The crew shouted to one another as they tugged the dock lines taut, the ship lurching into its berth as the gangway slammed down onto the pier. Overhead, gulls cried while dockworkers bustled about their business below, sparing little attention for our newly arrived vessel. I remained at the bow, casting eyes over the port around us. There was little fanfare for our royal arrival, save for the banners lining the street that wound up the hill towards the walls of Relizia's fortress. A small contingent of finely dressed nobles awaited us on the pier, but the commoners paid us little heed, going about their daily tasks with barely a glance our way.

When the ship had tied down and Dulciana finally decided to grace us with her presence, a small crowd of commoners began to gather, curious. The nobles cheered and applauded as she sashayed down the gangplank, that snide, regal smile on her face. Her ladies-in-waiting trailed behind her, each of them clearly relieved to have returned home.

As I followed them onto Ardalonian soil, I noted the small force of armed guards standing between the commoners and the gathered nobles. The nobles, dressed in multi-coloured silks and dripping with jewels, were fawning over Dulciana, all bows and curtseys as they kissed her rings.

I'd expected the courtiers to greet her warmly, which was why I kept my eye on the commoners. Their reaction would be infinitely more telling than those of the fawning nobles.

The common folk nearest us on the docks began whispering among themselves, the looks directed our way more hostile than reverent. As I scanned the crowd, I noted several well-muscled men, attired as commoners but standing with the stiff-backs and alert posture of soldiers. They were watching the men and women staring at the princess, motionless as the crowd milled around them.

The uniformed guards snapped to attention when one of the bedecked courtiers, still lowered in his bow as he smiled up at Dulciana gestured for her to precede him. She swept up her skirts and the guards pressed through the crowd to clear her a path. The commoners didn't part willingly, glares and curses exchanged as the guards shoved them out of the way.

I wondered why no one had considered politely asking them to move when the first rotten fish flew.

The slimy, decayed glob landed in front of Dulciana, who yanked her expensive skirts out of the way before they grazed the filthy fish.

"La reina malvada ha regresado!"

The evil queen has returned.

The cry rose from a lone voice in the crowd and its effect on the guards was instantaneous. One of the uniformed men kicked the rotten fish away, his sword ringing free of its sheath as the others raised their shields, crashing through the crowd. Dulciana broke into as near a sprint as her regal dress would allow, the nobles on her heels, following her to the carriages awaiting us on the cobbled street. Commoners were shoved from the pier, some of them splashing into the water while others were trampled. The plainly-clothed guards had drawn weapons as well, clubbing anyone within reach, even if they were retreating.

"Come along, your Highness!" a chubby, rosy-cheeked man said, not a trace of an Ardalonian accent in his voice. He seized my hand, dragging me behind the fleeing courtiers. Dulciana had already slammed her carriage door, the horses lurching into motion as commoners flooded towards it, banging on the sides as the horses trampled anyone in their path. The mob paid little attention to the rest of us, trailing her carriage until it outran them.

The chubby man pulled me in to another carriage, this one crammed full of sobbing noble women and twitchy, frightened noble men. I wedged myself into a seat beside the chubby man, watching the guards beat the crowd through the curtained carriage windows. Beyond them, more commoners hung out the windows of the colourful buildings with their seashell roofs, shouting and gesturing rude things to the guards below. More rotten fish flew, the stench flooding my nostrils despite the cloying perfumes of the nobles around me.

The carriage jostled along the cobblestones, bouncing up the hill as it climbed towards High Relizia. It was only as we passed beneath the massive stone arch of the fortress wall that the women stopped crying and the colour returned to the men's faces. I looked around at the eight of us crammed into a carriage meant for four, noting that for all their ornamentation, not one of the men was armed.

"Not exactly the welcome we'd planned, eh?" the chubby man said, extending his porky fingers to me, "Ambassador Lawrence Wells, at your service."

I shook his hand awkwardly, nearly elbowing one of the women as he pumped my hand. His cheeks were flushed, his blue eyes wild as he looked from me to the nobles to the window and back again. His palms were sweaty and I tried to discreetly wipe my hand on my trouser leg, remembering what Lord Wentworth, father's foreign affairs advisor, had told me about Lawrence Wells:

Your father assigned him to Ardalone despite his vocal requests for Germania. He's done a fair job, but every year he requests a new assignment and every year your father refuses. Last year was the first time in my tenure that he didn't ask for a new posting...

"Pleasure to meet you," I said automatically, the ruddy little man's smile unnervingly bright after the mob down at the docks.

"I trust you had a pleasant journey?" the ambassador continued. Acutely aware that all the other eyes in the carriage were on me, I found myself wondering whether they understood what we were saying or not.

But better safe than sorry, I supposed.

"It was uneventful, thankfully," I replied, throwing on a rueful grin for the benefit of the rest of the carriage, "Though I'm certain my betrothed won't be too thrilled with our welcome. I do hope she's all right."

Ambassador Wells' blond lashes blinked rapidly as the grin slid momentarily from his face before it returned. One of the ladies leaned over to whisper something to the man beside her, her mouth hidden by her broad, lace-trimmed fan as her eyes remained on me.

"Yes, yes, of course!" the ambassador said, looking out the window, "Ah, here we are!"

