Page 2 of Glass and Bone
He wasn’t born into power like my father and I, but fought a long and bloody war for his position. A throne everyone believes he stole from the rightful heir, but he had proven himself to the citizens of Noterra and the neighboring kingdoms.
The king is gentle and caring towards his people, providing the best of everything to all who reside inside the borders. Endless wealth and treasures, the best trade routes on the continent. He’s beloved by everyone.
Despite his kindness towards his subjects, he is ruthless and abusive towards his child. I watched him hit his own son for not greeting me the way he believed a prince should greet his future wife. Tobias had kind and fearful eyes when they finally met mine. He was shaking, his cheek growing more purple as the moments passed. He seemed like he was trying to wordlessly warn me. His eyes were soft, pleading as if he was trying to convey a message to run before I could experience the pain he was in.
A message I couldn’t consider.
We don’t have a choice in this engagement.
I held onto those kind eyes all these years, hoping they remained so. If I were to marry a man like King Evreux, I don’t feel my safety would be well kept. A man of his people, and only his people, just like my father.
I won’t ignore the fact that I’ve heard the rumors that float through the kingdoms. How Tobias, who just had his 20th birthday, took after his father in all ways. How his playthings are usually found bloodied and bruised when he’s finished with them. How he will be just as aggressive and abusive towards his future children as his father, maybe even worse than my own father. I can only hope that the rumors are false, and there isn’t a monster waiting for me across the border.
I am worried about my future in Noterra, but it’s not something I can control, at least not right now. I don’t have any power here in Chatis as a princess, and I know I won’t have any there. As a woman, I fear I don’t have influence anywhere. Even as a future queen, my ability to have an opinion is limited to housekeeping duties. I only hope my future king values my happiness, as I plan to value his. Hopefully if Tobias is shown love and affection, he may be more willing to allow me to be his equal, be his partner, instead of just a body to warm his bed and bear him children.
However, I am too much of a realist to allow myself to hope.
I push the heavy covers off my body and stare down at my permanently pale legs exposed below the hem of my blush silk nightdress. My father’s kingdom lies within mountains and doesn’t see much sun. Chatis is a small country that usually experiences darkness and cloudy skies at all times of the year. The cloud cover never allows for many views of a bright blue sky, instead purple and black skies fill the air above my home nearly all year. Air that is thick with humidity, regardless of the season, makes everything look hazy. I don’t think I can remember a time when I could actually see across our lands from my balcony.
While I try to spend as much time as possible walking the gardens or the grounds, my father doesn’t allow me to leave the palace walls, sometimes not even my room. He claims it’s for my safety, but I know it’s for control.
He has many enemies, both at home and afar. I always wondered why, as he used to be a gentle ruler, used to be loved by his subjects. However, when my mother passed away, his kindness and devotion to his family and country took a turn and he became filled with hatred, destruction, and a thirst for power.
He focused his energy on conquering more land and starting wars instead of caring for his only child. Instead of caring for the lands he already had. Not to mention the wars he started did not go in his favor, and instead, his lands were reduced to just the northern plain next to the only body of water in the mountains, a small lake my mother called her own. Even with his failure to obtain the impossible, he still remained feared across the nation. He was still important enough to prevent any counterattacks on our own land, the other countries just fought him off and returned to normal life. It makes me wonder if they knew of his crazed tendencies and were just placating him instead of doing something about it.
I’ve heard my ladies speak about me with hushed voices. They believe I cannot hear them, but I do. They talk about how some citizens of Chatis don’t even believe I exist. How I am a mere myth and that the king has no heirs or children, that all of his children died. That he is alone in his grief since my mother passed and that was the cause for his recklessness.
Any time I have made it into town, which isn’t often, I am invisible. As far as they know, my face belongs to one of the many ladies of our small country, a Lord’s daughter, nothing more. The only ones who truly know of my identity are a small handful of the kingsguard and my ladies. Everyone else believes I am his pet, someone he sought to control after his wife passed. I don’t know why my father created this secret; I am sure it has something to do with politics.
Sometimes I wish it were true that I had a different father out there. One who would have loved me and cherished me, instead of abused and belittled me. One who would have allowed me to make my own choices instead of forcing me into a life with no chance at freedom.
