Don't Take Me For A Ride (Alex)

[Grand Duke Alexander Redwood]

The hint of a smile on Alex’s face broke out into a full grin. “Of course,” he said easily. Aha, so he had finally happened on the one subject they could not gripe with each other on! He felt absurdly accomplished. “I am the grand duke, after all.” He might not have control over his own romantic future, but he could certainly do this small thing for his bride-to-be. And the queen was likely to approve and commend his actions. Not that he cared for her opinion, not as he once had. Her little scheme had shaken his confidence in his aunt, far more than her indulgence of her daughter had. Not that he would ever question her authority, but the thought that she could be so careless with her own flesh and blood’s feelings on such an important matter did make him wonder. Not to mention the stunt she’d pulled with her messenger boy and Bell.

He nodded at her explanation of her father’s post, mildly impressed with her knowledge. Then again, he shouldn’t be too surprised – the same man who apparently encouraged his daughter to study tactics and strategy would undoubtedly have told Celvi something of his duty station. “Consider it done,” the grand duke said. If only he could bring back his own father so easily. All people thought when they looked at him was of his title and power, but the only reason he was grand duke at such a young age was his father’s death. Alex would have given almost anything to have his father back, harsh as he could be. One of Runnori’s priestesses had ventured that Alex’s myriad dalliances were an attempt to regain the familial affection missing in his life. It was utter nonsense, of course; he had his aunt and cousin, and the love of his men. Every orphan missed their parents, but it was part of the natural order of things.

He wondered if Celvi might someday be able to provide some level of affection for him. He’d made a good step toward it, with his words just now, but he somehow thought that would not be enough to shift their relationship from enmity to amity. Perhaps once they had children... He had to admit, he was curious about what she looked like under all those layers of silk. The queen had not saddled him with a bad-looking fiancee, luckily, and she was certainly passionate. It was not a terrible fate, but it was not one of his choosing. And that, ultimately, made all the difference.

In between thoughts of his parents and his impending marriage, Alex had let his gaze rest for too long on his riding companion, a fact Celvi was not too shy to call attention to. He blinked, trying to come up with a response, and looked down at his horse’s mane, uncharacteristically lost for words. Ought he tell the truth? They were to be wed, after all. Or would she turn around and spread his confidences throughout the court? He settled for a compromise. “Did you know my parents were a love match?” he said, looking at her sidelong. “My grandfather didn’t want the Redwood line subsumed into the royal line, wanted to keep them separate.”

Although his hand was no longer in his pocket, he could feel his mother’s ring like a weight against his ribs, or perhaps he was only imagining it. “My mother said she would give up the throne if she had to, to marry my father.” Of course, the families came around to it eventually. Alex’s father claimed he would not have eloped with her if his father had forbidden it, but Alex rather wondered what the story would have sounded like coming from his mother’s lips. That act of defiance had been the strongest she’d ever made in her life, succumbing to the demands of power once on the throne. Alex wondered if he would have been so bold, if he had someone he loved in his life.

[Celvi Gray]

Of course he would say that now. Thumping his title and the power it gave him. Seriously, should she have expected anything else? Well, maybe deep down inside she had, since she had asked him he would do it – not if he could, it was obvious he could, because like he said: he was the Grand Duke. Second only to the Queen in power. She had wanted to know if he would do it… for her in a way, but of course she should have guessed that such thoughts would have never entered his mind. Why even? It was not like there was any love lost between them, and a mutual agreement to not clash every five minutes might be all they ever got out of this. And Celvi didn’t even want more. She didn’t want this man, and she was sure she might not even want him if there wasn’t Chase holding her heart firmly in his hands.
Still, she had to be polite, she needed to thank him. Whatever his motives, he would make her truly happy, bringing her father back into her life, and so that would be what she focussed on.

“Thank you then”, she said, meaning the words, just the friendly, almost warm tone rubbing slightly wrong with her concerning him. Dagmara once had said the best thing an arranged husband could become for you was a friend and companion, since these sentiments were far more desireable than the quick upflaming and equally quick dying passion of love. How would they look like in a few year’s time, given they hadn’t strangled each other yet? “Knowing my father closer to home and not engaged in deadly battle every day will surely give me a few less bad dreams at night. Just… be prepared he might not thank you for it as I do. He takes his duty for Lamora very seriously. He will accept the new orders of course, but he might not do so wholeheartedly.” Celvi knew that if her father only had wanted, he wouldn’t have stayed five long years away from her. He was a soldier of the ‘old school’, like Dagmara once said, for him it was not duty for duty’s sake, but for the love of his country. He disliked this long war, and he wished for peace, but he would stand on the battlefield for as long as his queen and country wanted him.

