The life of a royal daughter

This is a story I wrote last year. I’m hoping to fix it! But, until then, Enjoy what you can!

Castles, Knights and kings and queens. This is a story of a daughter of the royal family in the Medieval times, which was also called the dark ages. This little princess has to live in the dark dusty castle on the top floor. For me personally I’d be a merchant, but you could not choose who you wanted to be. For this 6 year old girl, she had to go through a lot. One thing that she dreaded the most was when her father told her who she was going to marry that next year. But on a sunny day in Gilder the big news came…….

Chapter 1

Princess Isabell

In an old castle in the land Gilder, there lived a lord and his family, knights and guards, servants, and the royal family. In that royal family there were 4 children. The oldest was seven years, and just got told who she was going to marry. The second oldest was 6 and dreading the day her sister had had. She did not want to marry, much less being told who and when. The rest were two young boys that survived, but there was a chance they were not going to.
This second child is what we are going to focus on. Her name was Princess Isabell. She wore a tight gown and had her favorite necklace on. It was a 14 karat gold necklace with a little sapphire gem in the middle. She wore that all the time and would not take it off. It was a gift from her father, the king. Her mother, the queen, taught her all she needed to know, or so her mother said.
Isabell one day was late to her lessons.
“ Isabell! What have I told you about being late?” Her mother said.
“To never be late, mother.” Isabell said, ashamed.
“ Well now, your sister was reciting what to do at the dining table”
Not this again, Isabell thought. They recited the dining rules every day. Isabell tried to listen to the rules so she would not get in more trouble and be whipped. Isabell shivered. “To dine at ten, use manners, be polite. Say please and thank you and after, good night. To dine at eleven is when you should be quiet and let the men talk. If asked after that, tell a story of when a man was great and entertain until the men fall asleep.” Those were the rules in this castle. For Isabell, she did not like the lessons. She never did tell her feelings to others. You just were not allowed. Oh, when can I get away from here? Never?! Isabell thought.
Isabell could go on and on complaining and hating what she had to go through. Don’t even get her started on her lessons. Although she did like to dine, she was uncomfortable with the knights standing at the door, watching and waiting for the scraps from her parents. How could her mother go through being a queen and focusing all those rules and be as stiff as a stick? Did mother even love father? Isabell wondered for the first time in her life. She then dismissed the idea that a 6 year old princess should not be thinking.
When she came in her room, her servants dressed her in her nicest and tight and scratchiest gown for supper because it was almost 5 in the afternoon.

Chapter 2

Would You Like Some Knights with That, Sir?

