The Ring and the Crown

by Melissa de la Cruz

  She knew all of this already, of course. She would choose one of those awful boys from the photographs and make him fall in love with her. And then she would find a way to make this estate matter again. The port town was booming, and New York City was being compared to the great capitals. If the Astors managed to get some enchanters at their service, they might be able to shape their fortunes and their future.

  Her mother’s face, and her father’s name—her parents thought that was all there was to her, and maybe they were right. She would be married at the end of the London Season—and she determined right then and there that she would make not just a good match, but the best match; perhaps even catch the eye of the Kronprinz of Prussia himself. She had studied his portrait in the book with the greatest care, and had found much to admire in his noble profile. It was said that the Prussians had used a Pandora’s Box during the final battle, which had brought the queen’s army to its knees and ended the war. With a weapon of such magnitude, one could rule the world.

  Ronan was nothing if not ambitious.

  “WOLF! WOLF! WOLF! WOLF!” The roar of his name made him euphoric as the crowd surged forward, lifting him into the air. He raised a bloody hand to the ceiling. His vision was clouded by sweat and blood, his mouth full of red, his eyes bleeding red, so that everything was red—from the faces of the spectators to the shadows in the dark room. It wasn’t even a room, but a space in the bowels of an empty abandoned building by the harbor, once reserved for the coal stocks that powered the boiler. The ground beneath his feet was made of hard dirt, and soot covered every surface. The room was so dark that the gas lamps made the shadows deeper, the hollows blacker. This is a tomb, Wolf thought, a crypt.

  The crowd, made up mostly of day laborers and off-duty soldiers, hard men with stony faces, pressed against him, cheering his name.

  Victory. He had bested the fiercest fighter in the city—a soldier in the queen’s army, built like a fortress, who’d crumbled like a burnt and broken tower. “WOLF! WOLF! WOLF! WOLF!” They called him the Beast of Berlin, the Animal of the Black Forest, Lobo Loco in Spain, Le Loup Fou in Montreal; and tonight in New York City, he was the Mad Dog of the East. While he was no hero of Lamac, no soldier, no knight, he was still a winner.

  “Wolf!” One cold, disapproving voice stood out in the crowd, cutting through the noise. “WOLFGANG FRIEDRICH JOACHIM VON HOHENZOLLEM!”

  “Bollocks,” Wolf cursed. The fun was over. He waded above the crowd, touching feet and palms to hands and shoulders and backs as he rode the tide toward the door, his winnings in his pockets. His breeches were torn at the knees, his shirt shredded. He tumbled to the ground at the feet of his closest friend, his advisor, his minder, his mentor; the one who had taught him how to fight, how to stop a man’s heart with his hands. An old man, who crouched down low and lifted him up by his ear.

  “Ow, ow, ow!” Wolf said, batting Oswald’s hand away. “Leave me alone, Oz. I’ve taken enough of a beating tonight.” He winced; he had taken a few good hits from the Brooklyn giant. His back and shoulders throbbed, and he couldn’t open his right eye. He would have swooned and fallen, but he had too much pride. Thankfully, Oswald put his arm around him to steady him as they left.

  “Your father would have my head if he found out about this, and your brother will be far from pleased,” the old man scolded.

  “Hang my brother,” Wolf said, spitting out a tooth. A back one, thank Merlin, he thought, fishing in his mouth with his fingers, grateful that it wasn’t one of the front teeth so it wouldn’t show when he smiled. Messed-up chops didn’t go far with the ladies. He took a long, loud sip from his flask, felt the liquor burn his throat, and smoothed his dark hair away from his head, knowing it looked better that way. “You won’t tell Father; I know you, Oz. You’re all bark and no bite, unlike me,” he said with a golden smile that gave charm a new name.

  Oswald didn’t answer as he helped the young prince into his dark jacket. They boarded a waiting carriage that would take them back to their hotel. Once they were in the privacy of the plush, velvet-lined box, he spoke freely. “I suppose not, but the rumors will catch up with him one day. When His Majesty finds out the ‘Beast of Berlin’ is actually his younger son, you’d better hope we’re all very far from the capital.” He grimaced as he handed his ward a clean handkerchief. “You’re bleeding.”

