Lady Therese De Beauharnais, Duchess of Roche

7 December, Year 32 of King Frederick V of Monrique's reign

Bordeux Castle, Bordeux

Monrique

I almost stumbled in shock when I returned to my chambers that night.

A petite woman with waist length brunette hair was seated on my rocking chair in front of the fireplace, fiddling with her engagement ring. She stared at the flames in front of her, her goblin green eyes unfocused, lost in her thoughts.

I took off my veil, and threw it on the dressing table. "Lord, my Lady," I blew a breath through my lips, "not that I am displeased to see you, but I would appreciate some warning next time."

Lady Evangeline of Warwick glanced up at me, startled, before smiling faintly.

"My apologies, Tess," she stood up to face me, "I wanted to meet you as soon as you arrived in Bordeux, but Lord Timothée told me you were visiting a friend and suggested that I wait here for you."

I drew up a chair for myself, and bade her to take a seat once more. "I see," I nodded, "so how may I help you?"

"I wanted to personally invite you to Ned's and my wedding," she began hesitantly, "Ned would have been here as well, but he and Tommy are currently in Testalt, visiting their family."

So that was the excuse he had given her.

In truth, Lord Testalt had ridden to Testalt to leave Tommy behind with his family, in the safety of his own lands. He was then going to travel to Roche, to help the rest of the Earls there prepare for the worst if the petition failed.

That letter that Captain Everard had brought me from the King a week ago, blaming me for Lord Bertrand's execution, had left the Earls stunned. I had written to Lord Testalt as soon as I had gathered them together, and discussed and decided what was to be done about the petition.

We had all agreed that it was imperative that I presented it to the King before the latter could find the opportunity to order my arrest.

In the meanwhile, Evie held out the card in her hands towards me. "The wedding will be held on New Year's day," her voice was soft, "the both of us will be extremely happy if you and your family can attend."

Hesitantly, I accepted it from her, and fingered the gold embossing on the thick, cream coloured invitation. However, I had to suppress a chuckle when I noticed the borders of crossed swords along the edges of the card.

"Tommy designed the borders, did he not?" I guessed.

"Aye, he did," she laughed gently, "quite insistent he was, too. He is very much a part of this wedding as the either of us, so Ned and I allowed it."

I broke into a weak smile at that, and looked down at the invitation once more. "I appreciate the invite, my Lady. Thank you," my voice was soft, "my sister Clara would be able to attend, but I may not."

She bit her lip, genuinely disappointed. "Oh."

"'Tis not because I do not want to come. I will always want the best for you and Ned," I hurried to assure her, taking a deep breath, "but these next few weeks are going to be rather tumultuous, and I do not know if - "

"Because of the petition?" she guessed sadly.

I was surprised. "You know about it?"

"My earldom, Warwick, is a part of Anchorvale," she reminded me, "and its heiress presumptive, Lady Caroline, was very busy last month gathering signatures for it on your behalf. Evoric and I signed it as well. When are you presenting it to His Majesty?"

"Well, tomorrow - "

"Tomorrow?" she was flabbergasted, "by God, Tess - "

"Calm down, I meant I will be submitting the petition to the King tomorrow," I told her, exasperated, "after reading through it, His Majesty will schedule a date and time for the Crown Council to discuss and deliberate. That is when I will be presenting it formally."

She frowned. "Does Ned know about this?"

"He knows about the petition, yes - "

"Nay, does he know that you will be asking for your own death sentence tomorrow?" she demanded, sitting upright, "Tess, the whole court knows that the King is furious with you over the whole fiasco with Lord Bertrand. Should you not wait for a better time to submit - "

"I am already very late as it is, my Lady," my voice was soft.

Her eyes began to well with tears. "We live under a monarchy, Tess. His Majesty can do anything to you," her voice was filled with anguish, "you know he can."

I met her gaze steadily. "Well, I am no less, my Lady. I do not intend to lose - not without a fight."

Evie was stunned into silence for a long while. Her goblin green eyes were as wide as saucers, as she struggled to accept my decision. Eventually, she reached out to take her hand in mine, and gripped it hard.

"How do you do it?"