His next words again took her by surprise. Had his thoughts really ventured in the same direction as hers earlier? It surely couldn’t be coincidence he started talking about love matches now. Did that mean he had such high hopes for them as well? But then, that was ridiculous. If there was one belief Celvi firmly held, then it was that you could never ‘learn’ to love someone. You could learn to like him… but love was either there or it would never be. Everyone in Lamora of course knew the story of Alexander Redwood’s mother, the deceased Queen Lucenia, Queen Tiana’s sister, but the takes on this story were varying and extremely different at times, it depended on who told it. “I’ve heard the odd hint here and there”, she confessed, “but it was never said so explicitely.” Her aunt Dagmara had once brought up the former queen as an example what difficulty a love match could bring, but had said not much more about it. That had all well happened before Celvi’s birth,and so she had never concerned herself much with it. Just that it now would be part of her history too, as the Grand Duke’s betrothed.

“Giving up one’s responsibility for love is not what many would call adviseable”, Celvi commented with the hint of a smile playing around her lips. “but I hope you won’t find me presumptious when I say that I have more admiration than rejection in my heart for it. It shows a strong will … and deep feelings of course as well.” What would have happened, she wondered, if Lucenia really had given up her throne earlier, before rumors said she had caved under the pressure. Maybe she would be still alive now… didn’t that prove that listening to your heart could sometimes be better than listening to your mind?

[Grand Duke Alexander Redwood]

What a long way they had come from that meeting in the library! Celvi Gray, thanking him without a hint of sarcasm (that he could detect, anyway) in her voice. Of course, it did little to assauge his concerns about the match – those were far too deep-seated to be solved with a touch of kindness between them – but it was a good feeling nonetheless. And a good feeling was something Alex found it hard to come by lately. “My pleasure,” he said, feeling almost... cheerful? Perhaps.

The grand duke nodded at her explanation. Of course he understand where Celvi’s father might object. He himself objected to spending time at the palace away from the front lines, although that frankly was partially an abhorrence for court life itself. Still, it was the Redwood duty to protect Lamora. The charge dated back to time immemorial, as far back as the existence of the royal family, if not longer. It was in his blood. Even if he had been raised a shepherd’s son, Alex felt sure his noble blood would have called him to the aid of his country. “I understand.” He found him feeling almost jealous of Celvi’s relationship with her father. His had been dead for almost ten years now. A five year absence would have been easier to bear. But he didn’t imagine she wanted to hear his woes over his father. Nor could he be certain she wouldn’t gossip about them to all and sundry.

“Perhaps he’ll take it less hard if you reminded him that he’ll get to be around both his daughter and grandchildren,” he suggested. Alex had fond memories of his crusty old Grandfather Redwood, a scarred warrior who gave him his first knife. He’d died in a campaign when Alex was six, long enough for the boy to have more memories of the old man than his mother. If Celvi’s father was as she said, he’d be a good man to have around his own children someday. And of course there was always the thought lurking in the back of the grand duke’s mind, that he might perish in battle before he saw his own sons to adulthood. Runnori knew he didn’t want the raising of Redwood blood left to his betrothed and royal relatives! A boy couldn’t learn how to be a man without an example to follow.

“My mother was many things, but responsible was perhaps not one of her foremost qualities,” Alex admitted. “But knowing that I was loved – that my father was loved...” He shrugged, a little sheepish that he’d said as much as he had. “It gives one hope, is all.” Drawing up his horse, he hesitated. “Lady Celvi...” Sweet Runnori, how formal he sounded! He looked away to the river’s edge, the sounds of the rushing water filling his ears. How rarely he found himself at a loss for words, and yet now he could find no way to articulate his feelings. It was all so confusing. His hatred for his aunt’s manipulation of his life, his yearning for a love he’d yet to find, his railing against the bounds of duty that kept him in the palace, his desire for the sort of family he’d been bereft of for almost his entire life, his dislike and yet warming to his bride-to-be... The swirl of emotions constricted his chest, making it hard to breathe, much less speak.

He dismounted, walking over to the cliff’s edge with nary a word. It was all too much. Was this how his mother had felt, on the throne? On the balcony? Alex stared into the turbulent waters below. It wasn’t that he wanted to jump, exactly. He just wanted to escape into a life that wasn’t this hard, this complicated.

