Player's Princess (A Royal Sports Romance)

by Abigail Graham

  “I’m not going to lie. I went to college in a city. I’ve been followed, I’ve been catcalled, I even had to duck into a bar and call my fiancé once because I was scared of a guy following me on the bus.”

  “Fiancé?” he says, quickly and sharply. “You are to be married? You’re promised to a man?”

  “What? No. Not anymore. I don’t want to talk about it.”

  He eyes me and bites his lip. He has a snaggletooth, on the right side. It looks like a fang.

  “You’re not selling me on America. All I hear is that you have to be afraid to walk the street at night.”

  “Not afraid, cautious. I have to be careful, just like I have to be careful I don’t get run over, or something like that.”

  “You can’t walk the streets without fear someone will attack you.”

  I clench my fists. “Like what you offer is any better. You act like it’s better, but it’s not better at all. Sure, people in your country don’t have to be afraid of a criminal in a dark alley, do they?”

  “No. Absolutely not.”

  “They don’t need some random attacker. They’ve got you.”

  He blinks. “What?”

  “That’s the choice you’re offering here.” I hold out my arm, gesturing at the empty streets around us. “You’ve replaced one fear with another. I’ve read about this place. You only let them read what you allow, watch what you allow, say what you allow. Your schools teach children to report on their parents. You tell them what to eat and where to go and when to go to bed.”

  He says nothing.

  “Okay, so it’s clean, and you say it’s safe. Is it? Is it safe not to like the menu options at lunch? If one of your subjects just stands up and throws his lunch down because he can’t stand choosing from Door One or Door Two anymore, what do you do with him? Drag him off for reeducation?”

  I fold my arms over my chest and sink into the seat.

  “If anybody else talked to you the way I am now, would you just let them?”

  “No,” he says, turning away to look out the window.

  “Why not?”

  “They’re not you.”

  “But they are. I’m not anybody special.”

  His gaze almost disarms me a little. Almost. “That’s not true.”

  I sigh. “Of course you’d say that. It’s great for you, isn’t? You eat what you want, go where you want, do and say what you want, read what you want. Why? Because you were born into it. Because of who your dad was.”

  “You say that as if there are not people of privilege in your country—”

  “Of course there are. Look, I’m not saying everybody is equal and that it’s a perfect land of sunshine and opportunity and we all go out and dance in amber waves of grain like a goddamn cartoon. Yes, we have a lot of problems, but I’d rather have some problems than live in a cold gray world with no human spirit. God, look at this place! Everything is gray!”

  “It’s efficient.”

  “It’s a prison. The whole place is one big prison. You know what really speaks against the way you run this place? If you won’t let people leave.”

  “I—”

  “Don’t start. You have one of the tightest borders on Earth. Nobody leaves this place without your permission. Only diplomats. Oh, and you. Funny how there’s one exception to every chickenshit rule here and, I’m sitting next to him.”

  “Two exceptions,” he says. “If anyone else spoke to me in this manner they would have, what did you call it? A bad day.”

  “I know, I know, mister hit-me-and-I’ll-cut-off-your-hand. You know what kind of a guy tears out a man’s tongue? Somebody who’s afraid of what they might say.”

  He turns to me. “You just quoted Tyrion Lannister.”

  “That doesn’t make it any less true. Hypocrite. I bet your average man on the street here wouldn’t get that reference. Let me guess, no HBO in Kosztyla. Not for the common folk, anyway.”

  “I read that in the book. That line is not in the show.”

  “A book you don’t let your people read.”

  He looks over at me, and it feels like I just swallowed an ice cube.

  “Do you enjoy provoking me? Is it to make yourself feel better, or do you want me to put you in your place?”

  There’s an edge to that last part that I don’t like. I shift in the seat.

  “Maybe if I annoy you enough, you’ll let me go home.”

  “I’m not letting you go.”

