Neither, instead your pillow calls to you

Once you're finally in your slip you feel your spine and shoulders begin to relax. It feels wonderful to sit back on your soft bed and just breathe. It feels better still when you lie back. For a while you talk to Farinna about fashion, namely what in the world you're going to wear for the next month. She gives you a few good suggestions along with a few utterly terrible ones to make you laugh.

... and then you wake up. Blast - you've done it again! You must have nodded off and now it's sometime in the middle of the night, not a lit candle or lantern in reach. You reach out from beneath the thick blanket Farinna must have laid across you after you passed out. Your fingers nearly freeze, so that means it must be a few hours till dawn, when the castle is at its coldest. Even with the heat from the clay pipes buried in the wall of your room this old castle has powerful drafts. You're one of the lucky ones too. Anyone in the lower wing doesn't even get the advantage of those pipes, installed at the order of one of your ancestors who came close to losing a toe to the cold during winter.

You try to roll over and get back to sleep, but no, of course not. As usual, waking after sunrise is difficult but waking up now, with nothing to do, is easy. If the pattern holds you'll fall back to sleep shortly before dawn and feel miserable for most of the day. You can feel your overactive imagination warming to the task of keeping you wide awake.

'What useless ideas shall we pick to dwell on tonight?' you think to yourself. It's always something ridiculous - what you'd look like in a low cut dress made of beaten silver, whether you could conquer Carrillis and be known to history as a warrior queen, how best to frame an annoying noblewoman for a crime or slander her without getting caught. Never anything useful, always a stack of ideas that would make you look air headed, callous or downright brutal if you ever wrote them down.

Almost as if a second you is listening a copy of your voice comes back inside your head. 'Imagine if I took matters into my own hands. Why let mother choose a man for me?'

Well for once the idea wasn't so crazy. And it's not unheard of - certainly princesses get married off all the time for power, money, an end to war, a way to start one... But Orannar has been at peace for a long time. In fact the last four kings made it a point not to war but to expand royal power at home and get the mint and royal holdings under control. While other nations warred Orannar did great business selling them ships and arms. Your currency is so well regarded that your coins are accepted half a world away.

With the royal family doing so well there's no pressing need to marry you off. Certainly the marriage to Count Lucas was an almost perfect match, but there's no reason you can't have a hand in choosing your husband. You're an adult after all.

'Mother is almost certain to pick one of the men at the dinner last night, but we could choose anyone at all. Even a commoner!'

True enough. And marrying a commoner was actually seen in quite a positive light by most. Nobles couldn't get away with doing that, but the royal family could. It had happened three times in the last two hundred years, though admittedly each time it had been a young prince and a common woman. Two of those times said common woman had been uncommonly rounded at the waist come the wedding day, but even then people said "He's doing the honorable thing". In a way it was like a renewal of the bond between the king and his subjects. The ultimate way for a commoner to get ahead in life.

'Wonder if people would say I was doing the honorable thing if I married the man who got me with child? But regardless, any commoner I marry will need to know how to take care of a woman. That or he needs a hefty endowment betwixt his thighs. Quantity is a quality all its own.'

Where did that come from? What was in that wine? Marriage and love are about meeting the right man, with all the most wonderful qualities.

'Mmmm, yes, he can be caring and smart and all that, but if he's marrying into the royal line he'd better bring something amazing of his own.'

How is it possible for a thought in your own mind to wink at you like that? Do other girls have an inside voice that calls out for... men's bits like this?

'Oh come now, you're an adult now... aren't you?'

Of course, they're just words. Penis, cock. One sounds so clinical, the other a word good little princesses shouldn't say out loud. At least not until they're married and then only to their love. It was true that a commoner would have to be a fantastic man to warrant your attention. He'd need to be brave, strong, smart, incredibly handsome...

'All that... and a hefty sausage - like those ones from Navenath'

Ugh - why are you like this sometimes? Somehow it seems to have been getting worse for the last few months.

'I must be pining for Count Lucas, worried about my future. And the commoner I'd secretly love to marry.'

Even in the dark you know you're blushing. No, no, no. Sir Arrick Stone might very well be brave, strong and smart but he's your half brother! Even if you did have some naughty ideas once, there's no way you could marry him now that you know he's family. If you did your mother and a few other well trusted individuals would know the truth. Your mother would probably have a heart attack if she ever found you and he...

'Making the beast with two backs! And don't forget "incredibly handsome" - in fact, lets think about what he'd look like without his shirt on.'

Oh no! You manage to fight off the image of your half brother slowly undoing the laces on his shirt. Slowly pulling it open to reveal his glistening - NO! It came back for a second, but you stopped it in time. You can't have terrible little babies with him. The church warns about what could happen if... if... best to lock those thoughts away.

'Well if not the good Count or my handsome hero of a half brother who else would make a good husband for me?'