Player's Princess (A Royal Sports Romance)(150)

I frown.

“You have changed me, though. Look.”

Vans. Big vans…like school busses. They roll into the square and stop, and I swear the entire world goes dead silent, like everything has frozen, as quiet as the grave. The air is no longer so warm, the sun no longer so strong. It’s like an invisible shadow has fallen over the world.

The doors open and nothing happens. Then the first child, a little girl, steps out. Haltingly, slowly, more join her, then more, forming a crowd around the vehicles. One of the seated couples…no, a pair of the seated parents, finally jump to their feet and run over, scooping their daughter up in their arms.

Then the dam bursts and they run together. Laughing, crying, embracing and spinning in place.

I have to cover my mouth. Hot tears burn on my cheeks.

“You…”

“I can’t undo everything I’ve done, but there are ways I can start. You were right. I wanted to free my people and I put them in chains instead. I was trying to make a heaven and instead I made a hell.”

I can’t talk, my throat is too dry. I want to tell him something but I don’t know what.

“This will continue whether you stay or go,” he says. “I will make this right. I cannot die a man you would hate. I only beg you to stay, so that I can become a man you could love. They need this. I need it. I don’t want to be Hades anymore. Lead me into the light, Penny. Please.”

“I don’t know yet,” I choke out. “I’m sorry but I don’t know. I need to go home. I need to see it again before I decide.”

He holds my hand hard in both of his. “I know that now. I understand that I cannot grip the world and crush it into a more pleasing shape. I tried to escape the madness of my fathers… But it took root in my soul and twisted me, ruling my land and people while I looked away in disgust at what I was doing. You’ve broken my armor, Penny.”

I try to speak but can’t. He dries my tears lightly with a caress and holds me until my breathing steadies, and gives me a little push.

“You are responsible for this. Go see them.”

Trembling, I walk over to the crowd. I don’t know if anyone has told them, but they know somehow.

They…they bow. They get down on their knees in front of me.

“Stop,” I bark at them in their language, “get up, stand. Don’t kneel before me.”

It takes them a minute to listen. Then the hugs and kisses to my hands start, and I’m jostled around by joyous, weeping parents. I can’t stand it much longer, and have to run back to my prince. I stay at his side while we tour the festival.

There’s food, fresh fruits and vegetables, and traditional delicacies, and everyone wants to feed us. After an hour I’m so stuffed I can barely walk.

Then the dancing starts.

The biggest square in town surrounds a huge statue of one of the prince’s ancestors, maybe the first one, his armor of black marble inlaid with gold, helmet tucked under his arm.

I don’t think he was meant to be covered in flowery wreaths and decked out in a big, plumy hat. Nor surrounded by people dancing. The dance is fast, rhythmic, in time with the band playing on the stage at the far end of the square. They sing too fast for me to even try to make out the words.

I’m distracted anyway. Kristoff pulls me out into the open and spins me around, and the dance starts. It feels like flying, most of all when he grabs my waist and tosses me in the air, catches me, and spins around with me until I’m dizzy. A fruity punch like Sangria is passed around in clay cups, and after a few gulps I get a very solid buzz going. When he sees me swipe my face clean with my sleeve, my prince laughs at me.Loud and long.

I stand there and smile dumbly, shocked at the sight. I’ve never heard him laugh before. I’m not the only one staring. He snatches one of the clay cups and drains it, pinkish punch running down his chin, and the dance starts again.

After a few more we’re both giggling and dizzy.

He feeds me a sausage on a crusty bun to sober me up, then some grapes, plucking them from the stem one at a time to pop them in my mouth. I nip at his fingers before I chew them and swallow them, so sweet they almost make me sick, but I can’t stop craving more.

This goes on throughout the day. By the time the sun has passed its high point and begins to sink toward the mountains, I’m exhausted, sick to my stomach, still tipsy, and giggling like a fool as he literally carries me over his shoulder and puts me back in the car. I flop down on the seat and when he gets in the back with me, I crawl on top of him and kiss him and mingle his heat with the sweet taste of the liquor.

Whatever he said about comporting myself apparently went out the window during one of these festivals. My dress is a mess, the laces pulled loose, and the big buttons on my blouse are half undone. He stops himself when he realizes he’s just shoved his hand into my blouse and squeezed my breast. I bounce on his lap and giggle and laugh at nothing.

Even the castle is a less dreary place. While we were gone the servants hung flowers and bright banners from the battlements and gargoyles, and the black, brooding stone is suddenly alive with color, like flowers springing from the darkness of the earth. I stand there and stare at it in the reverence only a drunk woman can muster, and jump up to kiss his cheek.

“Why all this?”

I though the festival was over, but music blares from the courtyards. The servants are free for the day, too, it seems.