Love Tested (A Short Story)

Carnations of red, orange, and pink bloomed on the outskirts of the gardens surrounding the castle, the smell filling the air and turning the season from winter to spring. From the window, I saw Prince Jamie riding through the meadows on his brown stallion, while inside I got dressed by the handmaiden before our meet.

“He is so charming,” Isla admired, tightening the corset strings behind my back. It knocked the breath out of me. “Is he as pleasant as he is handsome?”

I’d only met the prince a couple times. He was handsome, with his rich dark tone and deep eyes. He always looked so clean, his beard neatly trimmed and his hair always out of his eyes. Jamie was also sweet, the kindest soul. Always extending a hand, always ready to defend. Sometimes it was the best quality about him. Sometimes the worst.

“He certainly has an allure about him.” I was surprised that my own voice did not waver. My hands had begun to tremble when I had seen him outside in the meadows, and not because he left me weak.

There was a delicate knock on the wooden door that led to the passage past my bedroom, a knock I had become accustomed to. A small smile broke my face, and I was glad for a moment that Isla was behind me instead of in front of me. “Enter.” The large door swung open, and the smell of carnations wafted quickly into the open space of my bedroom as Sir Thomas entered it. His uniform, always the same silver and green, shone in the sunlight, as did his sandy hair and soft blue eyes. He smiled in greeting, meeting Isla’s eyes but not my own. Not while there was company. Not when a prince was waiting for me.

“Prince Jamie beckons for you, Lady Isabelle.” His voice, normally stern and powerful, wavered at the sentence. I felt myself freeze at the words, though I knew them to be true. Isla tugged more behind me, this time to weave my auburn hair into a braid down my back, and I felt the air being pushed out my lungs at each tug.

“Is it cold today, Sir Thomas?” Will you warm my heart the way you did in the dead of winter?

“There is a chill in the air, but I feel as though my lady is protected enough to withstand it.” I am the only warmth you shall ever need.

Isla finished the braid and turned me around to pinch my cheeks, then smiled. “You look stunning. He is going to feel the same.” I hope not. I smiled back at her weakly and turned to exit the door. Thomas followed by my side; his strides as slow as mine. Our breathing matched as we walked down the long golden corridors of the castle. Ornaments of silver and green hung from the ceiling and around the portraits that hung on the walls, the suns glow illuminating through the large windows of the castle. Footsteps echoed all around us, some far away and some close by.

“I’ve missed you Izza,” Thomas whispered, his head down and lips barely moving. “I’ve missed you so much it hurts.”

Thomas and I rounded the corner, and I saw the entrance to the outside in front of us, a massive wooden door with delicate carvings through it. My stomach twisted as the door got closer, and I inched my fingers closer to Tommy’s.

He reached back and our fingers brushed. Such a simple touch, yet my world ignited at the contact.

Too soon after, he retreated back, and the powerful force of energy surrounding us beckoned down to a simmer as the doors of exit reached closer. My heart hammered in its chamber, and I had the sneaky feeling that Tommy’s heart rang just as fast, if not faster. I hoped for faster.

He opened the door to the outside world, and before it sat Prince Jamie on a small white column that overlooked the gardens. Up close, he looked impeccable in his white tailored suit, the lapels covered in a rich purple and his shoes a deep brown. Not a single spot of dirt rested upon him, even though I suspected he had been riding for a good portion of the morning. He stood up quickly to greet me, bowing before me with one hand behind his back and the other outstretched in front of him. After bowing my head back to greet him, he stood straight and revealed the hand behind his back with a pink carnation, extending it to me.

“It is hard to capture beauty, but I feel as though this flower tries its hardest,” Prince Jamie proclaimed, placing the flower in my hand. “Much like you, Lady Isabelle.” I smiled, because I had too, and focused on the princes gleaming white because I didn’t want to focus on his words. Everyone had told me he had charm, that I was lucky and brilliant for catching his eye, but every word he said never matched up to what I had been told by another. Nothing ever would.

