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“Like a woman in mourning, your highness. When the judge inquired about her dark clothing, she replied that she was mourning the child that her husband had killed,” Marie replied with a smile in her voice. She stands at the cusp of the wide French doors of my chambers that lead out to the balcony, maintaining a short distance between us.

I nod approvingly, turning around to face Marie. “Just as I told her.”

As a woman, and especially as a princess, I am not able to bear witness to the trial. A strange game of telephone between Marie’s nephew, Marie, and myself has been enacted since the trial began a week ago, three weeks since my heart-to-heart talk with Augustus.

I reach out to take Marie’s hand, gratitude causing me to squeeze it tight in appreciation. “Thank you for your help, Marie,” I say warmly, walking us both back inside. My bed covers rustle as a cool breeze eases up the heat that still lingers in the evening.

She squeezes back. “It is both my and my nephew’s pleasure, your highness,” Marie reassures me.

“He’s a good lad,” I remark. I’ve never met him, yet he was so willing to lend his aid in this instance.

.....

Marie laughs, amused at how I speak of the older boy like my junior. “Yes, he is!”

“I shall see to it that he is properly compensated for his assistance,” I tell her in a firm manner. It’s a heavy promise I intend to keep.

Flattery makes Marie’s already ruddy cheeks grow redder. “There is no need for such,” she hastily says.

“I must insist. You’ve been with me from the start and you have never wavered. Let me show my appreciation to you, alright?” I urge. Nina silently enters and closes the French doors to the balcony, before exiting my room altogether. When I make eye contact with her over Marie’s shoulder, she tucks her head down in fear. Good.

“Your highness...” Marie’s touched.

“Still, I do wish I could listen to the trial with my own ears,” I muse wistfully, reopening a can of worms.

“You are not allowed, your highness, remember?” Marie says in an almost stern manner.

“Oh, I know, I know...” I pout, tugging at her sleeve so she knows I’m just playing.

We’ve had this conversation, several times actually, with Marie talking me off the ledge on every occasion. It’s a futile desire of course. There is no way out of the imperial palace without permission and I don’t have Jack’s wiles when it comes to escaping. In fact, I have a sinking suspicion that every time I escaped out of the palace, somehow, some way, the emperor always knew.

A not-so-short figure slinks into the room, long and lean from hours and hours of training and practice. She’ll soon need a new maid’s dress, this one has already become too short around the ankles. Emma’s eyes are vigilant as ever, flitting over the corners and windows of the room before settling on me. She curtsies, shutting the door without a sound behind her. We still don’t see each other as often as we used to, but not for the same reason as last time when we had faked an estrangement so the empress can try to bribe her.

“Emma,” I call affectionately.

“Your highness,” the robot, I mean, Emma replies.

“You’ve tanned. It looks good,” I lovingly gush as if my praise aren’t falling upon deaf ears. She spends much of her days out of my sight now, a choice I understand well. Beneath her hunger for gold lies another, a love of the outside.

“It is good to be out of the palace,” she answers, but this time, there is a faint devious glint in her gray eyes.

“I’m sure it is,” I grumble, staring down at the invisible chains that keep me from leaving. If you told me she said that innocently, I wouldn’t believe it. But Emma’s hidden snarkiness has always been something I love about her.

She has changed in these few years, blossomed even. Perhaps our time on the warfront planted a seed. Who knows? But with a great majority of my days confined within the palace, I know that this kind of life is not for Emma. So like any good friend and boss, I shifted her out of my department to another when I have a considerable number of people: the imperial kitchen.

Getting poisoned during my first week at the palace taught me the importance of having my own eyes and ears in the place my meals get made. And sneaking Emma out of the palace was proving difficult with the security blocks that had been erected, so it made sense to provide a more viable way for Emma to come and go as she pleased.

“It’s a pleasure to see you, official inspector of palace goods.” I greet Emma with a mock salute.

She salutes me back, a learned technique from me that always gives Marie the giggles.

As the imperial kitchen has learned over the years, it isn’t simply good enough to inspect goods when they’re being brought into the palace grounds. Many of them require extra inspection while they are still in the possession of the sanctioned merchants, undetected inspection.

For such a role that requires great discretion when investigating, there is no better solution than a child. Emma now finds herself weaving through bushels of corn to check for blight and secretly comparing the cost difference between the same goods when sold to the palace versus the public. The outcome has led to the discovery of poisoned products before they even entered the palace grounds and has helped cut back on the imperial kitchen’s spending significantly.

“I was just discussing with Marie some new methods of sneaking out of the palace to listen to the trial myself,” I tell Emma cheerfully. Behind me, I can all but hear Marie facepalm herself.

“Does Lief not provide accurate testimony, your highness?” Emma trots in, light and airy on her feet. She has gotten scary good over the years. The coin that I pay her instructor, Robbie Chensworth, is not light, but it has yielded incredible results. I once saw Emma slice a fly in half with her pinky. Really.

