The words hang in the air, refusing to sink into my brain. It’s like I can stare at them, observing, not really understanding why they’re here.

“What?” I eventually say.

My mother’s eyes narrow. “You heard me. You’re going to have to get married.”

Still, they don’t sink in. I tilt my head, not sure I heard her right either time. “I’m sorry. Married?”

“Married.”

“To who?”

“To whom,” she corrects me. “And I’ve compiled a list. I don’t have it on me because I figured you would need time to warm up to the idea, but I assure you it will be someone European and of noble blood, someone this country can be proud of.”

My mouth opens. Closes. My heart pounds in my head, louder and louder as I realize what she’s saying.

Dear God.

What is she saying?

“How is…what is…” I pause. “You want me to get married?”

She rolls her eyes and lets out a short sigh. “I know you’re not stupid, Magnus, so instead of repeating it back to me, how about you start believing it?”

“But…why? How is this your solution to a leaked sex tape?” I take in a shaking breath. “Fucking hell, you don’t expect me to marry Heidi, do you?”

“Oh, calm down. We both know the girl is batty. So is the prime minister. You will get married to someone beautiful, nice, proper, and prestigious. As soon as possible. It’s the only way we can save face.”

“How does this save face?!” I exclaim, throwing my arms out as I jump to my feet.

“Sit down.”

“Sit down? Sit down?” I can feel my face growing hot, my pulse beating wildly out of control. I know I should try and contain myself, especially when I get this way. “You’re telling me I have to marry some stranger for no reason at all except you think it will somehow make the country and the prime minister happy?”

“Yes,” she says simply, folding her hands in her lap.

I stare at her, breathing hard, daring her to mess up, to flinch, to show me that there’s a part of her that feels ridiculous for suggesting such a thing.

But she only stares back at me with flames in her eyes. Those small, smoldering flames that only hint at the dragons she has caged back there.

Yeesh.

Still, I don’t sit down. To sit down is to give in.

“Listen, I know this isn’t something you want to do,” she begins.

I scoff loudly. “You don’t say.”

“But honestly, what the country needs is to know a good and responsible man is representing them.”

“That’s what father is. Everyone loves him.”

She looks away, her gaze going to the windows and the lights of the city. “Your father is very ill.”

Over the course of the summer, I’ve heard my father been described as ill, sick, under the weather, of poor health, ever since he was diagnosed with pancreatitis. Over the last month he’s had his own sick room in the palace where the doctor comes to visit and conduct tests. From all that I’ve heard, pancreatitis is something he’ll recover from. This is the first time my mother has used the words very ill to describe him, the first time that I’ve grasped a hint of sorrow from her.

“He’s getting better,” I tell her, as if my words make it all true. “I saw him just two weeks ago and he looked great. Well, good. Better, anyway.”

She lets out a low breath and wrings her hands together for a moment, another telltale sign that this is a lot bigger than she’s letting on.

Everything inside me sinks to a depth I rarely venture.

“He’s got acute pancreatitis,” she says.

“I know. But you said eighty percent of people pull through.”

“That’s what the doctors said. He’s seen a lot at this point. But even doctors can be wrong.”

I don’t want to ask the next words. My father just turned seventy-five. Sure he drank a lot when the world wasn’t looking, but we all do in our family.

“Is he…he’s going to be okay, right?”

“He’s in a lot of pain, Magnus. He’s got surgery coming up, and even that is risky. And even if it goes fine, he might be in a lot of pain for the rest of his life. He won’t be fit to rule.”

For some reason I imagined my father would live forever. Until he got sick, I didn’t really think about his age. He didn’t marry my mother for a long time, and it was even longer after that before she was finally pregnant with me. There’s a fifteen-year age difference between them and he’s always been so outgoing and spry.

Because of that, I’ve always thought of my role as heir to the throne as something that would never happen. Or something that would happen to someone else, even if subconsciously the idea has caused me to panic.

She looks at me and her eyes are watering.

Shit.

