From the moment that kiss left her lips up through the moment the door had closed, Maria felt her heart plummeting and her stomach sinking well beyond the floor. Her knees felt weak, a hand bracing on the couch as Simprina rushed forward, the look of concern on her face a genuine one. There was no condescension for what she’d done and for what had gotten her into this mess--for laying with a man who was not to be her husband--but it was well beyond the point of chastising looks anyhow. Bradach was good for her, and cared for her, unlike any of the Sirmian kingdom, which meant that she’d do what she could to help them both out. The transgression was done, and there was no way around it.<br/><br/>But what could be done? Keeping Abby’s nose more than occupied up someone else’s derriere.<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">Much to plan…</span>the woman thought, as she got Maria back into bed, hushing her quiet worries that she dared not speak aloud. “I know that things are not ideal right now…I know that, Princess, but I’ll make them right.<span style="font-style: italic">We’ll</span>make them right. The roving eye will soon turn and things will be bearable for you again. Until then, I need you to relax for me. To breathe and just…relax. Don’t let her get to you. If you do, that precious life you’ve got growing inside of you is going to be gone before it can come to term…”<br/><br/>The words, though harsh, were true and it received a nod from Maria as she let out a breath doing as Simprina mentioned. For all her airheaded antics, Simprina could be very knowledgeable and if there was one thing she was good at, it was moving among the crowd without being seen given her station and getting things done. She’d done it many a time in Veruu.<br/><br/>Now, the stakes were higher, but they’d be done here just as they had been done there, she hoped.<br/><br/>“Will you be alright for a moment? I must away to take care of some business, and then I’ll be here with a compress for your head. Later, we’ll get you ready for dinner with the Queen,” the lady-in-waiting spoke, reminding her of the business and intentionally leaving off the most distasteful part. When Maria nodded, unable to manage much else, the woman spirited away without a trace, her steps silent as the door closed behind her.<br/><br/>Already the groundwork being laid for a plan, but…until then…the Princess would just have to sit tight. As was her duty Simprina would take care of her, no matter what it took.<br/><br/><div style="text-align: center;"><a class="postlink" href="http://s20.postimg.org/h8i3erc65/Aly_pagebreak.png">[ img ]</a></div><br/><br/>Much to her dismay, Simprina was going to be sitting this particular shindig out for the most part. Where the queen had suggested an intimate gathering for the three of them, Simprina would be left to watch from farther away, awaiting the time when Maria called her…but Maria was hoping that wouldn’t be necessary. While the tactless girl threw taunts at her, thinly veiled, in the presence of her mother, there’d be nothing to tamper with food or drink in front of her mother, would there? And gossip that held no weight behind it because of the lips that it came from certainly played a part in her favor, didn’t it? The Queen liked her. That had to count for something.<br/><br/>The dress she wore was dressed for the occasion of dinner, wearing the Sirmian colors, lacking in the corsets she’d forsaken long ago now that she was of delicate condition. Escorted down with her ladies at her back, ready to catch her should she need it, Maria held her head high and walked down the steps and out into the garden, seated only when the queen herself allowed it, giving her best smile to both the queen and her blasphemous harlot of a daughter.<br/><br/>“I’m terribly sorry for my display earlier,” she greeted them both in apology. “I’m not sure what came over me and why I was suddenly so declined in condition, but I assure you Simprina had my best intentions at heart and I do hope she didn’t offend either of you for speaking up on my behalf.”