Royals and Rebels 3: The Heartbreak Prince

Nine: Cecelia Porter

Nine

Cecelia Porter

The Queen had released an official announcement on twitter, so obviously it meant it was real:

HRH Queen Henrietta of House Tudor is pleased to announce that Lady Cecelia Porter is officially being courted by Prince Victor of House Bourbon Under the Queen’s law, no other royal may officially court Lady Cecelia for one year unless it is agreed upon mutually by the two parties to end the courtship and the Queen approves.

I was going to my first garden party with Prince Victor of House Bourbon. I was wearing a royal blue dress, to match the white suit that Prince Victor would be wearing. I’d also been gifted a small, diamond fleur-de-lis necklace by Prince Victor to wear to the party.

As I put it on, I heard the sound of coughing from the doorway. I looked behind me, and I saw my sister standing there with a disapproving look.

“Do you know he has a s*x tape?” Delilah said.

I rolled my eyes. “Yes, actually. I watched it last night for prep. He’s got good form.”

“This is a bad idea,” said Delilah.

“Look, I know this ruins your idea to have me married off by graduation, but---”

She coughed. “I’m not trying to marry you off.”

I looked pointedly at her.

“Okay, maybe I’m trying to marry you off a little,” she admitted, “but Cee, you know that Mum and Dad didn’t have that much money. And after you leave the palace, I’m going to be limited as far as how I can take care of you.”

“I’m fine with that,” I said.

“I don’t think you realize---”

I walked over, and I placed a hand on her shoulder. “Del, I grew up in the same place that you did. In Brixton, which is not exactly one of the richest neighborhoods in England. Our parents were teachers. I’m not afraid of being poor, but I am afraid of having my own life taken from me just because my parents died.”

She sighed, and reached out to brush back a brown curl behind my ear. “Okay, just as long as you know that it won’t be easy.”

“I’m fine with that,” I said, “I don’t want easy.”

“Alright, alright. But you have to know that this is going to be easy, right? Marlowe isn’t used to not getting what he wants. Also, there’s still that whole issue of the contract with that painting thing.”

She pulled out her little notebook, which still contained the contract we’d signed in the ballroom a few days ago.

I coughed. “That doesn’t mean anything. Besides, the Queen already okayed this. Officially. Are you going to defy the Queen?”

She sighed. “No. No, I’m not going to defy the Queen. But I’ve heard things about Prince Victor, and nothing was good.”

“All royals have scandals,” I said, “and I genuinely don’t care. I just…Marlowe wants to be a lot more serious than I am ready for. He’s talking about true love, and marriage, and I’m….I’m not even ready to try to be happy yet. Please just understand.”

“Fine,” she said, “come along. Prince Victor should be waiting downstairs. We’d better get there, before Marlowe arrives and…well…” She winced, and I truly wondered if things would be that bad. I could only hope not.

She smiled at me. “By the way, that blue dress looks amazing on you.”

“Thank you,” I said, “the Queen told me she wanted me to represent the French flag, I guess. Also---look at my bow.”

I turned around, and showed her the red bow holding up a small pony tail. The two of us walked down the staircase, and at the bottom, Henry was waiting with Vivian. He had his arm looped around her.

Vivian was wearing a dark, purple sun dress, complete with a little sun hat, and Henry was dressed in a gray suit complete with a gray top hat. Next to him was Prince Victor, wearing a white suit, and a white top hat with a red rose in his jacket pocket.

Vivian smiled when she saw me and came over, kissing me on both cheeks. “Oh my god---you look absolutely precious. Like a little French macron.”

I smiled at her, doing the kiss cheek thing back that appeared to be a royal custom. “Thank you, Lady Blackwood.”

“You know you can call me Viv, Cee darling.”

Prince Victor came up to me, with his hands behind my back. “Ah, my caille,” he said, “Henry sent me some lovely pictures of you…but you are even more beautiful in person.”

“Thank you,” I said with a blush, “you clean up nicely yourself.”

“Shall we?” he said.

He offered me his arm, and I looped my arm through his. From behind me, I could hear my sister making gagging sounds and I shot her a look. She recovered, forcing herself to smile.

I walked out with Prince Victor to the garden. There were multiple tents set up, with tables, and waiters walking around serving canapes and tiny little appetizers.

“You know, I have to admit that I was surprised that you wanted to date me,” he said, “given that we didn’t even meet at the wedding.”

“Did Henry explain the situation to you?”

He smiled. “Ah, yes. Something about trying to avoid falling in love with Marlowe?”

I sighed. “I know it sounds crazy but----”

“No, not so crazy. I understand. You don’t want to be part of this world, and Marlowe is used to getting what he wants. If he gets you, that means that you can’t leave this world even if you try.”

“That’s about right,” I said. “I’m sorry if you were expecting true love, or something.”

He laughed. “I am French, and I am royal, my caille. I am used to being in a world with and without love. Though you must know, I do not take kindly to people trying to take my things. So, if you’re doing this to hide that you’re in love with someone else---”

I shook my head. “No. No. I’m….I’m not in love with anyone, Victor. I just want to be able to survive these next to two years by myself, without having the Queen planning a wedding for me instead of my eighteenth birthday.”

