Soooo here we are, my lovely readers... the beginning of a new journey :D Are you excited? I sure am, and hopefully you'll love this ride as much as I do. But I won't rant on for long, I did that in the author's note which I hope you read before coming here. So enjoy, my lovelies~
P.S. I do not own any of the Hollow Crown characters. I only own Odette and any other OC you might encounter along the way :)
Prologue
The year was 1399. My beloved England was still recovering from the tumultuous events which had taken place just one month before; the Lancastrian Revolution, as the people had named it.
I was but a child at the time with only ten springs weighing on my brow. But I still recall the joy... the cheers... the blessings that the masses so generously bestowed upon our new King, Henry, the fourth of that name which England had been graced with.
On that day no one seemed to even recall the events which had led to his coronation: his banishment, his secret return, his plotting along with my father – his distant cousin, but the only one who had offered his help, other than the Earl of Northumberland and his uncle, the Duke of York – and finally, the deposition of King Richard II, Henry's closest cousin by blood.
All this seemed forgotten as the people cheered and shouted out their happiness to the new King. I recall my father's proud smile as he rode his black horse behind Henry's white stallion... I recall my mother's joy as she and I watched them pass us by. I did not fully understand at the time why we were happy, but I was happy along with her. Her happiness made me happy as well.
It was the last time I heard her melodious laugh, for she fell ill by the end of that year and passed away not more than five months afterwards. She was given a burial worthy of the highest nobles, as the King had seen fit to bestow upon my father the title of Duke of Willoughby. With my father too busy attending to the King after her death, to worry over me, I was left in the hands of my nursemaid; a fiery Welsh woman, by the name of Elain, who soon became as dear to me as a mother.
With that said, there are certain moments in life when our choices affect much more than the present; they ripple outwards – as water does when you drop a rock onto the still surface of a lake – and often their full effects cannot be seen until many years have passed. I know that now... but when I made my decision to stand against my father's wish, at the tender age of sixteen, I could never have imagined how my entire life would be drawn onto a path which I had always believed to be eternally separate from mine.
The year was 1405...
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"Odette! Odette! In God's name... where are you, child?"
With a huff, the elderly nursemaid placed her hands onto her hips glancing about the large garden. Moments later she was nearly startled out of her skin when the teenage girl jumped out from behind a large rose bush.
"May the heavens take pity on us, with such a wild heir to your father's name..."
"Come now, beloved Elain..." the girl laughed, wrapping her arms around the woman. "You know too well there is no ill intent behind my teases."
Sighing with a light smile, the elderly maid shook her head.
"Very well, change out of these horrible rags; bathe and let me put a proper dress on you. Sir Harold is due to arrive within the hour."
With her smile fading, the raven haired girl finally moved away.
"I have no desire to see him..."
"Your desire has no importance here; it is your father's desire that matters."
"But, beloved Elain, he is as boring as a caterpillar..."
Eyeing the struggle on the old maid's face to hold back from laughing, Odette now pressed on.
"And he stinks as foul as the stables wherein the horses have emptied their bowels."
When the old woman finally let out a burst of laughter, the girl did grin and once again wrapped her arms around her nursemaid.
"I would prefer dying a maiden than marrying him..."
With another sigh – this one much heavier than the previous – Elain placed her calloused hands onto the girl's cheeks and kissed her forehead.
"You have your mother's steel heart... God rest her soul. I wish you would not have to go through this, but it is your father's wish. Do not deny him and darken his elder years, for you are all he has of Lady Jocelyn."
It was at those words that Odette's humor left her and she lowered her chocolate eyes. Some years after her mother's passing, she had finally understood and seen just how broken her father had been by his wife's death. Often, it seemed to her, he had tried raising her as he would have a son... leaving her in the care of Bevis – his soldiers' captain – to teach her how to ride and how to wield a sword and to show her the secrets of a strategic mind. And at the same time, he had tried raising her as he would have a daughter... leaving her with Elain to teach her proper etiquette and how to gain control over men through seduction and how to be a wise and balanced woman.
For all that she was grateful to her father, despite having been starved of his love as he was mostly gone to London to attend his duties to King Henry. Yet, as Elain had so wisely pointed out, she had the steel heart of her mother... marrying a man she did not desire was something she could not accept. And at the same time she was torn in two by her wish to not upset her father and to not burden him with more worries than he was already bearing.
A sigh revealed her decision to put those thoughts off for a later time. Looking back to Elain she smiled again... a weak, sorrowful smile; but a shade of her former joy.
"Come and help me bathe, beloved Elain." she said softly.
Once more kissing her forehead, the old maid followed her into the castle with a heavy heart. If only the girl's mother had lived still... surely she would have found a way to convince William of how foolish his idea was to force their child into marriage with a man such as Harold. But Elain knew better than to voice such thoughts; the last thing she desired was to encourage Odette to rise against her father's word.
oOoOo
"My fair lady, your beauty surpasses even the angels."
