Stranger to the Crown

by Melissa McShane

  “Just have a seat,” Father said.

  James did so, dropping into a chair next to Elspeth’s couch. None of the children had sat next to her, even though the couch was long enough to fit at least one more person. She wondered if they could sense the despair that must surely be coming off her in waves.

  “The festival’s not over yet,” James said. He sat up suddenly and leaned forward. “What’s wrong? El, they didn’t kick you out, did they?”

  Elspeth shook her head. Her clenched hands were shaking. Telling the others felt so much harder than telling Hien. She looked at her father, pleading silently with him to do the dirty work.

  “You all remember your cousin Francis,” Father said. Ian shrugged. Sariah nodded. Well, they would have been six or seven the last time the family had visited Aurilien. “He passed away three days ago. He didn’t have any children or even a Consort, so someone else in his family has to be the new ruler of Tremontane. Ordinarily, that would have been me—”

  Sariah gasped. Father held up a hand. “Part of the agreement that made me ambassador to Veribold was that I could never become King. I won’t go into the details. The important thing is that my agreement doesn’t affect your ability to inherit. And because of that, Elspeth…is now the Queen of Tremontane.”

  Sariah gasped again. Ian’s mouth fell open. James sat back in his seat as heavily as if he’d been shoved. “You can’t be serious,” he said. “That’s…people have to be prepared to rule a country. Elspeth isn’t…she just can’t. She already has a life.”

  “There’s nothing we can do about it, short of instigating civil war,” Mother said. “It’s nothing any of us wanted for her, but it’s how things are.” Tears trickled unchecked down her face again.

  “The reason this matters to you,” Father said, “aside from how it affects your sister, is that all of you are now Elspeth’s heirs. Until Elspeth marries and has children of her own, any one of you might end up in her position.”

  “We’re not moving back to Tremontane, are we?” Sariah exclaimed. Her face was alight with hope. Sariah had loved their visits to the home country as much as Elspeth had disliked them.

  “No, I’m still the ambassador,” Father said, “but your lessons will be different from now on. It’s unlikely anything will happen to Elspeth, but after this, I’m inclined not to leave you as unprepared as she is.”

  Irritation flared up inside Elspeth. True, it was nothing she hadn’t thought herself, but Father had made it sound like she was some missish schoolgirl, with no experience of the world and vulnerable to any disaster that might strike. “I’ll be fine,” she said. “I can learn whatever I have to, and Hien reminded me I have all sorts of skills a Queen might need.”

  Father looked surprised. Then he smiled, an expression that relieved Elspeth’s heart. “Of course you will. We shouldn’t treat this like a death sentence.”

  “And it’s not as if we don’t visit Tremontane,” Mother said. “We just have more incentive to do so now.”

  Elspeth unclenched her fists and smoothed the surface of her robe. She’d forgotten she was still dressed like an attendee to the Irantzen Festival. “You said I have to leave tomorrow morning.”

  “We’ll need to arrange for an honor guard,” Father said, “but…yes. I imagine things have been thrown into chaos after Francis’s unexpected death, so they’ll want you there as soon as possible. It’s a week-long trip by carriage, since they don’t want the Queen traveling like a horse messenger. I’m sorry we have to hustle you off, sweetheart. I wish Holt were…” He closed his mouth into a thin line.

  Elspeth nodded. “It’s all right. I want to get this over with as soon as possible.” She knew what he’d meant to say, and wished as heartily as he did that the family manservant Holt were still alive. Having him at her back in Tremontane would make things so much easier.

  James rose and put his arms around her, hugging tightly. “You can do this,” he murmured in her ear. “I’ve never known anyone as determined as you.”

  “You mean ‘stubborn,’” Elspeth whispered back.

  “Yes, I do.” He released her and tugged on a lock of her still-messy hair.

  Ian still looked stunned. “What, the famous silver tongue is silent?” Elspeth teased.

  “If I could talk you a way out of this, I’d do that,” he replied. “What did Hien say?”

  “That it was a challenge I could face.”

  He stood, bringing Sariah with him. “That’s not what I meant.”