“If you don’t wish to abdicate, then you will be king. Sooner than you think, sooner than we all hoped. With all you’ve put this family through over the years with your partying and your women and your damn adrenaline sports, you need to step up and be the man we want you to be. We need you to do the right thing and marry someone and start a family and do all the things that a king should be doing.”

This is too much to take. My stomach is starting to twist. I sit back down, my foot tapping rapidly against the floor.

“Have you talked to father about this?” I ask quietly.

“I did,” she says. “He agrees.”

“This is like an arranged marriage.”

“It isn’t when you have a pick of who you marry,” she says stiffly.

“It’s an arranged marriage,” I repeat, looking at her hard. “A marriage of convenience. Or inconvenience since you very well know marriage has never been on my agenda.”

“You’re twenty-eight. It had to be eventually.”

“Why? Because that’s what society says?”

“Phhffft,” she says with a dismissive wave of her hand. “You’ve spent your whole life bucking what society says. Maybe this is about something else. Maybe you need someone, Magnus. You need someone in your life instead of all these, these things.”

“I can guarantee you’re not going to be telling any of my sisters this spiel. You’ve always encouraged them to do what they wanted, to date whomever they wanted, girl power and all that.”

“You’re different, Magnus, and you know it. I encourage them to do what they want because society is always there to try and hold them back. You have no one holding you back. I think it’s time that maybe you did.”

“Right. You’re really selling marriage right now.”

“Do you want to die alone?”

I get up again. “Okay, Mother, no offense, but I think this conversation took a turn for the worse seven minor heart attacks ago.”

She closes her eyes, seeming to compose herself, then gets to her feet. I offer my hand, but as usual, she ignores it. “This went about as well as I thought it would.”

She walks past me, heading to the door.

“That’s it?” I ask. “You’re not going to yell at me? Threaten me?”

She puts her hand on the knob, takes a moment, her shoulders seeming to grow heavier before my eyes, then glances at me. “Come over for dinner tomorrow. It’s been so long since we’ve had the whole family in one place.”

Then she opens the door, steps out into the hall, and the door shuts behind her with a resounding click that seems to echo inside my head.

* * *

At six-thirty the next evening, Einar and Ottar practically shove me into one of the royal cars parked around the corner from my apartment and take me to the palace in the city center, which is really only a short drive away. Too short, in my opinion. I told them I could have walked but I think they both imagined me running off into the sunset. My friend Viktor, the Prince of Sweden, got to do that, to run away and pretend to be someone else, and I don’t think I’ve ever been so envious than I am at this moment.

We go through the large palace gates and Einar parks at the back entrance, a lush park surrounding us on both sides. With it being September now, the leaves are slowly turning from green to gold and the nights are getting chilly.

Tor, my mother’s butler, greets us formally and then leads me to the dining room. It’s funny, even though I grew up in this house, I still feel like a commoner in it. The moment I turned seventeen I moved out, and ever since then I’d felt like this place belonged to strangers.

Or maybe it’s because I turned into a stranger to everyone else. This couldn’t be more apparent than when I enter the dining room and see three of my sisters’ blonde heads swivel toward me in eerie synchronicity. I supress a shudder, remembering that Village of the Damned movie I saw when I was young.

There’s Cristina, who is only one year younger than me, though I know she couldn’t be more relieved that I’m next in line and not her. All Cristina wants to do is live with her long-term Italian boyfriend on a Greek island somewhere, living off the land.

Then there’s Britt, in her mid-twenties, a real party animal with mile-a-minute tendencies and grandiose plans for herself which seem to change every minute. At the moment, Britt is planning her move to America where she wants to get an internship in New York, though I can’t say what for since she’s always changing her mind.

There’s also Irene, who is the spitting image of our mother and also finishing up at university for political sciences or something like that. Irene is about as reliable as you get. Some might say boring (I might say boring), but she’s smart and efficient and honestly would make a much better queen than I would a king. There doesn’t seem to be a scheming bone in her tiny little body, but if there were, I bet she’d wish I’d just abdicate already and give the throne to her.

