Page 1 of His Perfect Princess

Chapter 1

Rickard

“Did ye tell him?”

I looked up from where I was pouring myself a wee dram of whisky to see my brother Wulf had just stepped into the room. He looked angry, but since looking angry was Wulf’s natural state of being, I wasn’t exactly surprised.

I was surprised, however, to find he wasn’t looking at me.

Instead, it appeared he’d asked the question of our youngest brother, Findlay.

Findlay, who hadn’t acknowledged Wulf’s entrance—or his question—merely licked his finger and turned the page in the small black book he was reading.

“Och, Finn!” Wulf stepped up to his younger brother’s chair, cupped his hands around his mouth and hollered, “Earth to Finn!”

“I can hear ye loud and clear, ye idiot,” Findlay grumbled, his attention still on his book, even as he made a rude gesture with the recently licked finger. “And nay, I havenae told him.”

Wulf’s grin was more of a smirk as he gestured toward the whisky I’d poured myself. “Make that a double. And pour me one as well.”

Rather than doing as he commanded, I held out the dram I’d already served, offering it to him. “The news is that bad?”

“Worse.” Wulf tossed back the whisky as if we were still young men at university, intent on proving ourselves to the world.

Actually, now that I thought about it, Wulf had always been like that, whereas I…had always been the model of a perfect Crown Prince.

Which I was.

Our small island kingdom was balanced between several larger ones—Britain to our west and Norway to our east—but we’d remained sovereign even when our closest neighbor, Scotland, had been subsumed by empires. The only reason we’d kept separate was our insistence on strength, precision, and exacting expectation.

Again, rather like me.

I prided myself on being the perfect embodiment of those qualities which made Faencairn unique, even when my younger brothers eschewed family tradition.

“What, ye cannae take a hint?”

I blinked back to the present to see Wulf shaking the glass at me. Like a barbarian.

Keeping my expression bland—control—I reached for another glass, poured myself the amount I’d wanted in the first place, then handed the entire bottle to my more primitive younger brother.

“Well,” I announced, brushing past Wulf and giving Findlay my attention. “Will ye be sharing yer ‘worse’ news with me?”

He didn’t look up from his book. “I’m rather treasuring the chance to ken something ye dinnae ken.”

Behind me, Wulf snorted. “Ye ken all sorts of things we dinnae. Like the circumference of the earth. And why oranges are orange. And what steel is made of.”

“And what a dangling preposition is,” Findlay murmured, turning another page.

The two of them—as opposite as possible—were always teasing one another. Until it mattered, and then I knew they’d have each other’s backs, the same way I knew I could rely on them.

We might be very different people, but we were still brothers.

Even if Wulf insisted on using his fists to solve disagreements…

Frowning, I nudged Findlay with my boot.

“Finn, just tell me, please.”

He blinked. “Certainly.” As if he’d just been waiting for me to ask.

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