Ch. 54: Nah, I’m Good

I scoff internally at Lord Bromley’s promise, although I allow my little eyes to light up and regard him with the same excitement any child looks at candy. If I were truly a little girl, perhaps I would be swept up by his promises, but a well-known saying rings through my head.

There’s no free lunch in America.

What does this old man want in return from me for him to fulfill these lofty promises? I paid attention in history classes, bastards were pretty much raised outside of the palace and away from anyone’s eyes. Some were relegated to servants within their own homes. So what worth is a bastard daughter who can’t even contend for the throne to Lord Bromley?

An uneasy feeling fills my chest. It can’t be anything good, especially since I’m a girl. Perhaps if I was a boy, I could study hard and get into the Imperial Academy, perhaps painstakingly carve out a career in government and earn a title. But as a woman, what worth do I have in this old-fashioned world besides my pretty face and future marriage?

“You were my father’s advisor?” I ask, opting not to reply to his promise and instead focus on the fascinating tidbit of information he divulged.

It’s not that I don’t believe him, however, in the webnovel, this wily Lord Bromley was not even mentioned once. For someone who was important and powerful enough to elevate my father to the throne, surely he would’ve been mentioned once. Unless... he either died a natural death or my father took him out of the picture. I’m leaning towards the latter option. Someone this ambitious, only an incompetent leader would keep them by their side.

Lord Bromley smiled, a vicious smile that reminded me of a wolf. “Indeed. Back in the day, your father was just like you.”

A bastard. But he didn’t say it aloud, as if the word was too ugly to be put forth in the open. I suppose that isn’t unusual though. Bastards, in this world, are like dirty secrets in the closet, meant to be kept out of sight. If it wasn’t for the scarcity of the imperial bloodline after my father wiped out a majority of his relatives, I suppose I would’ve been left to rot in the slums with Bianca.

.....

“Unappreciated. Relegated to a distant corner of the palace and forgotten. Barely surviving under the shadow of his elder brother. But once I brought him under my wing, he has since flown up the highest reaches for any man,” he says.

I am actually interested in what he has to say, as my father’s backstory was never included in the webnovel. But gaining these small insights into his past only heightens my irritation with him. As a fellow illegitimate royal, shouldn’t he sympathize with my plight and be kinder to me? Maybe treat me to lunch every now and then to validate my existence in the palace?

I think of the cold, raven-haired man seated on the throne and I involuntarily sneer, although Lord Bromley is too carried away in the past to notice.

Now I find this man’s presence to be nuisance and I’m ready to nip this conversation at the bud.

“You know,” I start in a whimsical, childish voice, “My aunt was a prostitute. She was always spending time with many strange men. When I asked her why, she told me that nothing was free. Both our home, her clothes, my food all cost money. So while she gave them her time, they also gave her nice things in return. My aunt told me that nothing comes free in the Erudian Empire.”

Of course, my story is totally false, as Bianca was either drunk or whining about my existence most of the time. Idle conversation between the two of us never occurred, but she never questioned how I managed to learn how to speak so quickly.

“So since you want to give me nice things, what do you want? Do you want me to spend time with you too at night?” I ask, pretending to be an innocent child who doesn’t know what happened every night in Bianca’s room.

For the first time, Lord Bromley looks uncomfortable, coughing to relieve the discomfort of my ‘innocent’ question. I give him a point for that. If he were even the slightest bit interested in what I had said, I would’ve been thoroughly disgusted by him.

“No. Not at all.” he quickly clarifies before eagerly changing the subject. “Have you ever heard of the Old Continent?”

“Nope!” Actually, it was loosely mentioned in the webnovel as a distant land across the sea with a mysterious, thriving kingdom. The Old Continent is far, beyond the distant north of the Erudian Empire and across the choppy seas of the Moor. I twirl a loop of hair around my finger, very curious. After all, I’ve also heard that strange hair colors are the norm across the ocean.

Unfortunately, despite the enticing hook, the next words Lord Bromley spoke splashed me in cold water.

“Have you ever thought of your marriage, Princess?”

He calls me my title for the first time, and his desire lies within my previous assumption. Lord Bromley doesn’t even need to elaborate further, for I understand in an instant: Tie me in marriage to a random individual from this mysterious kingdom and enjoy a luxurious life as a princess consort to be before I’m shipped across the Moor. After all, my identity as an illegitimate royal is worthless, so I might as well become engaged to someone important for my presence to have any worth in the imperial palace.

Not for the first time, I miss my modern world, where girls have many more options besides getting married.

“No! I don’t want to get married!” I whine loudly.

Lord Bromley sighs but he looks like he expected this kind of outburst. “As a member of the imperial family, marriage is something that is considered from the moment you were born,” he says.

I scoff at his words. As a bastard, I was definitely not in this kind of careful consideration. Who knows, if I made a deal with this wily old fox and I’ll find myself married to a 50-year-old divorcee with a penchant for young girls.

