Busy Bee

Valentin nodded, understanding. It would take some hard work, but he’ll be able to do it. If not, he can just wash his hands of it and just be civilized to his stepmother as much as he could. “You’re right,” he said finally with a nod, after sitting in silence for so long. “I’ll do that, and if we don’t get along, as least we’ll just be civilized to one another whenever we see each other.”

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Bee's face lit up with a smile, and she felt tremendous self-satisfaction in feeling useful. "I believe this is one of those moments to say: both parties would win with this arrangement, right?" Whatever the outcome, if things could be more civil between the two of them, it would make everyone happier. "Have you ever thought about what you would like to do when you don't have that looming over your shoulders anymore?"

  Charlotte nodding in understanding when she explained her journey to Italy. ❝ I see. ❞ She says softly. ❝ Summer is a great time for a swimming. But here I see there’s no ocean. ❞ She really missed the sound of the ocean. Probably at somewhere might have lake or things like that. ❝ Or maybe if I was less weird, I’d talk to more people. ❞ The Aussie princess is introverted and not really confident. So she prefers wasting her times in books or in the gardens.❝ Lucky you. I get nervous when I have to interact with new people in spite of my title. ❞ As a matter of fact, it worst as a ‘princess’ she has in a way 'obligation’ to talk to people, even though she was raised 'locked up’ in a bubble where she couldn’t do anything.

"I hear people visit the lake a lot during Summer. But, again, by the time I arrived here, it seemed as if the cold temperatures had already made a permanent household," Bee sighed dramatically as if warmer temperatures would never see that land again. She met Charlotte's statement with some surprise. "Weird?" Bee couldn't help the questioning note in her tone. Still, the princess gave her a tasty morsel of insight into her life. It wasn't like her not to press for a little more. "Have people told you they thought you were weird? Because I find that a terribly rude thing to say," to a princess, no less! She thought indignantly to herself, unable to believe anyone would go through such lengths.

“I am right there with you. If it wasn’t for a select few people I would have done just that, fetal position and all.” She had freaked out, there was no point in denying that, not with Bee. “I was in the ballroom though so it wasn’t too horrible. We just…had to figure out how to not die. But you were in the cellar?” She knew how that felt, actually. “I was locked down there once with this guard, Klaus. It was awful so I can only imagine. I mean, Klaus wasn’t awful, just the situation.” 

She nodded as Bee agreed to spend some time with her, the princess grinning broadly as excitement started to take hold. “Don’t worry, I will pull the princess card if I have to. You’ll be helping me in my room all day, my ladies are sick.” She winked at Bee, her excitement only growing when the magazine was brought up. “I did! I never thought anything that cool could happen here. We have much to discuss.”

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Bee nodded in solidarity to her words. "I feel the same way. Some people really have the power to turn a situation around, don't they? I'm always grateful. Yes, I was there with Bastien, Claire, and princess Ausra. Let me tell you: we were lucky people got to us soon enough, because that place becomes a freezer quickly," she plastered a soft smile upon her features, and as Rosamie began speaking of her experience with the avalanche, a flash of something went through the blonde's blue eyes. "Really tall, brown hair, and a smile that could melt a glacier?" The maid had crossed paths with him a couple of times already, but it wasn't as if they had had the chance to talk.

Chuckling at the proposition, she didn't need any more encouragement to agree. "They aren't always happy with it, but it's not as if they can deny it," her shoulders carried with the smallest of shrugs. Bee's face lit up at the following statement, and she beamed. "We do. And I've been dying to discuss it with someone!" I'll meet you in your room in twenty minutes, okay? I'll just get these out of the way."

The question had him grinning as he thought back to their families and the little competition between them. Gio had held the title of champion for a little bit when the rock had hit him in the head but he’d quickly been surpassed once they grew older. “Um, twelve. I’ve had worse. And so have some of our siblings.” But soon confusion set in, Gio’s eyebrows knitting together as she brought up the two princesses. What did Alys have to do with this? He weighed his options with asking. He had a feeling Bee would drag this out as long as she could to get whatever answers she could but he honestly had no clue what she was talking about when it came to the Welsh girl. “Why would I have Alys change them?” As for Mia, he wasn’t going to entertain that one. She should know by now that he evaded as many questions about her as possible when it came down to feelings.

