Work Text:
Ghyslaine could feel the stares all around her.
And who could blame them? Among the men of every handsome shape and winsome size, her awkward, muscular woman's frame stuck out. Her sisters' words still echoed in her ears, instructing her to straighten her back, muster her kindest smile, speak as flatteringly as she was able (not very, unfortunately), keep her face and hands clean and neat. Be someone worth liking, someone worth trusting. Someone worth keeping. If she was to be wasted as an insult, her marriage prospects (however minuscule) destroyed with this gesture, she would be the most well-liked insult ever offered. Perhaps the princess would still take a liking to her, would invite her to stay as a lady-in-waiting or some dowager's companion. Edwige had said that this would be the best course.
"It's unfair of Father to volunteer you like this," she'd muttered, fussing with Ghyslaine's tight braids, adjusting her sash even though it would inevitably come out of its pretty, complicated knot during the journey. "Sending a woman in a man's place! You haven't even visited the matchmaker yet! How could the princess ever choose you?"
This was the one thing that all agreed on, from the province council of which Father was a member on down to the most ignorant servant. The proclamation asked for the suitor whom each province felt best represented them. Whether or not Ghyslaine truly represented the province was immaterial, despite her rough hands from carving wood, the persistent smell from minding various livestock. For 'suitor', the proclamation meant a man. So Ghyslaine felt no sting from her sister's words.
Sixtine, in contrast, had not fussed. From the moment Father had declared Ghyslaine the chosen suitor, Sixtine had folded her hands and refused to touch their youngest sister. This was not to say Sixtine had done nothing: there were many hours in which she had closed his office door behind her and muffled shouting had come, which Edwige's twins had eavesdropped on but Ghyslaine made them not describe to her. It was as if one hand clasped the other to keep from reaching out, holding Ghyslaine, not letting go. Sixtine had accepted the goodbye kiss Ghyslaine gave to each of the family, but cast her head down, refusing the last sight of Ghyslaine. As if being blind to the carriage taking away the sister she had so often rocked to sleep would make it so it wasn't happening.
So now Ghyslaine stood in a small crowd of strange men. She had not been the first to arrive, but she had arrived early, and so she had been spotted early. There were hours and hours for gossip to ferment. From the guardsmen who had stared when her royal escort identified her as Giolurett's suitor, to the steward who'd frowned when she stepped into the hall, to the other suitors who stole glances or appraised her openly, there was no doubt that the insult Giolurett intended came loud and clear. There had been dissent, over the years, from Giolurett and some of the surrounding provinces, but never had it been made so shockingly unignorable.
She only recognised one other suitor, the son of a council member in the neighboring province, and he did not deign to acknowledge her. Before this, he would have been a potential husband. The matchmaker would not accept either of them now. Courtship and marriage were complex. The royal demand for suitors bypassed courtship entirely and went straight to the marriage offer, and once an offer was rejected, matchmakers never wanted a second try. Certainly people had married without the help of matchmaking, or even remarried after finding the initial experience unsatisfactory, but the stigma still remained.
The servants lingered in front of her when it came time to serve luncheon, naturally curious about the outlier. She forced herself to smile, thanking them with each course and occasionally asking what the dish being served was. If she hoped to stay, these would be the people she would be living in the same castle with, and if she couldn't be liked right away, she could at least give as few reasons as possible to be disliked.
To her surprise, this seemed to work on the men seated around her as well. They were cagey about each other, unwilling to give much away, but to her they spoke warmly, charmingly. Soon the understanding came that they saw her as no threat, and instead someone to practice their smiles and words on, or better yet, someone who could vouch for them to the princess. And, well, it wasn't so bad an idea. One of them might become the prince consort, might recommend her to the princess. She had never had subtlety, so she did not try, but merely nodded at them and listened to their anecdotes and stored up their names, their faces, the way they behaved to the servants. It was the same kind of thing Sixtine had told her when she was still hanging on one or another sister's apron strings: "You'll know the measure of men by the way they speak to the poorest beggar better than the finest knight. For who knows how the wheel of fate turns? Someday you or I could sit by the road and beg for scraps, and that beggar could be the one on horseback."
One man was near as old as her father, and another with a bare dusting of hair on his chin to mark his age. They were accomplished in one way or another, this one a calligrapher, that one a cartographer. A mayor, a jeweller, a scholar, a judge. There were barely any who farmed as she did, and they owned more than they worked, gardening or riding more than she. Ghyslaine tried to push her thoughts of inferiority aside, since there should be no reason to compare herself to them, but it was very hard.
None of them were carvers. If the princess were to choose her husband blindly, Ghyslaine could very well submit herself as 'carver' instead of 'woman'. It was an absurdity, but it made her smile, even if it meant the man sitting across from her thought his poor jest had landed well.
At long last the royal family entered, the king and queen arm in arm, the crown prince with his wife on his arm and his child trailing behind, and finally the princess. Each was dressed in finer clothes than Ghyslaine had ever seen in her life, but it was undeniable that the princess outshone her family. She had her mother's foreign skin, lush and warm, and the royal family's stark grey eyes, so light they seemed white. Ghyslaine stared, but everyone was staring. This was certainly the first time many of them had seen any of their rulers, for the royal brood travelled very seldom. She was aware, distantly, of the silence around her, the diminuendo of clinking cutlery or the uncouth chewing or chatter of the men.
