hrh

&&. announcing his royal highness, ( robert stuart ), the ( 45 ) year old ( prince ) of ( scotland ). he is often confused with ( lee pace ). some say that he is ( opinionated & unserious ), but he is actually ( loving & friendly ). ( OOC: isa )

Ten times worse? What kind of a statement was that? He should have not been throwing around numbers that meant nothing — their conversation was too serious to have room for vague measurements. Wiebke was sizzling. The conversation felt like a waste of time and it was only making the negative feelings inside of her run wild. They had filled her to the brim and she felt like he was a million miles away, unable to see, and failing to understand what she was going through. She had always appreciated his optimism and ability to remain relaxed but now those traits felt like flaws. Gross blatant flaws. This was an adults' conversation, not a place for wild unserious statements like ten times worse. Wiebke's gaze was cold and harsh as she waited for him to turn around and admit defeat. She had made her stance so very clear. Her German approach was too direct for him to be unable to understand what she had meant. Leave. Go. Let it be. Seconds ticked by and the pressure in the room felt nearly suffocating. She barely breathed. Her certainty in the two of them had been shaken time and time again — and each time he had taken her hand and told her it was all in her head. Not everything she thought was true. He was true. He was constant. He would remain. He would continue to love. But now he was threatening to take it all away. Threatening to leave her standing alone on a hill of bones. "I am a reason." The two of them were a reason. The sort of reason that was in no competition with the burden of her political ambitions. "Do you mean that? Robert, you tell me immediately if this is a quip or a poor joke." The sort that flew right past her. The sort she was unable to decipher due to missing a tonal change or a quirk of a brow. "This is not the sort of threat you throw to win a fight. This is irresponsible."

Her nails dug into her sleeve and suddenly she was glad to be wearing something that covered her skin. Her jaw was stuck in place, she did not dare to say anything because she knew her words would have a thick accent that would give her away in a second. She was beyond upset. He was choosing to be righteous at the worst time when everyone else including lady Fortuna herself was turning on Wiebke. “It’s not greed. I am not one of those people.” There was a great difference between the likes of Arnauld d’Orléans and Verona di Savoia, and her. They were serving themselves and Wiebke… Wieke was… Her lips were pressed tightly together and she felt like squirming within her skin. The mirror he was holding in front of her was showing too ugly an image. He just did not understand. He could not understand. He could not comprehend what the win would feel like. How the blood, sweat and tears would suddenly be worth something. How the guilt she was harboring somewhere deep in her chest would disappear as the spilled German blood was suddenly not wasted. To be absolved of something so heavy and painful was just as good a reason to keep going as the feeling of a victory. “I’m not naive. I know the price. I know the price extremely well. I do not need you to tell me it. This conversation is not going to go anywhere if all you have to say is how selfish I am being. I know what I am doing. I am not convinced you understand how well I understand everything. I have made this decision. I have decided to continue this. I have had to make decision again and again this past year — every time there has been a set back. This is not the first time. I know.” She felt out of breath. “If you cannot tell me something reasonable, it doesn’t matter.”

“The Swiss are not your family — you don’t get to decide when you care about them and when you do not! You cannot win this argument with a flimsy statement like that.” Catherine would have more than enough to rule over with Scotland and Switzerland under her care. “Switzerland is not Scotland. I would never touch a single blade of grass in Scotland. If Switzerland really was close to your heart, this would not be happening. If Switzerland was treating Catherine in any other way than as a doll, I might have reconsidered my approach a long time ago but I do not owe them my loyalty.” If Catherine had settled in half a decade earlier and not at the beginning of Kaspar and Wiebke’s plans, her presence might have changed the course. The what ifs did not matter. Not this far along. “Stop. You are trying very hard to control me. You should know better than to be controlling. It is not going to work, I’m not some thick-headed little wife who is just going do as the man says. I would be pouring two years worth of work down the drain.”

“This is not the time to give up. This is just a– a… a setback. We’ve worked incredibly hard on Basel and Alsace. Holding Basel helps us to hold Alsace. Our investments, they—” Looking at Robert’s crestfallen expression, she couldn’t continue. Her words, they were lies. She knew it as well as he did. Basel had turned from an investment into a vanity project so slowly that she had not even realized it. By the time it had been time to accept it, she had needed to defend it twice as hard to everyone around her. “We cannot give up on Basel. It’s out of the question. It’s possible to get help from north — Arnauld d’Orléans has enough enemies to grant us at least one ally. This is not the end. This is just a tight spot.” Her jaw ached from the flexing her muscle had done. The tightness didn’t disappear even when she consciously attempted to relax it. She shouldn’t have been speaking to Robert. The realization creeped up on her like a wet cloth. Wiebke had always experienced fear as something cold and moist. Robert would try to paint terrible pictures of the future in an attempt to sway her. Wiebke would not be able to differentiate between exaggerations and the truth. “You…” The accusation was on the tip of her tongue. You are trying to trick me. She held it in remembering the one time she had actually uttered the words. The look of disappointment wasn’t one she could stand to see again. “You are not going to agree with me. I will continue this with Kaspar.”

“Robbie.” Her voice was sharp and humourless: she did not want him cracking jokes. Her eyes were pinned on him. She was talking to him because she needed someone to help her reach clarity. She needed to expand her view and find a solution — and if not that, she wanted more people to be furious with King Wilhelm. “I need to solve this. What can we do with our resources? I know they are not being used in an optimal way. I just don’t know where to start. I’m scared of underestimating the enemy forces and losing what we’ve worked hard to gain. This is too much pressure, I can feel myself being stretched out thin.”

“I’d have to agree. Primarily because it’s like Jekyll and Hyde when I’m drinking white versus red wine. I’d like to think I’m a lothario but if anything…” He trailed off as he swirled the wine in his glass. “I just end up redfaced and saying something I shouldn’t.” He paused. “To dangerous lovers I guess.”

catherine kept her mouth solemnly shut. as much as she wanted her uncle to tell her mother off, queen mary certainly wouldn’t think twice about pushing her brother to do things he was uncomfortable with just so it will benefit her. “i think we’ll still have quite a bit to go until the babies stop being babies.” although, oftentimes catherine might take her eyes off freddie for a mere moment and return her gaze to find him having grown twice his size. “it’s still funny to see freddie hover — well… hobble — over elsie like a tiny bodyguard.” she couldn’t help the bright smile that spread across her lips, although a terrified bout of laughter immediately spilled out from her mouth at her uncle’s question, it “ah— no… that would be—” disastrous, horrifying. queen mary would no doubt shut the entire show down if they even considered the idea. “—no. his girlfriend was in the last series. i’m not sure if you know anything about the show… but the people who go on it tend to not make the most suitable company, let alone partner. mother wasn’t particularly pleased with the idea of having a daughter-in-law who enthusiastically licked chocolate and whipped cream off a naked man’s chest on telly.”

her eyes scanned the letter with one critical sweep, the perfunctory language that she was so used to under the official letterhead of ‘her majesty’s state office’. “she want you to talk to the duke of inverness and tell him he should vote against the new amendment coming through the house of lords next month…” not in so many words, but catherine got the gist of it. “she thinks you’re still his best mate, or something.” even married and with his own family, queen mary still demanded as much of her brother as she does her own children. “maternity leave? i can’t, it’s already driving me mental. ah— there’s something else as well. it’s about georgie.” she handed back the letter back to him, as she fixed him a knowing look. “she thought maybe you can get through to him — tell him to straighten up and all that. he’s been on holiday with that girlfriend of his for god knows how long, mother doesn’t want his life to be a never-ending gap year …do you know the show love island?”