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Or so I thought.
After a week of constant badgering, I gave in. I always gave in to her eventually, and she knew that. We started her chess lessons one rainy Saturday afternoon, and now, six months later, she was so close to beating me for the very first time. Her bottom lip was pulled between her teeth as her eyes scanned the board, her hands clasped into tight fists on the table. I rubbed my face with my hand, trying my hardest not to smile at her frustrated expression.
The seconds ticked past slowly, Caliara’s face growing more and more serious as she worked through the moves she could make. If she moved her Queen now, she would block in my King, and she would win the game. It was an easy move that could be done in as little as four moves if you knew how, but this game had taken us nearly an hour so far. My hands itched to show her what to do, but I had promised to let her do this by herself this time.
Eventually, her eyes lit up as she saw the same move I did, and in her hurry, she sent the small collection of black chess pieces she had collected from me to the floor. She moved her Queen into the spot in front of my King, her Bishop blocking the path behind her. A triumphant grin on her little face, Caliara looked at me with wide eyes. I plastered a look of fake shock onto my face, flicking my King onto its side.
Caliara jumped from her chair, her small arms raised above her head as she laughed gleefully, filling my study with the noise.
“Check mate! I did it!” She squealed, jumping up anddown on the spot. I grinned at her, catching her as she threw her little body at me, squeezing around my shoulders in a death grip.
“You did. Well done, kiddo.” I smiled, ruffling the back of her hair before releasing her, her feet dropping back to the ground as I stood from my chair. “Maybe next time I’ll show you how to make that move a bit faster.”
I faked a wince as I stood, groaning unnecessarily loudly as I stretched my arms over my head and bent to the side, stretching my stiff back. Caliara rolled her eyes, elbowing me in the ribs and making me double over with anoof.
She huffed, and I chuckled, and between us we picked up every chess piece that had fallen to the ground in her excitement so we could set them up for our next game. I watched Caliara closely, her usually care-free expression seeming somewhat stressed as she put all of the pawns back in their front row.
“Are you alright, Cali?” I asked, keeping my tone casual, but the back of my neck tingled with anxiety.
I was usually very competent at keeping my anxieties under control, but the longer Kira spent in this castle without us being married, the worse it got. I found myself irritable and unable to concentrate on matters at hand, and until she was legally my wife, I feared it would not get much better.
Rolling my neck, I looked back to Caliara just in time to see her nodding her small head, a smile on her face.
“Yes, I’m fine.” She reassured me, slipping her small hand into mine and leading me through my study and back out into the busy hallway. It was full of people flitting back and forth, all of them completely lost in their duties and their own worries that none of them even noticed us joining the stream.
“Then why do you look so serious?” I poked her in the side, making her giggle as we walked. She swatted at my hand, her melodic giggle filling the hallway.
Cali’s small hand tightened in mine as we squeezed past a small group of Kira’s handmaids, their heads close together as they whispered, only breaking their circle to bow to me, their cheeks red as they noticed who I was. I nodded my head at them, letting them know they were alright, and continued down the hallway with Cali clinging to me.
“Come on, tell me.” I prompted, leading her down one of the many staircases on the second floor, towards the main hall and kitchens. “Is it about a boy?”
Cali laughed, shaking her head rapidly.
“Ew, no.”
“Good. That is the answer I wanted.” I laughed, stepping down the last three stairs quickly and holding out my hand for her to take again. She gripped it tightly, a grin on her face as she leapt from four steps up, a squeal coming from her as she landed on the polished marblefloors. She grinned up at me, swinging our arms between us as we walked.
She was quiet for a minute as we walked towards the library, her favourite room in the castle. I let my eyes wander over the paintings and tapestries hanging on the walls, expertly skipping over the painting of my mother and father on their wedding day. My mother looked beautiful, as she always had, her stomach barely hidden under her dress as she tried to hide her already growing bump. It was a scandal even now, that the to-be queen was already pregnant before she was even married. Father, however, looked bored in the portrait. Like his mind was somewhere else, with someone else.
My lips pressed into a thin line as I thought about what he had done to Mother, betraying her even on her death bed.
Did his betrayal bring me my sisters? Yes, and while I was thankful to have them every single day, there was still a part of my mind that would loathe my father forever.
Pushing open the library doors, I smiled at Iris. She sat behind her desk, her hair tied into a knot on top of her head and her glasses balanced precariously on her nose. She waved to both of us, a smile on her face.
Cali led me to two empty armchairs near the back of the library, her little hands swinging at her sides as she walked. She stopped only to pick up a book of fairytales that I had been reading to her since she was a child, and I smiled as she handed it to me.
Settling down into one of the chairs, Cali climbed up onto my lap and rested her head on my shoulder, letting out a small sigh.
“I met Kira yesterday.” She said softly, her fingers running along the edges of the book.
My eyebrows shot up to meet my hairline, and I tilted my head to look down at her properly.
“Oh?”
“She was in here, reading. I said hello, and we went to play dolls.”
I grinned at the thought of Cali being her usual, adorable self, and Kira falling so heavily for it that she had ended up in the toy haven, or toy graveyard if you were one of the unlucky dolls she deemed unworthy, of Cali’s room.
