Unspoken

A Long Road

The drive to the palace was long and silent. I tried to not to show my nervousness but kept fiddling with my hands in my lap. The Emperor rode in a separate vehicle behind us, I was much too low in station right now to be in the same vehicle as him. Colton sat across from me and I caught him glancing up at me a few times. Each time I caught him he would look away embarrassed. 

We had been on the road for almost an hour when he suddenly he spoke. "He's nice. I know your worried but... he's nice." I wasn't sure what he meant at first and looked at him questioningly. "My brother. Marshall. I don't know what you'd heard if anything about him but... he's kind." He said softly. I thought about what he said for a moment, I hadn't actually thought about Marshall yet, I was too busy wallowing in my own self pity about leaving my family behind. 

I haven't seen Marshall or Colton in ages. We were all friends as small children. When my mother was alive we lived in our family apartments inside the palace. We stayed in the same nursery as children, taught and cared for by the same nannies. It was decided long before I was born that the Emperor and my fathers oldest children would marry. My family was the highest in station behind the Emperor's own, so we were the first family deserving of the right to marry the heir. So as children we saw each other often but when my mother died my father couldn't stand to be in the palace much longer so we and our nanny Beatrice moved to our family estate when my brother turned a year old. 

"Addie?" Coltons voiced pulled me out of my thoughts and back to the present. I smiled when I heard him call me by my childhood nickname. I hadn't heard it in so long. "You can speak to me ya know" Colton continued. I looked down at the floor of the car and thought about this for a moment before finally working up the courage to speak. 

"What's he like?" I managed to squeak out, embarrassed at myself for even asking. Colton let out a small chuckle at my question and smiled. 

"Well, he's kind, like I said. He's a lot... hmmm" he paused thinking of what word to use to describe his older brother. "He's warm." He said finally. "He can make everyone in a room pay attention with just a look, but not like father, not because they are afraid of him, because they genuinely want to, he lights up a room effortlessly." He sounded proud of his older brother with a tinge of envy behind it. I looked at him for a moment thoughtfully. Marshall sounded a lot like the way I remember him as a child. 

Will he like me? I wondered. Will he be disappointed? I didn't consider myself much to look at, or the best company to keep. I wasn't allowed many friends and never cared much about my appearance. Now I'm getting really nervous. As if he could read my mind Colton smiled at me warmly. "He's going to love you." He said softly, a smile in his eyes. I appreciated his kindness but my stomach was still a ball of nerves. 

We had slipped back into a comfortable silence for the rest of the drive. I hadn't realized I had drifted to sleep until the vehicle came to a stop, jolting me awake. I looked up and out the window and the palace was in full view, we had stopped at the bottom of the hill to pass through security. It had been so long since I had seen the palace in person and it took my breath away. As we started up the winding drive to the palace doors I looked up at with a little bit of hope that maybe this wouldn't be such a bad thing.