Chapter 1 #2
“There was no harm, I assure you, nothing happened. I… Mr. Evergreen was the portrait of respect. Well, aside from getting me drunk in the wilderness—” Her eyes were big. “But that was an accident!”
“Did he… Did you….?”
“Absolutely not,” I said.
There was an awkward silence.
“Though I did, um…” I watched her face and touched the tip of my fingers to my bottom lip.
“Did you kiss him?” she asked.
My cheeks lit with the thought. “No! No, I was going to say I did enjoy the time.”
“Ah.”
“And I wish it didn’t end,” I said.
“You miss him?” she asked.
“Is that pathetic?”
Josie moved to braid my hair. “No.”
“I feel pathetic,” I said. “I know I shouldn’t miss him, but I do.”
Josie’s mouth parted for a moment, with naught but air. Then, “I’m sure he feels the same concern,” she said.
“No. No, don’t do that,” I asked.
“Do what?”
“C-Convince me that a man like him might… miss me back.”
She paused. “Why shouldn’t he miss you, Your Highness?”
“Because, I’m…”
“You’re pretty. Funny. Kind?”
“I’m not kind,” I whined. “Why would you say that?”
“What do you mean you’re not kind?” she asked. “You treat everyone so sweetly.”
“The King would die at that revelation. Kindness is weak,” I said. I flexed a hand. “Sorry, I—”
“Miss Svana, does your father not know you sing to birds?” she asked.
“They sing to me!” I quipped. “What? Am I supposed to ignore them?” I scoffed. “What, like, rudely? Whatever. I’m not kind. I’m reckless.”
“Singing to birds is hardly reckless,” she said.
“No, but I…” I steeled my face. “Miss Jocelyn, I have injured someone before,” I said. “Gravely. And it was entirely my fault. Do you understand? Do you think I’m kind now?”
She took a second. “What?”
“You said maids hold their ladies’ secrets. There’s one for you,” I said. “I have been injured before, and I have been the reason for injury. I don’t want Mr. Evergreen to get hurt. People get hurt around me. Just look at the Lord Commander’s response. That is a learned behavior.”
She exhaled. “Oh. Miss…” Then laughed. “You had me worried. I know your knights are trained to be protective. It’s their role.
But see? Listen to your words. You don’t want Mr. Evergreen to get hurt.
That’s exactly the concern that proves my point.
Despite His Majesty’s influence, you are kind-hearted and good. ”
“Josie, I’m being very serious.”
“Of course you are, Princess, but I’m serious when I say this: your swordsman is a grown man. He knows what he can handle. He knows what he wants. Trust that.”
“No,” I told her. “No, because God wants me to put the Crown first, not my personal desires. He always has. I have to trust Him. Trust Ser Elías as His sword. He says, duty first; duty last.”
“And where does Svana go?” she asked.
“I…She doesn’t go anywhere.”
“Your knight, as righteous as he is, as noble and fierce and strong as he is, does not know what you need. He does not know what you deserve, or, for that matter, what God wants for you. Only you and God know that.”
“But what if it’s a mistake?” I asked. “What I want has always been a mistake.”
“Daniel says God does not make mistakes. He says a person is exactly where they are to be exactly when they are meant to be there.”
“You’re suggesting I should be near Mr. Evergreen?” I asked.
“If he is what you want,” she said. “I’m suggesting that you should decide, not some pre-existing rule Elías declared for you. Do you like Evergreen for you?”
“…I have fun when we are together, I’ll admit,” I said.
“Good. Daniel says that while God does want us to cherish things such as the throne and titled men, he ultimately wants us to be happy. He wants us to trust Him and His plan.”
“I do trust God,” I said. “I do. It is that trust that keeps me waking up day after day when, believe me, I would gladly explore alternative avenues.”
“I trust Him, too, and I do not believe that He would have put Mr. Evergreen so deliberately close if He did not think you could benefit from the friendship, given the state of your marriage.”
“That’s horribly inaccurate and bad advice, Miss Jocelyn.