I was bewildered. "I beg your pardon?"

"How are you able to remain so calm, so confident?" she whispered, "are you not in the slightest bit afraid of what is to come?"

"I have been living in fear all my life, my Lady," I was honest, "but the time has now come for me to consider that there is something more important than fear, that is worth fighting for."

Her lips pulled up in sad smile. "Your courage is admirable. I can see why Ned fell in love with you."

"That is all in the past. It matters no more."

"It is not in the past," she murmured, her voice breaking, "I wish it was, but it is not. There are days I still wonder if I should just..."

She broke off, shaking her head tiredly, as she stood up from her chair. "You should rest. You have a big day tomorrow," she placed a hand on my shoulder, "have a good night, and good luck for tomorrow."

Before I can say anything, she strode out of the room.

***

"Announcing Lord Timothée Harrington, Earl of Johanne and Her Grace Lady Therese De Beauharnais, sovereign Duchess of Roche, and Lady Justice of Monrique!"

There was pin-drop silence in the room. There were no smiles, no applause. All eyes in the throne room were fixed on Lord Timothée and me, fearful, curious, and some were even downright angry.

We paused for a moment, and I gripped the crook of his elbow tightly. He covered my hand with his own in a gesture of support and comfort, before we began to walk down the long aisle together towards the dais.

King Frederick V of Monrique stared impassively down upon us, as we came to a stop in front of him, and sunk into our respective obeisances.

"Earl of Johanne," he called out, his voice loud and sharp, "please rise."

I kept my head bowed and maintained my curtsey, pursing my lips. The snub was completely intentional, and now I could not stand up until he allowed me to.

Lord Timothée squeezed my shoulder, almost in a warning to keep calm, before he stood upright. "Thank you, Your Majesty."

"Tell us, my Lord," the King continued, "what brings you to our court this morning?"

"My daughter and I," Lord Timothée held my shoulder protectively, "would like to submit a petition to Your Majesty, and we hope that you and your Crown Council would graciously agree to take a look at it."

"Are you drunk, my Lord?" I heard the King ask sceptically, "your daughter Lady Katherine is working in the Longbournian army. The woman whose company you are in at this moment is the whore of Roche."

A horrified gasp arose in the room, as a wry smile crossed my lips. I had heard several forms of this same insult too often to truly take offence.

Unfortunately, Lord Timothée did. "I consider her my daughter as well, Your Majesty," his voice was unusually cold, "as do all the Earls of Roche whom I am representing today, save for young Lord Alençon. I speak for all of us when I say that we do not like our daughters to be referred to as whores - especially when they have done nothing to deserve it."

"Uncle Timothée, it is all right," I murmured, clutching his hand on my shoulder.

I heard the creak of the throne just then, as the King leaned forward. "Such devotion is admirable indeed," he drawled, "have we offended you, my Lord?"

Lord Timothée wisely remained silent.

"If so, we apologise. Our displeasure is not with you," the King continued quietly, "now what is it that you wish to present?"

Lord Timothée took a few steps forward to present the petition to him. I heard the rustle of parchment, as the King took it from him.

"The three thousand, six hundred and twenty-one of us who have signed this document that you are currently holding," he began solemnly, "would like to request Your Majesty, the Crown Council and the Court of the Lady Justice to consider making a change to the current inheritance laws. We request that the right of primogeniture be amended such that our first born daughters are also able to inherit our lands, property and wealth like our first born sons, without the need for them to marry or enter an engagement."

Another gasp. A heated discussion began to ensue among those who were present, some with fervour, others in scandalised horror.

The King froze where he sat, as he briefly read through the document. "Why?"

"I am afraid I do not understand your question, Your Majesty," Lord Timothée blinked at him.

"Why have you put together this petition now?" he clarified, frowning, "what made you to? These inheritance laws have been present for centuries now."

"Which is exactly why it is high time they were changed."

I did not realise those words had left my lips until silence fell all around me. Lord Timothée's hand tightened on my shoulder.

The King's voice was tightly controlled. "I do not believe I gave you permission to - "

"Your Majesty, please," Lord Timothée cut in seriously, "Her Grace the Duchess of Roche will be better able to answer your questions with regard to this petition than I can. She was the one who initiated it."