Offering a graceful but ultimately fake smile, Odette merely nodded at Harold's compliment; granted, she could not speak even if she had wanted to, for she was much too busy clenching her jaw so as to keep from shuddering in disgust when he kissed her hand in a way which left a wet sensation on her skin.
Within the hour she was so bored that she felt she would go insane. All Harold knew to speak of, it seemed, was politics – whereas she desired to speak of art, of literature, of music, or simply of the beauty and grace of the starry night sky, of a flower, a beautiful stallion or a mother cradling her child whilst singing a lullaby. The prospect of a life spent with a husband who knew nothing save talks of diplomacy and treaties and laws, was – in a mild term – terrible.
She had tried... God was her witness that she had tried to understand what her father had seen so promising in Harold, that he would choose that witless oaf as her betrothed. It had actually been astounding to hear him compare her to the angles upon his arrival that evening, for she would not have believed him capable of even the slightest poetic twitch. Not even that, however, had been enough to sway her opinion of him; she still believed him to be a man more worthy of marrying a tavern wench, than a nobleman's daughter.
By all rights, she was King Henry's niece – even distantly related as her father was to him – as well as the niece to the King of France – on her mother's side – and it made her blood boil to know that her father had not considered her valuable enough as to choose a more worthy suitor.
As those thoughts swirled in her mind, whilst Harold's voice resounded ceaselessly in the background like the annoying sound of a fly buzzing in her ear, she stared into the flame of a nearby candle. And it was then that she could foresee the emptiness and desolation which awaited her, unless she took her life in her own grasp. Surely her mother would have been outraged by her father's choice of a husband for their only child. And it was the desire and hope of her mother's rage that ultimately pushed her to stand.
As though sensing the imminent danger, Elain immediately stepped to her side and gently but firmly grasped her shoulders, whilst Harold watched her with a confused expression as though he was intrigued by her unusual reaction; or perhaps he was simply irritated that she had interrupted his speech.
"Sit down, child..."
The old maid's whisper had Odette gulping as she braced herself for the decision she knew she had already made long ago, but had been afraid of pursuing as of yet... no more.
"No." she whispered back.
Tearing herself away from the old woman's grasp, she stormed out of the room leaving an utterly perplexed Harold behind. Elain herself barely had enough sense left to bow to him and mutter an apology before rushing after her.
"Child, come back..." she said gently upon entering the front room.
No response came from the young girl, but soon the sounds of fabric swishing made her perk up and she dashed into the inner chambers to find Odette trading the burgundy dress for the usual male attire she donned whilst riding or training with the soldiers.
"Odette! What in God's name are you doing, child?"
"I will to London... I'll speak to my uncle and end this madness."
Lunging forward at those words, Elain dropped to her knees and grasped Odette's hands just as she was about to tie the wide leather belt holding her sword around her waist.
"Child, I beg of you..." the old maid pleaded with a desperate look in her eyes, tears soon sliding along her aged cheeks. "Do not do this! Your father is in London, he would not let you see the King. He would have you punished..."
Stepping back and setting the sword belt around her waist, the girl then grasped her maid's face in her hands and kissed the woman's forehead.
"Beloved Elain... do not dissuade me. Would you wish me to spend my life with such a man? Would you be able to endure my sorrow and watch me wither away, bit by bit each day, like a flower starved of water?"
Seeing the hesitation on the maid's face, she decided to push further.
"Am I not my mother's daughter, as you said? Do you believe she would have been happy with father's choice? No, she would have rebelled against him and forced him to choose a better suitor. She would not have agreed to have her royal blood watered down by mixing with a dull, empty, pathetic excuse for a man, such as Harold. She would have seen me married to a French noble, before she would have handed me to an English fool."
Finally sighing in defeat, Elain merely lowered her head and pressed a kiss to the girl's hands.
"Travel safely... and do not see eye to eye with your father before you have spoken to the King. I will worry over you, and I will pray that God make the King merciful, and make him turn his ear and his heart to you."
"My father troubles me not, for I am well versed in avoiding him; only the thought of him returning and punishing you, beloved Elain, is what concerns me."
"Think not of that, child... you need your wits for the road, and more so for standing before the King."
Smiling, Odette once more kissed the old woman's forehead.
"You have been as a mother to me all these years, beloved Elain. I know not where my life will take me from here on, but I know that you will always be in my heart, come what may."
Finally tearing herself away from the weeping maid, she retrieved her cloak and made haste to the stables where she had sent one of the servants to saddle her stallion. Watching the horse's black hair shining like silk in the moonlight as she led him outside, she then trailed a hand along his face.
"Come, my friend... let us make haste that we may arrive in London by morning."
Wrapping the black cloak around her shoulders Odette hefted herself into the saddle and galloped out onto the dirt road, leaving behind the castle she had called home for the last six years. Under the veil of the night she rode on, grateful to the endurance and loyalty of her stallion which did not complain at the haste of his mistress. At the same time, Elain had watched her depart, until the darkness of the world engulfed her and the sound of hooves hitting the dry earth faded into songs of crickets.