  She’d successfully avoided thinking about the loss of her dream until that moment. “It’s not what anyone wanted for me,” she said, her throat closing up around her words, “but sometimes that’s what happens.”

  Sariah plunged forward and threw her arms around Elspeth’s waist. “I wish it was me,” she said. “I mean, because I know you hate Aurilien. I wouldn’t be Queen if you paid me.”

  “Maybe I’ll love it now I have to live there,” Elspeth said.

  Sariah gave her a skeptical look. Elspeth shrugged. The memory of her vision, contrary to sense, had gotten stronger the further she got from it. That palace…she managed not to shudder.

  “I’m going to change my clothes,” she said, rising from the couch, “and then…I guess I should pack, though I don’t know how much of my wardrobe is suitable for royalty.”

  Mother covered her mouth with her hand to hold back a choked sob. “Sorry,” she said. “That was overly dramatic.”

  “It’s all right,” Elspeth said. She managed a lopsided smile. “Just think. A year from now, we can look back on this moment and laugh at how despondent we all were.”

  “I hope that’s true,” Father said.

  3

  Elspeth had never seen snow before. The Aurilien she remembered was a city drenched in summer sunlight, hot and dry like a baker’s oven. Now fat white flakes whirled around the carriage, blocking her view of anything more than a foot from it, which meant the entire city. Between that and the low hooting wail of the storm, broken only by the endless rattle of the wheels over the cobblestones, she felt cocooned within the carriage, wrapped in a soft white blanket and free from responsibilities. It was an illusion, but one she welcomed after seven days on the road.

  She shivered. That soft white blanket wasn’t a warm one, and the hot brick they’d put at her feet at the last stop had long since gone cold. She hoped they would arrive at the palace soon, and laughed at herself for being eager to see that monstrosity. She had to laugh if she didn’t want to go out of her mind with anticipatory dread.

  The journey had started well enough. The honor guard Father had assembled was mainly men and women from the ambassador’s household, all of whom she knew. They didn’t always remember to call her “your Majesty,” which was fine by Elspeth, but they showed her more respect than they had when she was just the ambassador’s daughter, and it left her on edge. Still, she could bear that if she had to. Which she did.

  But the second day, they were joined by a group of…Elspeth didn’t know what to call them. Not servants, but not peers. She went with “attachés” because they reminded her of those members of her father’s household who were on the diplomatic fast track to being ambassadors themselves one day. They’d followed the messenger who’d come so swiftly with the news that Elspeth’s life was over, and immediately took command of Elspeth’s retinue. And everything had changed.

  The second night, when Elspeth had tried to leave her carriage to go into the inn they’d selected, Miss Jones White had said, “Not yet, your Majesty, permit them to establish that this location is secure,” and had made her wait in the carriage for fifteen minutes before escorting her inside and up remarkably quiet stairs to a room on the third floor.

  Elspeth hadn’t found out until the next morning that “secure” meant her attachés had evicted everyone else from the inn for the night. When she protested, Mister Dyer had said, “This is standard procedure, your Majesty. They were well compensated for the inconvenience.
” Elspeth had fumed silently, but Jones White and Dyer both had the air of people who never lost an argument, even with their Queen. And if it was standard procedure, should she disrupt that and insist on doing things her way? She didn’t want to be an entitled snob…though it sounded like all her options ended there.

  The following day, Jones White had climbed into the carriage with her and said, “Now, your Majesty, I understand you’re unfamiliar with Tremontanan society. With your permission, I will instruct you in the behaviors expected of the noble class.”

  Jones White’s air of superiority irritated Elspeth, but she was grateful for the help. So she endured four hours of Jones White telling her the difference between a Count and a Baron and the rules of a formal supper and what would be expected of her at a state reception until she was dizzy and exhausted.

  After a stop for dinner, Elspeth was dismayed to see Jones White approaching the carriage, clearly intent on another marathon session. “Miss Jones White,” she’d said, “I think I need time to absorb everything you told me this morning.”

  “Your Majesty,” the woman had responded, with a frown that reminded Elspeth of the easily-annoyed priestess Sela, “we have only five and a half days to prepare you for your new role. We cannot lose any time.”