[Celvi Gray]

A different note had entered their conversation, there was no denying it. Not yet to be called amiable maybe, but they were definitely steering towards another fragile truce after passing yet another field of eggshells to walk on. And yet,Celvi had no right idea how to deal with it all, since she knew their truces usually didn’t last long until one or the other took offense in a simple comment or show of view. Did he really mean it when he said it was his pleasure to have helped her out with this? – Then again, he hadn’t helped her yet, he had just promised to, but a man like Alexander Redwood surely would stay true to his promises, yes? He prided himself on being a man of honor after all, they had been through this topic on numerous occasions. He had sounded quite cheery as well, and she doubted he was that good an actor in faking such sentiments, he didn’t want to be called a courtier after all. The grown-up part of Celvi was quite relieved this ride turned out better than expected so far, but the stubborn, childish part of her didn’t like this at all. She didn’t WANT to feel sympathetic towards him, she wanted to hate him so she could love Chase even more and wallow in self-pity just a little while longer, until Chase and her met again. She wanted to be wild, deceiving the court and her fiancée as much as she could… but for now that part was still safely locked up inside her and she even intended to throw away the key. She could not be a disgrace to her family. If she rebelled at all, it had to happen in cover of Runnori’s face herself, in the dead of night.

Her mind wanted to squirm and refuse to listen at what the duke suggested next. Grandchildren for her father, that meant children for themselves. That meant… the full amount of what it took to be a wife. Celvi didn’t want it, but she knew shying away from it would get her nowhere. She had to act responsible about this, grown-up, like a true lady, at least on the outside. This was all not imminent yet, and so she would deal with it when the time came. It didn’t hurt though to prepare for it in some way. The court had decided for them to marry, and so marry they would, unless a miracle happened. What they themselves wanted was of no consequence, even though she could not imagine the duke to NOT want it. Wasn’t that what some of the older ladies had said whenever they even talked about it? That the men seemed to like it, and it was a wife’s duty to make their husband happy. And some… some of the younger ones had whispered with hands covering their mouths that it needn’t be the man’s pleasure only… if you did it right. Such talks of course were not suitable for a lady, so Celvi had always tried to block them out. Now… now, she sometimes wished she knew a bit more about it, so she would at least know what would await her.
“He would certainly like that”, she agreed with a tentative smile. “I remember a fond glittering in his eyes whenever he saw children. And then… he always wanted a son of course. So I guess a grandson will have to do.” Her father had never given her the impression of being unwanted, on the contrary. But some of the choices he had made in her upbringing, including his casual talk about war tactics and weapons, had always shown Celvi that he missed the company of a young male he could teach.

“But knowing that I was loved – that my father was loved...” “It gives one hope, is all.”
The words seemed to echo in Celvi’s mind and suddenly she felt incredibly guilty. For not being the woman he would need, for loving another man while she stood here with him, for her treacherous, damned heart doing exactly the opposite of what it should do. It was like a huge weight was descending on her and for a moment she felt like she couldn’t breathe. Was there really no hope for them?! For him?! She didn’t want to feel guilty about him, and she tried to remind herself what an arrogant prat he could be… but right now he was nothing at all like that and that made it impossibly hard to bear. “Hope…” she heard herself whisper. “Yes, I guess that’s what we all need.” Then she watched him walking towards the cliff, and for a moment her heart seemed to stop. She remembered her own words, spoken to Dagmara in jest once. “I’d rather jump off a cliff…” and she had had exactly these cliffs in mind. Now her fiancé was standing there, after they had just talked about his mother who had presumably taken her own life… and all Celvi knew was that it could not be. It would be an easy way out for her, but she did not want it.

With a swift motion, she dismounted as well and joined him at the cliff, looking down at the turmoiled river below, the wind tearing at her hair and cloak. It would be easy, all too easy. One step forward and then all her worries would be history.
Almost acting on its own accord, her small, delicate hand found its way on Duke Alexander’s shoulder, barely touching it for fear of being obtrusive. But her words rang soft, yet clear as she stated: “Forget the Lady, I’m Celvi. We are to be wed after all. Or call me Fay whenever I act and speak out of line. That’s what most do, after all.” It might be a meagre offering, but it was all she could give for now while still meaning it.

[Grand Duke Alexander Redwood]

For someone as experience as the grand duke, he had never really connected the thought of the marital bed with children. Obviously one preceded the other, but his conception of being a father was curiously divorced from all that. Then again, he had never truly known any married couples growing up outside of those below him in station. His mother had died at an early age – taken her own life, his thoughts corrected him – and his grandmother far before that. The Redwoods were not known for their large families. And the queen had never been a mother figure to him. It was perhaps this lack in his own life that made him idealize fatherhood and family life so much.