As we'd spoken, we'd ridden past endless manicured lawns and pristine white manors, the opulence and size increasing as we neared the palace. The closest few homes rivalled the finest in Highcastle, with fountains and rock grottos and groves of cypress trees jutting into the too-blue sky. As the trio of alabaster towers loomed overhead, we crossed a drawbridge over a saltwater moat, the walls here more for decoration than any defensive purpose.

The palace was all pale marble and sandstone, immaculate and frigid compared to the glittering, bustling streets of Relizia proper. There was a much larger greeting party here, the black and gold banners of the royal house swaying in the salty sea breeze. The king sat atop a throne erected before the great ebony doors, their darkness an inky stain against the bright stone. The palace itself comprised mainly of towers and column-lined passageways, with hardly any outer walls thanks to the moat we'd crossed to enter the grounds.

In fact, all of High Relizia was more or less a fortress, surrounded by the great wall separating them from Relizia proper. We'd passed guard post after guard post on our way through High Relizia, which had me wondering why they needed so much security in a place supposedly so impenetrable...

The king drummed his fingers impatiently as our carriages lurched to a halt, a pair of princesses flanking him. Rather than exit immediately, however, Dulciana remained tucked away in her carriage while the assembled nobles batted their fans in the heat of the stone courtyard. I tried not to roll my eyes at her desperate power play, keeping them all waiting while she rearranged her skirts or fanned away her perspiration. The king's glower darkened every passing second, his impatience clear even from my poor vantage point.

The nobles crammed around me seemed to be holding their breath, waiting for Dulciana to emerge. A bead of sweat trickled down my neck, the stuffy carriage growing stuffier as no one dared to move.

Finally, the door to Dulciana's carriage opened, a footman hurrying to help her out. The moment her foot touched the ground, the nobles surrounding me made for our carriage door, flooding out into the courtyard like fish from an overturned barrel.

I waited for them all to leave, Ambassador Wells turning back to gesture me out as I took stock of the rest of the assembled court from the shadows of the carriage. There were certainly more people here than there had been at the docks and they were clearly arranged by rank and family. Those closest to the king, standing at the base of the stairs, were far more luxuriously dressed than those who had met us down by the docks. Two groups even had servants holding canopies overhead to shade them from the sun.

The one thing they all shared, however, were the smiles that barely reached their eyes.

The princesses, however, were an entirely different story. I learned two things about them very quickly: the first was that the pair of them were not faking their enthusiasm and relief at Dulciana's return. The second was that the tallest one never made a move without glancing towards the shorter one for her approval. The smaller one very nearly burst into tears as her older sister emerged from the carriage, the taller one glancing over at her shorter sister's reaction before following suit.

Between them, the king remained unmoving. As Dulciana climbed the stairs, he didn't bother to rise from his throne, instead extending his hand for her to kiss his rings. She did, gracefully, while curtseying awkwardly on the stairs. The king held her there, his hand outstretched, for far longer than was customary and I realized that the throne was not simply for appearances' sake.

The throne was meant to remind Dulciana of her place. She would do as he wished, even if it meant curtseying on a set of stairs under the sweltering sun and holding her lips to his rings for longer than was necessary to show her respect.

The fact that Dulciana played along, however, was more telling. Gone were her sneers and sidelong glares, and while she still retained a certain swagger, she was far more subdued in the presence of her father.

"Where's the prince?" I whispered to Ambassador Wells.

"He's...away," he replied, nervously twisting his ring before shooing me up the stairs behind the curtseying princess. Filing that bit of knowledge away to further investigate later, I squared my shoulders and slid on my favourite smirk. The crowd hushed as I followed in Dulciana's footsteps, bowing before the king.

To my utmost surprise, he rose.

"Welcome to Ardalone, Thomas," he said, clasping my hand with a firmer handshake than I would have expected from someone his age, "Come, let us welcome you."

Just like that, the King of Ardalone had painted an even larger target on my back, as he led me past his daughters towards the black palace doors, escorting the guest of honour rather than his long-departed daughter. The princesses sank into curtseys as we passed, Dulciana's sour look returning as she glared between me and her father. The shorter princess had taken her place beside Dulciana, her almond-shaped brown eyes following me with thinly veiled curiosity. The taller of the two kept her eyes trained on the marble floor, studiously ignoring us as we passed.

"Unfortunately, my son could not join us," the king continued, as the great doors opened before us. The massive entrance hall was dominated by a grand marble fountain, the water tinkling as it ran down a pair of glass sculptures within. Birds chirped and bathed, flitting about the room and up into the carved, arched ceiling as we approached.

I did my best not to gawk, taking in as much as I could without swivelling my head. The palace was airy, with very few doors and very many columns. The great hall led straight through to a set of stairs descending into a massive, glass-roofed pavilion, their version of a ballroom. The room was bright and hot thanks to the sun spilling through the domed roof, though the doors on all sides were open to allow a cool sea breeze to blow through from the gardens. The white towers of the palace rose around us, spiralling upwards into the blue sky above. A series of walkways connected them, criss-crossing the gardens over rows of colonnades.

I couldn't help but wonder what they did when it rained.

**A/N: Look out Ardalone, he's arrived! What do you think of Ambassador Wells? And what about the missing crown prince? There's also the two new princesses to consider...but more on them later. I hope you all enjoyed it and, as usual, please don't forget to vote and comment!