"Princess Snow White! How are you?"
As soon as the princess opened the door, Rachel entered, speaking in a cheerful and energetic tone. She was ready to support the princess after her long sleep and make her forget the terrible things she'd been through days before. She'd been so worried about her! Mariella had told her what she remembered: losing the princess in the crowd and panicking. Truly horrible.
She was saddened that something so terrible had happened to her friends. That said, Rachel was known for her optimism: she would help her dear companions cheer up! She hadn't expected, however, that she would be missing from her rooms. Mariella had arrived shortly afterward, following Rachel to visit Snow White, and when she saw the maid standing motionless in the doorway, she also stopped, believing something had happened: "Is the princess okay?"
"The princess isn't here!" Rachel had quickly turned around, looking at Mariella with a worried expression, then went to check the bathroom to make sure the princess wasn't there. When she finished her inspection, she came to a conclusion: "Have they kidnapped her, perhaps?" Shocked, she ran out of the room, followed by a very agitated Mariella: "What are you talking about? No one could enter the palace unnoticed! Let's ask the guards."
They reached the nearest guards and explained the situation, holding back tears. The two men looked at each other in confusion. One of them stopped the maids with a wave of his hand: "Princess Snow White left her room last night and hasn't returned. Markus," he looked at his colleague, "spoke to the queen's personal guards and confirmed her location. If she hasn't moved, she's still in Her Majesty's wing."
Rachel and Mariella began to breathe normally again, but a glance at each other was enough to understand that they had the same thought: had the princess spent the night with the queen? Wasting no time, they continued their journey to reach Snow White, and when they found themselves in front of queen Grimilde's chambers, the guards informed them that the queen had left the wing early in the morning, while the princess was still resting. The two maids looked at the stoic men and wondered how it was possible that the situation didn't provoke some kind of reaction in them too: they came to the conclusion that they were the only ones who suspected the relationship between the queen and Snow White.
Rachel, after days and days of discussions with Mariella, had convinced her that queen Grimilde had some sort of interest in the princess. Both she and Rachel were aware of the existence of sensual and romantic relationships between people of the same sex.
Whether it was the norm in society or the religion prevalent in the capital, it was foolish to pretend that many relationships among the nobles weren't of that nature. After all, marriage had never been born of love, but of self-interest, and the maids could easily observe from afar what happened among the nobles, who never cared about their servants. Rachel, for example, remembered seeing one of the foreign princes courting a nobleman from Arran at Snow White's birthday party; she'd spied them briefly before running away, her face red. Mariella, on the other hand, knew that her female cousin, also of noble origins, had had an affair with a foreign noblewoman. Essentially, the two maids were no strangers to these situations and didn't condemn them; on the contrary, they were curious to see if their hypotheses were well-founded!
Rachel and Mariella knocked on the wooden door adorned with fine gold decorations, and waited to be welcomed; soon they heard a "Come in!" and entered without further ado. The princess was sitting on the bed, smoothing her hair and checking her clothes to make sure they were in place. She had just woken up and hadn't expected to find her friends right there. Rachel was the first to break the silence after closing the door: "Mariella and I were worried when we didn't see you in your room. Imagine our surprise to find you here!"
"Rachel thought you'd been kidnapped. Apparently, that's what happened..."
"And who kidnapped me?" Snow White rose from the bed, her face flushed and her eyes narrowed: her friends were trying something. Rachel wasn't meeting her gaze, while Mariella continued to hide behind the taller brunette. "We think it was the queen who—"
Snow White's eyes widened and then she turned away, biting her lip: why were they trying to embarrass her? It was exactly what she wanted to avoid, but the queen had insisted on keeping her in her room, and by the next morning she had evaporated, leaving her alone in bed. "Are you well?"
"You're only polite when it suits you, my friends." The princess giggled, looking back at them, then closed the distance between them. She hugged them both, forgetting the complaints she wanted to air. She was happy to see Mariella in such good health and wanted to show them that she was doing well, too. "I've missed you."
"You, too." Mariella held back her tears, and Rachel held back the words she wanted to say. She longed to find out what had happened during the princess and queen's absence, but it wouldn't be easy to get information. The princess was reserved.
"So... shall we go to your room, or would you prefer to move in?"
"Rachel."
"Oh, did I say something wrong?" She winked and turned toward the door, ignoring Snow White's complaints. Mariella approached the princess and helped her get ready before leaving the room. The morning passed peacefully, and while Rachel was still thinking about how to get Snow White to confess everything, the latter wondered why the queen had left her alone in her room, without saying anything.
It was when lunch arrived that the princess decided to step forward and confront the queen: she had asked the guards to pass on the invitation to Grimilde, so that she could be waiting for her directly in the dining room, welcoming her at the table. She quickly prepared to reach her destination, and when she entered the large room where she would dine, she saw Grimilde waiting for her, next to the long table.
She seemed to be suppressing a smile, chewing on her lower lip.
When she raised her blue eyes to the princess, the latter felt her resolve melt away.
"Have you been waiting long, Your Majesty?" Snow White bowed slightly in reverence and exchanged a glance with Grimilde before walking past her and taking a seat to the right of the queen's usual seat, at the head of the table. The castle servants busied themselves with bringing drinks and food as soon as the two women were seated.
Grimilde remained impassive as she sipped from her glass of red wine to accompany the dishes, and Snow White watched her silently: she was always so elegant in everything she did, even sitting at the table, using cutlery to eat, or simply lifting a glass. The princess simply couldn't match her in elegance and control.
"What are you thinking so intensely about?" Grimilde's clear, firm voice distracted the young woman from her thoughts. The latter put down her fork and met the gaze of the woman who was accompanying her during lunch:
"I have a lot of thoughts racing through my mind right now... but isn't that the case with everyone? Sometimes it's almost impossible to figure out what someone's thinking." Snow White wouldn't reveal anything to her, not so easily. She was still angry about that very morning. The blonde smiled at those words and also put down her silver cutlery, which was richly decorated and elegant, just like everything else surrounding the queen.
"You're right. Therefore, it's my duty to rephrase the question to help you provide me with an answer: do you have any concerns? I know the look on your face when something isn't right."
"You seem to know me perfectly, Your Majesty." Snow White's smile was clearly fake: her frustration had certainly increased. She would have liked to leave the dining room without another word, but she couldn't, given that they were surrounded by too many eyes and ears. "And if you really know me well," the princess began, "you should already know the answer to your question."
Grimilde then became more serious and silent: she continued to stare at the princess, breathing calmly, thinking carefully. The ebony-haired girl seemed annoyed for some reason, so Grimilde began analyzing everything that had happened in the last few hours: was it possible that Snow White was still angry about the pact with the demon? But they had already had that conversation, and they had also discussed their intimacy...
"Princess," the queen decided to get straight to the point, to avoid further misunderstandings, "would you like to accompany me this afternoon? I'm meeting with a merchant, and it's necessary to inspect the horses and mares to ensure they are healthy and of good quality." At those words, the princess was stunned and didn't respond for a moment. Then, picking up her glass for a sip of water, she forced herself to speak: "V-Very well, Your Majesty. I'll follow you."
Grimilde waited until she saw a small smile from the princess before relaxing again.
~•~•~
Snow White angry is like a cute puppy trying to fight you XD