The royal family, it was widely known, rarely ate meals with others around. Having entered now, they had finished their luncheon already, and would sit and watch the guests and drink sweet wine. The king and queen sat upon thrones on the central dais, the prince and his wife and child on the lower dais next to the king, and the princess on the lower dais on the queen's side. There was a throne left empty beside her, obviously for her future consort. The steward stepped lightly up and began speaking in low tones to the king and queen. The prince and princess turned their heads to listen, and to follow his gestures. He was obviously indicating the suitors; Ghyslaine could see that the men facing her now were wishing that they had chosen to sit opposite, so they could watch the royal family and so the princess could see their faces.
Those facing the royal family all knew when Ghyslaine was spotted. The king reacted first, frowning at her unmasculinity, the tight black braids draped over her shoulders. The gesture he made to the steward was clear, the words he spoke too faint to make out across the hall but their tone all too distinct. The queen and her children, the prince's wife and her child, one and all turned to look at her, with varying low tones of surprise and amusement. Ghyslaine did her best to act as if she was simply chatting to her partner, though she suspected she presented little more than a gaping fish or a stiff mannequin depending on whose turn it was to speak.
She did not dare look at the royal family. She was sure there was rage there, or annoyance at the mildest. A laugh rang out from their direction. A younger voice, not the king or queen, but all the same she felt herself shrinking in her chair. Only a little -- so many years of Edwige's fussing had taught her perfect posture even when she went among the geese -- but enough to feel herself already on the way back home. Perhaps not even in a coach. Perhaps on foot.
Their attention turned from her eventually, an eternity too long for Ghyslaine's liking.
The luncheon went on to the last courses, the royal family looking over the suitors all the while. The king and queen seemed pleased, overall, the prince less attentive where both child and wife demanded his opinion. The princess had set her elbows on either arm of her throne, the better to rest her chin on her interlaced knuckles. Occasionally her nibling would wander over to her and tiptoe in order to whisper some message in her ear; without fail she would listen as if it was the gravest news, and impart some counsel that sent the child back into their mother's lap to whisper to both mother and father. It fair set Ghyslaine longing for her own niblings, and her sisters with them.
At last the princess rose and descended from her throne. The child made to follow her, but was scooped up by the prince before they could get too far. She made one round of each of the long tables the suitors sat at, looking at each one, an inscrutable expression on her face. Men smiled, men preened, men nodded gravely to their prospective bride. Ghyslaine made eye contact with her and tried not to shrink again. The princess's gaze passed over her as it did each suitor, and for that Ghyslaine relaxed. But not too much.
When the princess had rounded each and every table, she returned to the daises. She did not return to her seat, only stood on the central dais with her back to her father and mother, as if she would make some speech. From their expressions, they surely hoped she would not. Her gaze swung from one side of the room to the other, slow and deliberate, examining each suitor again.
She came to some internal decision, and beckoned to Ghyslaine. There was no mistaking which suitor she meant, for she flicked her fingers to dismiss the men rising on either side of Ghyslaine. Ghyslaine hurriedly swallowed her mouthful of wine, stood up without too much of a clatter, and paced the princess on the opposite side of the table to meet her at the door. She could feel her meal threatening to come up. Up close, the princess towered over her, the sort of slender that her sisters used to sigh after when they were approaching matchmaking age. Her smile was slightly ironic, her lovely eyes unreadable, and before Ghyslaine was aware, she laid her graceful fingers on Ghyslaine's arm and swept them out of the hall toward the gardens.
Ghyslaine could catch a distant murmur of discontent behind them, but the doors shut too quickly for her to identify the voice.
"Ghyslaine of Giolurett," the princess mused, looking down at her. "Ghyslaine, the most unexpected of my suitors. How came you to my home, Ghyslaine?"
The sun was bright, and Ghyslaine tried very hard not to squint as she looked up at the princess, shadowed in the light. "Your Highness-"
"Oh, no no," the princess interrupted. "You and I are of an age, are we not? Call me Aignéis."
This was something impossible. Ghyslaine could barely open her mouth, so she nodded quickly. The princess turned briefly to look at a flower bush, and Ghyslaine looked at the line of her cheek, the curl of red-brown hair slipping loose under her ear. No girl at the province fairs looked half so fine in twice more elaborate hairstyles.
She managed to squeak out something that approximated the princess's name, and the princess turned to look at her again, one hand still lifted to a speckled orange flower. She cleared her throat. "I… I was called like the rest. That is, the council thought it best to send me…"
"For what reason? Are there no men in Giolurett? Do you gain their seed, then let them die as the bees do? Or is it that you are so accomplished that no man could measure?" The princess plucked the flower she had reached for, then tucked it in Ghyslaine's hair, not quite behind her ear but perched in a loop of her braids. Ghyslaine found her face heating, from embarrassment or nerves she could not say.
The princess's smile relaxed a little, still like she could be laughing behind her smile, but also as if they shared an amusing secret. She drew her hand down Ghyslaine's arm until they were holding hands. Ghyslaine stared down at their joined hands, her face now fully on fire, and forced herself to look back up into the princess's eyes, her spine stiffening. This was not fear, not nerves. The princess mocked, but it was Ghyslaine's ability that would determine who she mocked. The princess, it seemed, would not address her an insult, so Ghyslaine would not give up ground and name herself an insult.