He chuckled. “Gran is still fond of me, you know. She might still be planning that wedding.”

I smiled. “Yes, well, I suspect you won’t care if I spend my time painting and in art galleries.”

He laughed. “No, my caille, I would not care much about that. But the English and the French are very different that way. The English want to own beautiful things, while the french---we like to admire beautiful things….as well as own them.”

The first garden party of the season went to raise money for Cancer research. Everything was done in light pink, and the people at the event were the top researchers in the world and the heads of hospitals.

“Now,” he said, “can I get you something to eat?”

“Yes, that would be lovely,” I said.

“I’ll be right back.”

The minute he left my side, I could feel eyes on my back. I turned around, and Marlowe was sitting at a table next to his sister Daisy and a pretty, blond girl I remembered was Astrid. I could feel Marlowe glaring at me, the hatred almost palpable.

Daisy, however, smiled brightly at me and waved. Astrid seemed to be staring off in the distance, a dazed look on her face. I was determined to make things right between us so that we were at least friends, the way I said that we were.

“Hello, everyone,” I said.

Daisy smiled at me. “Hello, Cee. I’m so happy you’re dating Victor! He’s absolutely lovely you know.”

“Yes, he’s been fantastic,” I said.

“Did he give you the necklace?” Daisy asked.

I nodded. “Would you like to see?”

Daisy smiled, and I walked closer so that she could get a better look. “Gosh, that’s just adorable.”

I took the empty seat next to Astrid. “You’re Princess Astrid, right?”

Astrid smiled at me. “Yes, that’s me. You’re the girl that broke Marlowe’s heart.”

Marlowe huffed, and I shook my head.

“Well….um…I suppose that’s one way to look at it,” I said, “the other is that I didn’t want to make things odd by dating someone I consider to be family.”

Marlowe shook his head, once again saying nothing.

“Marlowe, are you enjoying yourself?”I asked.

Marlowe finally looked at me, a withering glare on his face. “I’d be enjoying the event a lot more, if we were up in your bedroom and I was making you scream as I f****d you. But you’ve publicly declared someone else is courting you. Which means that by royal decree, I can’t touch you for a year. Despite the contract we made.”

Astrid glanced at me, curiosity showing, and so did Daisy. “What contract?” they both said in unison.

I blushed. “Marlowe, that wasn’t serious.”

“I was serious about it,” he said, his blue eyes flashing dangerously with anger, “I promised you that we were going to find the true artist of those paintings and---”

Astrid let out a gasp. “Oh my god! Did you make a vow to find the artist of The Broken Heart series? The ones for Queen Marcella?”

“It was a joke,” I insisted, “he wasn’t serious. He barely knows me, and true love----”

“I believe in true love,” he said, “and we kissed in front of those paintings the first night that we met, and I think those paintings blessed us. We’re going to be together, one way or another. Whether you believe it or not. So you can have your year with Victor, but it’s going to be me for the rest of your life. Do you understand?”

There was the sound of coughing. From behind me, there stood Prince Victor. He had two glasses of champagne in his hand, along with a small plate with an appetizer on it.

“Well, quite eloquently put, cousin,” said Prince Victor, “mon amor, you seem to bring out such romantic passions in people. I’m going to have to keep a close eye on you, it would seem.”

I took the drink of champagne, along with the little plate of food that he had gotten me. Together, we sat down at the table.

“You’re not welcome here,” said Marlowe.

I shot him a look. “You can’t be serious.”  

“I am the Prince of England, I am your superior, and I never said that you could sit. In fact, I am ordering you and your lover to go somewhere else,” Marlowe said bitterly.

“Cousin,” said Prince Victor, unhappiness in his voice, “I think you go to far---”

“I think I go just far enough, Victor,” said Marlowe.

The two glared at each other, and I realized that there was never going to be anything easy about this. Marlowe thought I had belonged to him, and I had gone out of my way to publicly declare myself as belonging to someone else.

Not just someone else, but his cousin, the Prince of France.

“Marlowe,” said Daisy gently, “she’s trying to be nice.”

Marlowe glared at his sister. “Nice? She rejected me, Daisy. Rather than accept the offer I was going to give her, she decided to choose someone else. She has insulted me, and the House of Tudor, and you should be as irritated with her as I am.”

“Will you stop being such an arsehole?” I said. “If you’re going to be angry at someone, be angry with me but don’t be angry with them. And you….god, you would see that this is about a whole lot more than just you.”

I left the plate of food, and the glass of champagne on the table. I stormed off to the maze, hoping to get lost so that no one would come and find me. I passed a few couples on my way, and I ignored them. I didn’t stop once until I found the statue of Henry the Eighth and Anne.

It was marble, and the two of them stood facing each other, holding hands. The statue itself was on top of a small, roman pillar. I sat up against it, folded my knees up against my chest, and I started crying.

