The Princess Read online

  Her dressers drew her hair back into a perfectly neat and tight chignon. They snapped the steel fasteners of the long Merry Widow and dressed her in a somber black suit with a big diamond brooch on the left shoulder. For a moment, Aria considered exchanging the brooch for the gaudy enameled parrot she had bought in Key West on a shopping spree with Dolly, but she didn’t have enough courage to carry out her idea.

  Outside her room, J.T. was not waiting for her and he wasn’t in the dining room. She was beginning to learn to ask a guardsmen if she wanted to know anything. J.T. had left the palace before six A.M. and had given no hint as to when he would return.

  She waited until the last minute but she had to reach the Blessing Festival on time. She tried not to let her face fall when she saw Count Julian standing by the car door. His expression was stern.

  “I thought perhaps you were going to discard your obligations again today,” he said in reproach.

  She didn’t answer him because she felt too guilty about yesterday. She had had a good time yesterday. But princesses weren’t supposed to have fun. They were to fulfill obligations, not play with the peasants’ babies and exchange gossip about American movie stars.

  “Aria, people are beginning to talk,” Julian began once they were in the long black car. A Royal Guardsman sat beside the chauffeur behind the glass partition, and a carful of guardsmen followed them. “The king is too ill to take the firm hand with you that he should so I am left with the duty. You are behaving like a…a woman of the streets with that crude, vulgar American. You spent every waking moment with him yesterday and it is all anyone could speak of this morning. If you care nothing for your own family, think of what the servants say. They do not want a princess who is one of them—they want a princess. I hear you even dared to invade the Royal Guard’s training ground. Have you no respect for the privacy of those men?”

  Aria sat in the seat, her hands tightly clasped in her lap, feeling more awful with his every word. Then, to her utter astonishment, the guardsman in the front seat turned and winked at her! She came very close to giggling. What especially surprised her was that he had obviously heard every word Julian had said—and she had always believed the partition to be soundproof.

  Julian kept fussing and Aria kept listening, but she wasn’t worried any longer. Maybe her family was ashamed of her, but it didn’t look as if her people were.

  Meeting the people today was very different from yesterday. The people were in their Sunday best and were using their best formal manners. They smiled at her, but no one laughed and they just asked her questions. It was really quite tedious for her.

  The people seemed pleased to see Count Julian and repeatedly asked when the wedding was going to be. “But I’m already married,” she wanted to tell them.

  It was one o’clock before they were on their way back to the car and over the heads of the people Aria could smell food. There was a break in the crowd, and some distance away, at the side of a tiny house, a woman was ladling something into a piece of bread and handing it to a little boy. Aria knew what it was; she’d had one as a child. A piece of thick Lanconian bread, still warm from the oven, with a thick, chewy crust, was split and inside was ladled a generous scoop of spicy chicken stew made with grapes. Fresh goat cheese was sprinkled on top.

  Aria wasn’t even aware of what she was doing, but she turned away from where Julian waited by the open car door, started saying, “Excuse me,” and made her way through the crowd to the woman’s house. “May I have one?” she asked the astonished woman.

  The old woman just stood there and stared.

  “Gramma!” the little boy said loudly, bringing the woman to her senses. She spooned stew into the bread, sprinkled it with cheese, and held it out to Aria.

  “Thank you very much,” Aria said, biting into it. She suddenly became aware of the silent crowd behind her. She turned, a bit of sauce on her upper lip. “It’s delicious,” she said, and the crowd cheered.

  A guardsman handed her a clean handkerchief to use as a napkin and she saw that there were four guardsmen near her. They had followed her as she went through the crowd.

  “Princess,” she heard, and looked down to see the little boy holding out a rough stoneware mug to her. “It’s buttermilk.”

  Aria smiled and took the mug. “Thank you,” she said.

  The little boy grinned. “You’re not like a real princess at all.”

  “Thank you again,” she said, making the crowd laugh. The guardsmen parted the crowd as she made her way back to the car.

  Julian was fuming. He lectured her all the way back to the palace as she greedily ate her sandwich and drank her buttermilk. He wanted to throw the mug out the window but she wouldn’t let him.

  When they arrived at the palace, the guardsman who had sat in the front seat opened the door for her and she handed him the mug. “I would like to thank that woman for her food. Would you please find out what she needs?”

  “I saw an empty chicken coop,” the guardsman said softly.

  “Fill it,” Aria said before Julian gave her a sharp look. “Do you know where Lieutenant Montgomery is?” she whispered.

  “With the guards, Your Highness.”

  Aria turned her head so Julian wouldn’t see her talking. “Would you please see that my horse is ready in twenty minutes?”

  The guardsman merely nodded as they rounded the car and she was within earshot of Count Julian.

  * * *

  Aria had some difficulty escaping Julian and she saw a few other members of her family looking askance at her as she ran across the courtyard and made her way to the stables. Her horse was saddled and waiting for her and four Royal Guardsmen were ready to ride with her.

  It was a matter of minutes before she reached the guardsmen’s training field then halted her horse to watch the men. J.T. was with the guardsmen, wearing the white loincloth and battling with a stick against a guardsman. J.T. was as tall as the guardsmen but paler skinned and not as heavy. He wasn’t very good with the stick either and the guardsman he was sparring with seemed to be toying with him.

  “He will learn,” said the guard beside Aria. “In another year or so he will be the best fighter in Lanconia.”

  Aria smiled at that, but then she remembered that in a year J.T. would probably be back in America and she would be married to Julian.

  At that moment J.T. glanced at her, she waved, and the next moment J.T. was sent sprawling on the ground.

  “Keep your mind on what you are doing,” the guardsman standing over J.T. yelled.

  Aria went running to J.T. “Are you hurt?” she asked as she knelt beside him. She glared up at the guardsman. “I’ll have your head if you’ve hurt him.”

  J.T. smiled at her as he rubbed his bruised shoulder. “I may die of embarrassment but nothing else. Tell Rax you didn’t mean what you said.”

  Aria was aware that many of the guardsmen were now watching them with curiosity. She genuinely wished she had not made such a fool of herself, but before she could say a word, Gena came running across the field. She was wearing practically nothing: a short-skirted, one-shoulder dress, a heavy gold bracelet on her right upper arm.

  “J.T. darling,” Gena said, falling to her knees by his side. “Are you all right? Have you been injured?”

  Aria didn’t speak but slowly rose with great dignity and walked away. She reached her horse before J.T. caught up with her. He grabbed her arm and pulled her into the trees. Aria squirmed to get away from him.

  “Come on, baby, don’t be mad,” he coaxed, running his hands up her arms.

  His bare skin was hot and sweaty and her face was inches from his chest.

  “I had to do something with her. She was following me everywhere, so I gave her to the women to train. It’s keeping her out of trouble.”

  “And you enjoy her. No doubt the sight of her in that little skirt—” She broke off as he kissed her.

  She was breathless when he finished and she clung to him, her cheek a