Unwittingly

One

Somewhere with a Monarchy, 1835

"Emray, but you must!" my mother was insistent I went to the town square with her today, but it was raining and she would never even consider letting me wear something comfortable, or at least not a dress.

"Mother! It's raining!" I exclaimed as loud as was considered ladylike, feeling my olive cheeks redden with anger, and I liked to think my blue-gray eyes were narrowed.

"So bring a cloak," she reasoned, powdering her nose in the washroom two doors down from the sitting room, "there's going to be a big announcement today regarding the royal family!"

My thoughts on Prince Damien Brioc Lovette? Spoiled. His name means "tame mighty prince loved one". There's no such thing as a more condescending name.

"Damien-" 

"Prince Damien, but with any luck, darling, it will be proper for you to call him that someday," my mother didn't even glance at me as she walked into the finely furnished sitting room where I was. So she didn't see my obvious struggle to not yell at her.

"Mother, I thought I already told you. When Damien and I saw each other last, we were toddlers and you thought I would eventually be his bride no matter what. Now look where we are, he's going to announce a betrothal celebration for all the nobles," I stated, before I realized, that I was Lady Emray Evergreen. Lady. Ugh.

A slow grin spread across my mother's face, and I knew she thought I was right. There was a betrothal ball every year for all the nobles, and this year, the newly 19 year old prince would have be involved. As soon as they announced the betrothal celebration, which I knew they would, she would be strategizing like I was going to war. 

Although, I guess if I did go to war, it would look like the palace's grand ballroom.

"Honey!" she exclaimed. "You could be the prince's bride! Become queen one day and therefore our lineage will be royal!"

She wasn't going to stop. What she didn't know was that I wanted to find my soulmate, my other half. Sometimes, I wondered if she even saw me as a human, not just a daughter who could bump her up in the social rankings.

"Mother, if I go with you to the square, will you please silence yourself on this topic?" I offered, watching my mother carefully. If her eyebrow went up, she was going to try and trick me. If she picked up the fan next to her on an end table, she was lying. And if that vein in her forehead started popping out, she would agree fair and square, if reluctantly.

"Alright," the vein on her forehead popped out, even under all of her face powder, "I agree to your terms if you allow me to shop with you for an opening day dress at the garden party, or better yet, the masquerade ball."

"Mother," I sighed, "I will agree to that. But I do wish you would consider thinking Prince Damien will not instantly fall in love with me."

"I know that. But he will," she replied, and before I could respond, her blonde hair swished around the corner, along with her beige day dress.

When she was out of sight, I stood up and took off my high heels. Feeling instant relief from the wicked torture devices, I sighed and walked to the front of the house. 

My family's house on main street was in the valley, underneath the castle's mountain. Almost all of the nobility have identical houses: picket fences, brick walls, eight windows, and brown shingles. Inside, since my father is a high ranking nobleman, every room is lavishly furnished. In the sitting room I just left, there are rose printed couches and a chaise lounge by the window that lets soft beams of natural light into the room. In the kitchen, we have a fireplace to put the ceramic pots and pans over to cook our food. There were also dark wood cabinets and rose wallpaper. The staircase in the entryway was a dark wood, engraved with the family motto: aliud fidem potissimum, meaning "loyalty above all else". I climbed the stairs to my bedroom, the style of the century with a four poster bed, more rose wallpaper, a dark wood nightstand, a golden candelabra, and a dark wood dresser.