar. "I don't like the way things are going, and – " he paused. "What are you wearing?"
"A… nightgown?"
"On your head."
Katlin put a hand up to her hair, and felt points. She pulled and found she had been wearing a feather-light crown, in wiry, lacy silver with tiny, incandescent pearls. "Oh, I guess they put it there."
"You're not here to play dress up, Ensign Pierce."
"They put it on me!"
"No excuses. You have no idea the damage you could do."
"I haven't done anything!"
Riker sighed. "Well, get some sleep. I've convinced the guards to give me the room across the hall. Don't leave in the morning without me."
"Yessir. Goodnight sir."
Riker grunted and left.
Katlin threw the crown away in a snit. Playing dress-up. She could barely undo the knot keeping the robe around her shoulders. When she finally pulled it free she let it fall where she stood and flopped angrily into the bed. The bed hissed and shifted beneath her, and she sank into the thick pillows like a falling soufflé.
She tussled her way on to her back and stared up at the canopy overhead. The gold thread shifted and twinkled in the candlelight as she sank deeper into the pillows. Just who did Riker think he was, her dad? She wasn't playing dress-up, this was serious. Riker would just have to get used to the fact that, for the next three days, Katlin was Queen of the World.
Best away mission, ever.