CHAPTER 20
Axel
D eciding that he’d pushed his luck enough for one day, Axel contented himself with offering to escort Katy to supper. He would have foregone even that, but it was her first day loose in the castle; she might appreciate a guide.
At his light knock, Katy’s door opened to reveal a vision of loveliness. Her friend’s dress had fit her better, but his mother’s was more fashionable and made of finer fabrics. Someone had pulled her hair back into a stylish knot, but a few curls had been left loose to frame her face, and he found the effect enchanting.
She lacked the trained grace of his noblewomen, but she carried herself with the confidence of one. Now, she had the clothing to match.
“You look beautiful,” he praised, reaching for her hand to bend over it. She whisked both behind her back. “May I escort you to the dining hall?”
“I look like a fool in these borrowed feathers,” she grumbled. “If your father wants you to marry a village girl, why can’t I dress like one?”
He raised an eyebrow. “You ‘borrowed feathers’ for the theater, and that didn’t seem to bother you.”
“I wasn’t pretending to be someone else or trying to impress anyone then; I was simply matching the dress code.”
“So don’t pretend.” Stuffing his hands in his pockets, he shrugged. “Be Katrin, and if my father has a problem with it, that’s his fault.”
“And your courtiers?” she challenged. “I was told they would be there as well.”
“Some of them will.”
Katy folded her arms, narrowing her eyes at him. “Are you going to be Axel? Or will you be pretending again?”
She had him there.
“A prince lacks the luxury to simply be himself.” He leaned his shoulder against the stone wall of the hallway, barely avoiding a tapestry depicting one of his ancestors fighting a dragon. “Especially when he is expected to lead the people one day.”
“But his wife can do whatever she wants?” Katy matched him, leaning against the wooden frame just past the door. It looked uncomfortable.
“You’re not my wife yet. My father could change his mind.”
“And if he doesn’t?”
The right side of Axel’s mouth tugged up. “Then he will be unable to claim that he knew not what he was getting himself into.”
She finally cracked a small smile. “You might both be sorry by the time the night is out.”
Only if his father was sorry enough to let her go.
Despite Katy’s assertions, she was relatively quiet during the meal. She kept tugging her neckline up or attempting to draw her sleeves over her bare shoulders. Occasionally, one of the noble guests would whisper to a neighbor, eyes on the newcomer at the prince’s side. Axel tracked Katy’s reactions in his peripheral vision, not wanting to make it obvious that he was paying attention, but she either didn’t notice the gossip surrounding her or didn’t care.
After dinner, she waved off his offer of an escort back to her suite, instead latching onto a familiar face standing near the door. A wave of wagging tongues spread from her exit with his newest guardsman, but she would correct any erroneous rumors that came her way. It might be fun to witness.
He excused himself shortly afterward, retreating to his rooms to grab his cloak before slipping out to the gardens. It was dark and chilly outside, but he preferred the freedom of the open air when he couldn’t be striding about the darkened stage at the theater. His quarters were better than other rooms in the castle, but they still often felt like a prison.
Besides, if Katy had been less prickly earlier, he would have invited her out for a stroll; why not go by himself?
As he walked, he thought back over the emotionally charged events of the day. When Katy had introduced him to her friends, his guilt had increased significantly regarding his father’s suggestion that he woo her. She hadn’t introduced Fritz as a relative, and he had followed her to the capital. Add the way Fritz glared at him, and Axel had begun to suspect the reason Katy was so adamant that she be set free.
Her behavior had been inconsistent, though. She was clearly aware of Fritz’s romantic interest, but she had seemed as frustrated with him as with Axel. She’d acted as if she were trying to spare Fritz’s feelings, but she’d been ready to shove him out the door. She’d referred to him as a suitor after he was gone, but she’d refused to leave the castle behind and let him take care of her and her family.
All in all, Axel couldn’t decide how he should feel about tearing her away from that young man.
It was a still night. He trudged along the path with his head down, lost in his mental trails. A few months ago, the theater would have filled his thoughts, but now, his promise to look for Gunther was unimportant next to the puzzle that was his betrothed.
“Why did you call me here? You know how dangerous it is for me to be on the grounds.”
Axel stopped abruptly at the hissed voice. It had come from a few rows over.
“But they are resisting. The prince asked for her freedom. If I had not been there—”
Dropping to a crouch, he hid himself behind the shrubs. He would recognize that wheedling voice anywhere, but why was Lord Ulrich meeting with someone out here? And what did he mean about resisting?