  The image of herself as a basin into which Jones White intended to pour knowledge amused, then irked Elspeth. “I don’t think anyone expects me to be perfect immediately,” she’d said, “and I think the Queen can be excused a mistake or two. You’ll ride with Mister Dyer and Mister Hawsey this afternoon, and we will resume instruction tomorrow.”

  To her surprise, Jones White had bowed and said, “Very well, your Majesty.” She sounded disapproving, but Elspeth had realized she didn’t have to care. She’d settled into her carriage feeling as if she’d won a battle—and that maybe she could manage to be Queen, after all.

  It had set the pattern for the rest of the trip: relentless instruction in the morning, riding alone in the afternoon, supper in whatever inn had been cleared for her convenience. Every day had brought them farther into the uplands, the great plains that lay between the Kepa Valley and the hills of western Tremontane. Every day had been gradually colder, with the occasional rainstorms becoming slushy and frigid. The first hot brick had appeared on the fifth day, and Elspeth had welcomed it, as well as the heavy velvet-lined cloak one of her attachés had found for her. She’d never felt so cold.

  The storm had loomed on the horizon that morning, and Elspeth had heard her attachés discussing it after breakfast, whether they should push on for Aurilien, which was only a few hours’ drive away, or wait for the storm to pass. Elspeth had drifted over to join them and felt her usual discomfort at how their conversation broke off when she neared. “Is it safe to travel?” she’d asked.

  “It is your Majesty’s comfort we are concerned with,” Hawsey had said.

  “I’ll be more comfortable when the journey’s over,” Elspeth pointed out. “If I can make a request, I’d like us to move on.”

  They all bowed immediately. “Of course,” Dyer had said, and that was that. Now Elspeth huddled into her cloak and watched the snowflakes swirl. She hadn’t thought how the drivers in her little procession would feel about driving through the storm, and guilt swelled inside her. The drivers, the horses pulling the carriages, the outriders on their horses…she should have considered their needs before she let her impatience with the journey make a decision that benefited only her.

  She wrapped her hands more tightly in the folds of her cloak and sighed. She’d been Queen for seven days and already she’d made mistakes. There would no doubt be times when she would have to inconvenience others for the good of the country, but this wasn’t one of them.

  She ran back over some of what Jones White had instructed her in. She hadn’t realized at first how ultimately useless most of it was. “Useless” was probably too strong a word, because if she needed to know how to open a ball, or what the order of precedence in dining was, she was thoroughly prepared. But Jones White hadn’t told her anything about the Council, or how to understand the law, or anything, really, that would help her rule a country. The closer they drew to the palace, the more nervous Elspeth became. Not addressing a Count properly was just embarrassing. Not knowing how to draft a law could be disastrous.

  The sound of the carriage wheels changed, became higher-pitched, and the jouncing motion grew stronger. Elspeth clung to the edge of the seat so she wouldn’t be bounced off. Her nerves, already on edge, tightened to the breaking point. She made herself breathe the way she would if she were meditating, in through the nose, out through the mouth. Being anxious wouldn’t solve anything, and might make things worse.

  She took hold of the toan jade, which hung around her neck beneath her shirt. Even with the fabric between it and the skin of her palm, it comforted her. It had seen so many lives and was about to embark on a new one. Toan jades weren’t more sacred because of their heritage, but knowing this had been Hien’s soothed her as much as her calming breathing did. Whatever came next, she would endure.

  The carriage came to a halt. Elspeth waited. That had been another thing she’d learned: the attachés insisted the Queen not open any doors for herself. Elspeth had silently grumbled about the Queen not being a helpless child, but had acquiesced. It wasn’t as if she knew where to go, anyway. And the storm still raged outside the window, its howl audible now that the carriage wheels didn’t drown it out. Elspeth had no intention of stepping out into it until she knew where she was going.

  The door opened. “Your Majesty,” Hawsey said. He extended a hand to her, and Elspeth accepted his help down, grateful for it when her foot slipped on the iced-over step. She tugged her hood low over her forehead and hurried with him up the long flight of black marble stairs she remembered well, leading to the great palace doors, which at the moment stood open, shedding a bright light into the storm.