“Well, that’s good. Because you’re probably the one girl I’ve never thought about kissing aside from my sister.” The very idea of it made him want to cringe. Bee was a beautiful girl and if he hadn’t grown up with her he was sure he would have tried by now but they were too close for him to even consider it. “When you put it that way…” Gio trailed off, no longer offended by what she had said before, and nodded as she continued. “It all kind of happened so fast that I didn’t have a lot of time to process it until afterwards. I think the scariest part was not knowing if the building was going to hold up. I’m glad you were up here too, even if you were stuck in the cellar. That was probably the safest place.”

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Bee tilted her head to the side at his confession and her lips scrunched up. "Still, not too shabby," she reasoned. At that point, it felt as if they'd all seen worse than that already. "I think if we round up me and all of my siblings, we would still be coming in short," though what could she expect when they led such harmless lives in comparison. She watched as a myriad of emotions seemed to go through Gio's face at that moment, and she tried to drink them all in and dissect them all as soon as she had the chance. Did it mean she wouldn't blow it out of proportion? Probably not. Deciding Gio wanted to play coy about the situation of the princesses in his life, Bee schooled her features into a sunny and childlike smile of someone who thought they knew too much. "If I were you, I'd start talking. You know it's always a lot worse when I have to go around trying to fill in the blanks. So, spill it."

"And I've never been more flattered to hear something like it," she let out a breath in mock relief. "I don't know how Giulia and Massimo do it, but," she paused, her features twisting into a scowl. "I also don't want to find out," she mentioned, moving her head from side to side. "I know. I know how to plead my case," Bee smiled sweetly, in a way that made it hard for anyone to be mad at her for long. "Adrenaline does all these funny things, doesn't it? I thought I was running after you towards safety, and at that moment, it didn't feel like I had much to panic over. It wasn't until the door to the cellar locked us in that you weren't there that everything sunk in," the details of it were still too vivid inside her mind. "But we don't have to think about it anymore. We are all right. It's all gone now. And we've made it."

“I don’t think anyone is cut out for this weather,” he replied, “least of all us,” he added. Bas moved one of his hands to cover Bee’s, in an attempt to warm her up- futile, since they were both complaining about the cold. “At least now we know for next winter, gloves at all times,” he said. He laughed at her answer, though he nodded. “Yeah, probably not very smart,” he agreed, though even as he spoke he stood up to pick a bottle off the shelf. “But it would help us warm up, wouldn’t it?” 

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"You're not wrong," she shook her head, blonde waves spilling over her shoulders at the movement, and she glanced briefly over their linked hands, her fingers reflexively flexing in the tiniest of squeezes. Bee couldn't help smiling over the words. "And whatever else we might be able to pack. Maybe I'll leave out an emergency bag with all the things I might think I need for times like these," she found herself pondering. With wide eyes, she watched as Bastien snatched up a bottle, worrying her lower lip between her teeth before she agreed. "It does have this warming up quality," the sentence trailed off. "It might also account for entertainment."

Perhaps he was spoiled (many would argue that this was, in fact, true) but at home most of the staff knew better than to bother the prince when he was reading, and if they did not, they learned fairly quickly. His quick temper was so notorious that people tended to avoid the library in the Swiss Palace when he was there. It would foolish to think he’d be able to get away with such a reputation here, nor would his sister allow it.

“Are you always this careless with your work?” Frédéric allowed just a hint of cruelty to seep into his controlled, aloof tone. He glanced across this part of the library, and spotted a cloth that clearly did not belong draped across a reading lamp. “Is that it?”

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Bee bit back her tongue not to argue back. No good could ever come to her in such situations. So, she lowered her head and gulped the lump in her throat. “I’m sorry,” she worried her lower lip between her teeth.

