chapter 3
2104 Words
The morning after the thirtieth birthday gala felt less like a celebration and more like the aftermath of a siege. At Noordeinde Palace, the golden sunlight filtering through the windows did nothing to warm the atmosphere. The "baby bootie" incident had been scrubbed from the official press releases, but within the walls, it was all anyone could breathe.
Prince Floris hadn't slept. He had spent the night in a fever of digital sleuthing. While the Royal Marechaussee and the AIVD (Intelligence Service) analyzed the drone’s flight path, Floris had been looking at something else: a photograph he had snapped with his phone of that waiter near the service entrance.
"You look like death, and not the fashionable kind," a voice whispered.
Floris looked up from his tablet to see Elisa Van den Berg slipping into the library. She was dressed in a leather jacket and heavy boots, looking entirely ready to flee the country.
"Elisa. What are you doing here? Your parents were supposed to take you back to the estate this morning."
"Saskia is busy playing the grieving fiancée-in-waiting, comforting your mother with herbal tea and platitudes," Elisa said, dropping into a velvet chair. "And my father is locked in a 'crisis meeting' with yours. So, I figured I’d check on the man of the hour. You found something, didn't you?"
Floris hesitated, then turned the tablet toward her. It was a grainy, zoomed-in shot of the waiter. "The security footage says his name was 'Stefan.' It was a fake ID. He disappeared five minutes after I saw him. But look at his eyes, Elisa. And look at the way he stands. He isn't a waiter."
"He looks like he’s waiting for a fight," Elisa noted, her eyes narrowing. "Where did he go?"
"The GPS on a stolen catering van was pinged near Doetinchem three hours ago," Floris said, his voice dropping. "The Achterhoek. It’s a needle in a haystack of farmland, but it’s a lead. The police are focusing on terrorist cells or anti-monarchy groups. They think it’s a provocation. But I think... I think he was a messenger."
"And you're going to go find him," Elisa stated. It wasn't a question. "You can't just drive out there, Floris. You have a tail of six bodyguards and a GPS tracker in your watch."
Floris stood up, his jaw set. "Not if I’m in a car they don't recognize. And not if I have someone with me who isn't a royal."
Elisa’s grin was slow and dangerous. "My vintage Land Rover is in the south lot. No GPS, no fancy tech, and it smells like wet dogs and rebellion. If we leave now, we can be in the Back Corner by lunch."
"Why are you helping me?" Floris asked.
"Because," Elisa said, standing up and heading for the door, "Saskia wants you to be a King. I want to see what happens when you actually become a person."
While the Prince was plotting his escape, the sun was rising over the Achterhoek with a deceptive peacefulness.
At the farmhouse, Teun stood in the kitchen, the scent of strong coffee and fried eggs filling the air. He hadn't slept either. The image of his father crying over that wooden box was burned into his retinas.
Bram entered the kitchen ten minutes later, his limp more pronounced than usual. He didn't look at Teun. He went straight for the coffee pot, his hands trembling slightly as he poured a mug.
"Morning," Bram grunted.
"Morning," Teun replied, leaning against the counter. He watched his father for a moment, waiting for the man to offer something—an explanation, a greeting, anything. Bram remained silent.
"I saw you last night, Pa," Teun said. The words were quiet, but they carried the weight of a falling axe.
Bram froze, the mug halfway to his lips. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"In the study. The box. You were crying over a photo and a piece of paper." Teun stepped closer, his shadow falling over his father. "Aniek was talking about the news. About the Prince. About the k********g thirty years ago. And then I see you, late at night, holding onto secrets like they're the only thing keeping you upright. What’s in the box, Pa?"
Bram finally looked at him, but his eyes were guarded, the warmth usually found there replaced by a cold, desperate layer of denial. "It’s nothing for you to worry about, Teun. Just old papers. Taxes from your grandfather’s time. I was... I was just missing my mother. The anniversary of her passing is coming up."
"Grandma died in August," Teun said flatly. "It’s May. Don't lie to me."
"Don't you use that tone with me in this house!" Bram snapped, his voice cracking. He slammed his mug onto the table, splashing coffee onto the worn wood. "I’ve worked this land every day for sixty years to give you a life. To keep this farm in our name. You’re my son. That’s all you need to know."
"Am I?" Teun’s voice was dangerously low. "Because I don't look like you, Pa. I don't look like anyone in the village. And every time the news mentions the 'Lost Prince,' you look like you’re about to have a heart attack. If there’s something I need to know—if I’m not who I think I am—you owe it to me."
Bram turned away, his shoulders hunched. "You’ve been listening to Dirk and those fools at the keet. Too much beer and too much imagination. Go check the fences, Teun. The cows don't care about your identity crisis."
"Where is the box, Pa?"
"I burned it," Bram lied, his back still turned. "It was trash. Now, get to work. Or I’ll find someone who actually wants to be a farmer to do it for you."
Teun felt a surge of white-hot anger, but beneath it was a sickening hollow. He knew his father. Bram was a terrible liar. The way his eyes darted to the floor, the way his hands shook—it confirmed everything Teun feared. He wasn't just a farmer from the Back Corner. He was a secret.