Great, thought Isabell, we’re going to dine at 11 today . Her mother was telling the day’s schedule. She had had a good nights sleep compared too her sister. Her sister had screamed a terrifying scream that had woken everybody in the castle, outraging her father. She had said it was a horrible dream, but I didn’t believe her. I think it was worse than that for her to scream that horribly loud. To get on with the day, mother had me study Spanish and her German. It was terribly boring and I could see my sister felt the same. We had to do what our parents said and Isabell tried to think of what they could do whithout someone telling them. Isabell couldn’t and it was either too little or no rights at all.
could not take it. She what the boys were up to. They should have seen the chance to incredibly annoy her. Writing and then reading some more, then writing again, then going on to rules. Some days were longer than others here, she thought. Isabell’s sister suddenlysuddenly complained that she was really hot. Mother took her to a doctor who was by the castle, leaving Isabell alone. She wondered Isabell shrugged her shoulders. It was just as well.
At supper there were 4 empty seats and Isabell noticed some knights were gone too. Noticing Isabell’s puzzlement, her father told her that her Brother and sister are with the doctor and her mother was with them. As for the knights, three had died suddently from a strange sickness. That’s strange, she had never heard of a sudden sickness. Mabe it was all the rats cralling about this old ramshackle castle. She never dared tell her father those thoughts, though she would soon wish she had.
After the silent supper, she went to a castle window. Isabell looked over the old stone and gray castle’s gardens. Green, blue, yellow, purple were just a few colors she saw. It had always calmed her to see the gardens. At the corner of her eye, she saw mother walking up gracefully. Isabell wonderd about what happened with the doctor, because her mother didn’t look to well. She looked sad.
After a refreashing scene of the beautiful castle gardens, her two servents dressed Isabell in her dining clothes. Finally at the long table, she sat down in her usual seat. Her sister and her littlest brother were missing
from the table, but the oldest brother was not absent. He smiled a sad smile when he saw Isabell looking at him. Then the food came.
Something was still missing. The lord and his lady was there, (she liked them), mother and father were at the end as always, the obvious empty seats, and her brother was there. Who could be gone? Isabell thought. She suddently looked at the door entery way. The knights! The knights were not in their usual spot, which is a rare behavior for them to be absent. The cook came in, unusual thing still, and said to father,
“ Would you like some knights with that, sir?” .
“ Yes, send for them now,” father demanded in a loud voice.
The cook then bowed and stepped out of the room. The dark stone room was suddentlly silent. When the cook came back, he brought two knights who uneasily walked to their posts. As the poor cook( Isabell’s opinion, not the king’s) turned to hurry away, Father demanded,
“ why were they not here when we were just sitting down?” Father suprisingly said in a hard and angry voice.
“ Well, I….. don’t….. know sir, ask….them, sir,” said the poor cook in a quiet and quivering voice.
`Father then asked the two knights where they were, but in a harsh voice. Sensing this was a chance to escape, the cook hurried quietly away. Isabell didn’t hear what the knights said but she noticed that they did not get the scraps.
Here is what Isabell thinks of knights. They wear armor and helmets everywhere they go, they stand too stiffly and stand for hours watching her eat. Of course Isabell did not know any thing about knights.
Isabell is a smart girl and pretty too. She had long black hair with smart looking brown eyes, and she mostly took after her mother. None of these helped any with what her mother told after dining and was in her room.
“ Honey,” her mother said in a sweet sad voice, your sister and brother died this morning suddenly.”
It was like someone telling you your best friends had died. It was a shock, and a sad one. Isabell cried and cried, her mother crying with her. Father was not a person who cried, so he took the death of his son and a little bit of his daughter out on the knights and cook. That sentence, would you like knights with that, was the signal for anger. Isabell vowed to never forget that quote, for it was her sister, whos name was Elizibeth, who liked that quote when the cook said it, so mabe that was why a fight had triggered her father. After crying half the night, Isabell said the words over and over in her mind. Would you like some knights with that, would you like some knights with that, would you like some knights with that? And Isabell understood her sister in a whole different way, just in that unusual quote that her sister loved when she was little.
Then Isabell realized something. She was going to be seven in four weeks!

Chapter 3

My Sister’s Golden Necklece and My Last Christmas

The next day was dark and rainy. Isabell was not in the mood, but her mother forced her to study. A week before Chistmas time, she was searching through her sister’s room. She found a small box with jewels on the sides. The lid had a tree on it and on the bottom someone had woven, Elizibeth beautifully. Isabell had a box just like it, but not as pretty as her sister’s. Isabell sat on her sister’s bed. She then gently lifted the box and looked at the shining jewelry in the velvet inside of the box. She held each piece of jewelry and smiled sadly. She then noticed something. Deep in the box was her sister’s golden necklace, shining bright as a sun. She fingered the crystal and looked at her sapphire necklace.
She put her sister’s necklace against hers. “There… now I’ll have something to remind me of the good times with my sister,”Isabell said to herself, and felt much better.
She remembered the time, the one time, she fought with her sister. The fight was about 1 year agoand it was because she thought Isabell had stolen her necklace. Isabell remembered Elizibeth’s words clearly. “ You better give me back my necklace or I’ll tell mother!” Elizibeth had yelled.
Isabell had been scared to death. Isabell never had gotten in trouble before, so it was worse. They had yelled some time after that and Will, Isabell’s biggest brother had finally stopped the fight. Elizibeth had never found the necklace after that, but never fought with Isabell again. Isabell thought she was sorry. Now Isabell had found the necklace deep in her Jewelry box and always held on to it. That necklace wasn’t just a 14 keret gold necklace, to Isabell, it was her dear sister’s spirit.
That next week was Christmas. There are actually 12 days of christmas, but I am going to tell you about the christmas day because that was most eventful.
Isabell woke from her bed, excited. It was Christmas day, and she loved the shows after church. Her servents hurried in and dressed Isabell in the nicest gown, did her hair, helped her put on those tight, tight shoes and the whole time they were talking fast. After rushing to dress, Isabell and her family went to church. At church they heard the holy stories and prayers and sung them too. After that, there was a feast. The Yule boar was Isabell’s favorite.
Then the dancers came. They had a lead singer and a ring ofdancers who danced gracefully off the floor. I was the best day of her life, but it would end soon. After she got home, her father took her to a court in a hurry.When he finished his speech, he looked at Isabell and told her a name.
That night, it was impossible to sleep. Father had told her who she was going to marry. It was Prince Edward, but he didn’t tell where. He was also three weeks early! She could not belive it.
She guessed this was her last Christmas for a long time.
Chapter 4

