He was late. AGAIN! Mid-morning just before the sun was highest in the sky was the same time they agreed to meet every year, and every year he was late!Ugh, she couldn’t believe it. After all of these years this birdbrain of a man she was forced to call her husband still couldn’t wake his pampered a** at a reasonable time and be on time to anything.
Ridiculous. This whole thing was just utterly ridiculous!
From childhood, Hildegard and Lenox’s lives had been reluctantly intertwined. Since emerging from their baskets, their future life plans and marriage had been laid in stone by their parents. They were expected to marry for a strong political alliance to bolster the strength and status of both families. They were expected to copulate and she was meant to give birth to many foals in her time - most of all a son to be the grand heir to both great houses and unify their legacy moving forward.
Love or even liking one another was thankfully not an expectation, but rather a strongly encouraged and helpful tip their parents pushed on them to help this whole arrangement along without fuss.
So every summer since they were able to travel they had been dragged out into the country to play host to each other and be forced to “grow their bond†for a few weeks before parting again.
All the good that did all these years was make the two despise each other all the more. Every summer a new competition to piss the other off even more than the year before.
For the past few years, though, since they had officially become full-fledged adults their yearly meetings had taken a more serious turn and were more closely monitored by the small staff and attendants that flocked around both of them. Watching - and reporting back - every word and action they did to their parents. For now, these meetings were less about bond building and had shifted to one goal:
Making foals and a future heir to the families as soon as possible!
All Hildegard had heard from her father in the weeks leading to this meeting was that this year had to be different. She was chastised for being too old to be childless at this point and should have had at least one batch of foals already running around and swollen with another set. Her father spared no expense this year with the preparations to ensure a smooth…seduction and coupling, as he called it.
Hidegard was outfitted in the finest jewels and a beautiful shawl that “accentuated†her scales. She had been bathed with fragrant natural oils and flower petals to make her smell heavenly. Her fur had been brushed by familiars to ensure that not a speck of dirt stuck to her, and her hair was braided and styled in a complex updo. Her wings preened and fluffed to be soft and sheen in the sun. The perfect image of class and royalty.
In short, ridiculous. She looked and felt utterly ridiculous.
(WC: 490)
Juliette06