"All right, then," the King gave in with a bad grace, "rise, Duchess."

I heaved a sigh under my breath, before I rose to my full height in one, fluid motion. I refused to allow my legs to quiver in any way, as I gazed at the King straight in the eye, throwing etiquette out of the window.

"I thank you, Your Majesty," I remarked solemnly, "to answer your question, I began to gather support for this petition a couple of months ago, when the Court of the Lady Justice imprisoned your niece, Lady Madeleine De La Tours, Countess of Auvenge, for taking 100 000 Crowns from the Treasury of Auvenge for the betterment of her people."

"We are aware, Duchess," his voice was sharp, "but Lady Madeleine should have known better than to take that money. It was not hers to take. She is still - "

" - unmarried, and unengaged, and is therefore not legally recognised as a Countess in her own right," I finished for him, "but do you not think it is unfair, Sire? She is full of ideas and potential, and is eager to work towards making a difference in the lives of her people as their leader - but she is currently rotting away in a dungeon, solely because of her marital status. Had she been a man, this would not have been an issue at all."

The King remained silent, as he listened.

"I admit, Your Majesty, I mainly began this petition to free Lady Madeleine from her imprisonment," I was honest, "but along the way, it has come to signify so much more than that, to every person who has signed this document - men and women alike."

"She is still imprisoned, as we speak, waiting for a trial that will never come," I frowned, as I recalled Lady Madeleine's feeble condition in the dungeons, "although the reason why still eludes me, Sire. The Prosecution is no longer exists to pursue the case."

An eerie silence fell over the room at that, and Lord Timothée stepped closer to me protectively. I knew I had wandered into dangerous waters. The King held my gaze ferociously now, his usually calm grey eyes slowly beginning to fill with fury and grief for his dead second cousin.

"No longer alive, because of you," his voice was dangerously low, "indeed, Duchess, one wonders how you even dare to stand here before us, after what you have done."

I raised an eyebrow. "What have I done, Your Majesty?"

He leaned forward in his throne. "You had Lord Bertrand killed without a fair trial," he hissed, "he may be base-born, but he was still of our blood - "

"Six witnesses - all Corporals from the army - have testified that they saw me struggling to push him away, while he attempted pin me to the ground and enter me, Sire," I cut in, "and the jury at the Court of the Lady Justice in Roche unanimously found him guilty of attempted rape, and executed him appropriately."

Unease brewed among those watching behind me.

"May we remind you that by killing a member of the royal family, you have committed treason, Duchess?" he growled, "we could have youexecuted for this."

Lord Timothée gripped my hand in alarm. "Tess, tread carefully - "

I shook it off. "Executions are sentences meted out by the Court of the Lady Justice, Sire," I reminded him coldly, "do you truly think the jury will have me executed for simply failing to stop a procedure I had no control over in the first place?"

"They could," he narrowed his eyes, "for lying about being raped, and having an innocent man beheaded for your own twisted amusement."

Lying about being raped.

With those few words, it felt like he undermined and obliterated everything I had been through these many years, and I stood there, utterly stunned at the level of insensitivity he displayed.

"He must have merely held your hand, or something just trivial, as a polite gesture," he continued harshly, "and seeing an opportunity, you must have blown it out of proportion for the attention. Whores like you have nothing better to do."

I eventually found my voice. "Do you think I would want to lie about something like this, Sire?"

"You - "

"Do you think that I enjoyed announcing to the world that I let a man strip away my clothes, my pride and my dignity and try to force himself inside of me? That I was too weak to push him away, and lay there while he touched and groped my body as if it were his damned property?" I asked him quietly, "is that the kind of attention anyone would want? Would you, if you were in my place?" My voice betrayed a flash of pain.

The King, surprisingly, caught it, and he was momentarily rendered speechless.

"You only want to see what you want to see, Sire. You grew up with Lord Bertrand, and mayhap you knew him as a wonderful human being," I trembled, "but the monster I had the misfortune of knowing was as far from innocent as one can get."

I took a deep breath to calm myself down, and drew myself upright. This was going in circles, and I was becoming unnecessarily upset.

