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CHAPTER ONE
1855
In the capital city of St.Edys
Wesloria
THECROWNPRINCESSJUSTINEMARIEEDDAIVANOSENtook one hesitant step from behind the curtain and glanced at the podium in the center of the stage. She slid the palm of her hand down the side of her skirt and—
“Non, non, non,non.”A wiry gentleman with very blond hair threw up his hands in despair.
The princess groaned to the ceiling. “Nowwhat have I done?”
The inimitable Monsieur DuPree, an instructor of elocution and comportment on loan to Wesloria from Empress Eugénie of France, clasped his hands together and pleadingly said, “Your Royal Highness,s’il vous plaît.” He leaped onto the stage and strode across to instruct her again.
From his royal box seat beside Her Majesty Queen Agnes, Weslorian Prime Minister Dante Robuchard swallowed a sigh. The princess suffered from terrible nerves at the mere thought of public speaking, which was a conundrum for a future queen, aspublic speakingwas high on the list of requirements. The citizens of Wesloria would need a queen who spoke firmly and elegantly, who exuded confidence and command of her kingdom. Not one who shook the moment she took a stage. Even now the shake in the hem of her gown betrayed her nerves and exuded the opposite of confidence.
“You must not hesitate,” Monsieur DuPree insisted.
“I beg your pardon, but this is my first time seeing the completed hall,” the princess said.
It was indeed a grand stage. The new Prince Vasilly Hall—with its domed ceiling depicting Joan of Arc, boxes festooned in velvet and gold ropes above the general seating, huge crystal chandeliers, each sporting one hundred gaslights, and its seats for five hundred souls—dwarfed the princess. Only in Paris and Rome and London would you find a stage as grand as this. Not in Wesloria. Not until he’d become Prime Minister.
At least, he mused, if there was one good thing that could be said of Princess Justine—and little good was said of her, frankly—it was that she had the carriage and fine looks of a queen. She was a bit taller than average, like her mother, and possessed a fine figure, also like her mother. But where the queen’s eyes were blue, the daughter’s eyes were bright and curious and a warm shade of honey, and they tended to lock with yours when she was speaking to you.
Ministers—most of them old men whose libido had been lost decades ago—would forgive many faults if they resided in an attractive young woman, and the princess was certainly that. She had long, dark brown hair gathered in an artful array of braided loops and knots at her nape as was the Weslorian fashion. The streak of white in her hair, a slender tress that refused any color—a trait peculiar to the Ivanosen family—looked almost like it had been dyed white on purpose. She wore a gown of gold silk patterned with starbursts and styled in the manner of French and English fashion—a full tiered skirt, voluminous sleeves—and ending just at her ankles, so that her embroidered kid-leather-and-silk shoes could be seen.
The gown had been hotly debated between himself and the queen. The Weslorian style of women’s clothing was typically worn close to the body with a long, embroidered train, which the queen thought important for the future queen to wear. But Dante had argued that people feared what they did not understand, and as the princess was a commodity in an international marriage mart, in public she ought to dress as noble women did in Paris and London.
He’d won that battle, at least.
The princess and Monsieur DuPree disappeared behind the stage curtain again.
Princess Justine was here today to rehearse the speech she would give for the grand opening of the hall. The event would mark the start of the annual Carlarian arts fair, for which people would flock to St. Edys from all over the world. The grand opening ceremony was generally presided over by the king, but his precarious health prevented it this year. The king suffered from consumption. He was declining; there was no dispute. Privately, the royal physicians had said he might not last the year.
The king knew how poor his health was and had expressed to Dante his fervent wish that Princess Justine be prepared in earnest for the throne and that, if at all possible, a prince consort be decided. “They’ll eat her alive without a husband at her side,” he’d said one night.
The king was right about that, and Dante would certainly be counted among their ranks. He was the prime minister, after all. He needed to be able to steer that young woman in any direction he needed.
He looked at the princess now, she of the slender shoulders and youthful head, and tried to imagine how she would carry the burdens of an entire country without her father to help her. She was not prepared for the throne in his humble opinion, and the queen clearly shared that opinion, based on the number of sighs she emitted when her daughter was near. He understood her impatience—he himself had spent an awful lot of time thinking about Princess Justine when more pressing matters required his attention.
He glanced at the queen from the corner of his eye and noted her sour expression as she contemplated her older daughter. It was only the two of them in the box, as this was only a rehearsal. In fact, Dante had believed the two of them would be the only ones in attendance, but below was a smattering of onlookers. Courtiers, mostly. But also in attendance, without explanation, was Princess Amelia, the next in line to the throne. She was in the company of her three constant companions. Dante viewed those girls like so many rabbits, a little warren of them always hopping around and getting into things that didn’t concern them. He’d recently suggested to the queen that perhaps Princess Amelia might study art in Switzerland as many grown daughters of royalty and nobility were wont to do. The queen wouldn’t hear of it.
Dante had won a hard-fought battle for his office only a year ago. He understood early on that he must tread lightly around the topic of the princesses. Amelia was her mother’s favorite, and Justine...well, Justine was not. Perhaps she had been at some point early on, but recent events had tarnished the young woman’s halo. Nevertheless, she would be queen, and as he intended to keep a grip on power for many years,shewas the princess who concerned him most.
He was determined to take the poor economy that had plagued Wesloria for centuries into prosperity and modernity. Under King Maksim, the country had made significant progress, but there was so much more to do. Given the king’s advancing consumption, he needed Princess Justine as malleable as possible. Therein lay the rub.
Below them, Monsieur DuPree finished his consultation. He hurried to the edge of the stage, leaped to the floor and took his seat among the courtiers.
Dante’s first mistake had been in assuming that a young woman of Princess Justine’s age—she’d be five and twenty in a couple of weeks—could be easily influenced. But she simply did not behave in ways he could predict or find logical. This had perplexed him for many months until one day he realized that what he needed her to be was a man. To think and walk and talk like a man. And as she could not be that, the next best thing was to marry her to one.Posthaste. Get her a consort as the king had suggested; someone who would guide her with Dante’s considerable influence.
“Yes, then, begin again!” Monsieur DuPree bellowed.
Princess Justine stepped out from behind the curtain, and this time strode purposefully across the stage to the podium as the onlookers rose to their feet. She gestured in a queenly manner that they should sit. For the next few moments she stood at the podium, looking very much like the intelligent young woman who had been tutored by the best educators in Wesloria. She looked fit and athletic, too, which Dante certainly appreciated but never said so, because the queen had made it abundantly clear she did not approve of athleticism in a princess, and particularly fencing, at which, Dante had heard, the princess excelled.
The point was that she had all the necessary ingredients to be a good queen and a good wife and would be a fine catch for the right sort of man...
Therightsort of man.
