The Prince's Duchess { Illyria Series 1 } - COMPLETED

Chapter 50: The Poison

Leone's POV:

"You are starring at Shanna's portrait a little too intently, son." Joram's voice made me turn around.

We had just finished our annual meetings with the Council of Ministers and the decisions regarding our kingdom's rising economy inside the Royal Palace's Observatory; For once in my life, I looked forward to meeting my father on this important day and he even surprised the Council members when he praised me for my work these past years.

A praise that was long overdue and it somehow warmed my heart to know that he is slowly changing.

Garbed in his royal uniform, My father touched the surface of the painting gently and his eyes softened as he looked at my mother's face.

"You...never told me much about your time with her. How you met and why you married her in the first when you knew that the love you were meant to have was still out there." I asked him and his hand stopped stroking the painting.

He gave me a look and I could see that it was a teasing one.

"Are you trying to weedle a story out of me now that I am much more nicer?" he raised a haughty eyebrow at me.

"Not....if you don't want to talk. " I shrugged at him, the air of playfulness was evident around us.

"Very well. I guess I can spare a few of my precious time from being a king and just be...a father." he said as we walked towards the garden terrace on the upper floor above us.

The Observatory always has this terrace garden, stories of my mother spending hours here just reading and often times playing with us here were well known amongst the Palace staff even when she died.

We both viewed a field of sunflowers before my father spoke.

"I already told you about Shanna and how she was a gentle soul. She is aware that I don't love her when we married and yet she gave me companionship and her affection as a close friend and confidant. She was younger than me by three years and yet she was more mature about her outlook in life; she finds the good things and enjoys what she could of our loveless marriage. Slowly but surely I came to love her as a friend and although it sometimes feels wrong to me; I came to appreciate her as my Queen."

I listened intently, every word he uttered was indeed filled with respect and a degree of fondness that was unmistakable in his voice and the way he smiled.

"During our marriage, she....told me about her lonely and harsh experience as one of the youngest princesses in Danati. How she was sheltered from the outside and is only allowed inside the Palace watched like a hawk by servants. What little she saw of her father was often met with hurtful words, beatings, and scoldings about how inept she was in catching a husband because as the 9th princess, her fondness of reading books and daydreaming was a useless skill for a woman. She told me stories of her older sisters and how they would compete in catching the best husbands and lord over her and the younger princesses like they were servants and not blood sisters." he smiled at that. " I suppose you can say marriage to me freed her from her father and older sister's torment. She would always send gifts to her younger siblings as a sort of comfort for she did not want them to think she had forgotten them."

"Sounds like you really think well of her despite being unable to love her truly," I said after a while.

"That is not true, I loved her in my own way. She was my best friend and at times I miss her." my father closed his eyes and massaged his face. "That was also the reason why.... I found it hard when Eva suddenly appeared in my life."

The subject of Sey's mother made us uncomfortable. I should be angry that this woman captivated my father in an instant but as someone who has experienced the same pull towards Sarina; I could understand.