  “Just a trickle,” Wolf said, taking it and pressing it against his eye. “Nothing permanent, don’t worry. All damage is temporary.”

  “You’re lucky. We have a month to get to London, so your bruises should be healed by then, and your face back to its rightful shape. You’re sure about the eye? We can have Von Strasser look at it tonight.”

  Wolf waved the suggestion away. “Let the doctor sleep. It’ll open in the morning. This is nothing compared to what they did to me in Boston. They had a real gladiator there—you should have seen the arms on the man. Tree trunks! No, tree trunks are smaller. So, we’re off to the enemy’s lair, are we?”

  “Hardly an enemy, more like your new family,” Oswald sniffed.

  “Right. Leo’s to marry the princess now, isn’t he? That was one of the terms of the peace treaty.”

  “After all the papers have been arranged, yes.”

  “Poor Isabelle. She can’t be happy about it. She’s been looking forward to her wedding since February.”

  “Her happiness is irrelevant.”

  “Of course. Although Marie can’t be thrilled either. She’s never liked Leo very much,” Wolf said. Smart little Marie, with her wan face and kind smile. He hadn’t seen her in years, since relations between their kingdoms had gone south. He missed her warm and easy friendship. Marie had always been such a sensible girl, the only one apart from him who understood what it meant to be royalty, and the uselessness that came with privilege. The Prussian kingdom was run by its ministers, the empire by the Merlin. Whoever said “uneasy lies the head that wears the crown” knew of what he spoke. It was a pity that her hand and happiness were the price the empire would have to pay for peace with Prussia. She and Leo would be miserable together; a more ill-advised match could not be proposed between two more different people. But it wasn’t as if his father had married their mother for love, either. For that, his lord father had his mistresses. This was how it was for the heirs and heiresses of this world: trapped by their families, by their titles. Duty. Family. Royalty. Side dish.

  The King of Prussia had forbidden his younger son to fight in the war, arguing that the country needed him safe in case anything happened to Leo. But Wolf became a fighter anyway. There were underground sparring clubs in every city. The staff usually knew where they were located, fond as they were of wagers. The first time he had done it, he’d been fourteen, and ruthless even then—trained by Duncan Oswald, his father’s master-at-arms. He’d been itching to show off what he’d learned. In the ring there were no rules, no restrictions. During a fight, it didn’t matter if he was a prince or a peasant; he was the same as any other man. In his eighteen years, he had never felt better than when he discovered he could fight, and fight well.

  “So, what does that have to do with me? Why do I have to go?” He already knew the answer, but he felt petulant, small, and complaining—the opposite of being a man. But then, what kind of title was “prince” anyway? It was an embarrassing one. It spoke of lace collars and tufted pillows, like the one his sore behind was comfortably seated on now.

  “To represent your house and honor. Not that you have any,” Oswald said with a raised eyebrow.

  “I need to fight, Oz. You know that. Especially since they wouldn’t take me to Lamac.”

  “You know why your father sent you away. If your brother had lost, then you would be king.”

  “Ha, the odds of that happening are about as good as Leo beating me in the ring.” Wolf grinned. The heir and the spare. Wolf was the one in the shadows, the one who would inherit little…some land out in Bavaria, maybe. There, he would be nothing but a titled and glorified sh
eep farmer when it came down to it, unless something happened to his brother, the future king, who had the duty and honor to lead the Prussian troops into battle.

  “Your brother is a good soldier,” Oswald admonished.

  “Only thanks to that demon’s tool,” Wolf said. “Practically cheating.”

  Pandora’s Box. Supposedly it was the last one on earth, able to conjure horror unlike anything seen in this world. “I don’t need magic to win my fights,” he said bitterly. Leo had been something of an apprentice to his father’s oldest and most trusted advisor, Lord Hartwig, who had been intent on finding a way to combat the empire’s monopoly on magic. Wolf had to hand it to him; he had certainly succeeded wildly on that front. Growing up, Leo had taken to Hartwig in the same way that Wolf had taken to Oz. Both of them were searching for a father figure, as King Frederick, busy monarch that he was, never had time for either of his sons.