It was stupid to cry. It was all I seemed to do anymore. Worse, I wasn’t even crying over what I should have been crying about. I should have been crying over my parents. Instead, I was crying over bloody Prince Marlowe of England. I hated him, and I wished more than anything he would leave me alone. I wanted him to make me stop daydreaming of a world I wasn’t supposed to be in.

I was crying for far too long when I heard footsteps, and I saw a pair of shiny, black, mens dress shoes standing next to me. “I’m sorry, Victor. I’m not being a very good guest.”

“It’s not Victor.”

Of course, it wasn’t.

It was Marlowe.

My heart clenched, and I wiped the tears away from my face. “Please, go away, Marlowe.”

Instead of listening to me, he sat down next to me. Which was typical Princely behavior. He always did whatever he wanted instead of what anyone else desired.

“Why are you crying, Cecelia?” he asked.

“Because, you’re an arse,” I insisted.

He laughed, and placed a hand on my shoulder. “We’ve established that. But you were crying before, and it seemed like there was another reason. One that didn’t just involve me being an ass, but involved us.”

There was hesitancy in his voice as he said the word ‘us’. As if he were afraid that using that word might send me running, which was absolutely a possibility.

“Cee, please, look at me,” his voice was breathless, and desperate, and I hated it.

I turned my cheek, desperate not to give into him. “No.” The answer came out muffled, as I spoke into my knees.

“You love me, don’t you?” he said. There was hope in his voice, and it made me want to hurt things.Mostly him.

“I barely know you, I can’t love you,” again, the words were muffled as I was hiding my face against my knees.  

“There is such a thing as love at first sight, and I think you felt it the same as me on the night of Derek’s party. It was there, the moment we kissed in the gallery.”

I sniffed, and wiped my face. Then scowled at him. “I can’t be in love with you, Marlowe. I can’t.”

“Why not? I certainly give you permission.”

“If I’m in love with you, it’s not just you that I have to be in love with. It’s this whole world. This world….your world of privilege, ballgowns, crowns and politics…it’s what took my parents away from me. If I’m in love with you, then I’m….I’m…”

I was sobbing uncontrollably again. At this point, he had wrapped me in his arms and was rocking me back and forth as if I were a small child. There was no more anger or tension in his body the way that there had been.

“You can love me, and still honor them,” he said, “we’re not the royals that took your parents away, Cecelia. In fact, it wasn’t even royals that killed your parents.”

“No,” I said, sniffling, “but it was revolutionaries that were against royals. Sometimes, at night, I have the same nightmare over and over again. I’m in that car with them, we’re going home, and instead of living through it….I die. I wish I had. I don’t even know who this person is anymore. Dating Prince’s and being called a Lady. I’m just a girl from Brixton. I was never supposed to be here, and the longer I am, the farther away from myself I get. The more they---my parents--seem like a distant memory. And if I let myself love you….”

I couldn’t finish the words, but I didn’t need to. I looked up, and I saw understanding in his eyes.

“You don’t hate me,” he said, “you’re not rejecting me.”

I shook my head. “Honestly Marlowe….if…if you were any other boy on the planet, I would have fallen for you that night in the gallery as we kissed. There wouldn’t even be an issue of Victor. But it isn’t just you that I’d have to love, it’s the monarchy too and I’m….”

“You’re not ready for that,” he said softly.  

“I’m not,” I whispered, “I’m sorry if that disappoints you.”

He laughed. This time, it was genuine, with no bitterness in it. “You know I…I rather believe that I don’t mind it one bit.”

“You don’t?”

“I just thought you really hated me,” he said. “I understand, the monarchy can be overwhelming. I will give you space, if that is what you need. And I’m perfectly fine with you dating my cousin. He, at least, can treat you in the way that you deserve. I don’t need to get bad press for punching a commoner. I’ll tolerate it, for now. But you should know that once the year is up, I intend, my dear, to make you all mine.”  

I smiled up at him. “You’re incorrigible.”

“I’m perfectly aware,” he said, “but you’re also in love with me.”

“I retract everything else. I’m not in love with you, I lied.” I pushed myself up from the garden floor, and dusted off the strands of grass.

“You can’t take that back,” he said with a grin, “you love me. You love me, and you’re willing to wait for me.”

“Yes,” I whispered, “yes, I’ll wait for you.”

“Alright then,” he said, “it’s agreed upon. You have one year, one year to sort yourself out, and get everything together. Then, when that year is over, I am holding you to that contract of ours.”

“Of course,” I said, “whatever you believe.”

I wanted to rest my head on his shoulder. I wanted to stay there in the maze, and forget about everything. But I knew that we couldn’t spend the whole of summer lost in the garden maze avoiding everyone.

“We should get back,” I said, “but we….we can’t go back together.”

“No,” he said sadly, “no.”

“But someday, we will,” I told him.

“Someday,” he said with a smile.

I stood on tip toes, and I kissed him on the cheek. He no longer looked sullen, and I felt a little lighter as I left the maze in the heat of English summer.