Fucking leeches!

Gossip journalists and the paparazzi. The maggots of society.

Know what’s amazing about today’s technology? Anybody can call themselves a journalist or a photographer. Anybody with a smartphone and Internet access.

That’s great, right? Now anyone can tell the world anything. Even the most ordinary cat can become a celebrity without ever leaving the house.

Sometimes, though, technology fucking turns everything to shit.

I thought I was being careful, coming to The Dungeon on another Masquerade Night.

It was already fucked up that I couldn’t go to my own club whenever I wanted. Now it seems I can’t even go at all.

I glance again at the gossip tabloid that I’ve just thrown across the room, lying on the floor with some of its glossy pages bent.

On the cover are two familiar figures: me and Rosemary.

We’re both wearing masks, of course, just like everyone else at the club.

Normally, when I visit the club, nobody pays me any attention. After all, I could be anybody. Maybe I’m just someone with a similar build to the crown prince.

But I forgot my black bowler hat last night. I thought it was going to be fine, because the hat had always made me stand out anyway. And we only spent a few minutes in the common areas last night, opting to stay in the private room for most of our time in the club.

Without the hat, as the pictures show, it’s easier to recognize me. My hair, my profile, and the shape of my face are all visible.

And I’m caught in the act of buying lingerie and a collar for a woman. In a BDSM club.

In short, exactly what I’m not supposed to do.

God damn it, after the previous scandal, I should’ve known better than to indulge in public. I have no one to blame but myself.

The editors of this particular tabloid have been nice enough to cover our (already masked) eyes with rectangular black bars. However, the headline, in big yellow letters, also says, “CROWN PRINCE BEHAVING BADLY: A NEW VICTIM?”

Fucking judgmental pieces of shit!

These people don’t even know me, and they’re sitting there, up on their high horses, judging me.

It’s highly hypocritical, because these people must’ve done some things that are not perfectly nice and conventional.

Perfect example? Whoever took our pictures must’ve been in the same club I was in.

I could tell the press it wasn’t me, of course. This is easy enough to deny.

It’s even easier for Rosemary to go unnoticed. As long as her father keeps my presence here a secret, nobody should be able to say, with confidence, that it’s her in those pictures.

But my father and his advisors would’ve immediately figured out that it’s me.

They’re the ones who told me to stay in Ardglass Palace, so they know I’m close to Malvern.

And they know I used to frequent similar clubs when I was living in the capital. It’s not too big of a stretch to suggest that I also frequent the local club while I’m here.

Wait until they hear that I even own the club. It’s just a matter of time now until they find out. And then, who knows what’s going to happen after that?

I know they’re going to make me pay. I just hope they won’t make me break my promise to my mother.

* * *

“My mother used to do that, too.”

Rosemary jerks and cries out from the sudden sound of my voice, and the bird that has been feasting on the seeds on her palm flies away to a nearby branch.

“It’s just me,” I say. Maybe I should’ve tried to walk more loudly so she could hear me. Kick the grass, or snap a twig, or something.

“I didn’t hear you coming.” She puts her hand over her heart as she turns around to face me, her breathing rapid and shallow through her open mouth. That look kind of reminds me of the expression she wore on her face last night.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you,” I hear myself say.

But hold on. I didn’t do anything wrong. She just didn’t hear me approach, but that wasn’t my fault.

The squirrels and birds that have scattered from Rosemary’s cry begin to gather at her feet again, collecting the seeds that have fallen to the ground. “That’s okay. It wasn’t your fault,” she says.

Exactly. That’s my girl.

“So, you’re trying to train the wildlife to be dependent on you?” I ask.

“Huh?”

“You’re not supposed to feed wild animals, because they’ll be useless when they go back to their own natural habitat. They won’t be able to hunt or gather nuts or whatever they do to get food,” I say. “And yet here you are, dispensing seeds like a drug dealer on a street corner in the bad side of town.”

Rosemary laughs as she holds out her hand again.

Seeing the opportunity, a heavy bird slowly flies up to her palm, but a trimmer bird beats him at this race. There’s not enough space for two, so the first bird floats back down.

I almost feel bad for the little guy. If I were a bird, Rosemary’s hand would be the best place for me to eat seeds from. Why would I want to peck seeds from the dirt when I can get them from her dainty little hand?

I grab a small handful of seeds from a plastic bag lying on the ground. Finding the bird from before, I crouch down and make my way to him. I hold out my hand, letting him see the seeds, but it flies away, out of my reach.

“That’s not how you do it,” Rosemary says.

I look up at her pretty face. The sun casts its light from behind her. She’s glowing.

“You have to let them come to you. Just open your hand and stay still.”

I follow her advice and stay in place, crouching with my palm up on the ground. The animals stare at the seeds, then they take a couple of cautious steps closer.

Then a breeze rustles the leaves, and they nervously stop in their tracks before they realize it’s nothing to worry about.

It takes a while, but the big bird finally makes it to my hand. Two squirrels crowd around it too, occasionally grabbing some seeds into their own fists.

“You said your mom used to feed the animals. She didn’t teach you how to do it?” she asks.

“She tried.”

She lets out a gentle, melodic laugh that I could listen to all day. Then, in a voice tinged with sadness, she says, “My mom never taught me anything. She died before I ever met her.”

“Sorry to hear that.”

My second sorry of the day. Do I get a prize if I get to three? Because that has never happened before.

I already know about Rosemary’s mother, of course. So this detail is not news to me.

But it does surprise me that Rosemary would open up about something that personal. And it confuses me that I’d feel my heart squeeze at the pain in her voice. I feel like I want to punch whoever caused her pain in the face and shield her from ever getting hurt again.

Ironic. Because I’m the one who has been making her scream with pain and use that pain to heighten my own selfish pleasure.

“She died giving birth to me,” she says, again telling me something I already know. “My sisters used to tell me I’d killed her.”

“That’s ridiculous,” I say with unexpected anger. I didn’t know that last bit of information, and it makes my blood boil that anyone would accuse Rosemary of something like that. “You were just a baby. You didn’t do anything.”

“I know,” she says. “I know that now. But it used to bother me when I was a little girl.”

“Damn. That sounds like a tough childhood. I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

“That’s okay. My mother did leave me something. My name. She whispered it with her dying breath.” Rosemary pauses and lets out a big, audible sigh. She laughs nervously. “I don’t know why I’m telling you this. It’s old history.”

“I don’t mind listening,” I say.

What I’m not telling her is, I don’t know why I don’t mind it. I’ve never cared much about people’s personal lives, much less their childhoods.

But I want to know all there is to know about Rosemary, and I don’t know why.