"It would appear we have strayed from our original topic. I am sorry for that, Your Majesty," I cleared my throat, "the Earl of Johanne and I would be most grateful if you, the Crown Council and the Court of the Lady Justice would deliberate over this petition, and allow me to formally discuss it in front of you all at a later date."

The King frowned. "But - "

"I do not wish to take up any more of your precious time than I already have," I inclined my head, "there are many people behind us waiting to have an audience with Your Majesty."

It was only then that the King seemed to remember that we were not alone. He looked around at the people waiting in the room, who had all come to seek the King for one request or another, just like Lord Timothée and I did, watching this heated argument between the both of us unfold.

Having no choice, the King bit back a sigh, and sat upright.

"The Council will deliberate on the petition, and send word to you soon."

***

"So that is the story," I swirled the wine in my glass, "of how His Majesty King Frederick publicly labelled me a whore, told me I was lying about being raped, and threatened to execute me for leading an innocent man to his death. What a day."

Later that day, in Jules' bedchambers, a group of women were gathered around me, listening to me in heavy silence. Each of them held a glass of wine, except Jules, but none of them had touched a drop of it in this past half hour that I had been speaking.

Lady Camille set her glass down, disturbed. "What a day indeed," she released a shaky breath, holding my gaze, "Tess, I am not jesting when I say you are lucky to still be alive. Today was a shitty day to submit the petition."

"Any other day in the future will be a shitty day to submit, as you put it," Lady Sophie of Rortaine pointed out, "it has been a week since Lord Bertrand died, and the King seems just as vengeful as before in his grief."

Liv shook her head, her blue eyes blazing. "Lord forgive me," she growled, "but our sovereign has a heart of stone."

"And a severely lacking intellect," Lady Madeleine's cousin, Laurette De Gaulle, frowned heavily, "why would anyone lie about rape, and set society's tongues wagging for the rest of their lives?"

"Well, what else did you expect?" Lady Aurore of Condé remarked, bitter, "he is a man. What do they know of rape, or of the hell that a woman goes through because of it? Of course he would assume Lady Therese was overreacting."

"Aye, they spend half their lives drinking, and the other half bedding any woman who walks by them," Lady Antoinette of Avignon muttered, "consent is a concept they do not know, or even care to understand." She kicked the corner of her chair moodily.

Lisa's emerald eyes widened, alarmed by the amount of negativity suffocating the atmosphere.

"His Majesty is in the wrong for how he treated Tess today, but we should have some compassion for him too," she protested, "Ladies, he has just lost a family member. He is handling his grief terribly, mayhap because he does not know how to."

"But grief does not give him the right to blame her for what Lord Bertrand did to her. That was a low blow."

Jules' surprisingly ice cold voice silenced everyone in the room. She was inclined against her pillows next to me, and she slowly tried to sit upright now, careful of her enormous belly. I slipped an arm around her, and helped her up.

"My husband and I have spent the past week yelling ourselves hoarse at the King. But His Majesty does not - nay, refuses to - understand that Lord Bertrand was no saint," she explained, frustration lacing through her voice, "unfortunately, that pathetic excuse of a man - born of an extramarital affair though he was - was still the last link the King had left to his childhood, and he had always been very fond of him."

Liv wrinkled her nose. "Last link or not, he had been a sordid man while he lived," she shuddered at some remembered memory, "has the King not heard of all the vices he engaged in while he lived?"

Jules shook her head. "Nay, he does not know, Liv," she answered tiredly, "he is utterly unaware of the several cases of rape and assault over the years that had never reached the Court of the Lady Justice, because Lord Bertrand had enough money and influence to buy his victims' silence. And Tess - "

Words failed her, and her voice broke on my name. She tightly gripped my hand she was already holding, and gazed straight into my eyes, allowing me to see every last shred of her anguish, her helplessness and her pain for me.

Understanding, I wrapped an arm around her shoulders, and leaned my head against hers.

"Grief does not give him the right to treat you thus," she repeated, trembling, "especially when you were simply submitting a petition that had nothing to do with it."