“You already have what you need. The compulsion we placed upon Steffan will be strong enough as long as you refresh it daily; you do not need to be present every time his foolish son appears to plead for the girl.”
“She is strong-spirited. If she and the prince approach his father together—”
“He will not budge. As I said, the magic is strong. They will not break it.”
Magic?
“Should we put a compulsion on the prince as well, just in case?”
He stiffened.
“No. He must agree of his own free will, or the agreement is void. Now stop wasting my time. I will be most displeased if you contact me again before our scheduled meeting.”
Heart racing, Axel rested a hand in the dry, prickly branches to prop himself up. He didn’t know what the two men were talking about, but he trusted it was nothing good. Compulsion? Magic? And what did Katy have to do with anything?
They hadn’t mentioned her name, but he had pled for no one else’s freedom.
“What was that?”
Silently cursing his movement, he tried to hold himself still. Too little, too late after the telltale rustle of the shrub’s branches and crunch of gravel from his weight shifting. He could hear footsteps and the cracking of broken twigs as someone shoved through the intervening rows.
“Who’s there?”
He held his breath and hoped his dark cloak hid him sufficiently.
A light blossomed somewhere to his right. “Do you see anything?”
The light and footsteps passed him, and he began to relax. Then a hand grabbed the back of his cloak and jerked up and backward, hauling him to his feet and choking him at the same time. He struggled with the clasp, abandoning the garment as soon as it was free. Recovering his balance, he raced down the path toward the castle.
“I applaud your efforts,” the man that wasn’t Lord Ulrich said in a bored tone. “Useless as they are.”
Axel kept sprinting, not bothering with what that meant. He opened his mouth to yell for the guards—
And suddenly found himself flat on his back, gasping for breath after crashing into a wall in the middle of the garden path. His nose and forehead hurt, but he was more concerned by his inability to inflate his lungs after the rough landing.
“As I said, useless.”
Opening his eyes, he saw a tall, cloak-shrouded man standing over him. In the flickering light of whatever Lord Ulrich held, he caught a glimpse of red hair and perhaps a hint of green in the man’s eyes. “Who—wha—what—” He couldn’t draw enough breath to speak.
The man tilted his head as he looked at the helpless prince. “I suppose I could simplify things and kill you. But no, I think your death now would cause your father less grief than what I have planned for the future. Besides, we still need an heir.”
“But he heard,” Lord Ulrich whispered, eyes darting around. “This changes everything! We can—”
“You worry too much,” the stranger drawled as he lifted his hands and drew a sign in the air. Axel instinctively raised his arms over his face, wishing he had the strength for more. “And the alternative might not work. Control your flames, remember your training, and leave him to me. He won’t be a problem.”
~
“Your Highness!” A hand on his shoulder shook him roughly. “Your Highness! Wake up!”
Axel shivered, wrapping his arms around his torso and drawing his knees up toward his chest. He dimly wondered what fool of a servant had left his window open so early in the year; not only was it freezing in his room, he could hear the morning birds chirping happily.
“Prince Axel,” the voice growled, “if you don’t open your eyes now , it had better be because you’re on your deathbed.”
Blinking, he looked up into Bertram’s irritated face. But why did the ceiling behind his guard’s head look like trees?
Why was his bed so hard?
“We know that you are upset by your father’s decision. But could you cut the dramatic statements? Your father will have my head if you catch your death of cold.”
“Dramatic statements?” Axel repeated in confusion as he pushed up into a sitting position on the bench. His cloak slid off his shoulder and landed in a heap on the dirt path below. “Why am I in the arboretum?”
“You’re asking me?” Bertram stood up and shook his head. “Next time, please tell someone when you plan to camp out. Hunting the gardens for you when you’re not in danger isn’t in my job description.”
Stooping to pick up his cloak, Axel paused and winced, pressing a hand to his head. “It wasn’t planned. I just went for a walk in the gardens.” He glanced around at his surroundings. “I must have gotten tired and laid down to rest?”
“‘Must have’?” his guard snorted. “Don’t you remember?”
Frowning, Axel muttered, “No, I don’t. I don’t even remember walking this far.”
“Tell it however you like, Your Highness,” Bertram sighed. He scooped up the fallen cloak and tossed it to him. Catching it with one hand, Axel gladly wrapped it around his shoulders. “For now, let’s get you inside and warmed up.”
