Once a Princess

Chapter 47

The capital city of Cardinia was merely that, a city, not unlike Warsaw, which they had passed through, or Danzig. Tanya didn't know why she'd had a fairytale setting in the back of her mind, complete with castle and rosy countryside. There was no castle, but it snowed for her arrival, which added a wonderland beauty to this place where she was going to live. The city proper was enclosed in an ancient wall that was no longer guarded and crumbling in places, but the city had stretched beyond this wall centuries ago.

As in any city, there were many large, elegant homes in certain sections, then there were many not so elegant in other sections, but they all looked only slightly different from the homes she'd seen elsewhere in Europe. Commerce was thriving. There were large stores and small shops, open markets, vendors, even warehouses, next to parks, cafes, churches. Carriages and sleighs clogged some streets where the snow had been swept to the sides but an icy crust remained behind, while other lanes were empty, the snow pristine white and undisturbed. Tall bronze statues were centered in squares, and winter-naked trees lined many streets.

The palace formed a square by itself. If not a towering castle, it was incredibly large nonetheless. Three stories high, it covered an entire block in the city proper, with the majority of official rooms at the front of the palace and many more rooms stretching down the side blocks, a barracks comprising the rear of the square, and open gardens and courtyards in the center of these four long, connecting buildings.

Tanya was delighted with the city, after having seen nothing but small villages and the occasional estate of a nobleman for days. But she was totally amazed by the palace, the grandeur of it, the opulence. The entrance was mammoth, the entire three stories high, where an official with armed guards at his sides, many more stationed about the hall, would have stopped them if Stefan hadn't been recognized. Wide corridors of marble were lined with large portraits in solid gold frames, separated by consoles on the walls set with silver lamps, or pedestals holding busts or small statues, or doors with footmen standing at attention on either side.

She was dazed by it all as she was ushered down one corridor, then another. Was she actually supposed to live in a place like this? And if she was being taken to the room she would be given, Lord help her, it must be at the end of the next block.

But she wasn't being shown to her rooms, which were going to be in the same wing as Stefan's. She should have known he would go immediately to his father. She just wished he hadn't thought to bring her with him.

Stefan might be king now, but she hadn't always thought so, and she still thought of him only as Stefan. But his father had been king for twenty years, the length of her life, a real king as she saw it, and she wasn't up to meeting him just yet, was forgetting all the protocol and correct forms of address Lazar and the others had drummed into her.

It was no wonder she curtsied to the Prime Minister, who was seated at the desk in the anteroom outside the royal chamber, when he looked up in surprise. Fortunately, his surprise was such that he didn't notice her blunder.

"Stefan! Why did you not send word that you had returned?"

Stefan embraced the older man with a laugh. "I would have, except Sandor's man was waiting in Danzig and left immediately to return here, so I didn't see any point in sending another with news you would already have."

"What man? Sandor didn't send anyone. We assumed you would."

"Then—" Stefan paused to glance at Tanya. "It would seem your would be assassin was rather clever after all. And that means Alicia would know what he looks like."

"Assassin?" Max exclaimed.

But Tanya interjected first, with eyes narrowed. "If you're going to see your redhead to question her, Stefan, I'm going with you."

"I don't even know if she was returning to Cardinia, but in any case, someone else can question her."

Tanya was only slightly mollified. Maximilian Daneff wasn't at all. "Assassin?" he repeated, and regained Stefan's attention.

"Someone has made two attempts on her life since we reached Europe," Stefan replied, then added in what was clearly an order, "I don't want another, Max. "

"I will see to it personally. But I do not think Sandor should be told. His health has improved, but worry could cause another setback."

"How improved?" Stefan asked suspiciously.

"Now, my boy, none of that. You cannot really think your father would have staged—"

"Would he not?"

Max grinned. "Well, possibly, but as it happens, he did not. Your crowning was official. And I said his health had improved, not that he has made a complete recovery. However, the physicians are hopeful that he might have a few more years left, if he stays out of the throne room. Now, if I may welcome your betrothed, who certainly needs no introduction." Max turned to Tanya and bowed formally, then said, "You are the very image of your mother, Princess Tatiana, except for your hair, which is pure Janacek. Welcome home."

