Work Text:
Expecting brutality from a marriage is not the norm for an aspiring Queen Apparent, but it's difficult to put aside misgivings when faced with— the gentlemen intent. Both, of course, are older. Established. Kings, one inherited and the other taken by war. They are good men, close advisors assure, with fine breeding or good training to their combined name. Even still— she is nervous.
All throughout her fittings, it lingers. Concern, no. Fear, unlikely. Merely uneasiness. Exchanging letters is a way to gauge the emotional depth of a person, but does every royal pen their own thoughts? Or do they rely on scribes and whispering consorts, dictating what a young girl would like most to hear?
These overwhelming thoughts are beginning to twist in her mind, gnarling an already thorny bramble. The wedding arrangements are in place, handled with utmost efficiency by mindful cultural experts. A bit of everything, seamlessly blended. But now the fault lays on her, manifest in the form of dress anxiety. Too snug, too revealing, too bright, too drab...
As her mother might say: "To err is human, to fret is Lalonde." What a kick she'd have as witness to this event. Positively smug to the bone, and she'd leap on suggesting an outlandish gown.
It's all the motivation she needs to form a final decision. Her chest heaves a sigh of relief as warm orange and pastel blue garb her in heavy veils, sweeping silks. Billowing sleeves serve to hide fiddling hands, loose skirts to obscure unsteady legs, and flats to avoid twisting an ankle before scores of nobles. Now that would be embarrassing.
Fortune is smiling down at her, it seems. Only half an hour remains of her "preparations" now, leaving no room to panic or second guess further. The gathering of maidfolk breathe a collective sigh of relief when she deigns to eat, offering light hand cakes and sips of bracing wine when asked. When this inevitable timesink is complete, the princess vows internally to recognize each for a duty well done.
As long as she doesn't take ill mid-ceremony. If such a thing occurs, her ire will be unparalleled. With nerves still jockeying her good senses, this possibility is assured among her attendants. Used to such things, they smile placid but disbelieving. On a better day, it might make her crack a smile of her own. For now, it leaves her petulant.
Not for long, at least. Drums ring out in a cheerful march, but in her fugue? It feels like a funeral procession. Even through the heavy veil, the magelight is almost piercing.
At the end of the hall, stood by the altar and the comfortable arrangement of pillows beyond, stand her betrothed pair. Arrayed for the wedding in unexpected fashion— and this stalls the worrisome roils in her gut. Though their lands could not be more different, hers sequestered where twilight sky is near-eternal and they basked in equal morns to eves...
On her left: the Lord Keeper of the Heartland, a towering specimen typically garbed in fuchsia and violet. Now he drips with gold, ears to ankles, arrayed in the colorful array of a sunset. It complements her well, and brings softer element to his general's figure. Her right: the High King of the Fertile Plains, steely blue eyes in perfect harmony with a sweeping suit of navy and seafoam, styled to accentuate the grey coming into his hair. Not built for war as his counterpart, but solid as they come, an anchor dressed like midnight
She is— the plushest of the lot, and comparatively small. Not uncomfortably, but certainly unprepared for how far back her head must tip to make some semblance of eye contact. It's when the music swell begins, as her padded feet cross the threshold into the grand hall, that they turn. Perfectly synced. Two of a kind.
A matched set that she will soon be joining.
Part of her reels, body moving without her accord down the aisle of thick carpeting towards the grooms, at the realization. Soon— too soon— not soon enough— they will be joined in matrimony. Is it natural to feel like an imposition? Of course she's garnered feelings for the pair, after so many hours tucked into her chambers with letters penned bold and strong, but—
Surely they consider her a means to an end. Pretty, youthful, capable of bearing a child to term. If it weren't her, it could have been anyone. And that sensation, the bitterness in her gut, returns even as every step shortens their respectful distance. Close enough now to see the silver in blond locks, the scars in broad hands dusted in dark hair, the warmth in very different smiles.
One grins with his eyes, squinted and curved with cat-like amusement. The other is nearly paternal, proud in the most forgiving sense. It turns her gut, different this time. So light, so ticklish, she does not dare open her mouth for fear of the butterflies escaping all at once. The dais represents the final step, not unlike the perilous climb to gallows. Hesitation, thy name is
"Rosalind?" he asks. The shorter one, dark-haired, gentle in tongue with concern knitting his brow. He speaks soft, with only her ears in mind, tipping out of a perfect posture to draw nearer to her height. Mindful, the bastard, to the point of tempering some number of fears. That hand is still outstretched, and what fool would she be if it was not taken?
So her soft fingers rest in his scholarly palm, to be gently led up the first step. There is one more, her mind helpfully reminds, and to balk again is absolutely humiliating. But when a furtive glance is cast to the other side, a hand waits for her acceptance. He is not as gentle, built for battle or conflict. They shared barbs in letters, but appreciated kinds, a like-mindedness that lends itself to soothing the nerves.
Gold pierces through her veil, as though he can perfectly discern the position of her eyes despite layers of fabric. Maybe he can. But his voice is gentle now, a reminder of their decision. "Are you ready?" is a— difficult query. There is time to run, gather her skirts and flee all the way back to a starving country wracked by loss and ill-preserved culture, isn't there? And she knows, surely as the sun and moon rise, that they would allow her to go.
If that is what she chose.
One slow inhale. One slower exhale.
"I am ready," Rosalind says, smooth as the waters over which she presides. To her right, James affords another fatherly grin, saturating her in raw courage. To her left, Ambrose narrows his eyes in silent mirth, spurring her to proper form. Beyond, behind, their congregation seats—
They are a set, the day and the night and the twilight between. For every heaven has a moon, a sun, and stars to govern. An auspicious day, a beautiful union, and rumor speaks of portraits to come that depict the ecstasy of matrimony. Loving, transcendent, a honeypot overflowed with nectar and seed. Maybe the rhymes will cease when the Queen of the Wine Dark Sea no longer trembles with finish.