The Runaway Princess

by Christina Dodd

  “I’ve been tested enough to be the princess, but in fact I am not.” Evangeline knew she sounded a little touchy, but this princess thing had caused her no end of trouble.

  Marie Theresia plucked a dozen long-stemmed coreopsis, and added a few snowy white daisies. She detoured into the rose garden, and with the knife at her belt, she cut two perfect blood-red blossoms. “What is a princess?”

  Evangeline looked sharply at the plump, girlish face under the wimple. Marie Theresia wasn’t a halfwit; Evangeline knew that from their former conversation. Yet today, Marie Theresia seemed distracted, flighty, and definitely a little odd. “A princess is the daughter of a king and a queen,” Evangeline answered without a doubt. After all, she’d given the subject a lot of thought.

  “No, you’re wrong.” Marie Theresia arranged the armful of flowers. “A princess is one who is noble of demeanor, who is kind, modest, willing to put her people’s welfare before her own, regardless of the advantage she might gain.”

  Evangeline couldn’t believe it. A postulant who waxed philosophical. “No, you’re wrong. There are plenty of women like that, rich and poor, and if the king and queen and all their children were killed, they still wouldn’t be princesses. To have even the remotest possibility of being a princess, one must be born into a noble family.”

  “Who decides nobility?” Marie Theresia added a spray of stiff greenery sprinkled with tiny white flowers to serve as a background for her bouquet. “If a family is noble, and believes that their line is noble because of God’s sanctity, might not God wish to change his blessing if the occasion demands? Might not God have different fates planned than mere mankind determines?”

  Evangeline felt trapped by the question. Leona had been quite clear in her faith, and nothing Evangeline had read about the other religions had contradicted those teachings. There was only one answer to Marie Theresia’s question, and although she mumbled, Evangeline knew nothing could change this eternal truth. “God is almighty.”

  “Exactly! God works in mysterious ways, and even the wisest prophets are wrong sometimes.” Hooking her arm with Evangeline’s again, Marie Theresia pulled her down the twisting path toward the courtyard around the fountain. “You have fulfilled the prophecies, Evangeline, and I believe God brought you to Baminia to be the princess for our people.”

  They walked around the corner into the courtyard, and Danior rose from the bench where he’d been sitting. “That’s what I believe, too.”

  Danior. Dear Lord, Danior. Evangeline had braced herself to never see him again. She’d waved good-bye and turned her face resolutely onward. Then he’d sabotaged her, creeping into her mind with admonitions about the two countries, about how the revolutionaries would destroy the land and the people if Revealing didn’t occur, and she’d come to Plaisance. To this moment which, if Marie Theresia was to be believed, had been foretold by the mysterious Santa Leopolda.

  Danior stood watching her, daring her to take flight and promising, with the tension of his body and the expectation of his eyes, that he would run her down. He wanted to run her down, to work off his frustration at her intransigence with a hard chase.

  Yet it seemed that every time she ran from him, she instead ran right to him. And how could she run away from the big, rough-looking man when she carried his image with her always?

  Marie Theresia pressed the flowers into Evangeline’s arms. “White for purity, gold for nobility, and red for the blood you’ve spent getting to Plaisance. This is for the princess that you are.”

  Funny to be here again, captured by Danior and carried along toward the fate she’d fought so hard against. Time had run out. Tomorrow was Revealing. And she had to decide soon what she would do. Today. Now.

  Danior was not making it easy on her. He sat between her and the door of the royal carriage, his long legs stretched out as a living barrier to freedom. He had bathed, he wore clean clothes with an absolutely magnificent waistcoat of royal purple, and his beard had been shaved to display his stubborn, offended, set-in-granite chin. His arms were crossed over his chest and his mouth was set. He stared straight ahead—not at her, not outside—but straight ahead at the buttoned red satin upholstery.

  He was the crown prince of Baminia again, elegant and royal and much, much too arrogant.