He would be like his own father, but better – more outwardly loving, and with an intact family to insulate his sons and daughters from the harsh realities that their station in life would bring them. A father… and a mother. He returned her tentative smile with one equally as hesitant, but tinged with sadness that his children would never know their Redwood predecessors. Perhaps this marriage was a wise choice. Perhaps his aunt had wisdom beyond their ken. For a moment he could imagine their truce growing into… well maybe not love, but tolerance? Affection, even, would Runnori be so kind.

The snow crunching underfoot punctuated the quiet as he walked toward the cliff’s edge. The susurration of the river echoed the deluge of change in his life. It seemed he had scarcely met Celvi but that he was to wed her, and though the queen had not yet set a date, the fateful day seemed to loom large and close in his future. And, like a leaf caught in the current, he could do nothing except get carried along in the flow. Or sink below. A rock, jostled loose by his approach, tipped forward and tumbled, knocking off the cliff once, twice on its descent, and disappeared beneath the dark waters of the Ryum.

So absorbed was he in his own thoughts that Alex didn’t notice her approach until she placed her hand on his shoulder. He started slightly – one did not touch the nephew of the queen casually – and looked at her, his dark eyes questioning. Her words were kind, but the cynic in him wondered. Was she sincere? He felt so in his heart, but was that trusting organ merely hungry for some recognition of a kindred spirit? He felt doubt, dark and looming, his lips parted slightly as he struggled within himself for what to say. He longed for someone to trust, but knowing his deep desire made him distrust this feeling all the more. Like a man who, thirsting, sees an oasis, was he only imagining that the possibility for trust existed in her fairy eyes?

Alex licked his lips and returned his gaze to the turbulent waters below. But though he had adverted his eyes, he reached a hand up to cover the one she had placed on his shoulder, and said, “Celvi.” As gestures went, it was small, but it was difficult for him to speak and act this way without adding a deprecating remark to shield himself from however she might react. He had always treated relations with women as a game of who could care less, and had always won, but now he wondered if a change of the rules might not be in order. Maybe this time, for the first time, he could shed the armor he took for granted was necessary to survive court life, and trust someone else to watch his back in this palace of vipers.

“Fay.” He tested her nickname out on his tongue, stepping away from the edge of cliff and drawing her with him by their touching hands. “My mother used to call me Sasha.” Alex reached in his pocket, feeling unusually fumble-fingered and tongue-tied as he pulled out the ring. It glittered emerald green in the sunlight, simply cut, and set in gold. “This was hers. And, as we are to be wed,” he said, repeating her words from before, “it ought to go to my betrothed.” He held it out to her, feeling more vulnerable in this peaceful spot than he ever had out on the battlefield.

[Celvi Gray]

Celvi had never felt so unsure and unexperienced about something in her entire life. This was nothing she had been brought up to do, this was not covered by however many lessons she might have been given by Aunt Dagmara. Never before had she ever felt so vulnerable and exposed, like she was walking on a tightrope over this foaming and rushing river below, and any misstep would mean her immediate doom. She was on similar uneasy ground with Chase, but there she felt the gentle yet strong hand of love guiding her, which made everything seem so much clearer and safer. This hand, however, was entirely missing here, and Celvi was sure she had never been so alone and helpless in her entire life. She might be well of maritable age and yet she couldn’t seem to ever be old enough for the kind of responsibility she was now faced with. Juggling two lives, the one she ought, and the one she wanted to lead, while both could not get in each other’s way or there’d be hell to pay.

And then there was also this cursed matter of that tiny spark of hope inside Celvi, blossoming into bloom now they had seemed to be able to hold a conversation for quite a length without threatening to kill each other in their minds. When it came down to it, Alexander Redwood was as unwilling about this as she was, and maybe that would turn them into allies after all, even though it hadn’t seemed that way in the beginning, when the betrothal first was announced. This tiny spark of hope had been her reason for reaching out for him in that rather uneasy and hesitant manner, and it threatened to be quenched by anything he would now do. Celvi felt him wince slightly as she touched him, and for a dreadful moment she thought she had done it all wrong, destroyed whatever delicate truce had built between them over the last few minutes – and yet the next thing she knew was herself wincing slightly, but more in surprise than anything as he put his hand over hers and called her by the name she offered. So this is it… she thought with a wistful smile. We cannot escape this, but at least we’re in this together.