"It depends on your measure. Any man is taller than I, just as you are. I am stronger than many men, and better with animals besides. It's said that no one carves finer than I do, but I've travelled too little to learn the truth of that." Ghyslaine felt the princess's thumb skim over her fingertips, feeling the calluses and scars there, but she did not waver. However much blood heated her face, she pushed it aside to say her piece. "All the proclamation asked for was one who best represented his province. Whether or not any of them suits you as a husband is a separate measure."
She had surprised the princess, she could tell. When her eyes opened that way, they looked like twin full moons in the sky before sunset.
They walked in silence a short distance, the princess stopping in a circle of sweet-smelling trees to drop onto a finely carved bench of dark wood. She tugged Ghyslaine down beside her with their joined hands, and waited for Ghyslaine to settle her skirts in order, onehandedly, before she spoke. "Have you been to the matchmaker's, Ghyslaine of Giolurett?"
"I… no, your Highness. Aignéis," she hurriedly corrected herself. "Were it not for the proclamation, I should be visiting this autumn. But the call came so early, I'd scarcely even begun to prepare. And the council felt my attention ought to be turned to other things, once they had chosen me." Felt, in Ghyslaine's heart, that there might be no hope of matching her anyway. That they were better off sending an insult to save the matchmaker's otherwise wasted time, than an insult who might yet be a good wife to some fine young man.
"We of royal blood do not seek the services of a matchmaker. That is, after all, why you are here. No single matchmaker can hope to cast a wide enough net to assure the satisfaction of a country." The princess clicked her tongue. "An alliance for the firstborn, and then shoring up from within for the rest. Such trouble. My ladies-in-waiting have married over the years, and they tell me such stories… To be sure, there are duds in every crop, but I had rather sort my prospects myself, than have them sorted first for me."
Ghyslaine digested this, staring down at their joined hands. The princess had the softest hands, long graceful fingers, shapely nails that had never seen a day's work. She would have a husband from the country's finest men. Handsome, clever, talented. And still, just like Ghyslaine, she wanted the chance to choose for herself, really choose and be chosen in turn, instead of this screening process of suitability. Whatever advantage could be gained from a royal marriage for her suitor, the princess wanted to be sure that her husband would want more than just that.
She squeezed the princess's hand suddenly, eliciting a yelp from the royal lips, and snatched it up, clasping it with her other hand, looking up into the princess’ royal eyes. Now the twin moons were wider, startled and perhaps a little puzzled, but Ghyslaine was too excited to care. She had found her place, here and now, in this castle.
"Your Highness. Aignéis. What do you want in a husband?"
"I… I want someone I can love," the princess answered, clearly bewildered now, the closest she seemed thus far to being made of the same stuff as Ghyslaine. It was a lovely thing to see, but Ghyslaine couldn't dwell on it. She barrelled on ahead.
"Don't you see? This is perfect. Your parents would find it unseemly for you to mingle too much with your suitors, but it isn't unseemly for me. If you would tell me what to search for I can at least narrow your search. It needn't be so tedious as you expect!"
The princess stared at her, mouth open.
Of course she was surprised. It was a surprising day in many ways. She had not expected to receive a female suitor, so she could not have expected to have deeper help in her selection. Ghyslaine let her digest this. It was an opportunity to study the princess herself. Ghyslaine was not intimidated any more, nor did she think she would suffer reprisal for the council's choice.
For now, the princess's wish was paramount.
The princess, recovering her poise, pulled her hands gently free, composing herself. Something had shuttered in her face, a closing off, but not to the extent that Ghyslaine began to doubt herself. "That is… quite the offer. It is true, I know very little of my suitors. You as well. You are quite the original creature, Ghyslaine."
Now Ghyslaine's blush was one of pleasure. Perhaps she would feel relief at another time, but the mix of knowing that for now, at least, she would suffer no repercussions, and the princess calling her an 'original creature', was a rather heady and consuming emotion.
It was not an opinion shared by the royal family. If the princess accepted her with ease, the rest of the royal family accepted her with, at best, warmth as a guest but no more partiality than that, as they did every other suitor. Ghyslaine had always known there would be some opposition, and her father had vaguely alluded to the reception she was likely to receive.
"You know only as much as any man on the street would, and no more than that. Even less is it expected of you. Your ignorance will be a guarantee of your innocence." Ghyslaine had not known then what he meant, but she knew now. When the king looked at her, or spoke to her, it was with some pity, but more disdain. Giolurett had taken an unaccomplished girl's future in order to make a point, and the king thought it a point poorly made.
The other suitors, of course, were eager to ingratiate themselves with her. If they were attentive at the first luncheon, it was nothing compared to their amiability in the following days. She was the princess's new confidante, and one word from her could very well assure or injure their chance to become her lady's consort. Even those who had recognised her only as an insult before now spoke sweetly, asked after her comfort, sought to tease out the details of her little time with the princess.
Now that she had a chance to influence the princess's choice, Ghyslaine found that there were, indeed, some men she gravitated to more than others. The scholar, who recognised her ignorance of obscure subjects and carefully altered his conversation to suit. The captain, who was full of stories and eager to share his travails and the treasure he had collected. She stored these up, but tried not to let her own prejudices influence the way she told the princess about them.