  Evangeline shuffled the flowers from one arm to the other. The rose thorns poked at her, and the stiff greenery chaffed her, much like the words Marie Theresia had spoken.

  Might not God wish to change his blessing if the occasion demands? Might not God have different fates planned than mere mankind determines?

  Evangeline was Serephinian, and apparently the daughter of a noble house. Possibly even the cousin of the princess, and if that were all the truth, she would bow to destiny and claim her place at Danior’s side.

  But if Honest Gaylord and his cohorts were correct, she was also the daughter of a barrel-maker. A respectable man, and well-liked, but a barrel-maker nonetheless. Evangeline had to weigh Danior’s pride in his royal line against the consequences of refusing his suit.

  And the only way she could do that was to talk to him, and breaking the frigid silence took all her courage. Jiggling her foot against the floor, she said, “Your Highness?” Then, “Danior?”

  No response.

  “Have I angered you?”

  He gave no indication that he heard her.

  She took a breath. “Well, of course I have, that’s obvious, and I’m sorry.”

  His shoulders hunched.

  She was getting nowhere. Looking out, she saw people lining the streets, staring as the royal coach made its way to the Palace of the Two Kingdoms. When they spotted her peering out at them, they waved with such vigor that she didn’t know how they remained on their feet. This was what the citizens of the Two Kingdoms wished, that their prince and their princess be in the city, waiting for tomorrow with as much anticipation as the people experienced.

  Our appearance will calm the rumors of a lost princess, Evangeline thought. Especially when it’s reported Danior fetched me from the convent. They’ll think he stashed me there on purpose.

  Danior. She peeked at him. He looked positively grim, but she had to try again. “It hasn’t been an easy journey for either one of us, but we’ve learned a lot about each other and I think perhaps . . . that is, when I ran away this time, I think you were worried.”

  As if she’d turned a tap, his head snapped around and his eyes flashed. “Worried?”

  She flinched from the single word roar.

  “Of course I was worried. Revolutionaries scouring the countryside, men who you’d already humiliated seeking you with retribution in their hearts, and you think I might be worried? I was frantic!”

  At least he was speaking to her once more. Shouting at her once more.

  “Running was stupid,” she admitted. “The first time I ran away without realizing how vengeful they were. This time I ran away because—” Because I made love to you, and you made love to a princess.

  What she had not said hung in the air like a wisp of smoke rising from a barely kindled fire. She blinked away a sudden onset of inexplicable tears.

  Danior’s fury visibly died before her eyes. He looked away from her, and a dark color stained his cheeks. He looked like a man whose dream had died, yet when he turned back to her, determination etched his face. He grabbed her hands in his grip, the first time he’d touched her since he’d taken her from the convent, and he squeezed them tightly. “Was it that bad?”

  She winced. “What?”

  He released her to chafe first one hand, then the other. “I know it wasn’t what you dreamed. What woman dreams of making love in a dark hole? And we were dirty and it was rough and uncouth, and I was too hurried, but I thought you—I couldn’t see you, of course—but I thought you liked it. At least to a point. At least as far as I was able to tell . . . in the dark . . . and I was excited beyond belief.”

  He didn’t understand. He thought he had frightened her with the
demands of his body, when it was her fear of disappointing him that drove her away. “No, that wasn’t why I ran. I did like it.”

  He disregarded her so completely that she might not have spoken. “I’m usually better than that. I promised to romance you—remember, back in your bedchamber at Château Fortuné?—and I know how to do this courtship thing right.”

  “I wouldn’t hold you to that!”

  “Women like to be courted.” He was back to deciding what she thought, making kingly statements and not listening to a word she said. He rapped on the roof of the coach, and immediately it slowed. Even before it had come to a complete stop, he was out the door and running across the street to an old woman who stood hawking confections before her shop.

  Even the wisest prophets are wrong sometimes. So Marie Theresia had asserted. Did she mean that Santa Leopolda had not seen the whole truth? Evangeline was meant to be the princess?