  “No doubt your father will find some use for you.”

  “Ah well, could be worse. Could be goats rather than sheep.” Wolf winked. He leaned back into his chair, wondering exactly what he would do with his life. He hadn’t a clue. Nothing was expected of him, other than to remain alive in the event of his brother’s death.

  “We are sailing on the Saturnia in the morning. And good timing, too—a quick escape, shall we say—for there is another one now,” Oswald informed him.

  “Not again?” Wolf groaned.

  “Yes. That makes three young ladies of gentle birth accusing you of fathering their babies since we arrived in the Americas. The latest one is a baron’s daughter visiting from Sussex.”

  “She has done this publicly?”

  “No. They are—taking care of it,” Oswald said delicately. “Unless…”

  “Unless I marry her. Is that it?”

  “Yes.”

  “She’s lying. They all are.”

  “Oh?”

  “I didn’t touch her. I didn’t touch any of them.” Wolf smiled at the memory. “It was merely an innocent game of strip billiards. Surely you know the game?” he teased. The memory of a certain night several months ago flitted into his mind. The eight-ball sinking in the corner pocket. Click. Swish. Thud. “Strip.” The girls, standing at the back wall, giggling, with only their long hair to cover themselves; not that they hadn’t wanted to show him everything they had…they were more than eager…but he had not touched any of them, and that was the truth. But there was no harm in looking, was there? “Really, Oz, do you think I’m that stupid?”

  Oswald looked cross. “You are accusing these fine young ladies of harlotry.”

  “Whoever they’re sleeping with, it wasn’t me.”

  “So you deny it all? Every one?”

  “Oz, don’t you know me by now?” Wolf said, feigning hurt. “Let them make their accusations all they want; they are without merit. I’m as pure as a maid,” he added, his face set. Unlike his vaunted older brother, he had no taste for womanizing, no desire to father a litter of bastards. He vowed that once he was married he would never take a mistress, not after seeing his mother cry in her room over his father’s indiscretions. When she was alive, she had cried all the time. He would never add to another person’s misery in that way, and his future lady wife—whoever she was—would not suffer the fate of his mother.

  It was his darkest secret: Wolf, the Beast of Berlin, was more Labrador than fox when it came to the ladies. “This is my only vice,” he said, holding up the bloody handkerchief.

  Isabelle had never been across the Atlantic, but had heard that the richest Americans, whose fortunes rivaled even the queen’s, lived in grand, palatial homes. There was no need for fireplaces, as they were built with central heating and wired with electricity. And so, when she thought of that faraway land, she thought of being warm. With their astonishing technical inventions, the Americans had learned to live comfortably without magic. Critics of the Merlin accused the magician of keeping scientific progress at bay. In the empire, if one had no magic, one had almost nothing. It was always cold in this house, ever since her family’s witches had been burned at the stake. Not that Isabelle had any more faith in the power of magic; far from being able to save her family, magic had been its destruction. Magic had rendered her a charity case, one to be pitied or cast aside. And now magic was taking her dearest love away from her, along with her dreams for the future. She cursed the Pandora’s Box that had won the Prussians the war.

  The reality of her situation made the walls feel colder, the ceilings taller, the drafts more intolerable. Her home was more cave than castle. The parlor they were sitting in stank of oil lamps, and the walls had acquired the gray sootiness of a decade’s worth of ash and candle flame. The great fireplace in the middle of the room had a hearth taller than her head. The thing was immense, medieval, originally designed for roasting whole hogs—perhaps two at a time. It was all so primitive.

  Through the high windows she glimpsed the family vineyards, long rows of knotted vines stretching over rolling hills. The castle was overrun with vintners, field hands, and armies of grape sorters and bottlers. There were hundreds of wine barrels in the cellar, and more in the servants’ chambers below the house. Now that she thought about it, she’d seen wine barrels in just about every cool place they could be stacked. The whole castle was one big, rotting barrel, stinking of vinegar and fermentation. It smelled like defeat.

  The horrid letter from the solicitor’s had arrived that morning.

