Could she live with herself if she put her feelings, her wants ahead of their needs?
The flow of tears increased as she took George Evan's hands in hers.
"I can't. Those men need to come home, and I can make that happen. I'm not free to marry for love." The final words came out in choking sobs. "Please forgive me. Go and be a great success, knowing that you have my love."
"I have loved you forever, but never more than this moment," he whispered. "Be a good Queen."
He left.
Making no effort to stop the tears, Ursula turned to the priest. "I, Princess Ursula of Valborough, do solemnly promise to honor and..." She swallowed. "...to honor and love King Killian of Heyton."
The priest sighed but said, "Sign your name to the pledge."
She did, not seeing what she signed as tears flooded her eyes and dripped on the paper.
"Congratulations," Kylan said in a voice that conveyed something other than the joy the word should express. "You are now Queen of Heyton."
"Is this strictly necessary?" Ursula stared at Kylan and the Elemental Priest. "It's a proxy wedding. We all know this, right? I'm not actually married to Prince Gideon."
"I understand, your High— Majesty," the priest said, "but certain things need to be done and documented for history and the official records."
"Then how about when I get to Heyton, meet my husband, and have a real wedding night, we document that."
"I'm sorry, Princess," Kylan said. "Tonight is your wedding night. If you and Prince Gideon do not spend the night in the same room, in the eyes of the Elements the wedding did not happen."
"I'm afraid that's true, Your Majesty." The priest hunched his shoulders as though he wanted to hide. "The ceremony is not complete until the husband and wife are witnessed by myself to be in the marriage bed."
"This is outrageous," Ursula said. "I don't remember anything like this with any of my siblings' weddings."
"It happened, though." Her brother, Prince Ramone, stood at her elbow. "It's not so bad. In our grandparents' time, the consummation had to be witnessed as well, until it became common knowledge the Sensitivities merge at the moment of..." His voice trailed off, and he cleared his throat, shifting his eyes as though he didn't know where to look.
"I know what happens between a married couple, Ramone." Ursula tsked. "You sound like an old spinster woman." She asked to the priest. "We will be followed into the room and watched while we get ready for bed?"
"Well, not that part." The man's face turned red, and Ursula wanted to scream. She was surrounded by men who acted like she had just stepped out of the schoolroom.
"Am I or am I not the Queen of Heyton?" she asked.
The men all nodded and agreed she was.
"Then I should be able to determine how I'm going to spend my last night in my Valborough."
"Ursula," Prince Gideon said, "let's not make this any more awkward then it's going to be anyway. It won't be as bad as you think."
She spun to look at him. "You're fine with this crazy idea?"
He shrugged. "Heyton has similar, if different, customs, as far as royal weddings go. In the Sapphire Palace, it is still the responsibility of the King's closest advisors to check that his bride is a virgin before the wedding and to demand proof of consummation after."
Her eyes grew wide as she stared at him. He had to be joking with her, didn't he?
"It's true," his friend, Dashiell, said. "My father acted as one of the witnesses for King Killian and his first wife. Father was only about fifteen years old at the time, but the custom demands five men not related to the couple. He was the closest male available when the Minister of Finance developed a reaction to the fish soup served at the wedding dinner."
"So." Prince Gideon shrugged again. "See? It could be worse." He reached for her hand. "Let's go back to the ballroom. I think King Killian would want to dance with his bride."
"You can't dance," she said. "Your legs don't work right." Perhaps that sounded a bit insensitive, but at this point, she didn't care. She was angry at being in this situation, and he was nearby, so she might as well be angry at him.
To her surprise, he winked. "Then we'll give everyone something to laugh about while I try." He reached for her hand.
She stared at him. Was this some kind of joke to him? Of course, when they got to Heyton, he could go back to whatever kind of life he'd had before, while she would be the wife of a man she'd never met and Queen of a country she'd never set foot in before. He could afford to laugh, but she didn't find anything funny about the situation.
"I'm not going out there and act like this is some big celebration."
Shaking his head, he took her hand anyway, which was a complete violation of protocol. In shock, she tried to pull her hand back, but he gripped it tightly.
"Don't let them see you as a victim," he said, still looking as though this were a true celebration, but his voice was pitched so low only she could hear him. "You're a Queen, and those people out there need to see a Queen."
"What are you talking about?"
Prince Gideon stepped closer to her, tilting a bit as he moved but never taking his eyes from hers.
"I'm talking about you, Your Majesty. This may not be the wedding you wanted. It's certainly not how I wanted to spend these weeks, but it's done and only a few people out there in that ballroom know the truth. Don't go out there as a pawn in someone else's chess game. Go out there as the Queen, the most important piece on the board. Show the world and all those other people you control the situation."
"But I don't."
Now he whispered in her ear. "Then take control. You're the Queen. At least put on the mask, and let them believe you are." He gave her hand a squeeze and peered at her with his eyebrows raised in a question.
Ursula met his eyes and nodded once. He was right. If she acted like a victim, the last impression the people of the court would have of her is one of pity. Instead, she wanted them to see her as someone in charge of her own destiny, whether that was true or not.