  She watched as Danior spoke to the old woman, waving his arms in big circles. He stuck his hand in his pocket and poured coins into her palm. The candy maker looked toward the carriage and grinned a toothless grin as he plucked a gaily decorated tin out of her display. Then she insisted on winding it in a ribbon while Danior shifted his feet impatiently.

  Snatching the tin, he ran back to the coach. It tilted under his weight as he climbed in. Sliding off the ribbon, he popped the lid and selected a marzipan made in the shape of a seashell.

  “Really, this isn’t necessary,” Evangeline said.

  And he put it in her mouth while she was speaking. It melted in sugary goodness across her tongue.

  “See? I know how to romance a woman. Especially you. I’ll bring you confections every day. And jewelry. There’s a shop.”

  He repeated the drill, running inside.

  As she waited, Marie Theresia’s words danced in her head. You have fulfilled the prophecies, and I believe God brought you to Baminia to be the princess for our people.

  Troubled, Evangeline watched as Danior came out with a gaily decorated box. He climbed in and shoved it into her hands.

  She just held the superfluous present and tried to explain. “Danior, really. It’s not what you think.”

  Impatient with her hesitation, he took the box and unwrapped it. Inside, a necklace of pearls glowed like beads of moonlight set with an emerald clasp. She’d never seen jewelry like this. A week ago she would have been ecstatic just to hold them. Now they made her feel faintly ashamed of herself.

  Danior looked at her in expectancy. “Good, huh? See? I know what women like. When we’re together, it will never be like it was in that place, ever again.”

  Something tightened in her chest. She’d struck Danior in the one tender spot where he had no armor, and he was bleeding. The blow had been inadvertent, but the blood was still real. “You are not your father,” she said.

  “No! That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I’m not. I have control of myself, and now that I know the consequences of losing that control, it will never happen again. I swear to you, Evangeline—”

  She placed her hand across his mouth before he could finish his oath. Looking into the blue eyes she adored, she said, “I just . . . I want you. I want you the way you were in Blanca, in that dark hole where you held nothing back from me. I want it to always be that way. I didn’t run because you loved me honestly. That was the reason I wanted to stay.”

  He shoved her hands aside, and frustration vibrated in his tone. “Then why did you run away from me?”

  Carefully she placed the box top over the pearls so she wouldn’t have to look at them again, and took his hands. “Would you love me . . . no.” She tried again. “Would you want me if I weren’t really a princess?”

  “Love you, want you—haven’t I proved that I need you?”

  That was the truth. He did need her, for without a princess he could never be king.

  I believe God brought you to Baminia to be the princess for our people. No doubt Evangeline didn’t understand the will of God. And perhaps Marie Theresia did.

  “Then I will tell you the truth. I am your princess, and I will marry you tomorrow.”

  Thirty-one

  Two fires roared in two fireplaces in the royal bedchamber, yet Evangeline shivered in her chemise as she watched four young and bustling maids pour hot water into the highbacked copper tub. The palace was old, drafty, massive, and medieval—just as she’d imagined it. Candelabras held long beeswax candles that provided shimmering pools of light and accented the dark corners. The furniture ranged in age from a new gleaming banquet table bought and placed in the dining hall for tomorrow evening’s festivities to the thousand-year-old bed slept in by the very king and queen who fought so wickedly and divided the country.

  That tall, broad bed stood sentinel over this bedchamber, drawing Evangeline’s gaze until all she could think of was Danior and the kiss he had given her in the coach. It had been sweet and chaste, a touching of mouths without even a hint of passion.

  She’d been astonished until he set her away from him and looked at her. Then she’d understood. Color blazed along his cheekbones, his blue eyes flamed like the hottest part of the fire, and his body gave off heat in waves. “If I touch you,” he said, “I will take you in the coach as we drive down the Royal Way in Plaisance with all our subjects waving and cheering.”

  “That’ll give them something to cheer about,” Evangeline had quipped.

  He didn’t seem to see the humor in that, but she suspected he might be in some discomfort.