***
The princess - though it was becoming easier to think of her as Aignéis - looked at her, with her chin cupped in her hand. "Have you a choice, Ghyslaine? If you had the pick of the men."
Ghyslaine had learned by this time not to drink anything until it seemed Aignéis had completed whatever mildly shocking thing came out of her mouth. She held her cup anyway, drumming her fingers lightly. It wasn't, perhaps, as shocking as usual. They were in the same position, nominally, and naturally Aignéis would consider her own opinion to have greater bearing than others. But it was a little difficult to reset her view. A suitable husband for herself was not the same as a husband who would make Aignéis happy. And practically speaking, there was a good deal more to consider when she had almost no wealth of her own.
"I suppose there are several I could choose by one measure or another-"
"Oh!" Aignéis exclaimed in exasperation. "Must there be so much to consider? I shall not be ruler, nor should I be a ruler in this! What measure can be most important but one's happiness, Ghyslaine?"
Ghyslaine bit her lip. How could she explain? Happiness was no single treasure that once won was kept for eternity. It was gold dust in a pan, shallowly in running water, accreting little by little and meticulously tended so it did not wash away all at once. Each measure added up to a tidy pile that became contentment. No one could be so easily measured by such a nebulous thing.
Aignéis was looking at her still, waiting for an answer.
"Can a man be loved, even if he makes his wife unhappy?" Ghyslaine asked at last, turning her head just enough not to meet the princess's eyes, slanting her gaze up so she watched the princess through her eyelashes. "If he is profligate? Cruel? If he scorns her? Beats her?"
Aignéis pursed her lips, though the way her palm cupped her face turned it into a pout. "Of course. There's many a woman who wastes her love that way. But the fact that she has no one else to give her love to is not her fault. Nor is she obliged to continue loving him."
Ghyslaine looked down at her cup, half-full, undrunk, and back up at the princess. "Yes, you see. Happiness and love do not guarantee each other. Please, Aignéis, I would rather help you choose one whom you can love, or one who you can be happy with. But they are two different things, and if you cannot have both, then choose the one you can live out your life with. And living out one's life with another comprises so many little things."
The princess leaned back in her chair at that, hands laid upon the table, displeasure evident in her face. Ghyslaine would have quaked, but for the way the princess's hands remained on the table, flexing almost into fists and then relaxing again. She put her cup aside and took Aignéis's hands into her own. This startled Aignéis, but her fingers curled over Ghyslaine's at once, and the corner of her lips curled up likewise. "You speak so well of marriage, Ghyslaine. I fear you've lied to me about not meeting the matchmaker, or else had your own escapade without one and now seek to warn me."
Ghyslaine laughed, and turned her hands so that their fingers laced together. Aignéis's hands were very warm. "No, no. I'm the youngest of many, that's all. My sisters all have much to say of their husbands, so I'm filled up with advice, whether it's useful or not. And two of them live with myself and our father and their families, besides, so one knows when there's a falling out or a sweet day. It boils down to so many little things in the end, when one pays attention."
"And here I am with a sister-in-law of my own, and many brides among my ladies-in-waiting," Aignéis mused. "Yet they do not speak of such little things."
"It's probably a bit different when all of us have tended to each other at one time or another," Ghyslaine said tactfully. "Tears or more embarrassing things. And you are their lady, after all."
Aignéis smiled, properly this time, and made circles on Ghyslaine's palm with one thumb. It was ticklish, and rather distracting. "Very true. Fine, then we'll begin with the most courteous ones. Do any come to mind?"
***
The days passed, time enough for the princess to meet and speak with all of her suitors. Still the wedding preparations went on, inexorable, so that the slightest servant knew exactly what their role would be leading up to and on the inevitable day. No less did the suitors feel this, whether he had already exerted his considerable charms upon the princess or yet had plans for how he would win her. Ghyslaine made a point of mingling with the suitors when she could, gravitating to each loose clique, seeking out loners where decorum allowed. All their questions were of the princess, her moods, her likes and dislikes. Ghyslaine had permission to be honest, with the freedom to judge where to stop, and the princess had made a point of allowing her to be free with her own questions.
"They will attempt to elicit some obscure meaning from everything you ask," Aignéis had told her, and several of the older ladies-in-waiting nodded in agreement. "Whether you are collecting answers for my decision or satisfying your own curiosity. So do as you please." And Ghyslaine had, listening to tales of lands she had never visited, marvels she never knew existed. She might return to Giolurett with ten times more questions than she had had answered, but it was a hundred times that which she had only begun to imagine.
She carried these to the princess whenever she was summoned, and made sure to name each man who had told her of it, the better for the princess to choose.
When Ghyslaine knocked to announce her arrival, the princess was sitting at her window and did not turn to greet her. She waved instead to the lady-in-waiting in the opposite seat, who rose and ushered Ghyslaine to the seat she was vacating before leaving. The princess still stared out the window, listless, as they were left alone. An embroidery hoop swung from her hand, the needle loose on thread instead of tucked in.
