location & setting: parisian woodland
closed to @santianscrids
an austrian ambassador had once remarked they three –– joanna, carolina, and santiago of castile –– were the blessed children of iberia. the infanta thought it an apt moniker, though it had been many years since she last settled her fox-like gaze of intrepid curiosity upon castile’s youngest prince. in her own observations, carolina believed herself to have outgrown the title, breaking from its steel shackles as a woman on the cusp of an auspicious marriage, albeit she found santiago simmering comfortably within it; clinging to his fresh-faced and green charm until it rotted into a tarry brown. one could hardly envision the prince dauntlessly spearheading and forfending the castilian army when his smirk still cleaved like a boy, and his jests and mannerisms were just as she had recalled them being: inane, like her own dear sister’s. carolina stifled another belabored sigh, tightening her fingertips in her lap as the dinner company surrounding the pair continued to jab at childhood memories.
“ is it true, your highness, ” the infanta sang low, hoisting her chin to regard the neighbouring prince with a winsome crease of her mouth, “ that your brother keeps all of his princes on a leash so short it snaps in the wind? albeit my sister is not yet queen, i may sympathise that having a ruler for a sibling is not as easy as some would believe –––– they become ever more difficult to adore when we must serve them, do they not? ”