Mari, the youngest, isn’t at the table. She’s seventeen, just finishing up school and still living with our parents here at the palace. Because she’s the last to leave and was a complete “miracle baby,” she’s probably the closest to our parents right now. She’s sweet, compassionate, and always willing to go above and beyond for anyone. But there’s no mistaking her for a pushover either.

I’m not sure how long I seem to stand here at the head of the table, maybe no time at all, but Britt clears her throat and says, “Well, well, well, look who it is. Mr. Sex Tape.”

I pinch my eyes closed, pretending she didn’t just say that.

“Oh my god,” Irene mutters. “Can we not talk about that?”

“It’s the elephant in the room,” Britt argues.

“It’s not proper dining room etiquette,” Irene argues back.

Cristina snorts. “What is etiquette anymore than just an antiquated set of rules set to control our society? It’s a prison of manners, that’s what it is.”

“Hello to all of you too,” I tell them, taking a seat beside Cristina. “Now that it’s out of the way, the elephant has been revealed and shit on all the rules of etiquette or whatever, let’s just go on and pretend it never happened. Okay?”

All three blonde heads nod. Creepy. Do they know they do it in unison?

Suddenly Mari appears at the doorway, giving us all an anxious smile.

“Hi, Magnus,” she says quietly, then addresses everyone else. “Father is coming. He’s, uh, feeling pretty good because of the drugs the doctor gave him, but they don’t give him much of an appetite and they tire him out. He’ll only be here for the soup and then I’ll take him back to his room.”

Shit.

Here is beautiful young Mari helping my father, the fucking King, like she’s his nurse. Not only is she way too young to be doing this, but it’s reminding me that I’ve been a fucking moron, living my life without a single thought to others, oblivious to the lives straining around me. This is my family, in pain, and I’ve absolutely let everyone down, including myself. Maybe my mother is right. I really should get married. I spent all last night and all today stewing over what a horrible idea this whole thing is and how terribly unfair, and how I wouldn’t agree to it no matter what…

And now I’m thinking maybe this is the kind of punishment I deserve.

As Wayne Campbell says, marriage is punishment for shoplifting in some countries.

So I sit here, tongue-tied and feeling like garbage while Mari disappears around the corner, presumably to get my father.

I glance over at my sisters, and all their brows are furrowed, lips being bitten and gnawed on in fear and sympathy. How much do they know? More than me? Am I the odd one out, the prodigal son with his head in the clouds?

I’m about to open my mouth to ask them how he really is when their attention is diverted to the doorway and my father appears, with Mari and my mother on either side of him, arms hooked around his elbows as he slowly shuffles forward.

My first thought is that it isn’t my father. That they’ve hired some actor to portray him as “sickly” and they’re doing an overdramatic version of it. The way he’s hunched over, the ashen pallor of his skin, his hairline that seems to be reduced to wispy tufts. He’s changed a staggering amount since I last saw him and that honestly was only a few weeks ago. Has he always looked like this only now I’m actually seeing it for what it is?

“Father,” I say, the words escaping me in a hush and I’m ready to get up and help him, embrace him, tell him I’m sorry for bringing all this fucking trouble and shame to us when he’s barely hanging on.

“Sit,” he says with a smile. “You just stay put there, Magnus.” And with those words, his warmth flows through him. He is my father after all, buried beneath an exterior that seems to shrink from pain.

I hang on to that because I can’t let myself fall to worry. If I do, it will be the end of me. I’ll obsess over it, as I often do. I’ll let myself luxuriate in darkness, in pity, in the travesty of it all. I know myself enough to keep out of those low spots when I can.

“I hope dinner is klipfisk,” he says, looking at my mother as she holds on to him. “The Lord knows I have to be nearly dying for you to let Gette indulge that delicacy.”

The word nearly springs some hope into my heart, and of course, we all laugh in relief that there’s something to be laughed about. My mother was raised in a fishing town on the coast where klipfisk is a specialty. It’s salted cod, which makes for a tasty stew or even pizza. No one else in Norway really eats it that much, but when my father was dating my mother, he tried to impress her every chance he had by making it.