"I will dance with you, Prince Gideon," she said, loud enough for the priest and Kylan to hear. "After all, this is my wedding celebration. I should enjoy it."
"That's the way," he muttered as he settled her hand in the crook of his elbow and haltingly led her out of the office and into the ballroom.
The room wasn't as full as it had been when either Liliana or Ramone had gotten married, but at least she'd gotten a party. Mariana, because she'd married against their parents' wishes, had gotten nothing more than a family dinner before being sent away to live with her pig farmer.
As soon as she entered the ballroom, the small orchestra, which had been playing a soft version of the Valborough anthem, but in a lighter, dreamier key, stuttered to a stop and all eyes turned in her direction.
Raising her chin just a bit more, Ursula glided to the center of the floor, Prince Gideon beside her. Then she spoke to the orchestra's director.
"Play something I can dance to on my wedding day."
The musicians played the introduction to "Alexandria's Gate," a dance written in honor of the wedding of Ursula's parents. Deciding not to ask them to play something else, the new Queen of Heyton turned to Gideon.
"The steps are the same as for 'Night Breeze over the Misty Peaks.'"
He nodded. "I recognized the meter. Shall we?" Holding their joined hands at chest height between them, he led her to the front of the dancers.
The men stood in one line facing their partners in the other. While the lines filled the length of the ballroom, the steps were executed by two couples.
Ursula was relieved to see her brother Ramone and his wife Victoria were beside them. At least Gideon's bumbling wouldn't be noticed by someone liable to start gossip.
The couples honored their partners with a bow or curtsy. Normally, Ursula would have let her gaze slip to the floor but now she watched to see if Prince Gideon would stumble. To her surprise, his bow was as flawless as any man's there.<
br />
She repeated the gesture to her brother as Gideon bowed to Victoria.
The next few steps were performed only by the first couple in each set, meaning she and Gideon had to circle each other then move across the space to repeat the movement with the other couple.
An involuntary smile crept over her face as the Prince performed every step as though he danced every day of his life. He did limp a bit as he moved, but it was so minor a flaw Ursula doubted anyone noticed.
He still seemed to be having fun when he came back to take her hands and lead her through the center space to the other side of the set. Now Victoria and Ramone would repeat the same thing they had done.
"Enjoying yourself?" he said as he stepped away from her to return to the men's line. She grinned at him in reply.
When the music ended, the couples repeated the honoring bows and curtsied, then Gideon offered her his arm.
"Shall we get something to drink, Your Majesty?"
The food table was on the far end of the ballroom, and they had to walk past all the guests. Ursula held her head high. He'd known she needed to present herself as Queen to all present.
"I believe you've been holding back on me, Prince Gideon," she said, looking around at the other people. "You never said you could dance."
"You never asked, Queen Ursula. I didn't spend all my time at university with my nose in a book." He winked at her. "Many a young man has missed out on holding a beautiful woman in his arms because he never learned to dance."
Chapter 15
Two hours later, Gideon and Ursula lay in an enormous bed raised high enough off the floor to need two steps to reach it. Gideon had required Traren and Dashiell's help, but at least his ritual wedding night garments were so long and loose around him that his awkward maneuvers didn't expose anything to her view.
Her gown, on the other hand, had been specifically created by a team of seamstresses for every Princess in the palace to wear, so it was designed to show off her physical assets to their best advantage. Consequently, she had felt as though she were virtually naked as she climbed onto her side of the bed.
One consolation was that even on this faux wedding night, she had gloves on. This was a concession to the whole travesty of the situation. Because Gideon wasn’t truly her husband, it would be inappropriate for him to see her naked fingers.
Of course, the fact that little else was hidden from him made this one thing more important to her than she would have imagined. Never before had she slept with her hands covered, but she was determined that tonight she would.
The bedroom door closed behind the priest, Kylan, and Traren, who kept his eyes on the floor the entire time the priest was saying the words of ritual over the wedding bed. Even the holy man seemed uncomfortable as he sprinkled the sheets with water, soil, and blood representing the Elements. Ursula tried not to wrinkle her nose at this, but out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Gideon grinning.
In between them lay a heavy broadsword that had been dragged out of the royal armory and blessed by four priests before being put where it was. Just its weight precluded either of them from trying to move it.
Not that she wanted to even think about it.
Rebecca had rushed after the celebration to help her out of her wedding garments and to take her hair out of its elaborate arrangement so it could fall in soft curls around her shoulders.
Now, she sat up, leaning against a pile of pillows, listening to the final blessing and trying keep the satin coverlet from slipping down and giving the four men in the room a view of her breasts through the sheer fabric. As it was, she'd had to climb into the bed and get under the blankets before she took off the blue silk robe so as not to show Prince Gideon more than he needed to see.
Finally, the priest was finished. He closed his prayer book and beamed at them.
"May the Elements bless you with a long, happy marriage and many healthy children."
At this, Traren coughed. Kylan touched the priest's arm.
