Queen of Hearts: The Crown (Queen of Hearts Saga #1)(3)
Harris licked his wrinkled finger and wiped something from her face. “Dinah, my child, look at me. Everything will be fine. I’ll be waiting for you out here.”
Dinah was seized by a sudden panic. She pressed against him. “No. NO. I want you to come in with me.”
“I am not allowed in the Great Hall for this . . . just for today. The King desires your full attention.”
Harris had never been excluded from an event in the Great Hall. As her guardian and tutor, he was welcome to observe the King’s Council. But not today. Something was wrong.
“NO!” Dinah flung her arms around Harris. “Please come, I don’t know what’s going on, please, just come with me.”
Harris detached Dinah from his thick waist. “Dinah! Do not forget who you are. You are the Princess of Wonderland, and you are not to act like this again. Would you like to embarrass the King?”
Dinah shook her head, “No.”
“Then go in there and greet him in the respectful way.” He gave her a generous smile. “It will all be alright, child. Trust me. Now put on your brave face. Let me see it.”
Dinah scowled.
“No, that’s not it. Now show me BRAVE Dinah. Dinah the fearless, the future Queen of Wonderland, the future Queen of Hearts.”
Dinah took a deep breath and steeled her black eyes. She stood up taller and sucked in her belly.
“There, that looks a little bit better.” Harris patted her head happily, but Dinah was sure that she spotted tears in his weathered eyes. “It’s time. We are very, very late. I’ll be out here.”
With that, he pushed her gently into the hall. The ivory doors slammed shut behind her, the sound bouncing around the vast room. Voluminous red banners billowed from floor to ceiling, a black heart stitched across each center: the blazon of the King. Dinah’s white slippers echoed loudly against the marble floors, and she felt thousands of eyes watching her, judging her. She held her crowned head as highly and regally as she could. The entire court watched her walk up the aisle, lords and ladies of noble birth, their bright fashion a blot of color on the otherwise black-and-white marble room. Dinah walked swiftly toward the throne, but the front of the Great Hall still seemed to be miles away.
The different factions of Cards all nodded their heads as Dinah passed, some saying “Princess” under their breath. She heard a faint snicker and a whisper from a Diamond Card. “Recard.”
She held her head high and straight, as Harris told her to do. Someday this will be my Great Hall, she told herself. All these Cards will bow before me when I rule beside my father and I will make it death by beheading to laugh or even look at me.
All of the Cards were in attendance today, a rare sight. There were four divisions of the men called Cards, each serving their purpose to the kingdom. Heart Cards, handsome and skilled men uniformed in red and white, protected the royal family and the palace. Club Cards, dressed in gray, were in charge of administering justice: they punished criminals and murderers, and organized Execution Day. Their most important function was running the Black Towers. Diamond Cards, clad in vibrant purple cloaks, protected and managed the treasury and sought to increase the King’s resources. And then there were the Spades. Spades were the warriors, those in charge of fighting and pillaging. The Spades scared Dinah; cloaked in black, they were hard, grizzled men with dangerous pasts. They were viewed as untrustworthy, brutal, and bloodthirsty. If criminals were reformed and pledged their fealty, they were allowed to join the Spades; that is, if they didn’t die in the Black Towers first.
The Spades were universally loathed and feared across Wonderland. Her father held a firm hand over them, but he was the first King to overpower them with his iron first. He had executed their strongest leaders and subdued their wildness. The Spades simmered quietly, like a burning ember that could ignite and spread over the entire city. All of the Cards, though, no matter how frightening, were the source of much lore and many legends. When Dinah was a child, she loved to lie in her raised bed at night and list the Cards in her favorite order: Hearts first, since they protected her, then the Diamonds, then the Clubs, and finally, the Spades.
“DINAH!” A loud voice bellowed from the throne, and Dinah felt a tiny trickle of urine roll down her leg under her dress. She had been lost in thought, standing midaisle. Dinah bowed her head. “Get up here. Now.”
She walked quickly to the platform, up a set of wide stone steps. Atop the platform sat two massive chairs. They were carved from gold, each in the shape of a large heart. From the top of the throne, tiny hearts rose upward, growing smaller and sharper the higher they reached. The top ballooned out and opened into a flurry of sculpted hearts, as if they were taking flight. They reminded Dinah of birds. The pair of heart thrones was a part of Wonderland history: for it was said that once you sat in the throne, magic funneled down through the open hearts, and made you wise.
Looking at her father, she knew that wasn’t true.
One of thrones sat empty, a lone red rose always upon it. Davianna, her mother, had died when Dinah was ten. The second throne was commandeered by her father. The King of Hearts stood before her now, a giant man, full of fury and righteousness, and an insatiable lust for food and women. As his blue eyes lingered angrily on Dinah’s face, she saw him the same way his people did: he was the kind of king who would sooner ride into battle on his Hornhoov than rule from behind the council table. He was a man of action, a brutal and brave man whose rage was legendary. The people of Wonderland respected the King, but only because he represented a force to be reckoned with . . . and feared. What mattered to the townspeople was that he kept them safe from the Yurkei, and that was worth everything. Dinah didn’t believe he was a great king, but even she knew better than to ever speak those words. As she looked upon the King’s hard face, she remembered the time she had mentioned this to Harris, who had given her a hard shake.