The Lord is known for putting many obstacles in a person’s way-He-It’s in the vows, for better or for worse, and—We’re getting off topic!
The point is, I am the Crowned Princess, and Crowned Princesses don’t get to roll around in the hay with ostler boys or-”
“You rolled in the hay with Mr. Evergreen?” she asked. “Good for you.”
“What? No!” I shushed her. “No! I was talking about Ser Willem.”
“Who is Ser Willem?” She chuckled. “Is he one of ours? Where was this hay?”
“Jocelyn! He was- Oh, God.” I took a breath, defeated. “He was the boy I was in love with. When I was thirteen.”
Her mouth rose a hint. “Ohhh!” she cried in jest. “Oh. I see. This is rather serious, then. An adolescent love. Pray, tell me of this man who’s run away with the young Princess Svana’s heart!” She faked a swoon. “Unless, of course, he was an old man, then tell Elías.”
“He was a boy,” I glared at her. “Well. He was a man, technically. He was fifteen. But…But it is rather serious.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. Will worked for His Majesty. Er, his father did. He was just a stable hand, and, uh, well, he got hurt. Really hurt because of me. And it’s not funny, so please don’t laugh.”
Josie settled. “It’s not funny. I’m sorry for making light of it.”
“I forgive you,” I said, but then I realized why she hadn’t protested it. “You’ve heard the story?”
Her features changed, and I knew she had. “Story? What story?” she asked anyway.
“You can tell me you’ve heard it,” I told her. “I know the staff whispers still.”
She tried to change course. “You feel Mr. Evergreen is similar to your Willem, then?” she asked.
“...In every way,” I confessed. “Cyrus is…” I hated myself for saying it and more for the way my chest fluttered.
“Mr. Evergreen is everything the ostler’s boy was and everything of the man I’d thought he would grow to be.
He is adventurous, and proud, and sharp, and I…
I can’t unsee Elías’ fury as he grappled him like that.
And that is why I cannot allow myself to feel such things for anyone, let alone someone I enjoy so much.
I will hurt him with my affection just as I hurt Will. ”
Josie cautiously sent her arms around my frame.
“What are you—”
“I’m hugging you,” she said.
“Why? Why are you hugging me?” I asked.
She squeezed.
“Josie?” I asked.
“No,” she said. “No. You cannot think like that. Mr. Evergreen is fine.”
“For now,” I told her. “But Elías, he… Had he not stopped…”
“But he did stop,” she said.
“Y-Yes. But—” My voice cracked.
“But nothing, Mr. Evergreen is unharmed. They haven’t hurt him.”
Then my breath hitched, and I sobbed, once, then twice, into her shoulder.
“He is unharmed,” she repeated.
“Barely,” I whined. “What an awful creature I must be to expose him like this.”
“No.”
“Yes, Josie, and I don’t even want to never see him again. And God? He knows. God knows, and He loathes me for my disobedience.”
“He doesn’t,” she said. “He loves us all.”
“I have spent my whole life devoted to that boy and his sacrifice for me, and now I am to be tested. Here’s the first opportunity to forsake my vow to him. This man, this copy, this impossibly charming temptation exists to punish me.”
“Punish you?”
“Yes. For not putting the Crown first. Duty. God, of course. Miss Hellveig would whip me for this blunder. I would not walk for a week.”
She soothed me, and for a few seconds we remained like that, until finally she broke the silence.
“I do not wish to overstep, but I cannot believe the Lord is so evil. If your Mr. Evergreen is such a mirror to your Ser Willem, then maybe the comparison is not a punishment or a coincidence. Why could he not be him?”
“Be him? How could they be the same man?” I asked.
“No, I meant his role. Could he not be his replacement?”
I wiped a tear. “Men aren’t interchangeable. And I’m sure eventually I shall realize a minor inconsistency between the two and be repulsed, but for now…The truth is, every time I look at Mr. Evergreen, I fear I am, I don’t know, robbing myself of a future with my Ser Willem.”