  She, oddly enough, didn’t find his ready arousal threatening. Rather, a thrill quivered through her. She’d done it, taken the final, irrevocable step. She’d declared herself the princess and placed herself into Danior’s hands forever. She would be a queen. His queen.

  Her excitement had lasted until the coach had crossed the River Plaisance and she’d seen the Palace of the Two Kingdoms.

  Then reality set in.

  She had read about state dinners; she had never participated in one. She had read about how to receive foreign dignitaries; she had never greeted one. She had read about behavior appropriate to a princess; she had never been one.

  Now she was, and she dared not fail in any detail.

  “Your Highness?”

  The littlest maid smiled and bobbed curtsies at Evangeline until Evangeline realized the girl was speaking to her. “Yes?”

  “Would you like to test the water?”

  Evangeline moved to the side of the tub and wondered briefly if there was a proper princessly way to check the warmth. Then common sense took over, and she dipped in her finger. “It’s perfect.” She smiled at Tacita, one of five maids assigned to her by the extremely stately housekeeper.

  Evangeline had wanted to ask how she was supposed to keep five maids busy. Then she thought perhaps Ethelinda would know, so Evangeline had shut her mouth and smiled, and just kept smiling through meeting the majordomo and the butler and the scullery maid and the old governess who hugged her with tears in her eyes and exclaimed how she’d grown. The whole thing had been an ordeal, she didn’t remember half their names, and Danior had whisked away to speak to the prime minister who had to first express his pleasure in meeting the princess again after an absence of so many years.

  So she could cross one thing off her list of worries. She did resemble the princess.

  But how did a princess survive the unending scrutiny? Half the palace had come to watch as she consumed the dinner brought her on a tray. The capon on a bed of some kind of grain had been flavored with rosemary, but she couldn’t really savor it while the cook, the butler, and the kitchen staff opened their mouths every time she took a bite.

  Even now she still had five pairs of eyes watching her every move until she wanted to run back up into the mountains and use the hot springs for a bath.

  Especially when Tacita tried to tug away her chemise.

  Evangeline tugged back.

  “I must bathe you, Your Highness,” Tacita said in he
r soft, melting voice.

  “I must bathe myself, thank you,” Evangeline answered, firm as any proper English matron.

  Tacita’s lower lip trembled, her eyes filled with tears, and she looked around at the other maids as if needing support.

  Softening her tone, Evangeline added, “I’ve been too long without a maid, and I prefer my privacy. But you can lay out my clothing if you like.”

  “As you wish, Your Highness.”

  But Tacita’s tone left Evangeline in no doubt that she was sorely disappointed. Evangeline didn’t care. She wasn’t going to show herself naked for anyone.

  Or—almost anyone.

  “Is there a screen or something we can put—you can put here?” She indicated a spot between the tub and the rest of the room.

  “Of course, Your Highness.” Tacita waved at the other maids, who sighed gustily, and hurried to do Evangeline’s bidding.

  The screen they brought was Chinese, constructed of hardwood, polished to a high gloss, and inlaid with mother-of-pearl and carved pieces of jade. The jade alone probably cost more than all the money Leona had left her, Evangeline decided, and she wanted to ask for another. One fit for a counterfeit princess.

  She restrained herself while they placed the screen to provide a private alcove, complete with a tub and drying cloths, draped across a chair and warming before the fire.

  As the last maid reluctantly stepped out of the alcove, Evangeline removed her chemise while watching for Tacita’s return. She wouldn’t put it past the little girl to try and do her ablutory duty regardless of Evangeline’s command.

  Cautiously, she spread the chemise over the top edge of the screen—and jumped when it was jerked down from the other side.

  “Thank you, Your Highness,” Tacita cried. “It has been decreed that your clothes shall be preserved in a museum, so all the people can see how you suffered on your journey to Plaisance.”

  “The silk gown, too?” Evangeline asked, horrified.

  “Especially the gown.” Tacita tapped on the screen. “Are you ready for me to wash your hair?”