Chapter 2
Chapter Two
CYPRIEN
Iwas exhausted and sore when I dragged myself to my quarters in the attic that night.
Still reeling from what had happened with my stepbrothers, I didn’t notice the raccoons on the floor near the window until one started chittering.
When I turned to look at them, one stood closer than the rest, disappointment clear in his beady little eyes.
“Damnit, Bowie. I’m not dealing with your judgment tonight,” I grumbled, gesturing to Chuck and Lila behind him. “ Don’t you start on me either.”
Bowie stood on his back legs and Chuck skittered closer. They both looked ready to bite me.
“River, grant me patience.” I muttered under my breath, then more loudly, “I did what I had to do. I always do what I have to do.”
Chuck stood on his back legs as well, which was a feat for him considering how fat he was. Lila scurried around to face them, tittering like she was as tired of their shit as I was.
“So what if I almost enjoyed it?” I hissed, dragging my hand through my hair. “It’s better than the alternative. Losing my temper certainly won’t help, and fighting would have done me no good. Do you expect me to sit here and cry about it?”
Bowie stuck his tongue out and shuddered, clearly disgusted. I wondered, not for the first time, if I was crazy to personify a trio of raccoons, much less allow myself to be judged by them. Not that it mattered, no one knew about them but me. I never should have fed those little bastards.
I flopped down onto my bed and closed my eyes, ignoring them for a moment, but then my bed dipped as one of them hopped up.
I pried one eye open: It was Lila. “I know, I know,” I sighed. “You don’t have to say it.”
She tittered from my feet, seemingly in agreement.
My stepbrothers were terrible excuses for men.
They’d treated me horribly for years. They’d beaten me, abused me in the most horrible of ways.
And now? They’d gone and kept the one shred of humanity I’d been clinging to like a lifeline.
They’d used me like a common whore… and I fucking let it happen without a hint of protest. “I’m not traumatized, Lila,” I defended.
Yes, I’d been blackmailed by incredibly vile men, but I was fine.
I didn’t want to be fucked by them, but the truth of the matter was I couldn’t take it back.
Knowing Sebastian and Stefan, it was only the first of many instances, until they grew tired of it.
Though the thought didn’t disgust me as much as it should have.
Maybe it meant that I was starved for attention.
Maybe I was just a whore.
I scrubbed a hand over my face and groaned in frustration. Those assholes were going to milk knowing my secret for as long as they could. It would only get worse from here. Things would escalate; they always did.
Lila patted my leg then quietly slipped off the bed, nails skittering across the floor until they vanished–they’d done their job, after all.
My mind swirled with roiling thoughts, but exhaustion soon pulled me under.
I drifted off to sleep on top of the blanket, in my clothes, window still open to the cool night air.
ALARIC
“Well, fuck me mate. That’s terrible news!” That was all my drinking partner could say once I informed him of my father’s demands.
“I know,” I grumbled. “I honestly don’t know what he’s thinking, Travis. Men in high society don’t wed this young, and I have no interest in a wife.”
“But what about a husband?” Travis cackled, waggling his eyebrows at me.
“That might possibly be worse. Besides, it wouldn’t fulfill my father’s requirements. A man can’t bear an heir.” I lamented and knocked back the rest of my brandy.
“Are you sure you can’t fuck a woman?” Travis asked, clearly out of his mind.
“I can’t even get it up for a woman.” I spat, “Not even if I fantasize about the most attractive man in the court.”
The sitting room was quiet for a moment and I refilled our glasses.
We sat in front of the fire in silence, listening to it crackle and pop.
My mind drifted back to dinner, the meal almost as sour as Father’s proclamation.
Lydia didn’t return on time and Father had her dragged, sobbing and inappropriately dressed, from her bedroom.
It was monstrous and when I voiced as such, he yelled and threatened to have me locked away until the ball.
Mother was visibly miserable, which was very unlike her.
She usually held her composure through everything.
Travis interrupted the silence, voice barely above a whisper. “Would it really be that bad to be sent to the Outer Kingdoms? You’d be out from under your father’s thumb, finally free. It’s not as though it’s a death sentence.”
“For a prince it might as well be. The Outer Kingdoms are filled with nothing but criminals and beasts.”
“Would you just let me cheer you up, mate?” Travis complained. “Maybe you could wed a woman and get some other man to impregnate her. Your father would never have to know. Then you could have a man on the side and be fully satisfied. No Outer Kingdoms and royal obligations fulfilled.”
“I would never risk having someone else’s bloodline on the throne.
My father isn’t wrong about that. It could destroy our legacy if ancestry were to come into question.
He is, however, very wrong in threatening us.
There was no need for any of that. Lydia and I were raised with a strong sense of duty and loyalty to the crown.
We’ve been prepared to do what we must for years.
To threaten us with banishment was out of line. ”.
“Hear, hear!” Travis shouted, raising his glass. “I’ll drink to that.”
“You’ll drink to anything,” I teased.
“Fuck you, mate. Also, I’ll drink to that as well.”
I watched him knock back his shot of brandy–my brandy–without a care in the world. It rankled me that he seemed so carefree. Which is why I couldn’t control myself when the words spewed from my lips.
“Isn’t it about time you settled down too, Travis?” I asked, lips brushing the rim of my own glass. “Doesn’t your father expect an heir as well?”
Travis immediately frowned and helped himself to another pour. “There was no reason for that, your Highness.”
I released a regretful puff of breath and ran my hand through my hair.
He wasn’t wrong, of course, and it wouldn’t do any good to take my anger out on him.
Draining my glass, I rose from my seat. “You’re right, I apologize.
This isn’t your fault. I think it’s time I go to bed.
You’re welcome to use my guest quarters if you’d like. ”
Travis swallowed a yawn of his own. “ I think I’ll take you up on that. I’ve had far too much brandy to be stumbling home tonight.”
He stood, albeit slightly wobbly, and we clapped each other on the back before heading in opposite directions.
I entered my dark sleeping quarters and shut the door, muscle memory guiding me to my bedside.
I made quick work of removing my boots and clothes, then slid between the cool sheets, falling asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.