"No, Brother Chadwick. I don't believe that part qualifies."
"Oh." The priest reddened and swallowed. "Of course. Uh, begging Your Majesty's pardon, I...uh..."
"Can we just leave now?" Traren asked, still staring at the floor. "Is there more to this ritual?"
"No." Kylan put his hand on the priest's shoulder. "I think we've done all we can here."
Traren spun around and rushed out. Kylan urged the priest in front of him as they left the room and closed the door.
As soon as the catch clicked into place, Gideon started laughing.
Ursula gaped at him, horrified at his reaction. What could he possibly find so funny?
He shook his head. "You don't think this is the silliest thing you've ever been part of? I mean, what was with the blood and dirt?"
"It was to invoke the blessings of the Elements. Don't you, in Heyton, revere the Elements?"
"Of course we do," he said, still grinning. "But I'm sure we don't throw dirt and blood on a bride and groom on their wedding night. That's certain to cool off a man's ardor."
"I'm sure if they were truly in love, a prayer wouldn't keep them from..." Her voice trailed off. While she knew, intellectually, what happened between a man and a woman when they were alone together, she hadn't ever been in a situation to experience it herself. So, in reality, she didn't know if he was right.
Did he know this from personal experience? Had he already bonded, magically, with some other woman?
Not that it was important, she told herself. Nothing was going to happen between them, so it shouldn't matter.
"We should just go to sleep," she said, shifting down deeper under the blankets as gracefully as she could while still holding the coverlet over her chest.
"Ursula, relax," he said, his voice without any touch of humor. "I don't want to be here any more than you do. Your virtue is safe."
"That's what this sword is for, anyway."
The Prince shook his head and shifted his weight so he faced her more directly. "Do you think that if either one of us wanted to take advantage of this situation, a sword would keep it from happening?"
She lay on her back looking up at him now, and his words sent a shock of something through her. The feeling was new to her, and it made her aware of her vulnerability at this moment. The mysteries of the marriage bed had, at one time, been something she pondered often, and she and her sisters had whispered speculations deep into the night.
Liliana had been the one who expanded Ursula's education, but what her older sister had told her had been so strange and unbelievable the younger girls knew Liliana had been lying. No two people would ever want to be together like that, naked and touching each other in places never spoken of.
Even with George Evan, Ursula had never wanted to do more than kiss him. His touch had never provoked the trembling feeling in the pit of her stomach being this close to Prince Gideon did, as she wore a gown so thin the texture of the bedclothes could be felt on parts of her body that were never uncovered.
"I would keep it from happening," she managed to say, swallowing and glaring at him.
"Of course you would," he said, shaking his head and leaning back against the headboard. "A virginal Princess no doubt has all kinds of defenses at her disposal." He began ticking things off on his fingers. "Tears, most likely. Screaming. Possibly, fainting. That would certainly do it for me."
"Do what?" Ursula scowled. He was mocking her, but that didn't make sense. Certainly, he was as uncomfortable in this situation as she was. Why wasn't he acting like it? He should be frightened at the thought of what could happen if she accused him of trying to seduce her. She was his Queen, after all.
"Well, if a woman I wanted to be close to fainted at the thought of intimacy, that would certainly put an end to any desire I might have for her."
"I have never fainted in my life," she said. "I assure you the Princesses of Valborough are made of stronger material than your average shop girl or milk maid."
Now Prince
Gideon grinned. "That's interesting because I've met a few milk maids, and I think they could beat you in a fair fight."
She pushed herself up on her elbows. "Are you suggesting that I would ever get into some kind of physical altercation with a commoner? Or anyone, for that matter?"
He winked at her. "I think I would pay gold to see that."
"You're an awful man," she said. "Talking about paying women to physically fight."
"Oh, my dear Queen Ursula, you have no idea the kinds of things I have talked about. I have never been terribly interested in the things I should be talking about."
"What does that mean?" He had to be the most infuriating man she'd ever met. Every other nobleman, in her experience, would go out of his way to be as polite and proper as he could be in order to not offend any female companion. No one, in her sphere of acquaintances, would ever mention intimacy between a married couple nor talk about two women physically fighting. None of that was considered appropriate.
"I don't know what things are like here," Prince Gideon said, "but in Heyton, men are supposed to be interested in hunting or warfare, and all that goes with those things. Weapons are the most appropriate topic of conversation for Princes and other noblemen."
"And you don't like to talk about weapons?"
He shrugged. "I have never used one unless you count trying to hit my twin sister in the head with my Magical Murders throughout History book when I was ten. Therefore, anything I know about swords or axes or bows comes from books, and generally, that's considered beneath notice when other men are talking."
"I see. So, what do you like talking about, besides speculating on the brute strength of Princesses verses milk maids?"
He chuckled. "So you do have a sense of humor. I was beginning to wonder. I don't make such speculation a habit, you understand. I was just trying to ease some of the tension. This whole thing is pretty awkward, which I hadn't totally anticipated when my uncle sent me here."
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