Despite his protests, Axel found himself confined to his quarters for the rest of the day. Not at his father’s orders, but the physician’s. Oh, his father came in at one point and lectured him, but Father would have sent him about his normal tasks had the physician not insisted that Axel stay warm and consume an unreasonable amount of hot tea.
Since he had slept poorly on the bench and felt chilled outside of his covers, even with the roaring fire the servants had built in his fireplace, Axel found he appreciated the day off.
But being stuck in his room meant he couldn’t see Katy. What good was a day off if he couldn’t spend it with her?
He was settled in his favorite armchair, wrapped in a warm robe, late the next morning when a knock came on his door. Hoping it was the physician, coming to free him from his prison sentence, he sprang to his feet and hurried over to answer it.
“Good morning, Your Highness.” To his disappointment, a young woman stood outside his door instead. The pins stuck in her sleeve marked her as a seamstress, but he didn’t normally receive visits from seamstresses.
“How may I help you?” he asked, firmly fixing his politely interested expression on his face. It was tempting to take advantage of the pockets of his furry robe, but he tried to maintain royal posture in front of servants.
She smoothed her perfect black bun. “I know you are supposed to be resting, but Miss Katrin is… We were hoping you would come speak to her.”
Music to his ears.
Restraining his grin, he gave her a regal nod. “But of course. If you will direct me to her, it would be my pleasure.”
He soon found himself in Katy’s doorway. Bolts of colorful fabric were strewn around her sitting room, draped over armchairs and settees, and leaning up against the walls. A pair of seamstresses were pleading with her. One wrung her hands while the other gestured with a knotted rope and a pen. Katy herself stood in the middle of the room in a thin, white, sleeveless garment. Her hair had come free from its styling and bushed out around her head, highlighting her wild appearance as she gesticulated widely.
“—don’t need a new dress and I don’t want a new dress!”
“But Miss Katrin, the prince insisted—”
“I don’t care who insisted! I’m not a lady, and I am most certainly not a princess; I will not parade about as one!”
Smothering a grin, Axel stepped into the room. “Katrin,” he said in a calm voice.
She stopped arguing as her eyes flew to him. Her eyes scanned his face and the heavy robe cinched around his waist. “G—Axel, are you all right? They told me you were confined to your room because you caught cold the night before last!”
“I’m fine,” he assured her with an easy smile. “The physician is simply an overly concerned mother hen.”
She brushed her hand over the warm sleeve. “Then why are you dressed as if you’re freezing? Are you sure you’re not feverish? Chilled?” Her eyes lifted to his, and he was a little surprised to see the near panic in them. “Your eyes look clear, but—”
“I’m fine, Katrin,” he said softly but firmly, catching one of her brown hands in his own. “I don’t have a weak constitution like your mother. A slight chill won’t hurt me.”
Relief and embarrassment flitted through her eyes before she dropped them, giving his hand a small squeeze before she withdrew. “Good. I’m glad you’re all right. I couldn’t bear the thought that I had—”
“What did you have to do with it?” He raised a questioning eyebrow.
She fiddled with the bare skin on her right wrist. “Otto told me—he said you slept out there because you were upset by my behavior.”
“He shouldn’t have told you that,” Axel sighed. “He was repeating what Bertram told him, but Bertram was wrong.”
“Then why did you?” she asked hesitantly.
His head throbbed a little. “Honestly, I can’t tell you. I’ve asked myself that same question many times over the last twenty-four hours, and I have yet to remember my reasoning.”
A crease appeared in her forehead. “You can’t remember?”
“I didn’t come here to discuss my physician-mandated incarceration,” he said lightly. “I was informed that you disagreed with my orders to provide you with an appropriate wardrobe?” He let his eyes drop to the low neckline and thin straps of her garment for a moment before bringing them back to her face.
Her eyes followed his. Suddenly, her cheeks flushed bright red, and she spun away from him, crossing her arms over her chest as he held back his laughter. She truly hadn’t realized that she was standing in front of him in her undergarments, had she? “E-excuse me, Your Highness; I’ll be right back.”
She dashed off to her bedroom, reappearing a moment later wrapped in a cloak that was too long for her. He hoped it had come from Otto and not Fritz.
“Feeling better?” he smirked. Katy glared at him but said nothing as she approached. The seamstresses had withdrawn, leaving them standing alone near the open doorway .
“You could have said something sooner,” she muttered, crossing her arms as she came to a stop in front of him.
