AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘You hold all the cards,’ Beatrice said. ‘It’s not as if he’s got many other options. He’s not going to change the line of succession.’
Jasmine couldn’t even make a speech at a festival. She wasn’t an option here.
‘We’re not having this conversation.’
‘I’m right.’
‘Beatrice, I have always known that I was to marry. With privilege—’
‘Comes responsibility,’ she cut in. ‘Blah-blah-blah.’ She stared at him. ‘I’ve been passed up for better than you, Julius.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Him!’ She pointed skywards. ‘My mother chose Him over me.’ She stared at the six little swans, all happily swimming with one missing. ‘I lied. I found out who my mother is when I was nineteen. She was a nun at the convent...’
‘A nun?’
‘Well, not when I was conceived,’ Beatrice said. ‘She was pregnant when she entered the convent as a novice, and I was popped into that baby box without a second thought.’
‘You don’t know that—’
‘I do. She told me herself. Well, in as many words. I went back when I was nineteen to find Alicia, to find out if my mother had left anything to identify herself or me, and I found out the truth then. Eventually. I was a little blonde version of Sister Catherine, so I was sent to Milan, and then Switzerland. I thought it was because I was so good at languages, but really it was to get me away.’
‘They all knew?’
‘No. Reverend Mother guessed when I was ten or so.’ She looked at him. ‘Sister Catherine taught me Latin, and she made me go and play outside when I asked if I could stay in at playtime.’
‘No favourites?’ he said, and she knew he recalled their conversation.
‘Not even her daughter. Believe me, she wasn’t sneaking cuddles. She abandoned me as a baby and then sent me away at eleven. But she gave me away every day in between. I was screaming with nightmares, dreaming I was running through the fair at night, and all that time she was only a step away. So I know about duty, and what it means to protect a secret.’
He closed his eyes.
‘I’m not asking for marriage,’ she told him. ‘I know that’s impossible. But I won’t sneak into your suite via a tunnel, nor be hidden away on an island or ignored in plain sight.’
‘What, then?’
‘I don’t know,’ Beatrice admitted. ‘I don’t think it even matters what I say. You’ll keep on protecting the Princess, shielding her, and to hell with everyone else.’
‘My sister needs to live a quiet life,’ he admitted. ‘We always agreed that if anything happened to my brother I would step in.’
‘And you have stepped in,’ she said. ‘And you have stepped up. Just not when it comes to me.’ She stared at him then, and still did not raise her voice. She would not cry, but she would tell him a truth. ‘Do you know, I really think it is love?’ Beatrice said. ‘Because it hurts just as much.’
‘Don’t even compare—’
‘Yes,’ Beatrice said, ‘I do compare it. I’m a tricky secret. Well, you don’t have to worry any more. Go and do your duty, Prince Julius. To your country and to the people you love...’
‘He’s King...’
‘And clearly you’re not.’
It was mean, and it was cold, but to hell with it all.
‘You can be so—’
‘Yes, I can,’ she cut in. ‘That’s why you hired me.’
‘No,’ he said, ‘it isn’t.’
