“Mmm. Better. Where are the girls? I wanted to see them, too.”
“Out and about. In the gardens, I think.” In the hustle and come-and-go of preparations, Azalea had lost track of them. They hadn’t even come to see her in her ballgown. Mrs. Graybe and one of the maids had had to help her dress in the kitchen, tightening her stays while she traced her toes on the wood floor, impatient.
“Oh,” said Mother. “Well. If they are having a jolly Christmas Eve, then…I’m glad for it. Ah, but look at you! Princess Royale! You look a picture print! The green makes your eyes pop. I knew it would.”
Azalea caught her reflection in the glowering tea set. Auburn ringlets framed her face, and her tightly strung corset flushed her cheeks. From shoulder to waist she wore a silver sash. She looked regal, and nothing like herself.
“Everyone says I look like you,” said Azalea shyly.
“You lucky thing! Do a Schleswig curtsy.”
Azalea’s feet took over and she dipped into a curtsy before her mind fully realized it. It flowed from the balls of her feet to her fingertips in one rippled movement and a rustle of skirts. She disappeared into a poof of crinolines.
“Masterful!” Mother laughed. “You’re better than me! Up, up, up. Very good! Ladies’ cloaks, in the library, gentlemen’s hats—”
“In the entrance hall. Yes, I remember.” Azalea stood and smoothed her skirts.
“Brilliant. The gentlemen will be mad for you. Dance with every single one and find which one you like best. We can’t let parliament do all the choosing.”
Azalea’s toes curled in her dance slippers.
She hated the sick, milk-turning feeling that came when she thought of her future gentleman. She pictured it as a sort of ball, one that lasted a lifetime, in which parliament chose her dance partner. And she didn’t know if he would be a considerate dancer, one who led her through tight turns with ease, or if he would lurch through the steps. Or worse, if he was the sort of partner who would force her through the movements and scoff at her when she stumbled at his hand. Azalea tried to swallow the feeling away.
“I wish you could come,” she said.
“Your father will be there.”
“That’s not the same.” Azalea leaned down and kissed Mother, inhaling the sweet smell of white cake and baby ointment. “I’ll miss you.”
“Azalea,” said Mother, reaching out to place her hand on Azalea’s shoulder. “Before you go. Kneel down.”
Azalea did, a little surprised. Her skirts poofed about her. Poof.
From the end-table drawer, Mother produced her handkerchief, a folded square of silver. Silver was the color of the royal family. The embroidered letters B.E.W. glimmered in the soft light. Mother took Azalea’s hands and pressed them over it.
Azalea gasped. Mother’s hands were ice.
“It’s your sisters,” said Mother. “You’ve done so well to watch out for them, these months I’ve been ill. You’ll always take care of them, won’t you?”
“Is something wrong?”
“Promise me.”
“Of…course,” said Azalea. “You know I will.”
The moment the words escaped her lips, a wave of cold prickles washed over her. They tingled down her back, through her veins to her fingertips and toes, flooding her with a cold rain shower of goose prickles. The unfamiliar sensation made Azalea draw a sharp breath.
“Mother—”
“I want you to keep the handkerchief,” said Mother. “It’s yours now. A lady always needs a handkerchief.”
Azalea kept Mother’s cold hands between her own, trying to warm them. Mother laughed, a tired, worn laugh that bubbled nonetheless, and she leaned forward and kissed Azalea’s fingers.
Her lips, white from pressing against Azalea, slowly turned to red again.
“Good luck,” she said.
The King did not look up from his paperwork when Azalea rushed into the library. Two flights of stairs in massive silk skirts had left her breathless, and she swallowed the air in tiny gasps.
“Miss Azalea,” he said, dipping his pen into the inkwell. “We have rules in this household, do we not?”
“Yes, sir, I know—”
“Rule number eight, section one, Miss Azalea.”
“Sir—”
The King looked up. He had a way of frowning that froze the air and made it crack like ice.
Azalea clenched her fists and bit back a sharp retort. Two years! Nearly two years she had run the household while Mother was ill, and he still made her knock! She strode out of the library, slid the door shut with a snap, counted to two, and knocked smartly.
“Yes, you may come in,” came the King’s voice.
Azalea gritted her teeth.
The King was already dressed for the ball, fine in formal reds and silvers. His military uniform had meticulously straight rows of buttons and medals, and he wore a silver sash across his chest to his waist, like Azalea. As he sorted through papers, Azalea caught words like “treaty” and “regiments” and “skirmish.” As Captain General, he would be leaving, along with the cavalry regiments, to help a neighboring country’s war in just a few short weeks. Azalea did not like to think about it.
“That is well enough,” he said when Azalea stood before his desk. “One cannot run the country without laws; one cannot manage a household without rules. It is so.”
“Sir,” said Azalea. “It’s Mother.”