A Royal Wedding

Lucas met prince Derek outside the court quarter walls when he reached. His eyes first glanced at his face before moving to look behind his broad shoulders warily.

Derek lifted a brow in a scowl. "I wouldn't harm a strand of her hair," he clarified. It was hinted with irritation. Clearly, even his most trusted me man thought the worst of him.

Relief veiled Lucas's visage and he harrumphed awkwardly. "It isn't her head I worry for, your Highness. It is I and the old man's," he refuted halfheartedly. His surprise at the prince's leniency carefully concealed in the jest.

But then he asked seriously, "What about the clan? They wouldn't take her intrusion lying down."

Derek adjusted his coat and fastened the buttons. "The princess has a privilege." He strolled leisurely down the stairs. "The clan will have to learn to tolerate it."

A puzzled Lucas treaded after like a meddlesome child. "What privilege, Your Highness?"

"The wife of the first prince," came Derek's candidly unabashed response.

Lucas; "…"

***

For the next two days, Rain neither saw the prince nor hear of him. He'd left the castle on the day they spoke and had not returned since then. She worried if he must've forgotten of his own wedding ceremony.

No matter how indifferent his attitude seemed, he couldn't have forgotten, no?

The grooming days before a royal wedding was painstaking.

The princess to be wedded was preoccupied with the visitations of seamstresses and several hours long classes from royal tutors who knew better how to wife a prince.

The process of preparation was tiring and she would rather have to listen to her longwinded handmaiden telling her tales of a certain puppetry she saw at the circus.

On the dawning of the third day, the day of the wedding ceremony finally arrived. The entire castle was bustling, as every servant in the castle made perfection of the ceremony.

The wedding halls shone with elaborate décor and the air carried the scents of fresh flowers tangled with the aromas of exquisite buffets.

In her chamber, the bride didn't appear as festive as the atmosphere and carried a rather long face.

Her groom was yet to arrive, and even his trusted man, Lucas, said there was a slim chance he would return before the ceremony began. In other words, she was to go through with the wedding alone.

That was absurd, she thought at first.

But in few hours, she was fitted into a royal wedding dress, made up gorgeously and escorted to the halls.

Before noon, the guests began to arrive and it was nearly time for the orchestra to accompany the groom and the bride to the aisle_ a significance that the ceremony had commenced.

However, when the clock struck twelve and the orchestra began to play a harmonious melody, the bride and the groom didn't come forth.