Cheran hadn’t meant to drink so much. It was Obal’s news that had led him to take out the first bottle of wine. As Obal continued telling him the story, the servants had fetched them more drinks. He hadn’t eaten anything since the morning, and within an hour he was truly and completely inebriated. They fell asleep in his parlor, and he woke up with a pounding headache and all of the information he had learned the night before. 

She wasn’t a princess. She was an almost-priestess they dragged away from her life for politics’ sake. She probably hated him and both countries involved in the stupid war and the stupider agreement they’d made for peace. She came into court like a lamb to slaughter— no, she was dragged into the mess. From the next morning onwards, she would be pulled and manipulated in a million directions by all who wanted the power of the crown princess, and she was utterly unprepared for it. 

Young women from noble and royal families were always sheltered. They did not know much of surviving in the real world, but they were always taught how to survive in high society. They could give out backhanded insults and knew how to deal with those above and below their ranks. Their society functioned by a set of rules that never changed. 

“What have I gotten myself into?” he murmured to Obal.

Cheran knew that he was not the best kind of crown prince. He was born male, and grew to adulthood without major illness or infirmity. Those were his two main achievements, and in a country where magic was dead and medicine was in its infant stages, they were fairly big achievements. Two of his younger brothers had died in birth, and three more during childhood. He couldn’t say all of them were of natural causes. In all, he had won the competition due to luck and his healthy constitution.

He would have to talk to her eventually. She was not a problem that would go away if he ignored her, and so Cheran stood up. He motioned for the servants to prepare his bath and bring him his breakfast. Obal slowly left the room, rubbing his shoulder. He’d spent the night on the sofa in the living room of Cheran’s suite and was regretting it.

“Perhaps let her know in advance?” Obal suggested. “Send a servant ahead, so she can prepare herself for meeting you.”

There was a knock on the door, and a servant entered with their head bowed after the door opened. It was a young woman, dressed simply. Without raising her head, she started to recite her message.

“Her highness wishes to meet with you. If you are amenable, she would like to meet over the mid-day meal in the gardens near her quarters.”

“Please tell her that would be lovely,” Cheran said. The servant bowed deeper before walking out the door, her steps light and nimble. 

“The mid-day meal is not far off,” Obal sang.

Cheran did not know what to do. He was not a religious man, and he did not like speaking to religious people. He was not even sure if she followed the same religion as him. Perhaps she considered him and all of Daivia to be heretics. Nouminese people worshipped things of the sea. Their gods of seas and storms were the ones who they prayed to for safe sailing, for storm-less skies. The Daivian legends spoke of their founder being a god.

“What else did you find out about her?” he asked. 

“Nothing. No one wants to speak of her. Even this, I overheard a few of her maids talking.”

“Her stepmother obviously dislikes her,” Cheran thought aloud. “She’s older than the young king, the firstborn I’m assuming.”

Cheran paused. “Was she crown princess of Noumin?”

Daivia did not often recognize princesses as successors to the throne, but he knew other nations did not discriminate between men and women. At least not when it came to the monarchy. Noumin was too small for any war to become news. He knew how it must have operated. A carefully contained coup within the walls of the castle. The old king had died a decade before, and it was not a challenge to drive a young girl away from her home.

“So she was worth nothing to them,” Obal said. “If anything, they got rid of a threat to the king’s power by handing her over to us.” 

Cheran nodded in agreement. It was a surprise that his father had not found out about the princess beforehand. His father, who was usually a full ten steps ahead of others in the room, had made a misstep. 

“It does not matter,” he said. “The alliance was only an excuse to cease the war. We have access to their ports, they are free of the constant burden of war. We may have done Queen Raval a favor, but we suffered no harm in the process. A princess is a princess, dethroned as she may be. Whatever tricks they may have, if we waged war again they would lose. We did not offer them peace because we were afraid of loss, Obal. My father just did not think it worth losing so many men when there was an alternative.” 

“You and I both know it will not be so simple. They could turn on us any moment, and we do not have a bargaining chip. They could from alliances with other nations and pose a stronger threat. And what do we do if that happens? We do not have their daughter, their princess. We just have the garbage they threw away,” Obal said. 

“I did not realize I was garbage.” 

The princess stood at the entrance of the room, two maids on either side. He had recognized her voice from the day before, but it was his first time seeing her face. She stood unlike the women next to her, her palms clasped together in front of her, her posture severe and rigid. Her dark hair was in a single plait, a thin ribbon tied to the end. Her face was bare of powder or any stain on her lips of cheeks. She wore two small gold earrings and no other jewelry. 

He could imagine her as a novice, as a priestess, someday as an abbess of a monastery. The firm line of her mouth spoke of discipline and order. 

“I apologize, your highness,” Cheran said. “For my friend’s callous words. He—”

“Your friend should be the one apologizing,” she said, cutting him off. “In a matter of seconds he called the emperor foolish for this alliance, the crown princess of this nation discarded garbage, and the crown prince… well, surely he does not respect you that much if he feels comfortable saying such things about your wife, about your father.” 

Cheran swallowed. She had no power, but it would not be much for her to complain to the emperor. She had every right to do so, and Cheran knew of his father’s desire for respect. The nation functioned because the royal family rested only a few steps below the gods. One did not call demi-gods garbage. 

“What would you have me do, your highness?” he asked.

Her dark eyes were narrowed, furious. He saw the way her hands were balled into fists around the ends of her shawl. Her dark dress added to her somber appearance. She reminded him of a fury, one of the mythical goddesses of vengeance. Obal perhaps saw her as a goddess of death. 

“In Noumin, treasonous tongues are cut out.”