I nodded. "We cannot allow His Majesty's anger with me over Lord Bertrand cloud his judgement with regard to the petition, Ladies," I spoke up solemnly, "this is so much bigger than him, me or the rest of us."

"You are right," Lady Camille agreed, "as such, we must plan how we are going to discuss the petition with the Council. A few of our fathers are already on it, so it should not be too difficult gathering their support."

"Good luck with that," Liv told her wryly, "my Papa would never agree to allow this petition to pass into law."

"Or ours," Lady Aurore sighed, exchanging dark looks with her sisters Ladies Belle and Chantel.

"Nevertheless, we have to try our hardest," I smiled bitterly, "I am sorry, but because of me, we are already at a disadvantage with the King. Persuading the Crown Council is our only hope."

"We need to choose who is going to attend this discussion, then. They must be calm, and be good at persuasion," Liv mused, "Tess and the Crown Princess Consort have to go, but who else - "

At that moment, there were a few, sharp knocks on the door. All of us fell deadly silent at once, gazing at each other in surprise. Who was it that was seeking Jules at such a late hour?

"Who is it?" Jules called out, preparing to rise from her bed.

"There is a messenger from the King, Your Royal Highness," her Lady-in-waiting, Lady Brigitte, answered from the other side, "he bears with him an urgent missive for Her Grace the Duchess of Roche."

"Oh, good, it must be the date and time for the discussion with the Crown Council," Jules rose to her feet, smiling faintly, "now we will know how much time we have to prepare for it."

She supported her belly with one hand, and slowly waddled towards the door. She opened it, and spoke in hushed voices with the people outside, before she returned to the chamber, holding a scroll with one hand, and our petition with the other.

She held it up towards me, asking me if she could open it. I nodded, leaning forward.

The entire room held its breath, as she broke the seal and unrolled it. She read through the words once, twice, her eyes widened with each re-read. She then raised her hazelnut eyes towards us, which were beginning to blaze bright with fury.

"Those assholes!" she spat out, "I swear to the Lords above - "

"What does it say?" I tensed.

She was shaking, as she read it out loud. "To Her Grace the Duchess of Roche, His Majesty and his Crown Council regret to inform you that we have rejected your petition to - "

Almost at once, a pandemonium broke out among the women.

"So that is it? They are simply going to reject it?"

"We did not even present it to the Council!"

"This is so unfair - "

In the meanwhile, I was numb. I knew this would eventually happen, but I had expected to at least present the petition to the Council and spend a few hours discussing it, before they rejected it.

I had expected that these ladies, who had risked everything to sign this petition and gather signatures for it, would at least be given a chance to express to the Council why they wanted to change the inheritance laws.

The King has clearly influenced the Council on this.

I knew what was coming next. By now, the King would have noted the names of the noblewomen who had signed it. They would face his wrath, their families would face his wrath, solely because they had supported me.

Not on my watch.

I stood up now, eerily calm. "Jules, do you know how often the Crown Council meets in a week?"

Everyone stood up and gathered around me at that. Jules began to walk towards me, and handed me the rejected petition.

"Their next meeting is tomorrow," she told me quietly, "at 10 00 hours."

"Good," I nodded, as I looked around, "there is no time to waste. I want all eighteen of you - including you, Jules - to meet me outside the Council chambers at exactly 11 00 tomorrow."

"Will they listen to us, Tess?" Lisa whispered.

"They may not listen to us," I exhaled tiredly, "but they might listen to their very pregnant Crown Princess Consort." I gently patted my cousin's swollen belly.

I could have sworn I felt a hearty kick against my hand in response.

"And...I have one more plan in mind, in case Jules does not manage to convince them," I swallowed, my heart sinking, "but you do not need to worry about it. It does not involve any of you."

Everyone fell silent, equal parts curious and shaken by my words.

"It is still worrying, Tess," Jules lay a hand on my arm, "what are you planning?"

I shook my head at her. "I am truly, truly hoping it does not come to that," I murmured, "now if you will excuse me, I must make the necessary arrangements. Do not forget - 11 00 hours, Council chambers. I will see you all then."

With that, I strode out of the room, and straight towards Lord Timothée's chambers.