It wasn’t a habit of hers to leave her belongings behind, and she blamed the scattered state of her brain on the added workload that came after the avalanche. The maid hadn’t been able to have a proper night of sleep in days. Moving her gaze back up, then in the direction the prince mentioned, the blonde’s blue eyes widened in their orbits, her lower lids emphasizing her lack of sleep with a purpling shade. Turning abruptly to both retrieve her cloth and hide the color that crept up her cheeks, Bee scurried off to the lamp, and she should have been done with nothing more than a swift tug to the cloth, but the peevish piece of fabric seemed to have a mind of its own, getting caught in the lamp and nearly toppling the object. Gasping, Bee was able to kneel and avoid its contact with the ground, needing both hands to hold it up. It was heavy enough that she couldn’t move afterward. Glancing over her shoulder, she didn’t have the guts to ask for the prince’s help.

Noting her curtsy, he couldn’t help the shake of his head as he sighed. She must be some of the staff. “You don’t have to do that. It’s really unnecessary, at least around me, I don’t really know about the rest of the royal population here,” he muttered. This whole place was very odd to him, he understood, yes, but still being around the people, royal and not, was just so odd. It wasn’t like home… “Bee, is that short for something or were you named after a fuzzy bug?” he teased with a grin. “I’m Gabe, uh, Prince of Mexico if that’s something necessary to tell,” he offered.

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Bee stared at him, and if the lines forming on her forehead were of any indication, she was clueless to what he was saying she didn’t need to do. With her mouth hanging slightly ajar until it all clicked into place. “Oh, you mean bowing,” she let out a breathy chuckle. “There’s a saying, it goes something like it’s best to be safe than,” the words escaped her, and she gestured helplessly in the air with a hand as she tried to finish her sentence. “Curare,” the words fell helplessly from her lips in Italian. It didn’t mean she would not try to remember his preference when they crossed paths another time. A soft smile played on the maid’s lips. “It’s not a bad comparison. Not in its entirety,” she was often busy after all. “But it’s short for Bettina. It’s a pleasure to meet you, prince Gabe.”

“Maybe,” he agreed, with a small smile. It was hard to be optimistic, trapped in the wine cellar with no real heat source and no way out, but having an old friend by his side helped. I’m fine,” he replied automatically. “I’m a bit cold,” he confessed. “But I’ll live, don’t worry about me.” He looked at the shelves filled with bottles, and back to Bee. “So… scale of one to ten, how bad of an idea would it be for us to open a bottle of wine?” It was a joke, and an attempt to distract Bee from her anxiety, but even as he said it he was unsure if that would work.  

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Bee automatically moved her hands to cover his. Not that her hands were much warmer, but she could try to make him feel better. "We were not cut for this weather," she agreed, her head shaking from side to side. "I wish I had been wearing gloves today," she sighed in her complaint. Bee's eyes widened in their orbits at the suggestion, and she worried her lower lip between her teeth. "On a safe bet, I would say eleven. Maybe twelve," she gave him a meaningful look. "But I suppose these are desperate times, aren't they?"

He nodded. “It is,” Val answered. Sitting down and talking to her, telling her exactly what he told Bee…that sounds so damned simple. And yet…which it shouldn’t be a ‘and yet’ if he can just get over the fact that she’s mothering him, all the way in Austria when he’s here in Russia. “You think so?” he asked tentatively. “If we just sit down and talk like human beings? And not yell at each other like we always do?”

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Bee offered him a radiant smile as she looked up. "It shouldn't hurt to try,  right?" She reasoned. She couldn't be sure of what she was telling the prince. She didn't know all the people involved in the situation aside from his reports, but it was what she had inferred from it. "And, if everything goes awry, you can always find solace in the fact that despite your best efforts, if things still haven't turned out the way you wanted, you were the better person."

♠

❝ Malta?! Such a beautiful place. I’ve seen on the pictures. ❞ Italy in general is a beautiful place. Her brother’s visited that country before, but she never been in Italy. ❝ I’m hating the cold of this place. Enjoying the liberty I have here that I don’t have in home. I guess, this is a alright place. And the people are okay. I mean, I can’t really judged… It’s not like we can judge a book by its cover, also, I almost never leave my bedroom or the gardens, if I wanted to go for a fresh air. I’ve known some faces here but they seems nice. I’m not good with socialization. ❞ She blushes a bit after her confession.