  “If you think you can browbeat me into adoring you like your loving subjects, you’re mistaken. You’ll never force me to like you.”

  “I see that in America they do not teach gratitude.”

  “You saved my life,” I sigh. “I’m grateful for that, but that doesn’t excuse everything else that you are.”

  His eyes narrow. “What is that?”

  “I saw what you did to those men. You enjoyed yourself. I’m not talking about the general. I’m talking about the others, on the goat path. I’m not going to forget what I saw.”

  “I forgot myself,” he says quickly, turning away.

  “You think I’m dumb enough to believe that?”

  He doesn’t look at me. His voice is very soft.

  “Yes. I did it because I wanted to. Because I like it. I wanted to hurt them. I wanted them to suffer. I saw the terror in your eyes.” His voice rises and his hands clench into fists. “I wanted them to be afraid, as you were afraid. I wanted them to know what it was like to be hurt by someone they can’t hurt back. An eye for an eye.”

  “An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.”

  “You would have let them live?”

  “Did you have to kill them? Do you think they would have given up? What about all those men you ordered hanged before you left? They lost, they were beaten. They didn’t need to die.”

  “They didn’t need to live, either.”

  I chew my lip.

  “Many who live deserve death.”

  “Yes.”

  “Many that die deserve life. Can you give it to them?”

  He looks at me for a brief moment then turns away.

  “Stop quoting books at me.”

  “I’m an English teacher. Can’t help it.”

  “If I could, I would,” he says softly.

  “Could what?”

  “Give life.”

  The pain in his voice is like a knife drawing along my skin. He doesn’t look at me when he says it. He leans and touches his fingers to his chin, in thought.

  I think we’re here. The car stops.

  I know enough to recognize stables. I move to step out and when I open the door I’m confronted by a servant opening it all the way.

  I step out onto a rug lying in the mud, I suppose so as not to dirty my skirts or slippers. The prince strides around and offers me his arm, walking me down a path of planks with carpets laid over them toward the stables.

  “You have ridden before?”

  “I’ve sat on a horse before, yes. Ridden, not really.”

  “Oh?”

  I shrug. “Birthday party when I was twelve. Not my birthday, a friend’s birthday. I think. Maybe my mom’s friend’s kid’s birthday. I can’t remember. Anyway there was a horse and we took turns sitting on it.”

  “I do not see the point of that.”

  “I don’t know, kids. They like weird stuff. The horse pooped on my foot.”

  He looks at me. I shrug.

  It did poop on my foot.

  When we arrive there are two horses. One is huge, and black. The other is smaller, and brown.

  Also, it has a chair on its back. A funny, twisted leather chair, like a saddle but…chairy.

  “What is that?”

  “A sidesaddle.”

  “You’re making me ride sidesaddle? I’m going to fall off and break my neck.”

  “You won’t. This mount is well trained. I assumed you lack experience riding. Do as I tell you and you will not be hurt.”

  “
Oh, thanks. That really sells the experience. How do I get up there?”

  By way of reply he grabs my waist and lifts me right up off the ground. I squeak in alarm and grab the little arms on the sidesaddle and jerk myself into place. He’s so strong. I’ve never been lifted up like that. My heart is still pounding as he steps back and admires me in my seat. Somehow he manages to check out my legs beneath my elaborates skirts.

  I thought it was the armor. It’s mechanical somehow. It must be, but there is still incredible power in his compact form. He mounts easily, almost leaping into the saddle.

  Then they give him a bird. A hawk, I suppose. It has a little hood over its eyes. He holds his arm out and the bird sits perched on his forearm, talons digging into a thick leather gauntlet.

  He urges his mount forward and mine just follows. I sit there dumbly holding the reins, wondering how the hell my life reached this point. The point at which hawking became involved.

  “What exactly does hawking mean? What does that thing do?”

  “She hunts,” the prince says casually.

  “Are you always so cryptic? Hunts what?”