Without another word, Teun grabbed his jacket and walked out, the door slamming behind him. He didn't go to the barn. He got into his old truck and drove. He needed air. He needed to find Aniek. He needed to know that something in his life was real.
The drive from The Hague to the Achterhoek took nearly two hours. Elisa drove like a woman possessed, weaving her battered Land Rover through traffic while Floris sat low in the passenger seat, a baseball cap pulled down over his eyes.
"You realize that if we get caught, my father will literally lock me in a convent," Elisa said, though she sounded more excited than worried.
"And I’ll be under house arrest until I’m fifty," Floris replied. He was looking at a map on his phone. "The catering van was found abandoned in a ditch outside a village called Hummelo. It’s right near here."
"What’s the plan, Your Highness? Do we just knock on every farmhouse door and ask if they have a spare Prince?"
"We look for the man from the gala," Floris said. "He was a waiter, which means he has a connection to the city, but he knew exactly where to go in the country. He’s the bridge."
As they crossed the border into Gelderland, the landscape changed. The tight, urban geometry of the Randstad gave way to wide-open spaces, ancient oaks, and the smell of manure and fresh-cut grass. It was a world Floris had only seen from the windows of a royal train.
"It’s beautiful," he murmured.
"It’s isolated," Elisa countered. "The perfect place to hide someone for thirty years."
They reached the outskirts of the village by noon. Elisa pulled into a local gas station. "We need to blend in. Your 'casual' clothes still look like they cost more than this car. Put on this." She tossed him a worn, grease-stained work jacket she kept in the back.
Floris put it on, feeling the weight of it. For the first time in his life, he didn't feel like a symbol. He felt like a ghost hunter.
"There," Elisa pointed. A red Volkswagen Polo was parked near the station's small cafe. A young woman in nurse’s scrubs was talking animatedly to a tall man in a flannel shirt.
Floris’s heart stopped.
He didn't need a DNA test. He didn't need the age-progression sketches. He didn't even need the waiter’s photo.
He was looking at a man who stood with the exact same posture as King Willem Hendrik. The man had the same broad shoulders, the same way of tilting his head when he listened, and—even from this distance—Floris could see the piercing, steady blue of his eyes.
"Floris," Elisa whispered, her hand tightening on the steering wheel. "Is that...?"
"That’s him," Floris breathed. "That’s Casper."
Teun was leaning against his truck, listening to Aniek recount the gossip from the hospital, but he wasn't really hearing her. His mind was still in that study, seeing his father’s tears.
"Teun, you're not listening," Aniek said, poking his arm.
"Sorry, Aniek. It’s just... things are weird at home. Pa is acting strange. He lied to me this morning."
"About what?"
"The box. He said he burned it, but I know he didn't. He’s hiding something about where I came from."
Aniek looked at him softly. "Maybe he’s just scared, Teun. If you really are who everyone thinks you are, he loses his son. And the farm loses its future."
"I don't care about the farm right now," Teun said, his voice rising in frustration. "I care about the truth. I’ve lived thirty years thinking I was a Van Buren. If I’m just a stolen prize—"
He stopped. A battered Land Rover had pulled into the station. Two people got out. A girl with dark, messy hair and a guy in a work jacket that looked two sizes too big for him.
The guy was staring at Teun.
Teun felt a strange sensation, like a low-frequency hum vibrating in his teeth. He turned to face the stranger, his hand tightening on the edge of his truck bed.
The stranger took off his baseball cap.
The silence that fell over the gas station was absolute. It was the silence of a clock stopping, of a breath held too long.
Teun looked at the stranger. The man was blonde, well-groomed, and looked like he had never spent a day shoveling manure in his life. But his face... the shape of the mouth, the curve of the brow... it was like looking at a version of himself that had been polished and put on a shelf.
"Hello, Teun," the stranger said. His voice was refined, but it carried a tremor that Teun felt in his own chest.
"Who are you?" Teun asked, though deep in the marrow of his bones, he already knew.
"My name is Floris," the man said. He took a step forward, ignoring Elisa’s warning hand. "And I think you have something that belongs to me. And I have something that belongs to you."
Aniek gasped, her hand flying to her mouth.
Teun didn't move. He looked at this 'Floris,' this Prince, this mirror image. He thought of Bram’s tears. He thought of the black gold of his fields. And then he thought of the dark-haired boy in the silver-framed photo he had seen on the news.
"I’m a farmer," Teun said, his voice cracking. "I don't have anything for a Prince."
"You have my brother's face," Floris said, his eyes shimmering with unshed tears. "And I’ve been looking for you for twenty-nine years."
Behind them, the roar of a heavy engine approached. A black SUV with tinted windows drifted into the lot—the Royal Marechaussee had found them. But for the two men standing by the pumps, the world had already ended and begun again in the span of a single heartbeat.
The two halves of the House of Orange had finally met in the mud of the Achterhoek.
- Writer
