Intimate Education for a Noble Lady

POV Beatrice

The Montclair Royal Palace was designed to intimidate, and it succeeded admirably in its purpose.

I pressed my hands flat against my stomach as our carriage swept through the iron gates, past manicured lawns and towering oaks whose branches seemed to reach toward us like grasping fingers.

My stays felt too tight, though I knew it was merely panic constricting my lungs rather than any fault of Mary's careful lacing.

"Not a single misstep, Beatrice." Mother's voice was tight with barely controlled panic, her gloved fingers gripping my arm with bruising intensity. "Do you understand? Not one word out of place, not one gesture that might be misconstrued."

"I understand perfectly, Mother."

And I did understand—with devastating clarity. I understood that I was being offered up like a sacrificial lamb to secure our family's survival. That whatever marriage awaited me would be one of cold calculation rather than affection.

That I would likely spend my life as an ornamental wife to a man who viewed me as a regrettable necessity—the tainted Pemberton who came with valuable borderlands attached.

Three years since Father's final, devastating act of cowardice. Three years since his suicide reduced our family name to whispered scandal and doors closing in our faces. Three years of watching former friends cross streets to avoid acknowledging us, of invitations that never arrived, of marriage prospects that evaporated like morning mist.

And now, somehow, impossibly—an audience with the Crown.

"Remember your posture," Grandmother interjected from across the carriage, her sharp gaze capable of commanding rooms at sixty-three. "The Dankworths have held their heads high through five generations of royal service. Whatever your father's failings, you carry our blood in your veins—and our blood does not falter."

"Yes, Grandmother."