Chapter 6
CHAPTER SIX
ELLA
My heart races. I blink my eyes twice, then thrice more. But the diamond ring stays just as big, just as sparkly, and just as real in the palm of my hand.
Is this a prank? Is there a hidden camera somewhere? Are those shows even legal nowadays?
I close my fingers tight around the glaring piece of jewelry and look around me with the paranoia of a prairie dog. If it weren’t for the evidence I’m currently clutching onto for dear life, I could have sworn I’d imagined the ballgown princess runaway.
Runaway—that’s what she was.
The prince’s betrothal announcement was supposed to be this afternoon, and if I’m remotely right, that was his runaway bride.
“Oh my goodness,” I say to no one.
Which is a good thing.
Because no one should ever know about this.
I don’t want to be labelled a royal jewel thief the very first day I’m in Northandria.
I’m here to discover my ancestors’ legacy, and having my face plastered over every gossip news site online would sort of be the very opposite of preserving that legacy.
I might have to change my name, legally and permanently.
My panic peaking, I try to recall the princess’s instructions. I search the area she’d pointed at. The subtle shadows over the doors and windows make the entire row of them almost camouflaged against the castle wall. I force myself to focus. My eyes scan the building.
That door, left side, some sort of dressing room. I think that’s what she said.
There was something about coffee, I think. Or a letter?
I don’t wait to figure it out. Act first, think later. I cannot afford to be caught red-handed with what was likely some kind of expensive crown jewel. I would get a Wikipedia page overnight, and not the flattering kind.
I shuffle towards the inconspicuous side entrance as fast as my short legs can carry me. It’s unlocked. I take a deep, fortifying breath and fling it open.
When it comes to castles, I know popular perception suggests grand staircases and glittering ballrooms. But this is a side entrance.
It’s sort of like entering someone’s house via the garage.
The hallway is neatly furnished, and it’s nicely lit by large windows on one side.
But it’s still just that—a hallway, although sort of a very long one.
My heart thudding louder by the second, I rush forward until I get to the first door on the left.
It’s remarkably deeper inside the castle than I’d expected, but it’s a little late now to regret my reverse heist. I’ll take the leisurely castle tour another day.
I think I have a reservation for Friday?
For now, I’ll finish my errand, drop off the ring, and run away like a good little tourist. Keep my head down, work hard, do the right thing. Mrs. Schwagen would be proud.
The door to the designated room is blessedly open, so I quickly swing inside.
And I come face-to-face with a tall, college-age girl, who is also wearing a formal dress of sorts.
The sun from the window behind her casts a halo around her light red hair.
She looks at me, eyes running up and down.
Then she folds her arms, the paper she’d apparently had in her hand wrinkling and crinkling.
She talks in a posh and vaguely familiar accent. “I take it you know where she went?”
I’m nervous. I’m really nervous.
And I’m not the type to get nervous, at least not unreasonably.
Losing your parents young has a way of making you both traumatized and unflappable all in one.
But a whole bachelor’s degree worth of history and language and political science classes don’t exactly cover what to do when you’re caught holding onto an heirloom ring that most certainly doesn’t belong to you.
Didn’t people use to start wars over things like this? Again, not the best way to get into the history books.
I walk forward, swallowing. I wait until we’re just a few feet from each other to look up and meet her eye.
The distance and height initially made me think she was older, but up close, the girl looks closer to high school than college.
Not that her looking young curbs any bit of the sense of command that seems to ooze out of her.
Age aside, I wouldn’t be surprised if this were the queen.
“I was asked to return this.” I lift my hand and open my fingers.
She takes one glance at the ring and scoffs. “Leave it to Arch to choose the most boring thing imaginable.”
I look down at the largest diamond I’ve ever seen, and most likely will ever see, in my life. “Boring?”
“There are so many choices!” She throws up her hands. “There’s the Sky Sapphire, there’s the Silver Drop, there’s—ugh, anything but that.”
Still shocked at the apparent disdain this woman seems to have for the ginormous gem in my hands, I stare at it, trying to find a flaw.
“I think it looks—pretty?”
“Well, of course it’s pretty,” rants the girl. “Mother would never agree to anything that isn’t—Mother!”
As if suddenly possessed, my unexpected companion contorts her facial features from a frown to what could only be described a maniacal grin. If she weren’t so inherently pretty, I might have recoiled and dropped the ring.
“Of course it was Mother’s doing,” she declares in some sort of apparent epiphany. “Arch would never actually want—”
Then she spins on me. Her large, round eyes catalogue me from head to toe. I didn’t think I looked frumpy before, but now I feel distinctly like some fashion don’t compared to all the women in this castle who apparently parade around in ballgowns at two in the afternoon.
I suddenly remember that I’ve left my suitcase in the middle of the garden.
Will the palace guards confiscate it? I try not to think of uniformed security officers being forced to go through my underwear with a metal detector, checking to see if there’s a bomb tucked in somewhere.
My day’s been weird enough without the mental image.
“You’re perfect.”
I snap out of my thoughts. “What’s that?”
“Ha! Even better.” The girl walks forward, grabs me by the wrist, picks the ring off my palm and grins at it. “I think you need to return this.”
“That’s what I was trying to do.”
“To the owner of the ring, not to me.”
I nod vaguely. “Of course. And the owner of the ring is—”
“My mother.”
I nod even more vaguely. The maniacal grin is back, although this time with a look of distinct mischief in her eyes.
Abruptly, she shoves the ring back at me and tucks my fingers closed around it. “We should go.”
“I don’t think I understand—”
“I’ll lead the way!” She pulls me towards the door by the wrist.
“I don’t even know you, or your mother, or whatever—”
She throws me a look over her shoulder and chuckles. “Hi, I’m Alya. And we have a party to crash.”