She would never understand why tears suddenly sprang to her eyes, but they did. Perhaps it was because this man had known her parents well, had known her as a baby, could tell her things not even Stefan could. Or perhaps it was simply because home had been such an elusive thing to her all these years and now she was finally feeling as if she really had come home.

At the first sign of tears, Stefan drew her into his arms and grinned over her head at the Prime Minister. "It was nothing you said, I'm sure, Max, so don't look so stricken. The wench is just emotional and high-strung. You would not believe what I have had to put up with — " At that point he got a fist in his side and grunted. "You see?"

"You arrogant devil's spawn, you haven't had to put up with half of what I have. I'll have you know—"

"Behave, Tanya, or I'll have to think seriously about putting you over my knee again. "

"Like hell you will."

"Now, children." Max chuckled, because it was obvious neither of them was truly angry at the other. "I think it will do Sandor good to see how well you are getting along." At Tanya's glance, he explained, "We were worried that Stefan would—"

"That's quite enough, Max," Stefan cut in, and there was no doubting that this time he was displeased.

Tanya looked up at him and smiled. "Secrets? As if I can't guess he was going to tell me how much you hated having to fetch me home, that if you'd had your way, I would have been left to rot in America. I keep telling you I'm not stupid, Stefan, but you keep forgetting."

"That is a matter of opinion, as far as I'm concerned."

"Ouch." She grimaced.

"Now will you behave long enough to meet my father?"

"If he's anything like you, I'm not at all sure I want to meet him."

"Don't pout, little houri. Princesses concede gracefully."

"But tavern wenches go for the jugular."

He flushed. She did, too, realizing that no one here yet knew of her upbringing. But Maximilian made nothing of the remark, assuming they were merely jesting with each other, a private joke perhaps. And he was so delighted with this change in Stefan, he was barely listening to them. Sandor would be delighted too. They had both been so afraid that nothing was going to make Stefan accept the girl, whether he brought her home or not. But it looked as if he had more than accepted her.

"I'm sorry," Maximilian heard the girl say.

"Don't be," Stefan replied. "They, at least, have to be told, and it might as well be now."

"Told what?" Maximilian asked, suddenly alarmed by their seriousness.

"We will tell you both together, Max, so warn him that we're here. I don't want to surprise him by just walking in."

Max did as he was told, though reluctantly, and the next hour proved uncomfortable for all of them, but especially for Tanya as she listened to him sum up her life as nothing but a bleak and depressing existence. To hear Stefan tell it, you'd think she had suffered the agonies of hell, so she finally broke in to paint a less severe picture, leaving out the hardship and remembering only the lighter moments, in particular the years shared with Iris.

But Sandor was visibly affected nonetheless, and she realized why when he said to her, "You must hate me, girl."

"Why? I don't even know you."

"I'm the one who sent you off with Tomilova. She was your mother's closest friend. She would have protected you with her life. But not once did I consider she might die, leaving you helpless and at the mercy of peasants."

Tanya doubted Dobbs would appreciate being called a peasant. White trash he was used to, but peasant? The thought made her smile. She turned it on Sandor to reassure him.

"You don't regret what you never knew about in the first place, just as it would be pointless to regret what is done and past, so don't think I regret my life up to now. I don't. It taught me a lot, qualities a pampered and spoiled princess would never have learned. And there is something to be said for total self-reliance. I believe my upbringing has made me strong, certainly strong enough to put up with your son and his royal temper."

Sandor hooted with laughter. "Spoken like a Janacek. That branch of the family always did have the better diplomats. We are grateful for your understanding, child. You are going to make a truly splendid queen."

"When?" she and Stefan asked almost at once.

"Will next week be too soon? After all, this is something we have waited years to see, and the preparations have been in the making for months."

A mere week before the wedding? Tanya didn't mind. Sandor might have been waiting for years to see it happen, but she felt as if she had been waiting forever for this ceremony that was going to give her the right to call Stefan her own.