Ghyslaine waited a heartbeat, two, before leaning across to take the hoop carefully from Aignéis's hand. It came free unresistingly, and as Ghyslaine leaned back, catching the needle and setting it in the fabric, she realised that Aignéis was looking at her. Her hair was tumbling undone, as if she had dragged her fingers through it.
"You might have pricked yourself," Ghyslaine explained, holding the hoop out to her. Aignéis simply pushed it back, her fingers brushing Ghyslaine's knuckles. Her eyes were unreadable, but not, Ghyslaine suspected, because she wanted them to be. The princess was simply so exhausted that no other emotion registered.
Without thinking, Ghyslaine crossed to the other side, beside her. There wasn't really space to sit with her, so Ghyslaine meant to stand with her shoulder against the wall for support, but Aignéis made a dissatisfied noise and shifted aside for her. It remained insufficient for comfort, and her entire side from shoulder to ankle pressed against the princess's in an almost unseemly fashion, but Ghyslaine felt the better for it. She laid the embroidery hoop aside and reached for the princess's hair.
"I fear you are taking liberties again, Ghyslaine," the princess murmured, but she turned her body so that they might both be more comfortable as Ghyslaine tugged her hair ribbons free. She laid them over Aignéis's lap and began combing her hands through her hair herself.
"Have me turned out if I take too much liberty, then," Ghyslaine joked, fingers finding familiar patterns to take advantage of. "But I will do you no harm that I would not do to myself." The princess's head jerked then, and Ghyslaine tugged her hands away hurriedly, fearing that she had pulled too hard, but Aignéis leaned back against her.
"That is a great deal to promise, Ghyslaine of Giolurett." Aignéis picked up the ribbons, folding them over and over in her hands, the kind of restlessness that only exhaustion brought. "There's many a harm one can do to oneself without thinking. What if you broke my heart?"
Ghyslaine's eyebrows knitted, her hands faltering momentarily, and she felt her breath knot in her chest. "How could I, your- Aignéis? I cannot be that important to you, that your heart would break. Nor to the husband you choose, if that's what you mean. I would never do that, never."
"You'd break your heart first and then break mine," Aignéis said, a laugh in her words, bitter and sharp. "So very fair, Ghyslaine."
Ghyslaine stood up at that. Perhaps she would understand Aignéis's spleen later on, but she did not understand it now, and she suspected that staying to puzzle it out would only heighten it.
Aignéis, leaning against her, fell sideways, steadied herself and looked up, her displeasure wiped from her face in favour of confusion. Looking down at her upturned face, Ghyslaine considered she might have been hasty in diagnosing her own presence as an additional catalyst to the princess's mood.
She stayed standing.
"I think I have taken too much liberty, indeed, for you to feel that way," Ghyslaine said, voice as steady as she could manage. "My heart is mine to break, but yours is not. I should be ashamed to break it."
You should be ashamed of giving me the freedom to break it, she did not say.
Again those twin moons, that surprise, how unused the princess was to her small defiances. Aignéis sat up straight again, folding her hands in her lap, and Ghyslaine, finding no further unhappiness for the moment, settled on the opposite seat again. This time it was she who looked out the window, waiting for the princess to break the silence. It was a beautiful view, gardens and the silver ribbon of the distant river, but just on the edge of where the angle was too steep to see below without sticking one's head out, there was movement that she soon recognised as some of her fellow suitors sparring. The soldiers, whose training ground it seemed to be, were watching with a great deal of excitement.
She felt the princess take her hand again, and then a soft pressure on her knuckles. The princess had bent over her hand to kiss it.
Heat flooded Ghyslaine’s face, and it took every bone in her body to stay still. The princess looked up though her lashes, lips still to Ghyslaine's knuckle. "I've been unkind, and you've been wounded. Indeed, I presume too much of your loyalty."
Ghyslaine looked down at the princess, and wondered. Would this be a constant in the princess's life thereafter, this pain that could not be easily shared? The women around the princess had known her from childhood, some her mother's age, some of her own age. Yet Ghyslaine's provincial stumbles seemed not to be something that the princess scorned, or even looked down upon. Somehow, Ghyslaine thought, her naivety in the behaviour demanded of the castle residents was something the princess opened up to.
"I've had barely any time to build that loyalty," Ghyslaine told her, low and soft, gently taking her hand back from the princess, pushing with her other hand for the princess to sit back up. "Nor have you had enough time to build trust in me. That's all."
Aignéis met her eyes now, contrition breaking through her exhaustion. "Yes, of course. There will be time enough for us both to do that." She picked up the ribbons from her lap and held them out. "You had barely begun. Will you continue?"
"I… yes, certainly. Aignéis."
Ghyslaine was silent, concentrating on Aignéis's hair. It sufficed as a distraction from the question she was braving herself to ask, and the warmth of the princess's body arranged so that they both were squeezed on the same seat again.
They sat like that, too close and too quiet, no other communication than Ghyslaine occasionally patting the princess's forearm as an indication to pass her another ribbon. The princess's hair curled so fine and so gentle that the ribbons acted more as decoration than security, and idly, Ghyslaine imagined mornings a little like this, attending to Aignéis, moon eyes and smile and all.
Was this one of Aignéis's specks of gold dust, or was it one for Ghyslaine's pan?