So… what now? Where did that leave them? Apparently, her fiancé seemed to have an answer for that. He accepted her peace offering or whatever it was, and even went a step farther, giving her a nickname of his… Sasha… that really sounded nothing like the Grand Duke at all, this creature of poise, pride and dignity. It made him seem like a small boy, and judging from who had given it to him, he probably hadn’t heard this name being directed to him in a very long time. Unlike her own, it was a nickname purely meant for endearment, and Celvi wasn’t sure if she’d ever feel up to using it. Would they ever be that familiar, even in a few years time? Right now, it felt more like a mockery of his mother’s genuine love for her son, if she should use it. “What may I call you then?” she asked, to make sure. It somehow didn’t feel right to still cling to Grand Duke or Sire… she needed something in between.

Their momentarily joined hands – a very odd feeling, though it didn’t feel as horrible as she had thought – were pulling apart as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a ring. Celvi’s breath caught in her throat and her mouth suddenly went very dry. Such a simple thing, such a ring, really. A symbol more than anything. A ring around your finger could be as binding and restraining as shackles around your wrists… and a few rings together were a chain. But then, Celvi knew it was impossible to refuse it, even though she wanted nothing less than this ring, making their engagement even more official. Not taking it, and even hesitating a moment longer would be like a slap into his face. So she would try to concentrate on the positive sides of it all.
“It is certainly a beautiful ring”, she mused. “Your family has always been known for good taste” – if not for good manners sometimes, but that was a different story. Smiling, even though it was still a hesitant smile, she held out her hand to him. “Shall we do this properly?”

[Grand Duke Alexander Redwood]

Alex had never told anyone of his mother’s nickname for him before. Other women had tried to give him pet names before, of course, trying to force an intimacy that didn’t exist between themselves and the grand duke, but rather than draw him deeper into their webs, such a move guaranteed he’d have nothing to do with them afterwards. In telling Celvi about it, he wasn’t sure exactly what he meant. A mutual sharing, a tit for tat in the exchange of privy information? Or would he respond to her voice calling him “Sasha”? The fact that she asked, however, decided his mind about the whole matter. “You may call me Sasha, if you like,” he said. He felt as if he’d stepped off the precipice and was freefalling into the unknown. Would he find his trust shattered in a short, sudden stop, or would he continue to float on the wind, unharmed by his trust in his bride-to-be. If someone had asked him just this morning if he could trust the fairy-eyed girl, he would have denied it. Now… he didn’t know. It was more terrifying than charging into battle.

Yet charge he did, into a fray that he knew little of, and feared more than swords and arrows. The grand duke smiled tentatively at her pleasant response – at least he had not offended her, as he seemed so wont to do – and dared to let a small flame of hope blossom in his chest. It was all so different from how he’d imagined such things, when he’d had the mind to. She was so different from all he’d imagined, and yet, here on the banks of the Ryum, it felt almost… right?

“It’s alexandrite,” Alex told her. The stone was found only in a mine on Redwood lands and, while it appeared emerald in sunlight, by candlelight it glowed a deep ruby. His mother’s wedding jewels were also set with the stones, a wedding gift from her husband. They were rare enough outside of the Redwood treasury – most found them peculiar and less brilliant than diamonds or sapphires, and besides, the Redwood family had kept a tight rein on their sale in Lamora. It was rumored the king of Mar’vol was in possession of a few, the very idea of which (if true) rankled in Alex’s chest. “It was named for one of my ancestors. Green in day, red at night.”

He laughed at her suggestion, a bundle of nerves as he’d never been. “As you wish,” Alex said, feeling ungainly as he got down on one knee. The snow was cold and seeped into the fabric around his knee, but he was fixated on the green glitter of the ring in his hand. He could almost see the gauzy white fabric, her alabaster skin as she flew down, down, down…

Divesting his mind of such thoughts, Alex put on his best grand duke grin and looked up at Celvi. He held the ring aloft like an offering. So many women at court had imagined this moment for themselves, he was sure. The idea that maybe this icy adversary was melting just a bit brought back a touch of his usual cockiness, but his dark eyes were sincere as he spoke. “Celvi, will you take this ring as an everlasting sign of my affections and be my bride, so long as Runnori rules the night skies?” It was a traditional proposal, taken from the days when a proposal would be sealed in the temple. It was also how he imagined his father had proposed, although he had no reason to believe this was true. There was silent pause, or maybe it was simply his mind, stretching out the moment to torment him. In that space, a cold thought of her rejection – and her laughter about how she’d gotten the grand duke to get down on one knee without even a kiss – chilled his very soul