I haven’t traveled much throughout the nation, especially as I grew older. My last trip out of Chatis was near my 12th birthday, when I went to Rakushia with my father. The princess, Emery, is the same age as me, and I remember the feeling of relief I felt meeting someone my own age who was of the same status. But I also remember the jealousy I felt watching her interact with her father. The King of Rakushia was quiet, and soft with his daughter and his wife, showing them nothing but love. A gentleness I’ve never seen from my own father, even though the kings were cousins. Related by blood and name only, not by temperament. The traits of the Rakushian king weren’t genetic it seems, unless my father was the outlier.
Sliding off my bed, I take a breath as my feet meet the cool, stone floors. A drastic difference to the pain I felt in my dreams, the pain that I can’t seem to forget, no matter how many times I wish for new stories to come when I close my eyes. The same pain, the same shade of crimson running below my feet like a river, the same glass slicing down to the bone.
I have only mentioned my nightmares once, but the mender who I spoke to only said it was caused by the traumatic loss of my mother and would fade shortly. He gave me an elixir made out of wisteria to help me sleep, but I ended up sleeping for three days straight and it took weeks for me to recover. I refused to feel that way, that vulnerable, so I never took it again.
It’s been years and a single night hasn’t passed without the same dream replaying, but I stopped asking for help. To show a weakness would be to give my father ammo to further terrorize me, not that he needs it. If I told him I still dreamed of death and destruction, he would either ignore me or punish me for being weak and an irritation.
Walking to the balcony doors on the far side of my room, I pull them open. The clouds are dark, but a single stream of sunlight peeks between the gray. Stepping out to the railing, I stare at the picturesque views that I can make out through the haze, stifling a chill from the brisk, humid air, but basking in what little sunlight touches my skin. Lush, green mountains and hills surround us on all sides, only breaking where the Delaquar Lake lies just beyond the walls. The lake that I used to swim in as a child when my mother was able to sneak us away from the confines of the palace.
I remember the smell of the salty water and the sight of the native fish that called that body of water their home. I haven’t felt that sense of bliss in years, and I don’t know if I ever will again.
I made myself a promise that I will feel the water in the Delaquar Lake one more time before I leave. That I will once again let the icy chill crawl up my spine, causing goosebumps across my pale skin. That I will use that time to say goodbye to my home, and the memories I have of my mother.
My eyes glance down to the palace grounds. I can barely see the only Chatisian town past the stone walls due to their height, even from the second story. Tips of beige and gray roofs and billows of smoke rising from the fireplaces peak out above the towering walls before mixing with the suffocating fog and clouds.
Inside the grounds, there's endless green grass and flowers, something my mother tended to, and thankfully the groundsmen kept up with after her death. People are bustling around, completing morning duties, all in sync with one another. Whether it’s a guard, a council member, or a kitchenmaid, they all have a purpose. Or at least that’s what my father says. He says they were born to serve and that’s what they will do until the day they die.
I always said that wasn’t a life worth living, but he never fails to remind me of the privilege I have. I won’t ever forget, but I sometimes wish for an easier life. A life where I am nothing of importance.
But I’ll never have that.
I have never been truly unhappy with my existence, but the thoughts of jumping off this balcony have entered my brain time and time again. Living a life in a home you feel more of a captive than a resident in isn’t easy. Once my mother died, I thought about it. Running away, jumping off the balcony, or even eating the nightshade berries that litter the hills and letting the overgrown moss consume me. Anything that got me away from the loveless home I have been stuck in. Even now as I feel some sort of relief that I will be leaving these walls for good, I wonder if death would be an easier journey.
Easier than the unknown I will soon face.
Sighing, I turn back to my messy room knowing I will have to make an appearance at some point, but my actual motivation is the prospect of food. My stomach growls with hunger as I step down from the balcony, rivaling the nausea blooming. I search through the piles of clothes littering the floor for one of my favorite dresses, needing something to bring me comfort. Just when I spot the black lace peeking out from under a mound of gold and ivory, my door bursts open. I jump back in surprise, my heart rate skipping a beat, as the man forcing me to abandon my home, the man I hate calling my father, walks in.