“I assumed that you knew what you were wearing. But I apologize for making you uncomfortable.” Casting his gaze around the disordered room, he commented, “I hear you’ve been making life difficult for the seamstresses.”
“I don’t need new dresses. Or at least, I don’t need ones this nice.” She wasn’t looking at him. “This whole situation is wrong, and I’ll be gone as soon as I can convince your father of that. So I can’t let you give me dresses.”
His robe sleeves whispered against his side as he reached for her calloused hands. Lifting them to his chest, he said, “This isn’t how I pictured things, either. And I’m sorry. But can you pretend for a moment? Can you pretend that after meeting at the theater, I managed to persuade my father to let me court you?”
“But the distance—”
“I would have figured something out,” he interrupted. His thumbs traced patterns on the smoother backs of her fingers. “We would have walked together: alongside your river, through your market or mine, or through the castle gardens. I would have taken you to the theater to watch the latest production from the best seats in the house as many times as you wished. We would have walked in the park afterward, like we did the first time.
“When I couldn’t contain myself any longer—so after maybe a month—” Here, her lips curved up and the skin around her eyes crinkled— “I would have taken you to your favorite place and offered you a bracelet and my heart. Hopefully, I would have delayed long enough that you would be willing to accept it. We would have announced our betrothal, and if you weren’t already living in the castle, I would have brought you here to keep you as close as possible until the day we married.” She dropped her eyes, but she gripped his hands a little more firmly. “I would have called for the seamstresses to make you a wardrobe worthy of the princess that you were to be. If that were how we reached this point, Katrin, would you still resist their efforts?”
Her curls swayed with the slight shake of her head. “No,” she whispered. “I would have been overjoyed.”
“Then can’t you let the seamstresses do their job, even though that isn’t how it happened?” he asked gently. “For me? Because I know you hope otherwise, but I don’t think we’re going to find a way out of this. You’re probably stuck with me.”
“But Your Highness—”
“You called me Axel a little bit ago. Why the return to formality?”
She released a shaky breath. Peeking up at him, she replied, “That was an accident. I was relieved to see you on your feet and worried that you shouldn’t be, and my tongue slipped.”
“How do I make it slip again?” he murmured, releasing one of her hands so that he could wrap her curls around his finger. They were soft between his thumb and pointer.
Instead of pulling away like she had in front of her friends, she closed her eyes and turned her face toward his hand. “I’m still going to try to make it home.”
Smiling past the pain of that statement, he let his fingers slide over to her cheek. “I know. But you need something to wear in the meantime. If you appear at my birthday celebration in your own dress, my mother will collapse in hysterics. Since I doubt that you will achieve your freedom before then, could you accept at least one fancy dress to spare my mother? You were willing to borrow a dress from your friend; can’t you borrow one from me?”
“You have a dress to lend me?” she replied, trying and utterly failing to keep the corners of her mouth from curling up as her shoulders shook.
“You will have to let the seamstress make it first, of course,” he grinned back. “But she should use your measurements, not mine, so she doesn’t have to alter it immediately.”
Her smile turned crooked as she looked up at him from the side of her eye. “I don’t know; your mother doesn’t seem to be my biggest fan. Maybe if I distress her enough on your birthday, she’ll override your father and let me go.”
Dropping his forehead onto her temple, he sighed, “Katrin...”
“Don’t worry, I’ll behave. Or at the least, I’ll wear the dress. And…you can call me Katy, Axel,” she murmured.
He smiled into the hair fluffed around his face and nuzzled her cheek with his nose. “Anything for you, Katy.”
Suddenly, she pulled away and turned her back to him. Bringing her hands to her waist, she said in a higher pitch than normal, “Well, if they’re going to make me a dress, I suppose I should let the seamstresses finish what they were doing.”
He couldn’t help being disappointed by the loss of her in his hands, but he was amused by the way it came about. A flustered Katy was a great improvement over an angry or a sad Katy. A flustered Katy didn’t make him feel nearly so guilty.
A flustered Katy gave him hope.
“You should get back to resting, anyway. Could you call the seamstresses on your way out?” she continued, still facing away from him.
“I was simply sitting in an armchair being bored. Couldn’t I do that here?” he innocently proposed.
Whirling, she glared at him. “No, you absolutely may not! I’ll be—” She paused, peering up at his face before giving his shoulder a light shove. “And don’t pretend that you don’t know it. I can see in your eyes that you do.”
Abandoning his innocent expression, he chuckled and gave her one of his signature bows before turning to do as she asked. “Anything for you, Katy.”