"Since when have I been betrothed to Spencer Smith?" Cassandra asks, staring at her father with wide blue eyes. Her father's smile falters for a moment before it returns.
"It's always been an idea. His father and I just needed to iron out some facts." Her father tells her. Cassandra stares on with wide eyes. It wasn't like she had never heard of these arranged marriages, hell, other girls she knew, daughters of royality that had long since married into famlies more powerful than their own. There were girls younger than her who were already had husbands and children.
"Father, you didn't even ask me if I wanted this."Cassandra starts, worry etching her pretty face. "I barely even know Spencer anymore."
"Cassandra," The king starts, his arms crossing and a grim look on his face. "Of all my riches, of everything I own in this world, you are my most treasured possession." Her father tells her. "I need to know that you'll be cared for once I am beyond this world. If you marry Spencer, I know that it will happen."
"Father," What is she supposed to do with this information? Somehow she had believed that her father was more advanced than the other kings of the region and would let her marry who she loved, who she wanted to be with, like she had heard about in the stories from America.
*****
Ryan works down in the kitchen despite being only two years older than the princess. The girl moves through the solid wooden door and into the spacious kitchen area. The main cooks have retired for the night back to the servants quaters. Ryan's still in the kitchens though, cleaning.
The boy lifts his head at the sound of the girl coming into the room. "Princess, good evening." He tells her, stopping his sweeping to look up at her though his shaggy brown bangs. Despite how frequently the two of them talk, how often she comes to see him, he still holds a bit of a reservation around her, nervous, as if he's always one step away from getting punished.
"Good evening, Ryan. You know I told you to call me Cassandra." The girl points out, smiling at the dark haired boy. Ryan shrugs, squares his shoulders.
"You're royalty, not a commoner, not like me."
Ryan had been brought to work at the castle after the death of his father when he was just thirteen years old. His father had been a loyalist to the king, before he had been killed in one of the many missions he took for Cassandra's father, it was only natural that her father would take the young man in.