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Bee smiled softly at the words. "I only have vague memories of it, but my parents say the nicest things about it. It makes me wish we had stayed there other than moving to Florence. Then, again, if I had never gone to Italy, I might have never met Gio, and I wouldn't be here," she trailed off. It was a domino effect. And, in the end, Bee was happy about the outcome. "I don't believe I was made for this weather either. I hear it's exceedingly hot during summer, but by now, I'm simply waiting to see whether that's true," the maid added to the princess's words, and a soft smile played on her features as she heard what followed. "I think many people would be willing to talk to you if you just gave them a chance," she was a princess, after all. Who wouldn't enjoy such a possibility? "But, unlike you, I must say I don't seem to have a problem socializing at all," if anything, she did far too much of it.

“A crowbar could work I suppose…” Sighing, she shook her head. “No, it wouldn’t actually. These doors are far too heavy for that. Doors in movies aren’t nearly quite this heavy.” Rubbing her shoulder, she tried to ignore the pain that she herself had caused in an attempt to just do something. Claire wasn’t a woman to sit by and wait for others to do things, she needed to step up on her own. Unfortunately in this situation, there just wasn’t anything she could do. “Hopefully it goes quickly. I’m sure they’re working on it….” she murmured.

“Don’t think about how tiny the cellar is.” It was an awful reply and one that wouldn’t help anyone but Claire wasn’t much for words. “Perhaps focus more on how large it is and how many bottles of wine they managed to store in here,” she suggested. “Could even count the bottles.”

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Bee glanced around for a moment or two, taking in the faces of the people who were there with them. "I don't think anyone brought tools with them here," she shook her head. "But I could ask if it would make you feel better," the blonde suggested. It seemed like a wild goose hunt, though it wasn't as if any of them had anything better to do. Or anywhere else to go. "I should have taken the time to ask Gio about how the security protocols worked, but I also thought I would never need them. Or, when I needed them, he would be here with me and he would tell me what to do, I suppose hindsight is a bitch," she muttered that last part under her breath.

Counting the bottles was about the last thing Bee wanted to do while they were trapped in there. The blonde did not have the focus for something like it, and she would have much preferred to spend her time talking, but at least the woman had been helpful when offering something she could do to redirect her nervousness. "I- Thanks. It's really nice of you to suggest something," she mentioned swallowing the lump in her throat and plastering a small smile on her lips. "I wonder who will be the first person to suggest drinking some of the bottles," she mused.

“I can think of at least four people,” Ivan replied. It was just a shame that two of them refused to give a straight answer and that there was no way to contact the other pair. Realistically Ivan knew that he was going to have to contact Matthias to try and sort this whole thing out, but the idea was less than appealing.

Tilting his head towards the blonde maid though he couldn’t help but look her over. She had after all seen him in all his glory and he quite enjoyed the way she still seemed embarrassed by it. Perhaps this would be a welcome distraction. “You ended that call quick. Were you hoping I was in something a little more revealing?”

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Bee looked at him with her round blue eyes. “Are they here?” She asked before she decided whether she had to rephrase her initial sentence or not.

She could feel his gaze on her, and instinctively, she glanced away, unable to bear such scrutiny, and his words drifting in the air made heat travel up her cheeks. If Bee knew the prince any better, she would have dared to say he found enjoyment in her discomfiture. Outraged, she cried out. “No!” Far too fast to make it a believable statement, and she shrill in her voice also serving as a telltale to the lie. Gulping, she attempted again. “I mean... I did no such thing,” she argued, moving her hands frantically in the air to help her negative. With a defeated sigh, Bee finally worked up the courage to look at him again. “I think it’s time we put this little blip in our acquaintanceship behind us, yes?” Not that she would stop talking about it if given the chance. She just needed him to stop bringing it to her attention whenever they met. “Okay, so,” she paused, gathering her thoughts. “There must be something I can do to make you let go of that. So, what is it?” Bee asked tentatively.