I took the envelope and turned it over in my hand. I knew the prince had returned to Kalopsia—he was the king now—I just didn’t know why he would send me a letter. Why me and not my parents? They were the ones with the title; I was just the son, and not a very impressive one at that. My younger sister was far more accomplished and the jewel in the Andino family. Me? I was just the accountant.
“Lucas,” my mother encouraged. “Open it.”
“Why haven’t you opened it already?” I asked, moving back around to the other side of my desk and falling into my chair. I adjusted my glasses again and looked to my mother. Her cheeks flushed. “You opened it already,” I said with a sigh.
“Just read it,” she said, finally taking her seat.
I turned the envelope over in my hands and looked at the wax seal which had been cracked and then clumsily re-sealed. My stomach cramped and my knee bobbed nervously. As if I didn’t have enough to be nervous about today. The ring I’d had made for Clarissa sat heavily in my pocket, and the words I’d been practicing all day ran around in my head and got incredibly jumbled. Now I had a wax-sealed missive from a king. It felt like getting sent to the principal’s office, although I had no idea what I could have done wrong.
I slid my finger under the seal and cracked it for the second time. The envelope was made from a heavy card stock and so was the folded, handwritten letter inside.
I skimmed the letter, just to check I wasn’t being sued or scolded or…I didn’t know what else. I just needed to know I wasn’t in trouble for something. But when I got to the end, I had to go back to the top and start reading again because I couldn’t actually believe what I’d just read.
“I don’t understand,” I said, looking up at my mother after reading the letter a second time.
My mother vibrated in her chair, barely able to keep still. This was exactly the type of thing she craved. She took her place in society very seriously and for the king to reach out and request my presence as part of his court was just the thing she needed to climb another rung on society’s ladder.
“The king needs you,” she said, clapping her hands.
I didn’t know about that, but the request intrigued me. King Christophe was asking me to travel to Kalopsia and consider taking up a position in his royal court.
“Why me?” I asked. “Why not you and Father?”
Mother shrugged. “I suppose he wants to start fresh, surround himself with people his own age.”
I could tell she was a little miffed that she and Father were not being asked to return, but having a son in the royal court was the next best thing. Besides, why would she want to give up the luxury she lived in to go back to an island that had suffered under the regime of a greedy and fiscally irresponsible usurper? Kalopsia was not the jewel it used to be, and my parents liked the finer things in life. Not to mention, my parents had fled, abandoning the former-king to his fate. It was a surprise the new king wanted anything to do with any of us.
“Of course you’ll go, and you will take Clarissa with you.”
“What?”
“You can’t go to Kalopsia without a wife,” Mother said. “And you are planning to ask Clarissa to marry you, aren’t you?”
I didn’t know how my mother knew I was planning to propose to my long-term girlfriend, but I’d given up trying to figure out how my mother knew any of the things she did.
“So, you ask Clarissa to marry you and then tell her she will be a markissia.”
Markissia, the Kalopsian title for marchioness, which would make me a marquess, or markissios.
Oh god. I couldn’t breathe. I tugged at my tie and my collar. Meanwhile, my mother continued to prattle on about god-knew what. I was about to pass out and all my mother cared about was ensuring I had enough tailored suits to take with me because, in her words, ‘there is no way Kalopsia had any decent tailors left.’
I wiped my hands on my pants and took a breath before knocking on my sister’s office door.
“Come,” she said from inside.
I’d already gotten past her gatekeeper and been announced via the intercom, but no one, and I did mean no one, entered Euphemia Andino’s domain without knocking first.
I straightened my glasses and opened the door, closing it behind me and crossing the office quickly.
“Do you have those numbers for me?” she asked without looking up from her computer screen.
“I emailed them to you five minutes ago,” I replied, not taking a seat until she bid me to.
“There must be a lag,” Effie said, clicking around her screen and looking for the reports I’d sent her.
I waited silently, my hands behind my back. I tried not to fidget or shuffle my feet, Effie hated that. She said it was a sign of weakness, and Effie hated weakness of any kind. Instead, I stared out the wall of windows behind Effie that showcased downtown Boston in all its glory. The office took up the entire top floor of the brand new One Congress building at Bulfinch Crossing. Effie lived in one of the penthouses in an adjacent building in the same precinct and had offered me one as well, but I found living at home easier. The family estate in Newton was large enough that I had my own wing but still had the convenience of a cook and cleaner and all the amenities paid for. Not that I was lacking finances, I just preferred not to spend them when I could get the same thing for free.
Effie was the spitting image of our mother, if a little more severe. It was the expression she wore almost constantly that gave her the severe look. If my sister ever really let go and smiled, she would be absolutely gorgeous. She was three years younger than me, but she was the CEO of the family business. Father handed her the reins almost the same day she graduated with her MBA. I’d been working in the finance department of the company for a year by then, but there was never any question that the CEO position would go to Effie. I didn’t even hold the CFO position, which suited me just fine. I liked numbers and data sets and not being responsible for the financial well-being of the company our parents had built.
“Good,” Effie mumbled, scrolling her way through the numbers on the screen. “These are good, much better than I expected.”
She sighed and leaned back in her chair, the slightest upturn of a smile on her lips as she finally looked at me.
“Sit,” she said, and I did. “So, what have you decided?”
I didn’t need to tell Effie why I was in her office. Mother would have already filled my sister in on the letter and summons from the king.
“I’m proposing to Clarissa tonight,” I said.
“I knew that,” she replied with a grimace.
Effie didn’t particularly like Clarissa, but she would never forbid me to marry her. She would make her displeasure known in other ways, although she would never aim her digs at me. Effie treated me as if she were the older sibling, doting on me when we were younger and acted as my protector through the harrowing years of high school bullying.
No, Effie wouldn’t make any disparaging remarks about Clarissa to me or make me feel stupid for wanting to marry her. She would, however, make life uncomfortable for Clarissa, or at least she had in the past. I didn’t know—but I hoped—that would change once Clarissa and I were married.