Ghyslaine was just tucking one of Aignéis's ribbons in when Aignéis spoke. She did not turn, but leaned closer to Ghyslaine so that her soft skin met Ghyslaine's collar where her neckline left her bare, a physical warmth that was almost a lightning bolt. "Would you stay, Ghyslaine? I didn't ask, just now, and it occurs to me that it is a poor way to gain your trust by simply presuming."
Ghyslaine paused, studying what she could see of the princess's profile, then finished tucking the ribbon in. Though Aignéis's hair was still partly loose, she let it be, and instead put her arm carefully around the princess, in order not to startle her.
The princess was startled anyway. There was a moment as the side of her head met Ghyslaine's forehead quite hard, and they spent a few minutes tending to each other and assuring that it was no more than a brief pain. But when done, Aignéis took Ghyslaine's arm, put it around herself as before, and arranged it so they were closer than ever, cheek to cheek, almost sharing breath.
"Don't apologise for being presumptuous," Aignéis told her, forestalling the instinctive answer. This close, Ghyslaine could feel the words forming, even her lips almost moving. She felt her face aflame, for so many reasons, so she nodded, just a little to acknowledge Aignéis's words. This instinctive embrace was not like comforting a sister or one of their children. Her heart beat too fast for that.
"I will stay as long as you want me to, Aignéis," she murmured, feeling the sweep of Aignéis's lashes on her cheek, Aignéis's exhale and the release of tension in her body. She turned her head just enough for her lips to brush Aignéis's cheek, then sat back just a little, so that she had enough space to finish her work.
***
Every suitor had come with their own wedding attire. Ghyslaine was no different; Edwige had determined that, if Ghyslaine attended the wedding with a leaden tongue, she would at least look agreeable. Thus Ghyslaine's wedding outfit was the best of the small wardrobe she had packed, and the braids she wore now had been practiced until her fingers were sore. The jewelled comb in her hair was the single concession Sixtine had worn their father down to, the finest of their mother's dowry. The other suitors nodded to her as she took her place, all charming smiles or triumphant solemnity. Some made mention of how lovely she looked; others cajoled or demanded outright her knowledge of the princess's choice. Ghyslaine demurred as best she could, politeness winning out over any discomfort over their aggression. It helped that other suitors corrected or reprimanded them.
Whoever Aignéis chose, Ghyslaine thought, one of the remaining might propose to her. It was a foolish, idle thought, that having lost his chance at a royal wife, one might turn instead to the princess’s newest companion, with little more of worth than the princess's ear.
It was of no consequence. Ghyslaine could serve very well as a lady-in-waiting unmarried.
In the hall, all was ready, every guest in their place, suitors and nobility. The thrones on their daises sat empty. They waited only on the entrance of the royal family, and the princess's announcement of her choice.
She looked around her at the men, lingering on a handful she thought was on Aignéis's shortlist. Jewels, impeccable grooming, exotic scents. Others plain as a stream-washed boulder, their clothes sparing of feature or colour, but of silk and exquisite stitching for all that deliberate austerity. Thoughtful, sober, witty, charming, all qualities Ghyslaine supposed the royal family should embody in one capacity or another, all virtues that the princess appeared to admire. All of them she either liked or thought she would get along with as her lady's husband.
She had not planned to be selfish, but Aignéis had asked.
The chatter of the crowd diminished again, and Ghyslaine turned with every other suitor to watch the royal family proceed into the hall. As always, the king and queen entered first, and the princess followed after her brother and his family. Ghyslaine had been privileged to see the dress when she met the princess leaving the tailors' chambers, but it was another thing entirely to see the princess wear it. She seemed almost to glow in it, the arrangements of lace and silk framing her like a cloudy night sky. Ghyslaine gasped, and heard the hall gasp with her.
The princess wore her unreadable smile again, the corners tucked away so that one was not quite sure if she was indeed smiling. Certainly she was not frowning. But seeing her there, Ghyslaine wondered if she was doubting her choice. Ghyslaine had not dared ask, and from the several ladies' questions it was apparent that none of them knew either. The princess had chosen to keep her own counsel.
The prince and his wife and daughter sat upon their thrones, while the king and queen stood on the central dais with the princess between them. Ghyslaine hardly paid attention to the words being spoken. The princess did not move an inch, but her eyes scanned the crowd until she met Ghyslaine's eyes, and then, just barely, her mouth firmed.
Ghyslaine managed the most encouraging smile that she could. She wanted to mouth something, but she didn't know what to say, or even if Aignéis would be able to make anything out from this distance. But she dipped her head just a little, and Aignéis's mouth curved then, just the barest hint of a true smile.
"So you do know who she'll choose," whispered the suitor to her left. Though he'd remonstrated with those who'd pressed her, he too was not immune to curiosity. Ghyslaine liked him, his stories and his joviality. If he became consort, she thought the princess would laugh all the day, as she had often done when his turn came with her. It was laughter that came swiftly and left even swifter, with little remaining of its presence. Perhaps the assurance of its remaining would ensconce it there in the princess's heart.
"I truly don't," Ghyslaine whispered back. She knew who the prince wanted his sister to choose, and who the prince's wife wanted her sister-in-law to choose, and each lady-in-waiting's choice for their princess's husband, but Aignéis herself had kept quite mum. Ghyslaine could not even begin to guess, save for those she had picked herself, and even then she was faintly certain that there was some objection or other that Aignéis had.