  He eyes me, glancing back at the retinue of people following us on other horses. I think I need to watch my tone.

  “Ah, what does she hunt, my prince?”

  “Small animals. Squirrels, hares, perhaps another bird.”

  “When she, ah, hunts one, what do you do with it?”

  “Do? She eats it.”

  “Oh my God,” I blurt out before I realize what I’m doing. “You’re going to let that thing fly off and rip up some innocent animal?”

  He rolls his eyes. “You have a problem with that?”

  “Yes! You can’t just kill some little animal.”

  “Your country—”

  “Can we please not do the ‘your country’ thing again? Yes, people kill animals in my country. I’m pretty sure people train raptors for falconry or whatever, too. That doesn’t mean you have to do it. I don’t want to watch that thing rip up some innocent little animal. What the hell kind of activity is this?”

  “It’s a tradition,” he grates, sounding more exasperated with every syllable.

  “Can we please not do this? At least let me go back to the car. I don’t want to see any squirrel guts today.”

  He reins in his mount and hands off the bird, slowly turning his horse to face me.

  “This is absurd. You are absurd. It’s a hawk. It eats other animals. If I let it fly away it would eat other animals.”

  “Yeah, but you could just feed it meat or something. It doesn’t have to kill.”

  He stares at me like I just stepped out of a flying saucer.

  “Are you mocking me?”

  “No! I just don’t want to hurt a little animal, is that so wrong?”

  “You just told me to feed her meat. Where do you think meat comes from, tomatoes? She has to hunt.”

  “I don’t have to watch. I’m going to sit here with my eyes closed and not watch.”

  I close my eyes to prove my point.

  “You’re acting like a child.”

  “Whatever, my prince. The bird has to eat. You don’t have to get your rocks off watching it eat. I’m not going to look.”

  I open my eyes when he lets out a noise that’s half groan and half growl. He barks an order at the retainer holding the damn bird and the man wheels his mount around and heads back toward the stables.

  “Fine. I grow hungry. Lunch.”

  The prince heels his mount forward and mine just sort of follows him. I hold on to the stupid sidesaddle and sit there, trying to figure out if my butt is actually slipping and I’m going to fall in the mud, or I’m just imagining it. God, this is dumb. Why can’t I just sit in a regular saddle?

  Besides the skirts, I mean.

  It’s hot out here. I’m starting to sweat. The heat doesn’t seem to touch the prince. When he stops on a rise and sits up tall in the saddle, I forget for a moment that he’s a complete monster. With the sun at his back his hair glows a little, shifting subtly in the light breeze. It would be a good pose for a painting.

  He looks back at me and heels his mount forward again. I don’t have much of a choice but to be carried along.

  At the end of the ride is a wide, low pavilion. The prince dismounts and the retainers fall back, doing the same. I start to scoot my ass off the sidesaddle but finally give up and wait for him to lower me down, again by the waist. To steady myself, I put my hands on his shoulders this time, but pull them back as if I’ve touched a hot iron as soon as my slippers touch the carpeted planks.

  God, this is so silly.

  There are servants waiting for us, which I guess shouldn’t surprise me. I sweep my skirts under the table as the prince pushes a heavy, rough-hewn chair in under me then dashes to take his own seat.

  “You can feed me all you want. I’ll just get fat. I won’t like you.”

  “You could stand to plump up a little. Working in that aid camp has made you skinny.”

  I flinch and grit my teeth.

  “I can see you bristle at that. Does it insult you to be called skinny?”

  “I’m not skinny,” I growl.

  “Slender, then,” he says, with a casual shrug, as a servant lays his plate before him.

  He didn’t have to tell me. He’s been staring at them the whole time.

  Lunch is roast beef, still steaming, roasted vegetables, and boiled potatoes that taste like onion and spices when I pop one of the little cubes in my mouth.

  I’m not going to starve myself to make a point. Arguing with this arrogant bastard is hungry work.