Turns out my mother detests the stuff, all while he was growing a real appreciation for it.

Mari pulls out a chair for him at the head of the table while my mother eases him into his seat. I’m surprised they’re helping him and not a private nurse. After all, he is the King and I know he has the best medical care.

But maybe that’s exactly why. As easygoing as my father is, he has an insurmountable amount of pride and probably doesn’t think he warrants the help of a nurse in front of us. He’s been the same in the few public appearances he’s made—so far, the public only thinks he’s had a bout of mild pneumonia.

As it is, the starter for dinner is his beloved klipfisk soup, brought out by the head cook Gette, who looks rather proud of the meal, waiting for a few moments before my father takes a hearty sip and gives her his approval.

My father doesn’t talk much, just takes time sipping tea (no more brandy for him) and slurping the soup, asking everyone questions when the conversation lulls.

I’ve noticed that the questions never quite come my way and I’m both grateful and disappointed. Usually my father and I are discussing Formula One, rally driving, or moto racing or he has me filling him in on all that I’ve been up to. But this time there’s nothing.

I know why. That whole sex tape elephant in the room. He’s not ignoring me either because from time to time he’ll look at me and give me a reassuring smile, though I’m not sure if he’s reassuring me or himself that everything is going to be okay.

He makes it through the first salad before he clears his throat and announces to us that he doesn’t want to risk passing out on top of Gette’s famous roast grouse. I wonder if I should arrange to speak with him privately because I know we have a lot to talk about, but as Mari helps him out of his seat, my mother comes over and lays a hand on my shoulder and whispers into my ear, “When we’re done with dinner, he’d like to speak with you.”

After that, dinner seems to drag on, no matter how engrossing Cristina’s tale about her trip to the Amazon rainforest the other month or how delicious the roasted grouse is.

When it’s finally over and I’ve pushed back a half-eaten slice of cake and slammed back the rest of my red wine, my mother gives me a nod and it’s time to go.

I follow her out of the dining room and into the opulent halls of the palace, heading to the elevator at the end that will take us to the north wing on the third floor.

My mother pauses outside the large doors to his room and I almost ask if they’ve always slept in separate bedrooms and if I’ve only just noticed now or if this started since he became ill.

I don’t ask and she doesn’t say a word to me, except with her eyes which always say the hardest words for her. Now she wants me to be here, be grave, be present.

I nod back at her and step inside.

I don’t know what I was expecting, but I’m relieved to see that things look as grand and formal as ever in this room with the high ceilings and long velvet curtains, dark wood floors, and a smattering of paintings.

My father isn’t in his double poster bed at all but instead is in a chaise lounge by the crackling fireplace, a heavy wool blanket drawn up to his chin. The only things out of place are the IV drip connected to one of his arms, the bag hanging from a wheeled stand beside him, and an unblinking female nurse who seems to appear from the shadows.

“There you are,” my father says to me with a big smile before nodding at the nurse. “This is Ingrid, my nurse. She’s on her way out. Just wanted to make sure I got my vitamins before bedtime.”

Ingrid hurries past me without making eye contact, then she’s gone out the door. I think I hear my mother’s voice talking to her out in the hall.

“Does that hurt?” I ask my father, sitting down in the chair across from him as I nod at the IV. I’d been in the hospital plenty of times as a child for carelessly caused broken bones and sprains but I don’t remember getting an IV.

He rolls his eyes. “Hurt? My boy. A needle to the arm feels as sweet as a kiss when it takes away the real pain.”

My throat feels dry, scratchy. I swallow but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

“Don’t look so worried,” he says to me, his eyes squinting briefly as he takes me in. “It doesn’t suit you.”

“I would have come to see you sooner. I had no idea you were…”

“I’m fine,” he says, then winces as he adjusts himself. “I promise. I’ve been better, of course, and things have taken a little turn for the worse this last week, but I’ll pull out of it. I’m in good shape otherwise, you know. The doctors say I should be grateful for all those years running and skiing. I have to say that’s all because of you, Magnus.”