Not that there was anything particularly unique about that to royalty. But the net drawn tight around her range of choice grated very hard on the princess.
The king was coming to the end of his speech, and turned to his daughter. "Whom have you chosen?"
And Aignéis looked out at the crowd and said, "Ghyslaine of Giolurett."
Ghyslaine could feel her blood pounding, even down to her fingertips. There were others at the table, but it seemed as if she was alone, staring into those twin full moons. Aignéis's pale eyes, fixed steadily on her. There was sound, around her, but it was far away. She was aware of someone shouting, a clatter that might be furniture or broken porcelain.
Had she misheard? Had Aignéis meant something else? That Ghyslaine was chosen for some other purpose. To be a companion, one of her ladies-in-waiting. She would announce her real choice soon. The man who would stand by her side all her life. The man who represented the best of his province. Not Ghyslaine with her callused hands and difficult hair and unwillowy frame. Not Ghyslaine, who was not a man at all.
"Come, Ghyslaine," Aignéis said, a sweet but nevertheless commanding voice that pierced through the fuss and din. She held her hand out in Ghyslaine's direction. "We've much to do this day. Didn't you hear me? I want you by my side. Don't keep me waiting."
It felt like the first day all over again. Ghyslaine found herself, somehow, getting to her feet, crossing the hall to the princess and her parents. She dared not look to her left, to her right. Not even to Aignéis's right or left. She did not think she could bear any other expression than the regal eyes, the carefully ironic smile, aimed directly at her.
As she mounted the dais, she straightened her back, almost unconscious but for Edwige's oft-repeated words in her ears. Aignéis was holding out her hand.
Ghyslaine would not describe the moment as a fog, exactly, but it felt as if one lifted as she took the princess's soft hand, turned to face the crowd. Their roar -- was it confusion? Disgust? Approval? -- hit her like the north wind, physical, making her knees buckle.
Aignéis squeezed her hand, hard, and Ghyslaine managed to remain upright. She snuck a glance up at the woman by her side, and found her already looking back. That smile, no longer ironic, those moons, crescents of joy that she could not help reflecting. Her heart beat in her fingertips, and she thought she could feel Aignéis's heartbeat too.
All this while the royal family stood speechless.
If Ghyslaine had been a hapless victim of her province in the king's eyes when she first arrived, she was no longer anything of the sort. From a veiled insult to- to- she didn't know what she was now, but she was certainly nothing as harmless to him.
"What is this, daughter?" asked the king, his voice tight with anger. Ghyslaine did not dare look at the others of the royal family. She did not know if she wanted to.
Aignéis met her father's gaze, calmly, but Ghyslaine could feel the tension in the way she gripped her hand. "I was offered a choice. I chose from those I was offered. Is it any more complex than that?"
It was, Ghyslaine couldn't help thinking. It was so much more complex than this.
His daughter giving up no ground, the king turned his fury to her would-be wife. "You, Giolurett's chosen. Giolurett's suitor. You've instigated this - convinced my child of some erroneous logic that you and yours mean to ruin this kingdom with. What madness do you think you can accomplish with this? What-"
The queen moved from the opposite side of her daughter to rest a hand on her husband's shoulder, and he cut himself off to look at her. She spoke, and her voice carried through the hall. "Our daughter has made her choice, and Giolurett's suitor is the choice she has made. I trust that she has made the best choice of spouse for herself, and for the good of our country."
"For the good of our--!"
Up close it was possible to see the queen's fingers tighten on her husband's shoulder.
Ghyslaine spoke before her thought was fully formed, the better to be heard while the king was still sputtering. "Giolurett does not ask favouritism of you, your Majesty. If there is ill, let this marriage be a step towards a better understanding. The-" she faltered here, unsure of where she was heading, keenly aware of the attention of every single person in the hall.
"The unity of our country is assured with this," Aignéis cut in smoothly, giving Ghyslaine's hand a reassuring squeeze. "Father, I have studied our genealogy well - Ghyslaine will be the first suitor from the northern provinces to enter our lineage. There is no greater action to be taken to prove the crown's willingness to assure a harmony of our people."
Ghyslaine bit down the impulse to point out the several other northerners among the suitors present.
The rustling on her other side was the only alert she had of the prince stepping up to the central dais, putting his hand on her shoulder. She looked up at him, startled, and he smiled down at her as he spoke. "Indeed, my sister has chosen wisely. Let you and I be remembered like this, father- that we are unlike those who came before us." That I will rule after you, and it would be really nice if we used this very interesting opportunity that our Aignéis has seized upon instead of alienating every side, Ghyslaine filled in.
The crowd was becoming restless, equally stirred by the unexpected choice and the implications thereof. The queen on one side of the king, the princess on the other, Ghyslaine beside her, the prince beside Ghyslaine, all could not ignore them, the intensity of their attention, the murmuring emerging. For all that the king was blustering, there was no immediate way out. To force his daughter to choose another would cause disharmony with both daughter and son, a more immediate problem compounded with his wife's own choosing of them. To reject a wedding entirely would open a door for greater dissent with Giolurett and its neighbouring provinces, however unconventional the reason. And not only that, but with the audience before them, whichever he chose would be spread to all corners of the kingdom within days.