  “This is the Merlin’s doing, isn’t it?” Isabelle said bitterly, feeling sick to her stomach. She felt like throwing up, she was so upset. “It has his foul hands all over it.”

  “It is Eleanor’s proclamation,” her cousin said evenly, reading the paper once again.

  Isabelle laughed. “She is merely a puppet at that man’s command.”

  Hugh Borel frowned at his cousin’s loose tongue. He was called the Red Duke of Burgundy, not for the color of his hair (which was a nondescript brown) but for the rich, ruby tannins in the wine from their vineyards. Or so Isabelle guessed. She herself had many names for him. “Lech” was one. He was ten years her elder, a squirrelly, myopic man with thinning hair he combed over his forehead, and shifty, bulging eyes. “Even so, you will do as she has asked. You will release Leopold from his promise.”

  “You would like me to sign my future away, wouldn’t you?” she said, with an upturned chin that she couldn’t keep from trembling.

  “Like I’ve said before, I only want you to be happy, Isabelle. But if you do not do what you are asked, you will face the wrath of all England and France and the power of her magician. I cannot protect you from that,” he said with false concern.

  You have never protected me from anything, Isabelle thought, balling her fists against the folds of her dress. Her elder cousin had a way of staring at her for too long, and he was always “accidentally” running into her room just as the maids were helping her undress. He gave her the shivers, and she had been counting the days until she would be free of him and this damp, stinky castle. She had a feeling he would change for the worse once her engagement was dissolved. Her betrothal to Leo meant her freedom from Hugh, among other things.

  “Leo loves me,” she whispered.

  “His feelings aside, he will marry Marie-Victoria to bring glory to Prussia,” Hugh said, almost smugly.

  It hurt Isabelle to know he was right. Nothing mattered more to Leo than his country. He loved her, but he loved duty more, and the crown of the Franco-British empire was too tempting to refuse.

  The defeat in Orleans had been five hundred years ago, and yet it felt to Isabelle as if she was reliving it at every moment—that she was still a victim of that long-ago failure. She was the rightful dauphine, not that sickly pretender who was to marry Leopold once she signed the papers allowing it. Her father, rest his soul, would have been Charles VIII of France; but House Valois had lost the throne to the British king, Henry VI, when the Merlin broke the spell cast by their sorceress and won the battle
. Jeanne of Arkk had been burned by the English madmen, and her wyrd women disbanded and killed.

  Isabelle’s family had been banished to their ancestral holdings, and tacitly forbidden to appear at court. Even so, her father had a few loyal allies left, and at birth Isabelle had been betrothed to Prince Leopold of Prussia. It was an alliance uniting them against a common enemy. But who needed Isabelle of Orleans if Marie-Victoria was being presented as a bride?

  “I heard the princess is deformed—a freak—that no one ever sees her, that she is nothing but her mother’s pawn,” Isabelle said bitterly.

  “She is sickly,” Hugh said. “And her mother’s daughter. But she is said to be gentle and soft-hearted.”

  Isabelle snorted. Leopold’s victory at Lamac was no victory after all, if this was the sacrifice it entailed.

  “You will sign the papers when we arrive in London for the season. We must be grateful, as Eleanor was kind enough to extend an invitation for the royal ball to us all, for the first time,” said Hugh. “Look at this as your chance to secure a good match.”

  As if Hugh cared about matching her up with anyone, or about her future away from his influence. When he had arrived in Burgundy to become her guardian, he had made it clear that as highborn as she was, she was completely at the mercy of his kindness. He kept accounts of every piece of bread she ate, every dress or gown that was made for her, against a ledger that he would collect on when her inheritance was settled: when she turned eighteen, or married. Hugh knew she despised him, that she couldn’t wait to get as far away from him as possible.

  “Why do I need to find a husband?” she said. “Remember? Until yesterday I was to marry Leopold.”

  “But that is no longer the case,” Hugh said smoothly. “Be grateful the queen did no worse.”

  “Bastard,” she muttered.

  “Excuse me?” He cocked an eyebrow.

  “I am grateful for the invitation,” she said, gritting her teeth and lowering her eyes to the floor.