Carmela was going through the cases one by one."Most of your casual wear and about half of your formal pieces."
"So I'm starting my new life as a Solmarian princess with a wardrobe that looks like it went through a hurricane."
"We'll contact the designers immediately.They can have replacement pieces here within days."
"Days during which I'll be meeting the queen dressed like a disaster victim."
"I'm sure we can find appropriate items for you to borrow until your replacements arrive."
Borrowing clothes.Fantastic.This day just kept getting better.
"How often do these luggage accidents happen?"
"Never, Your Highness.This is completely unprecedented."
I looked at the soggy remains of my carefully curated princess wardrobe and a prickle of suspicion crawl up my spine.The convenient timing.The thoroughness of the damage.The way it hit almost everything except a few basic pieces.
"Carmela," I said slowly, "in your experience, do leaks in cargo holds usually manage to damage half of someone's wardrobe while leaving the other half mostly untouched?"
She hesitated, and that hesitation told me everything I needed to know.
"I wouldn't want to speculate, Your Highness."
"But if you were going to speculate?"
"I would say that cargo hold leaks typically affect luggage more...uniformly."
So someone had gone through my suitcases.Someone had destroyed half my clothes.Someone wanted me to arrive at my new home looking like I couldn't dress myself properly.
The question was who.And why.
"Well," I said finally, "I guess we'll just have to make the best of it.What do you suggest for tonight's dinner?"
Carmela had already pulled out one of the few dresses that had escaped damage, a simple black sheath that was appropriate for evening wear but not exactly what I'd planned to wear for my first formal dinner as Princess of Solmarina.
"This should work beautifully, Your Highness.Very elegant."
"If by elegant you mean 'the only thing I own that isn't completely destroyed,' then yes.Very elegant indeed."
As Carmela began hanging up the salvageable pieces, I thought about mentioning my suspicions to Archie.Then I remembered that I was supposed to be angry at him, not running to him with my problems.
Although...if someone was sabotaging me, that seemed like the kind of thing my husband should probably know about.Even if I was furious with him.Even if trusting him went against every instinct I currently had.
Six months in a palace with potential saboteurs, a disapproving queen, and a husband I simultaneously wanted to kiss and kill.
What could possibly go wrong?