The king looked at his family, then at his subjects, and nodded. "Very well, daughter. If this will make you happy. Giolurett's suitor will be your… your spouse."
Ghyslaine felt Aignéis's trembling relief as the tension left her, but almost immediately they were parted.
The princess's wedding had always been planned with an unknown bridegroom. The words were simple, the directions easy to follow. The bulk of the ceremony was conducted by the high priestesses, with the initiates guiding each of the couple. In every circumstance, the wedding would have as few and as low bumps as could be.
Still, several of the participants hesitated as they guided Ghyslaine to her place. Not enough to stop the ceremony, but enough to extend it, all taken together. What already seemed like an eternity of an afternoon became twice that. At every step, Ghyslaine wondered if this was when someone would stop the proceedings. Make a speech, destroy a centrepiece, come forward and attack. Her mind conjured up a new scenario for each pause.
At each one, she looked across to Aignéis, waiting until their eyes met. Each time, she saw Aignéis's impatience, annoyance, irritation that the ceremony dragged on, but each time, once Aignéis saw her looking back, that smile transformed.
They came together again only at the end, all eyes on their lone figures in the centre of the hall. First their hands, palm to palm and then each finger from the pinkies inward, then foreheads, Aignéis bending to compensate for Ghyslaine's height. The cheer that followed was hesitant, ragged, unsure of whether this would hold, this unexpected consort, this strange union. But as they made their way to the daises, first the prince and then his wife rose, and their daughter copying them. The queen rose half a second later, and the king last of all, his misgivings still clear in his face. In turn, each kissed the new couple on their foreheads (the prince's daughter lifted by her father to facilitate this), and then all were seated on their individual thrones. Ghyslaine felt more than a little lightheaded, seeing the crowd from this unexpected vantage.
Her wife squeezed her hand and relaxed her grip, so Ghyslaine could let go. Ghyslaine, without looking, squeezed back gently, and let her hand rest there on the armrests of their thrones. After a moment she felt Aignéis touch her hand again, and they laced their fingers, and listened to the endless speeches. They held hands through the shaky congratulations of stunned suitors, the confident well wishes of nobles whose smiles hid an edge of pity or mockery or both, the gamut of emotions poorly hidden and sincerity shining clear. As often as was allowed, each held her wife's hand, and in their room, alone, finally, each held it now.
Throughout the afternoon, throughout the meal, throughout the evening, Ghyslaine could read Aignéis's mood from the way she tensed, relaxed, fingers still or idly exploring Ghyslaine's innumerable carving scars. Now Ghyslaine found herself running her thumb over those soft slim fingers, her eyes drawn to those nails, gleaming like pale stones or stained glass.
She was avoiding her wife even as they stood together in the middle of the room. She knew that.
Aignéis's other hand came up under her chin, gently cupping her face, and tilted it up so their eyes met. Ghyslaine stared up into those pale eyes, feeling Aignéis's thumb skim her cheekbone the way her own thumb was skimming Aignéis's fingers. Her mouth felt very dry.
"You are angry, perhaps," Aignéis said, the most cautious Ghyslaine had yet seen her. "I have taken a choice away from you, Ghyslaine." Her thumb swiped down, over the apple of Ghyslaine's cheek, and stopped, very carefully, at the corner of Ghyslaine's mouth. "I apologize for the theft, but I do not regret it."
Ghyslaine's heart squeezed, and she took her hand out of Aignéis's to mirror her, hand at Aignéis's cheek, thumb just shy of Aignéis's lips. Those lips ticked upward at the corner, and Aignéis turned her head, just the slightest bit, so that she kissed the pad of Ghyslaine's thumb.
"It's not- I didn't-" Ghyslaine stopped herself, flustered, frustrated. Aignéis could surely feel the warmth building in her cheeks. She needed to marshal her words, put them in order. Make sure that her new wife understood very clearly how she felt.
"It's not a theft," she said, finally, looking up at Aignéis. Her thumb still lay on Aignéis's soft lips. "It never occurred to me to think that until you called it so, and I don't agree at all."
"No?" Aignéis murmured, as if they would be overheard, though they were all alone. Her free hand came up, cupping Ghyslaine's on her face, keeping it there, Ghyslaine's palm along her jaw, Ghyslaine's thumb over her lips as she spoke. "Never did you count yourself among my suitors? Never did you consider me a candidate for your hand?"
"You were unhappy with having to choose," Ghyslaine said, her eyes steady, spine straight. All her senses seemed concentrated on Aignéis's face, seeing only her eyes, feeling only her skin under her palm, her thumb over her lips. "There was misery enough without my including myself."
Aignéis tsked, and her hand on Ghyslaine's face repositioned itself so that it tipped Ghyslaine's face further up. Her other hand pulled Ghyslaine's away from her own face, gently, not very far. Again that low murmur came, the sound of intimacy inside isolation. "You do yourself a disservice. There is no misery in your presence, my Ghyslaine."
Again that pulse in Ghyslaine’s fingertips, again the breathlessness of being in Aignéis's presence. The possessive placed upon her was clarity almost too painful to bear, making her breaths come short and shallow, and rather than answer, Ghyslaine leaned up and took breath from her wife's lips.