The Queen's Handmaiden

Reunion

“Anne, did you check if the flowers in Richie’s bathroom were the right ones?” The queen anxiously asked as they waited for the prince’s carriage to make its way towards where the king and the queen waited for their son.

“Flowers in the bathroom?” Jane asked, confused, “I don’t remember seeing any flowers at all when I went to check last time.”

The queen’s eyes became as big as saucers. With an urgency in her tone, she whispered to Jane, “Anne, please, quickly go to the gardens, you know Richie’s favorites, get them, and put them however you like in his bathroom. Don’t trust anyone else with this. I swear I shouldn’t have trusted anyone else in the first place. Please go, he will be needing to freshen up as soon as he goes to his chambers, and make sure they are beautifully ready.”

Thus, instead of waiting for the prince’s arrival like the rest of the people, Jane rushed first to the gardens and then to the prince’s chambers where the Queen had personally supervised cleaning. Jane heard cheers from the chamber’s windows and knew the prince had arrived. She knew she needed to work quickly to leave before he arrived in his chambers. She quickly set the bouquets here and there and began spreading the petals in the bath. The Prince had never liked such stuff, but the queen was adamant about the decorations, as if it was a princess returning, not the future king.

She heard the chamber's doors open and shut, she was almost done and prayed that it was another maid sent to call her back or inform her that the prince was headed in this direction. She picked up the empty flower basket and opened the door of the bathroom, only to come face-to-face with the handsome prince himself, who stood shirtless looking surprised at her presence.

He looked at her questioningly and she recollected her thoughts from his naked chest to her reason for being in his bath chamber and the fact that she was facing the Prince.

She quickly curtsied and apologized and began babbling in a breath, his handsome looks making her flustered, “Your Highness! Welcome back! I was, uh, I was sent by the Queen to decorate your bath chamber-um, redecorate. Not that it was left from decoration before, it’s just, that she wanted your favorite flowers and she ordered me to make sure and-”

Richard saw how he affected her, he enjoyed having that effect on women. But to know that now he had that effect on Jane-Anne as well was a new thing and he liked it more, even though she was just his mother’s handmaiden. She never looked twice at him, never blushed in front of him before, always focused professionally on her tasks.

Richard smirked, not wanting to make her flustered any more than she was, and stepped in her direction, dismissing her explanation in his voice that had become deeper in the years he spent away, “Tis alright. You may leave.”

He told her to leave yet stood in the way of her leaving.

“Um,” She tried to tell him that he was in the way as he asked with questioning eyes, “Yes?”

She sighed, smacked herself mentally for forgetting her stature and his, regained her composure, and spoke confidently, almost bored of the game going on, “You are in the way, your Highness.”

There was sarcasm in her voice and Richard rolled his eyes, there she was, the old Jane-Anne that he had left behind. The girl who respected him for who he was, but other than that, never bothered about him.

He nodded and stepped, dropping the smirk. The fatigue of his fortnight-long journey took over and he allowed her to leave without another word as she bowed again with a ‘Thank you’ and tried to leave, only to find the door locked.

Richard sighed, having forgotten he had locked the door himself. Jane fumbled with the basket in one hand and the door with the other as Richard approached from behind her with the key and pressed it inside the lock himself.

Jane jumped at the sudden closeness from behind and held her breath as the prince snaked his naked arm around her to reach the door from behind her, grazing her exposed wrist from her uniform and sending strange alien sparks through her. He turned the key in the lock as a whiff of her flowery scent tickled his nostrils from the nape of her neck. It was rosy, but not very strong and had an almost immediate calming effect on him.

“There you go.” He spoke deeply in her ear with his exotic accent that even the king and queen never knew how he acquired.

Jane took a deep breath and accidentally inhaled his sweaty musk due to the closeness from behind. Not wanting to endure any more of this, she quickly pushed the door open and rushed outside without a look or word back.

Richard closed the door again and headed to his bathroom in hopes of a relaxing bath, his head full of recent events. He couldn’t deny Jane-Anne’s beauty had intensified in the last three years that he was gone, she was more feminine than he remembered her, or maybe he had never really paid her enough attention as he had done in only five minutes now.

Jane felt hot, she could almost feel her ears on fire. She was finding it hard to breathe as she headed straight to the gardens, the one spot in the Palace other than the library that eased her mind. But she could still feel his breath on her neck from behind her because her hair was packed in a bun and tied up with her scarf, exposing her neck.

The gardener, Paul, made his way to the young handmaiden, “Everything alright, Jane?”

She turned and smiled, “Of course, why wouldn’t it be?”

Paul shrugged, “You look like you’ve run a thousand miles.”

She shrugged, slowly coming back to her senses and her old self, “Maybe I have.”

He raised a brow and she held the empty basket towards him, “Took your basket without permission, I was in a hurry, Queen’s orders. Just came back to return it.”

Paul laughed and took the basket, “Met the prince.” It wasn’t a question; it was a statement that he knew she had met the prince.

She didn’t respond, so he asked in a fatherly tone, “That bad, huh?”

She shook her head, “Not at all. I don’t know what rainbows and sunshine you were expecting but he is still the man who left three years ago, only more well- (she wanted to say built but ended up saying) -learned.” She wasn’t sure if she was convincing him or herself that everything was the same as before.

There was still a lot to be done and to keep herself busy, she went back to the queen, taking her time to ease herself back into her normal self. The Palace was overrun with people, most of whom didn’t glance twice at a lowly handmaiden like herself, so working quietly was no problem and the dinner was a huge thing to be prepped for.