“He does, I’m sure,” I say, quick to give Lief his flowers. “But there is a certain thrill in witnessing such a spectacle for myself. Did you not say that there is little the common people speak of besides this?”

Emma nods. “That is true.”

I grin in delight. “I knew it.” I’ve seen the papers and the gossip rags, the hand drawn pictures that show a stoic Lady Arabella facing off against her estranged husband. Lord Berrick barely fits on the witness stand, his bulky frame exaggerated in some of the pictures to a cartoonish effect.

“But whose side are the people on? Arabella’s or that brute?” Marie’s smile fades a bit at my question.

“I cannot speak on what happens beyond the palace walls, but I have heard much about the case and it is largely skewed in Lord Berrick’s direction,” she admits.

My lips press together, but I’m not discouraged. “Unfortunately, that is to be expected. What of those beyond the palace walls?” I turn to face Emma.

“Similar.” Emma echoes Marie’s response.

I slap my thigh in frustration, an action diminished by the petticoats beneath my skirt. “It’s amazing how killing a dragon helped his reputation so much. If only the people knew what he was really like!”

“There would be false outrage, but ultimately, the people wouldn’t care, your highness. What he does and worse have happened to women in Red Houses and brothels for ages.” Emma says her longest sentence yet, with every word out of her mouth packed with a truth that still rings true in my modern world.

“That’s true,” I grumble. “People have always willfully turned a blind eye to the wrongs a man does if the end results can be justified. I don’t even have the right to complain – it is because of this tendency that father’s ascension to the Phoenix Throne was met with so little backlash from the common folk.”

“Still, Lord Berrick has yet to reach the late Lord Westmont’s fame and acclaim, your highness. Although he did slay a dragon, it was done with the assistance of a battalion of battle mages from the Holy Church and supported by a talented few among the royal knights. Lord Westmont is fabled to have done it himself with a single rusty blade and great courage,” Marie chimes in, trying to lift my spirits.

“Indeed.” I feel slightly mollified by that fact, a fact that I helped publicize amongst the people at the start of the trial so that there would be less fervent defending of Lord Berrick.

“I had hoped it wouldn’t come to this, but it means I will need to introduce another layer to this trial,”

“What do you mean, your highness?” Marie and Emma both say at the exact same time.

I think back on the promise I had made to myself amidst the rage at Lord Berrick’s transgressions and threats against me. That I would one day take his pride, his career, and his manhood.

“If the grounds of his abuse against Arabella aren’t enough, then there is another one that will,”

Emma’s eyes widen, a comical look on the stony-faced girl. “Your highness, you aren’t speaking about Operation Blue Balls, are you? Is it not too early for such measures? The Steinway Addendum hasn’t even been introduced yet.”

“What are blue balls? Are they a new toy you requested?” Marie’s head looks between the two of us, waiting for someone to spill.

“Yes, I am speaking about Operation Blue Balls. It is time, Emma.” I rub my hands together with glee and only stop short of cackling like a mad scientist.

Fear washes over Marie’s face perhaps from her years of knowing me, tugging her mouth into a perfect O. “By balls, you cannot be speaking of a man’s... nether regions? Right, your highness? Right?”

I fake yawn. “I’m weary from the day’s activities. You are dismissed for the evening. Once again, I must thank you both for your assistance.”

“Your highness! W-What do you speak of? What are you going to do?” Marie reluctantly looks over her shoulder, her feet slow in carrying her out of my room.

Emma calms. She approaches me and takes my hand. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.” I smile to reassure her, before saying quietly under my breath for just her to hear. “I want to ruin him.”

My promise to myself and Emma still echoes in my head the next morning when I awaken earlier than usual to a knock on the door. I groan, fearing that it is Ms. Laroche arriving extra early for the occasional morning etiquette lessons she likes to spring on me when I’m still groggy and disoriented.

As a part of the several intricate rules and regulations the upper crust must live by, some of those include how to conduct oneself from the moment you awaken in the morning. As one can imagine, having my governess breathe down my neck as I try and fail to elegantly conduct my morning routine is extremely maddening.

I shove my head under a pillow, my voice coming out muffled. “It is too early for lessons, Ms. Laroche! I don’t want to do those morning lessons again! I quit!”

The knock on the door sounds again, but no one speaks.

“I said, I quit! I will run away with Emma and Marie! You will never hear from me again!” I roar.

It goes without saying that I am not and have never been much of a morning person, particularly when the sky outside is still stuck in the dark purple-gray tones of dawn and the world is still gripped in the quiet calm of the early morning hours.

There is another knock. The last vestiges of sleep wither away and I roll my eyes hard. A few choice swear words come out of my mouth, but I manage to calm myself down enough. My loud, brash words just now will no doubt be reflected in some creative punishment Ms. Laroche will come up for me, and I have no desire to add to my burden.

My footsteps are light, my rage swallowed into my empty belly as I allow a pleasant smile to overcome my face. Whether it’s believable or not matters little anyways. I pull open the door, only for my carefully crafted display of teeth to come crashing down.

“Father?!”