“Me?” It was rare that I felt anyone was better off because of me.

“You were as much of a handful then as you are now. All those sports you were always active in, I had to keep up with you somehow. Honestly, the only downside to all of this is that I can’t drink anymore. God, I wish for a snifter of something but dying is a pretty big trade off. Cristina has me drinking this awful new stuff called Kombucha. Have you heard of it? She says it’s healthy for me.”

“I’ve heard of it,” I tell him softly. I’ve missed talking with him on this level. Not that we ever discuss business either, but sometimes it gets hard trying to separate my father from the king, or my mother from the queen.

He lets out a soft sigh, his eyes closing briefly. When he opens them, they’re sharper than they were before—he’s getting down to business.

“Magnus, I’m not going to bore you with the details of what has happened. I’m not going to tell you about the fallout behind closed doors that you have no idea about, I’m not going to try and make you feel bad or guilty about what you’ve done because it’s all a moot point. It doesn’t change anything to just talk about something that’s happened. There has to be a mental and physical change.”

“I know. Father, I am so sorry,” I tell him, hating how much I’ve disappointed him, hating that I hear it in his words and on his face even though he’s trying hard not to say as much. But I know. “What happened…it was stupid and I wasn’t thinking and—”

“It’s done,” he says emphatically with a heavy gaze that goes right into my soul. “It’s in the past.”

“But it’s affecting things right now.”

“It is, but you can’t change what was done. I forget sometimes that you’re my heir, you know? It’s my fault as much as yours. You wanted freedom so we gave you freedom. We wanted you to have the life you chose for yourself, not a life that was imposed upon you. My childhood was stifled because of my duties and we didn’t want that for you at all. But somewhere along the way you stopped being an heir entirely. It’s gone on for too long. You’re turning thirty soon, and you haven’t spent a single day at my side, learning what this role takes. Now, I’m afraid you either have to step up and learn and show you’re serious about this business or…you won’t be the king at all.”

I rub my lips together anxiously. I hadn’t expected an ultimatum but I don’t know why I’m surprised. Of course this is where this had to go—it’s the only way for my parents to find out where I stand. The only way I can change is if I’m forced to.

“I don’t mean to sound harsh,” my father says with a tired sigh, “but it’s the truth. You’ve long said you don’t want to abdicate, and if that’s the truth, now is the time to become the person you’re meant to be.”

I nod. “And I can do that. Start including me in your weekly council meetings. Start bringing me to the parliament or on official dinners or…”

“I will,” he says. “I just wish I had started sooner, before my condition started to deteriorate. But you know that’s only solving one half of the problem.”

For some reason I had hoped my father wasn’t going to bring up the marriage thing. That it would stay this crazy idea of my mother’s. But that doesn’t seem to be the case.

He reaches down to the low table on the other side of him and lifts up a clipboard with paper. There’s a few grainy black and white pictures of a girl, which must make this the list that my mother has compiled.

Shit is about to get weird.

“Is that the list?”

“It’s the list,” he says, flipping through a few pages. “I know this is the last thing you expected, but I have to say I think your mother is on the right track with this.”

“Do you really?” I hate having to question him in this state but I don’t think either one of them realize what a big fucking step this is.

“It’s not conventional,” he admits, glancing at me quickly. “But what about our lives is conventional?”

“So you’re just going to give me this list and expect me to pick out a girl and then we’ll get married and that will be the end of it?”

“Something like that.”

My heart is starting to race again at the idea, my lungs feeling choked. “You do realize this isn’t how the world works.”

“It’s how our world works, right now, at this moment.”

“Marriage won’t change me.”

He chuckles. “Oh, it will. And for the better. More than that, it will change you in the eye of the public and that’s all we really care about right now.”

“More than my own feelings, my own freedom.”

That brings a sharp look out of him. “Magnus. Sometimes there is something bigger than your thoughts and feelings. This is one of those times.”