“I’m sorry, Ser Willem is not a knight, correct?” she asked.
“What?”
“He’s the boy? The boy that’s gone? He’s not in our team. He’s not assigned to another post? He’s still a commoner, yes?”
“Yes, and?”
“Where is he?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Precisely. As a commoner, he can hide, but you do not have that luxury. You are here,” she said. “It is very public knowledge. You are the Princess. I mean this with respect, but, as you said before with Mr. Evergreen, Ser Willem knows where to find you. If he wanted to, he would.”
I clicked my tongue but could not think of a rebuttal.
“It is a man’s world, Miss Svana. A woman’s true power is in the acceptance of that fact, and in the fact that if he wanted to, he would.”
“It’s not so simple,” I said.
“It really is.”
“No, it isn’t. What if…What if he does not believe I love him?” I asked.
“Do you?”
“Yes, and I’ve written him a hundred letters declaring it,” I said.
“How many has he written you?” she asked.
“I, well, I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe he does not know I wish to speak?”
“After a hundred letters?” she asked.
“My correspondence may not have found him.”
“A hundred times?” she asked.
I scoffed.
“And his one hundred replies did not find you?” she asked.
“Not yet,” I said. “Maybe soon.”
“If he wanted to write you, he would,” she said.
I buttoned my shirt in a hurry.
“I’m sorry,” she added.
“No,” I sighed. “No, you’re probably correct. Statistically, at least one of the letters would have arrived barring Divine Intervention.”
Josie nodded. “I only want you to consider the facts and make a decision based on those.”
“I understand,” I said. “I am grateful for your brutal honesty.”
“It’s been years, Svana. He was older than you.
He could have a family. He could be a thousand miles from this very room.
He could be dead. We’ve just come out of a war.
And even if he were alive and not all those things, he could want them and wonder how could you give them to him?
What future would you have with your position? ”
“That is an awful thing to say,” I said.
She agreed. “Yes, but you must marry the Prince.”
I sent my eyes to the window. “I know.”
“And if he doesn’t have them already, Ser Willem may want a wife and children.”
“I know.”
“But,” she said, smoothing the shoulders of my blouse.
“The Prince is having an affair. That is something we know. His Highness carries no respect for you or your union, for as long as that persists. And Mr. Evergreen, he…He plays with you. He watches clouds. He laughs with you. He brings a smile to your face and shares your affinity for horses, and he is handsome, in a dreadfully rugged way that you seem to like. Why could you not have your own affair, if he were willing?”
“Jocelyn!” I cried. “What you speak of is blasphemous at best.”
“Would it make you happy?”
I didn’t want to answer. I didn’t know how to answer.
I said, “Being smited by Heaven for violating a holy matrimony? I can’t say. That’s never been an option for me before.”
“You are too strict in your ideology of God and His plan.”
“You’re too frivolous with yours. Elías says that noble men and women are-”
“Ser Elías has never been married,” she said. “He’s never been in love. You have been completely unlike yourself these last two weeks, ever since the cottage, and I hate to see you spend the rest of your days in this fog. Blasphemous or not, this could be your chance at love.”
“Love?” I patted the air. “Josie! Keep your voice down and goodness. Nobody said anything about love and Mr. Evergreen.”
“Then maybe it isn’t love. But it is a chance at something more than rearranging furniture and shopping for stupid hats.”
“You do think it’s stupid!” I cried.
“I would take it,” she went on.
“Then take it!” I tried to offer it to her.
“Not the hat!” she argued, refusing it. “Mr. Evergreen! Take the chance to be with Mr. Evergreen and never look back. Even if your Willem appears tomorrow, it’s not as though he hasn’t been with another woman since your youth. Explore this opportunity. What if Evergreen is—”
“What if—” I shifted. “What if Mr. Evergreen never wanted me at all? What if it’s all in my head? Worse, what if he did want me before and now he doesn’t?”
“Then nothing changes. You say goodbye, you go back to your Prince, and you never wonder what if again.”