Chapter Text
Katherine Pulitzer did not care for royalty. She never had. It was always an odd concept for her; one family ruled over a section of land but never saw the light of day or the land they ruled. And they usually didn’t rule very well. Her father, however, cared much for royalty. The reason for this was probably because he was the king. He wasn’t a particularly good king, but he wasn’t awful, either. He looked like a king, balding and stoic. Katherine looked like she should, being the princess. She was thin and beautiful, with wavy brown hair and fair skin. The whole royal staff and family looked like a portrait at any given moment. Obviously, Katherine hated this. She did anything she could to avoid being a princess. She wrote newspaper articles, she played sports, she rode horses like the cowboys out west, and she kissed girls. That last one was much more of a secret than any of the others.
The girls in question were few and far between. The majority of the girls she met were either pretty and conceited or threatened to out her if she didn’t give them money. Katherine very rarely found a girl who was pretty, nice, and wouldn’t tell the press. The tabloids were already all over her, seeing as she constantly submitted stories to them (which was somehow seen as risque and wrong) and was very involved in the royal affairs. If they found out she was, even more, the girl they said she was, she’d be ruined. Which, of course, she didn’t really mind, but her father most definitely would. He was old-fashioned. His favorite thing to remind Katherine of was that her reputation was his reputation, too. He tried to keep her locked up in the castle much more as she grew, knowing how her name could be tarnished in an instant. She was eighteen years old, next in line to rule, and completely in charge of her own life, whether her father was aware of that or not.
Her father, King Joseph Pulitzer, was not aware of this. He believed that Katherine would do anything and everything he told her to and she would obey because he was her father and that was how things worked. He was an old fashioned man with old fashioned needs and wants. He got haircuts every week to maintain his kingly appearance. He cared more about the tabloids than the condition of the farms on the outskirts of the country. The tabloids only started cracking down on the family when Katherine’s mother died. She had been the best queen York had ever seen. The press accused the king of being unstable and crazy when he took over, but he quickly dispelled the rumor by cutting his hair and beard, which is why he now got trims every week. Katherine only despised him a little.
The only person in the castle that Katherine did not truly despise and therefore felt bad for lying to was Hannah, her nurse. Hannah had been with Katherine for as long as she could remember. When Katherine was younger, Hannah would help her whenever she needed it and understood when she did something un-princess-like. Nowadays she just made up excuses for Katherine not being at dinner or being late to her lessons.
There was another person who Katherine didn’t despise. He was a kitchen servant. His name was Michael, but he’d been fondly nicknamed “Mush” because of his love of romance. He’d gush about his latest crush and he’d listen to Katherine talk about the girls she’d seen recently. Mush had about twenty crushes a week, but there was one recurring crush that he refused to tell Katherine about. Someday she would crack him.
She had been in her room that day, typing out her newest article on the lack of funds to smaller towns in the country when she was rudely interrupted by a knock on the door.
“Who is it?” she yelled.
“Oscar Delancey, ma’am,” came the response. Katherine rolled her eyes and sighed.
“Come in, then.”
The man entered. He was perhaps Katherine’s least favorite member of the court. He was generally unpleasant and apathetic. He made jokes that weren’t funny and then repeated them until someone laughed. He loved talking about the war and the number of people he’d killed (which was far too high to be proud of), as well as his many expeditions to other countries and how “strange” their customs were (which was honestly just plain racist). Katherine often wondered He always dressed in dark clothes and had a very thin, very gross goatee. Perhaps the strangest thing about him, however, was the fact that he was born with six fingers on his right hand. His brother Morris had a normal amount of fingers and was much kinder than him, though he was still quite offensive.
“Well?” Katherine said, not looking up from her typewriter. “What is it?”
Oscar cleared his throat. “Your father would like to speak with you.”
“Can’t it wait?”
“For how long?”
At that moment, Katherine hit an ‘f’ instead of a ‘g’. She cursed, tore the paper out of the machine, and sighed once again. “What does he want?” she asked, turning in her chair. Oscar stood like a soldier, his head held high. There wasn’t one ounce of personality behind his eyes, only malice.
“To speak with you. About the business of an heir.”
“And what of it?”
“Well, ma’am, at his age, most fathers have at least a son-in-law, and I don’t think the press will hold off on the accusations for very long after his birthday,” he said.
(That was another thing about the press; they were quite misogynistic. They would accuse Katherine of being evil and unlovable if she didn’t marry by a certain age. She hated the papers almost as much as she hated Oscar.)
Katherine frowned. “Damn. That means I’ll have to get married.”