Chapter Three
IN SPITE OF the fact that the bed was gloriously comfortable, she didn’t sleep.
She still didn’t have a phone or a means of accessing the internet, so she had no idea what ripple effect Ragnar’s announcement had in the rest of the world.
Or indeed, with her family. Maybe they were drawing up a treaty.
Maybe it had started a war. Why would anyone tell her? It wasn’t like it was her life.
She had been stewing, also, on what he had said about her needing to support herself after the marriage ended.
She knew that. It was just that she had vague fantasies about waiting tables and living in a small cubby of an apartment while she figured all that out.
She could go to Spain, Argentina, Mexico easily.
Or to Canada, England or even Australia.
Spain seemed the most familiar, potentially.
Mexico was very far away. That held its own appeal.
It was difficult to know exactly what her dreams were.
Because the biggest thing that had been hanging in front of her was her crushing lack of control over her life.
If she had run away from home she would’ve been tracked down and brought back.
There would have been no way for her to escape Cape Blanco.
She wasn’t anonymous. No one was going to help her get money or documentation that might help her escape.
Again, part of the paradox of her existence.
She was in theory a person with power. Privilege.
And yet none of it was accessible to her.
Not when she wanted it. Not when she needed it.
It was why the convent had felt so revelatory.
She had been cared for, and there had been a structure, tasks, but there had been a lot of time for her to sit and think.
But of course the things that she liked to do were the kinds of things everybody likes to do.
She enjoyed reading. Sitting and drawing, even though she didn’t have a talent for it.
Though really, if she could choose any sort of life, it might actually be on a farm. She could go from being a queen to being a farmer. She looked forward to telling Ragnar that was her plan. She hoped that it astonished and baffled him.
In fact she wanted nothing more.
Sparring with him was unlike anything she’d experienced before. There was something in it she couldn’t articulate. Something—
The knock on the door interrupted her thoughts, and she was about to ask who it was when the doors swept open, and in came a servant pushing a cart that was laden with pastries and a pot of coffee.
And behind that servant came two women, one holding a large kit, the other pushing a rack filled with brightly colored clothes.
She had slept in her dress last night, and she was feeling wrinkled this morning, and just looking at the sumptuous fabrics hanging on the rack made her feel a strange ache she couldn’t recall feeling before.
She hadn’t missed dressing up, at least not consciously.
In fact, she thought that she was happy to not have to go through the farce.
The clothes were always chosen for her. It was never about her. Never about what she liked.
And of course this time it wouldn’t be either.
“Good morning, Your Highness,” one of the women said. “While you take your coffee and your breakfast we will begin to show you some options for today. Then we will bring in the wedding gowns.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. Obviously you will need something for this morning, but then you will need to change for the wedding.”
It wasn’t entirely clear to her why she was expected to have more than one outfit. But she didn’t complain—she couldn’t. The first few dresses were lovely, pastel and made with sumptuous fabric. The kind of thing that would have been chosen for her to wear back home, but…
“You don’t like them,” the stylist said.
“They’re beautiful,” she replied.
“Yes. Of course they are. But they don’t speak to you. If I may, I wonder if it would be better for you to look at some more saturated colors.”
“Oh. Maybe.”
She sat down in a chair. She wasn’t sure why that happened, but then she realized that she had been ushered there by a handler who was so smooth he was orchestrating her movements without her even truly considering them.
Her coffee was poured, pastries served. She began to eat, and as she did, the hairstylist began to arrange tools, and started evaluating her hair.
“I would like for it to stay curly,” she said.
“Of course,” the stylist said.
There was no of course about that at home. They said that her curls were unruly. That they didn’t present a good picture of the crown. That they needed to be tamed, just like she did.
But if she was going to forge a different identity, it was going to start now. She could give Ragnar what he wanted. But she would give herself what she wanted as well.
Her hair was fussed with while she ate, and then she was presented with more dresses. And then, as if by magic, even more appeared.
The selections were vivid, and the winning dress was green, with long sleeves that were tight around her wrist and loose up to her shoulder. It fell softly down to her knees, the lovely, natural fibers in the fabric making it swirl delicately when she moved.
The sides of her hair were affixed upward, creating a slightly retro style that showcased her curls. And once they had settled on that, the wedding gowns came in.
A parade of glorious silks and satins. She chose the simplest one. White and closely fitted to her body except for a train which flowed effortlessly behind her as she moved.
It was marked up to be fitted for this afternoon, and then she was put back into the green dress, and ushered out into the hall, and down the stairs.
Maybe she should feel something. Something more than she did.
But marriage had never meant anything to her beyond this.
An arrangement. Maybe in another life, with another set of circumstances, she would have been able to be romantic about it.
But she never had been. She had only ever been able to be practical about the institution at best. And had dreaded it at worst.
She had never imagined marrying for love. But then, she had never imagined being able to marry for her own gain either, and buried somewhere in all of this was the potential for that.
She almost wanted to weep with relief. Reality hit, and hit hard.
If she were being married to the president then her life would be over.
She would be little more than his prisoner.
And it would last for all of her life, a life that was determined by him.
She would not have been choosing her own dresses; she was certain of that.
Everything would be laid out for her. Chosen for her.
Even though she was being given choices within a set parameter, they were still choices.
This might be a tunnel, but it now had a light at the end of it.
The only other time she’d had light had been at the convent.
Now she could take that experience, and she could make it into something even more expansive.
Provided she got through all of this. She was guided down a long corridor, and then a large, black door swung open.
There he was, sitting behind a desk. He looked up at her, those blue eyes burning bright in the relative darkness of the room.
He had a weathered face. But it was no less beautiful for it.
Each line spoke to worries he had carried for many, many years.
To the concerns that he had for his people. He was broad and muscular, and she thought then it was all the better for him to carry these burdens on his shoulders.
Do not romanticize him. He’s another man using you for his own interests. Just because you can use him back doesn’t make him benevolent.
It was a timely reminder. She looked over her shoulder, but there was no one there. All of the staff were gone. It was only her and Ragnar.
“Good morning,” he said, lifting up the stack of papers on his desk and tapping them once, the gesture so clerical. So civilized that it seemed directly at odds with him.
He was dressed all in black. Not in a suit, but in a black sweater, and beneath the desk she could see black wool trousers and black shoes.
She hadn’t noticed what he was wearing yesterday. Oddly, it had gotten lost in the kidnap of it all.
“Good morning. I assume that there is some public-facing event happening, or I wouldn’t have been dressed like this.”
“Correct. We are going to stream an announcement together about our upcoming marriage.”
“What exactly are we going to say?”
“I’m going to address the nation. You are going to sit beside me.”
“Am I meant to gaze up at you in adoration?”
“That is up to you.”
“This is going to look like a political alliance, you realize that, right. I don’t think people are going to find it overly romantic.”
“I don’t need my people to romanticize me. I need them to see me as someone strong and capable. Choosing you as a wife suggests that I am engaged in diplomacy.”
“You also want me because I can teach you something about this life. My father isn’t a good man. At least not on a personal level. But he is very good at making his people believe that he only ever has their best interests at heart. He’s extremely charming. His manners are beyond reproach.”
“Yes, as were my predecessor’s. He would lie, and he would smile, and he would slither off into the ether to do vile things. I am exactly as I appear.”
“Yes. But you might want to appear slightly more approachable. And you may want to let me speak.”