  After a moment I realize he’s watching me eat and force myself to slow down.

  “Better than MREs, yes?”

  “Yes, I’ll give you that. Not that you deserve the credit. One of your slaves cooked it.”

  “This again? They’re not slaves.”

  I look around. “Yeah, can they quit this job?”

  “This isn’t a job, it’s an honor. Their ancestors have served my family since…” he trails off. “Never mind. Don’t belittle my people with your ignorant assessment of their well-being. They are perfectly content.”

  “Yeah, the house slaves get treated better, is that it?”

  “You are beginning to test my patience.”

  “Good. Spending your whole life pampered and fussed over has clearly given you a fat head, my prince.”

  He slams his fist on the table, and the plates and cups jump.

  “Enough.”

  I look down at my plate and saw at my meat, my chest fluttering. I pushed it a little too far that time.

  “You think because I have some fine things, my life is easy.”

  I take a deep breath. “I just see a country full of captive people with someone commanding their every step.”

  I pop a slice of beef in my mouth and take time to chew it slowly, savoring the flavors, and swallow before I speak again.

  “Only, who commands you?”

  “No one.”

  “Exactly my point.”

  “That makes me no more free,” he says softly.

  I stop chewing to look at him. He sets his knife and fork down and leans back in the chair, cocked to one side.

  “Say I give you what you want. I step down right now, this instant. I go out and say, ‘You are all free,’ and then I leave. Then what?”

  I shrug.

  “Anarchy, that’s what. I am as locked into my role as my people are into theirs. You speak as if it is some easy thing, freedom. It comes with a heavy price. There are no easy choices in this world. I have made mine, as did my father and his father before him, stretching back to the time when my ancestors first came to this land.”

  “That’s a very poetic way of dressing up your fear.”

  He looks up. “What?”

  “That’s why I’m here, right? I amuse you. You can’t find anybody in your little empire who will give it to you straight. Do you know how beat
ification works?”

  He blinks. “The process of sainthood?”

  “Yes, that’s right. When the process starts, the church calls in a guy to speak against the person’s qualifications as a saint. To argue that their miracles are not genuine, that they are not worthy, that God would not choose them to sit at his right hand.”

  The prince sits up, eyeing me.

  “That person is the devil’s advocate. It’s not just a figure of speech, it’s an actual position within the church. That’s what you brought me here for, isn’t it? You want to hear from somebody who isn’t afraid to lose a limb if you don’t like what they have to say.”

  “You’re not afraid of me,” he observes.

  “No, I’m not. You don’t scare me. I’ve met plenty of bullies in my time. I know one when I see one. You might have an army backing you up and you might have that suit you had on last night, but I’m not scared of you.”

  “Why, because you’re an American citizen?”

  “No, because bullies act out of a sense of weakness, not power. You don’t force the world to fit your warped expectations because you feel powerful. You force it to be the way you want because it scares you if it doesn’t bend to your will.”

  The prince eyes me. “Finish your meat. Unless you wish to plead with me for the cow it came from.”

  I look down and finish eating without saying anything else. I clean my plate, and I guess I’m a good girl because I get dessert, a tiny scoop of ricotta cheese drizzled with honey and served with tiny little anise cookies coated with dark chocolate.

  “This is good,” I mutter, forgetting myself.

  I flinch, expecting the prince to lay into me for speaking without his leave, but he just smiles. He’s skipping dessert.

  When I finish eating, the food is carried away. I take a taste of the strange pale wine I’m offered and jerk back when it touches my tongue. It’s sweet as sugar water.

  “That’s mead,” he says with a little shrug. “I take it you’ve never tasted it. Is it to your liking?”

  “Yes. What is it?”

  “Honey wine.”

  “I like it.”

  “I’m surprised you’re not castigating me for oppressing the bees and appropriating the fruits of their labor.”

  I stare at him for a moment.

  Then he laughs, softly, as if the act is unfamiliar to him.