“No! No! No!” I even get off the bed and stomp my feet loudly. Get the message, Lord Bromley, I am never going to get married to some noble or prince from a place I’ve never even heard of. I’m a girl, not cattle. If you really need a princess to marry off, look to the beloved Princess Julia, not me.

“But this is-”

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” I roar obnoxiously every time he tries to get a word in. Such an immature action wouldn’t be possible if I wasn’t a child.

“It would benefit y-”

“I DON’T WANNAAAAAAAAA!”

“Little girl, thi-”

“NOPE! NOPE! I’m not listening! LALALALALALALA!”

I even stick my fingers in my ears and below at the top of my lungs. No way in hell am I going to agree to this proposition. That would make me a fat pig waiting to be slaughtered, pampered and fed delicious meals before being dragged to the butcher.

In the short breaths I take in between yelling, I watch Lord Bromley’s face grow darker and darker as he continually gets interrupted by me. I find it interesting how he is so quickly offended by a child.

Such a small stomach for dissent, I muse to myself, no wonder he was left out to dry by my father, the emperor. My active imagination conjures an image of a small dark-haired child with bitter, gold eyes, punished for horsing around like others his age and told to finish learning an entire book before eating anything. It reinforces my desire to not associate with this lord in any way, shape, or form, as I can see myself being forcefully carved into an image of his liking if I were to accept him as my mentor.

The silly back and forth goes on for a bit, bringing great amusement to the dim mood that has plagued me since I was dragged here. But I have the good sense to cease the noise when Lord Bromley loses the urgent tone and becomes quieter. I look at him and his face is still carved into a mask of irritation, but his voice at least is moderate as usual.

“Your highness,” he starts, surprising me again with my title. I recall what he said just minutes prior, about earning the right to it. “This is the best option you will get.”

The false camaraderie he employed to get my trust is gone, although he still sounds somewhat pleasant. “You can either die or give yourself a chance to survive. Surely even a small thing like you can understand that?” Lord Bromley is pretending to be reasonable, but a ruthless aura lies beneath his worlds.

I scoff at his words. After all, as an unfavored royal marrying into a foreign country, I can understand that his idea of a ‘best option’ would just be a prolonged death sentence for me. I want to tell him as much, but of all the people to display my above-average intelligence to, Lord Bromley is not one of them.

“No, it’s not,” I reply huffily, “The guillotine is better. Winter is never going to get married!”

I cross my arms and we have a short stare-off that he breaks away from first.

“Have it your way, girl,” he says. Without so much as a by your leave, he then leaves, his even footsteps getting further and further away until I can’t hear them anymore. My back hits the wall and I slide to the ground in a daze.

I had lied. I would do anything to get out of being executed, short of killing someone. But placing my fate in the hands of a man like Lord Bromley feels like an even bigger mistake. I don’t want to die. I’ve already done that one too many times.

I look at the tepid weather outside the barred window of the prison bedroom and the excitement from the previous interaction plummets. I am quite literally Rapunzel in a tower, only I don’t have loving parents waiting to welcome me back into the fold. Instead, my parents, directly and indirectly, are the ones who’ve put me here.

“You’ve done this before,” I reassure myself. “You literally spent five years in a tiny bedroom, this is nothing!”

But my heart disagrees. It dwells on the way Duchess Taylor’s lips pulled back around her teeth as she viciously slandered me, the suspicion and disappointment in the eyes of every knight that had once graciously praised my baked goods. I left the shack, went into the real world, and got kicked right back into the shack. After coming out to see the world and making friends, being confined hurts even more than it did for my previous years.

My sixth birthday comes to pass with no fanfare at all. Only that in the many songs I sing to myself through the day, I add in a little happy birthday. Winter is 6. Maria is 27. Both are having a miserable day.

My mood is like a rotting fruit, with each passing day growing more bitter and malleable. Sometimes I feel like I’m floating in the clouds, completely removed from the world in my little bubble. But then there are days when each breath I take is a waste of energy. I spend much of my time fantasizing and planning my future, each version more outlandish than the last.

First, I imagine myself being rich enough to fill the slightly outdated Rose Palace with decorations and furniture of my choice. I recall the fine boudoir where I burned my fingers, the ornate paintings and vermillion cushions on the chaise lounge. I imagine myself as Cleopatra, only needing to point a finger before a servant brings me a bowl of grapes.

As for my imaginary fortune, I’d make it all in business. In this current day and age, I believe that a trading company could flourish and serve as a perfect cover for intelligence gathering. I had given Lady Arabella a one-year waive of paying me my cut for her to establish her future thriving business, and soon that should give me enough funding to start my dreams for real. That is if I survive.

Like the summer rain outside, reality once again washes away my fantasies. But on this dreary birthday of mine, never did I expect for a large event to come to pass. Distant trumpets reach my ears and I rush to the barred window, pressing my little hands up against the water stained glass.

historical

It’s futile, as the Tower is so far removed from the main palace buildings that I can see absolutely nothing. I sigh softly, returning to the bed I have spent my days lazing away on. For my deadbeat father to return to the palace, whether it is a good thing or a bad thing, I will soon find out.