Behind me, out of the corner of my eye, I caught Tommy ridged as I accepted the flower. My mind flashed to the countless times I saw a daisy on my pillow, or a single red rose on top of my vanity. How such a simple action proclaimed love far stronger than the love Prince Jamie had for my beauty. Tommy had always made me swoon far easier than any suitor my father picked out, since the age of 12. Now at 18, it was time for me to grow up, as my father said. Prince Jamie was also fond of the idea of growing up.

“Shall we take a walk amongst the meadows?” The prince suggested.

Later, after the walk in the meadows, I came back to an empty room with lakes of salt across my cheeks. My hands, normally steady and strong, were trembling. I pushed the strands of loose red locks out of my face, and turned to the mirror to see that the red streaks that covered my face was not hair. Sobbing, I buckled and cradled my knees in my arms as the world came crashing down around me. Commotion rang throughout the castle, but I had no idea if it was normal or not. The door to my room flung open, and there he was, covered in the same red streaks as my face, yet his hands and fingers were the bloodiest of him. I wondered if anyone had seen him walk the halls of the castle, knowing exactly where to go until he hit my room. I wondered if he was careful or if he didn’t care. I wondered what he was going to do to me.

He didn’t say a word as he bent down to me, grabbing my face in his hands as he did out in the meadows, only this time the dried blood scraped my cheeks like claws instead of soothing me like his touch used to. He pushed back the unruly hair that snuck out of my braid and smoothed it down my back in slow rhythmic caresses. Once, the touch would’ve been something I craved, but now, when Tommy touched me, every fiber of me burned.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, his voice hoarse and burning like his touch. “I’m sorry you saw that.”

Sir Thomas had walked with Prince Jamie and I, careful to make his presence unknown to the prince and known to me. He had smiled at me every time the prince hadn’t, his blue eyes catching the sunlight and shining brightly at me every time he caught my eye. Feather soft touches along my back when Jamie had walked in front of us, or when the prince had turned to catch a flower between his fingers. Everything had been light and on edge all at the same time, every touch magnetic and full of everything. It was almost like Prince Jamie hadn’t been there, except when he bent down to one knee and took out a tiny box and started speaking all these words that meant nothing to me. Then, all of a sudden, his mouth had stilled, because his head was off his shoulders.

“You didn’t just kill him,” I whispered back, my voice equally hoarse as the image of a beheaded Prince Jamie hurtled through my mind, burning me. “You mutilated him.” Images flashed brighter at the thought, images of Jamie’s head on the ground, of his chest that was once white and then crimson as Tommy had obliterated it. He hadn’t stopped stabbing him, again and again until the entirety of Jamie had been red and the entirety of us had been equally so. I’d sobbed, and he’d killed. I’d begged, and he’d killed. And when he had stopped, he grabbed my face between his hands and kissed me so fiercely that I tasted iron in my mouth.

“His body is still out there, Izza. I was worried about you; I didn’t have enough time to bury it.” Tommy looked me in the eyes, and I could’ve sworn I saw blood swimming in the blue of his. His hair, usually neat and soft, was now unruly and caked in blood as I ran my hands through it. He reveled in the touch, letting out a soft breath and sinking into me, seeking comfort amongst the chaos. Hands still trembling, I picked out the clumps of Jamie’s blood out of the hair of the man who killed him.

“Isla could come in at any moment”, I suddenly realized, yet I made no move to get off the floor. “She wouldn’t keep your secrets as well as I do.”

“That’s why I love you, Isabelle. You take the world on your shoulders and ask if there’s anything else you could hold for me.” Tommy began to sit up, pulling me into his lap and capturing my lips into another burning kiss. “How did I get so lucky?”

I wondered the same as he picked me up and carried me to the basin in the adjacent bathroom, grabbing a wet towel and rubbing my face with it until I was clean. I wondered how long I could do this for, how many times we would go through the same cycle over and over again until it became too much to bear. He stripped me of my corset and skirts and began to wash me until my body went from red to white and I wondered if, underneath my skin, the scars of blood would remain until I was old and tired.

“There’s no point in being clean,” I finally managed to say after he was done. He looked up at me, and the look almost burned a hole in me. His hands that were under the water the most still looked red to me. “Are we burying him with the others?”