“You loved my mother.”

He narrows his eyes. “I still do.”

“Sorry. What I meant was that you married her for love. Didn’t you? I mean, she was a commoner. You had to plead your case to your own father and he basically made you choose her or the throne.”

He gives me a barely perceptible nod, his eyes not leaving mine. “If there had been another potential heir, I wouldn’t be here. I was his only hope. He had no choice but to let me marry her.”

“So that’s love. That’s real love. You fought for her for years and years before you were finally allowed to marry her. What you’re prescribing me is the opposite of that.”

“And since when do you care about love, Magnus? Have you ever been in love? Do you want to be in love? Is that what you’re doing every night with all these different women, are you bedding them because you’re searching for love?”

I blink at him for a moment, my thoughts becoming heavy, clouded. “No. I don’t know what I’m looking for.”

“And I know you don’t love any of them either. So what’s the difference?”

I give him a poignant look. I really don’t want to explain, but he’s leaving me no choice. “I like sex. Okay?”

My father rolls his eyes and snorts. “Dear boy. That is more than apparent. I know this is the last thing you want to hear, but just because you’re getting married doesn’t mean you stop having sex.”

I throw my hands up. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t want to marry someone I don’t know, let alone someone I do know. I don’t want to have sex with the same woman for the rest of my life.”

He cocks a brow. “Not even if it’s good sex?”

I don’t want to talk about this anymore. It’s still beyond mind-boggling that we’re even having this conversation to begin with.

“I don’t know what else to say,” I tell him, “other than I don’t want to do this and you have to understand why. It’s 2018. This sort of shit shouldn’t happen.”

“You’d be surprised how many marriages out there—genuinely happy ones—started out just this way. Royals, celebrities, we’re all very good at pulling the wool over the public’s eyes. And that’s precisely what we’re going to do with you. You will marry someone, Magnus, or you won’t be king. You will marry someone and your relationship will look believable to the world, and I promise you, in time, if you let it happen, you will learn to believe it too.”

He hands me the clipboard and I’m surprised to find my hands are shaking as I hold it, my eyes glancing absently at the girl on the first page, some pretty, dark-haired brunette princess from Spain. Who isn’t too far from the women I date but marriage is a whole other ballgame.

“Your mother is looking for prestige. And looks,” my father says to me with a wink. “So she can have grandchildren the world will fawn over. But, Son, don’t go for that. Go for the nicest, smartest one. The one with the biggest heart and the boldest mouth. Being kept on your toes is more attractive than anything, believe me. Have a smart woman in your marriage and you’ll never be bored a day in your life. Be with someone you can have a conversation with, who will challenge you, no matter what she looks like.”

So far in life, my ideal woman has been someone who keeps me on my toes until I’m ready to move on to someone else who keeps me on my toes. I don’t think any type of personality—or looks—will change the fact that after a week or so, I’m already moving on and looking for someone else. I’m not even doing that to be a non-committal asshole, I honestly have never met anyone who captures the attention of my heart, soul, and dick for long enough.

When I look up from the clipboard, my father’s eyes are closed and his head is back against the chair.

“Father?” I ask softly, and his eyes open briefly.

“Sorry,” he mumbles. “I’m afraid I’ve gotten to the useless part of the night.” He yawns and then closes his eyes again. “Remember, we’re not only doing this for all of us. We’re doing it for you, too. You just can’t see it yet, but one day you will. You’ll see that...” He trails off and starts to snore.

I stare at him for a few moments, wishing I could talk to him more, selfishly, of course, just to argue and try and get out of this. But there is no getting out of this.

After I leave his room, the nurse comes back in to help him to bed and I wander the halls aimlessly, not sure what to do with myself and how to handle the ticking time bomb I’m holding in my hands. My mother and sisters all seem to have disappeared, so I hunt down Einar and he takes me back to my place.

With my father’s words ringing through my head, I turn on a lamp, sit down in my armchair with a beer, and start flipping through the pages of princesses.