@buttonsandlace --Giveaway Prize #1
“Your Grace, Her Highness has… er…” the butler hesitated, not sure how to continue.
Emmeryn looked up from her desk, placing down her quill. “Continue.” She was still only fourteen, but she’d learned how to command a sense of authority in her voice by now.
“Her Highness has slapped her nurse. V-Very hard.”
This made the Exalt’s eyebrows raise, as a pale look of dread washed over her. “By the Gods, why?”
“Her Highness said that she didn’t want to eat lunch, she wanted to have tea-time, and… one thing led to another…”
Emmeryn sighed, raising one hand to pinch her nose and purse her lips. Lissa was in that rebellious, challenging stage of her early childhood. She wanted to push limits and make demands… Emmeryn had done it too, when she was little. She had taken being a princess to her head and made unruly demands of everyone around her until her mother had taken a firm hand and dragged her by the ear outside the castle walls to see what her privilege truly was.
Emmeryn certainly didn’t want to do that with Lissa, but she still needed to try to fix this. With a nod to the butler, silently dismissing him, the young Exalt went into the hall and walked her way down to the royal nursery. Chrom was in his schooling lessons this time of day, which left Lissa by herself.
“…Lissa?” Emmeryn asked, peeking inside. “We need to talk, dear.”
The little princess was sitting on her bed with defiantly crossed arms and her big pink cheeks puffed out. She was putting on her best show of indignation. It was adorable, and despite the reason for being here, Emmeryn’s heart melted a little bit at the sight. She came in and moved to sit down beside Lissa on the bed.
“Tell me why you hit Miss Anna.”
“B’cause I wanna have tea time!” she insisted. “I dun like lunch!”
“Ok, but… Lissa, that does not mean it is right to hit another person. Anna didn’t deserve that, did she? Don’t you like Anna?”
“Then why did you hit her?” Emmeryn asked gently.
Lissa looked up at her, with her big cornflower blue eyes, and she looked so sad in that moment. She was looking at Emmeryn like she was trying to say something, but didn’t know how. Something that was too young to understand.
And it hit Emmeryn like a ton of bricks as she realized something. “…Lissa, long have you been by yourself today?”
Of course. She was so young, she was only four, and she was acting out because she felt lonely. Chrom was going off to his lessons now and he always insisted that he was too big to play ‘baby games.’ Emmeryn herself was constantly busy, but it still felt like she had neglected her little sister. The little girl she had named and held and loved when their parents hadn’t been able to.
“What if you start having lunch with me?” Emmeryn offered. “Every day at eleven, Anna can bring you to my office and we’ll sit and have luncheon together and we can play a game. Then, when its time for tea, we’ll gather Chrom and have our sweets all together. Would that be nicer?”
Lissa’s sad expression lifted, and she nodded her head excitedly. “Yeah! Please Emmi? Please, can we?”
“Of course, dear. But first, you have to go apologize to Miss Anna. If you’re a good girl for the rest of the day, then tomorrow you can start having lunch with me. Deal?”