  Then she was inside, and the doors shut on the howl of the storm, filling Elspeth’s ears with a high-pitched ringing sound. She pushed back her hood and surveyed the room. There was the iron staircase spiraling off into the upper stories of the palace, there were the doors of varying sizes, some open, some shut, that led off into heaven knew where. She’d only ever used the biggest doorway, the one that opened on the wide hall that ended at the Rotunda.

  Aside from the attachés, there were only a few people in the antechamber. Some of them wore ordinary shirts and trousers in a Tremontanan style. Others were dressed more formally, in high-waisted gowns with straight skirts or frock coats and waistcoats and cravats like her attachés wore. Most of them looked like they’d been on their way somewhere else. All of them were bowing or curtseying. To her.

  “Ah…thank you for your welcome,” she said, hoping that would stop them bowing. It did, though it didn’t send them hurrying on their way. They all stared at her as if expecting her to do something obviously regal. Elspeth turned to Dyer, who had come in immediately behind her. “I would like to rest after my journey,” she told him. There. That hadn’t sounded nervous or insecure at all.

  “Of course, your Majesty,” Dyer replied. “Your servants will be waiting on your arrival. If you’ll allow me?”

  She didn’t know what that meant, but after he took a few steps and turned his head to look back at her, she guessed he meant to show her to…somewhere. Her servants, possibly. If he cared anything for her comfort, as he kept claiming, a bedchamber might be forthcoming. She felt unexpectedly weary for having done nothing more than jounce around inside a well-appointed, if cold, carriage for four hours.

  She followed Dyer from the antechamber down the long, wide hall to the Rotunda. No one followed them, not even the other attachés. Elspeth risked a glance over her shoulder and saw everyone was still watching her, though they immediately pretended otherwise. “Mister Dyer,” she said, prompting him to stop and bow. “No, please don’t—I was just wondering how the…my servants are paid. The drivers, and the guards, I mean.” />
  “That is not something your Majesty needs to be concerned with,” Dyer said.

  His tone of voice, that dismissive, uncaring sound that said he was growing tired of his royal charge’s ignorance, dispelled Elspeth’s awkward embarrassment. “Mister Dyer, what I do and do not concern myself with is not your responsibility,” she snapped. “I would like to see that those men and women receive a bonus for traveling through the storm. Is that something you can bring yourself to do, or should I find someone more willing to obey his Queen’s instructions?”

  Dyer’s eyes widened. “Ah…no, your Majesty, I would be happy to see to it. Please excuse my lack of understanding. Of course you are entitled to ask whatever questions you see fit.”

  “Thank you, Mister Dyer, for handling this matter.” Elspeth strode off toward the Rotunda, not waiting for Dyer. There was a lesson Jones White couldn’t teach her: don’t let anyone think they can walk over you, Elspeth. That was a good lesson for anyone, not just Queens.

  She stopped briefly in the Rotunda, ignoring Dyer’s tiny motions of impatience, to look far, far up at the domed ceiling. Murals of Edmund Valant, last of the Valant Kings, adorned the dome, all of them making him look like a larger-than-life hero instead of the indolent wastrel he’d actually been. Why Willow North hadn’t had them painted over when she took the Crown was a mystery, but Elspeth wondered if it hadn’t been to show how much stronger Willow was than her predecessor. Or maybe Willow had thought they were funny. She glanced at Dyer, who was practically hopping in his anxiety to, she thought, pass her off to someone else, and decided not to torment him further.

  The path to the east wing, where the royal family lived, led up and down flights of stairs and through hallways and chambers and past windows looking out on inaccessible courtyards. As usual, Elspeth was lost before they’d taken two turnings. She quashed the nervousness she always felt when she was in the palace and stuck close to Dyer, who showed no sign of awareness of her emotional state. His steps slowed when they were in a particularly narrow corridor, one made narrower by the heavy oak paneling stained walnut-black, and Elspeth bit back a cry of fear when he came to a complete stop. If Dyer was lost…did it make more sense for them to proceed forward in hopes of finding somewhere familiar, or should they retrace their steps and pray to heaven the palace hadn’t rearranged itself in the meantime?