I’m Going, I’m Going, I’m Gone

Isabell knew how to take care of a castle and was a very smart girl. It was a week after Christmas and two more weeks until she was seven and mother had still said that she needed to learn more and marry later. Isabell’s father could not wait that long. Isabell sat on her chest of things. He had said, no, demanded, that she was to marry that next year. She wondered what Edward was like, and wondered what was it like to love someone. Was it like a friend playing with a best friend? Or was it something that you can’t explain, something that you have to go through yourself?
One year, one more year, until she was gone to the kingdom of England. She decided to go to her mother to finish yesterday’s studies. Her father was off on war since three days ago and mother was in charge. Will was off in school and Isabell wonderd what it was like. Mother had insisted that she would teach Isabell and Elizibeth, and made the boys go to school.
She watched her mother take care of the castle, following her around which would help later, her mother had said. Still scrubbing and cleaning, Isabell’s mind wandered off. She went back to the pretty gardens and then she was thinking about the past when all the royal kids had played together. She smiled at the wonderful memories. She then wondered what the future was going to be like, and not just hers. She then dismissed the idea meant for peasants. A royal like her should think only of God and her chores, her mother had said.
It was hard being me, Isabell thought. Years of practice and play and then more years in studying and then now going to be a queen? Being a queen could not be worse than this she thought. She was wrong, so, so wrong. At five o’clock, it was supper. It was quiet with the men gone and Will was uneasy and Isabell was glancing at the knights. Then Isabell remembered: there were 100 guards and knights around this castle.
After cleaning and scubbing again after supper, her mother then made her do her studies. Isabell looked at the silver rings that her parents had given her. She had to study more of the English language and her mother was certain that she did not know it yet, though Isabell did, but never said anything, or her mother would beat her for not doing the work. That also scared Isabell, but she had never shown her feelings before.
After her studies, her mother let her walk in the gardens. A lot has happened in five weeks, she quietly told herself in a tired voice. Two siblings dead, her last fun Christmas, father telling her that she will marry Prince Edward in a year, and three weeks early, war has started and to top it off, studying all day. She looked around at the big old stone black castle. She wondered what words she would say, leaving a place she had been in her whole life.
She suddenly thought of something. “I’m going, I’m going, “I’m gone…” she quietly said. She thought about it and it was perfect.
“I’m going, I’m going, I’m gone” Isabell said loudly, walking through the plants and trees like it was a forest. To Isabell, that moment, was like going into her own future. She is going to be queen.
“I’m going, I’m going, I’m gone…” Isabell’s voice echoed through the garden.

Author’s Note

If you want to know what happened, and get a feel for what it was like to be a Queen, here it is. One year later, Isabell married Prince Edward in England. They had a nice reign but the good times did not last long. By 1530, war broke out and Edward had to go fight. Isabell was in charge of the castle and there were 100 knights and guards surrounding the stone castle. Isabell did like the castle, because it did not feel like the castle was going to fall down. One day, Queen Isabell got bad news. Prince Edward had gotten killed, but nobody knew who had comitted the murder. Isabell’s father then married her to a Prince in Germany. Isabell thought it was okay living there, and the King, since they married, was sweet and fair, though she thought England was much better. The Prince was named Henery and the two reigned a good 20 years until Henry broke his neck while in war.
By this time, Isabell had decided her husbands are going to die in war every time. For the third time, Isabell’s father married her to a Prince in Spain. This castle was worse than Germany and Isabell was certain it would fall when she was in it. It did. It was on a dark and rainy day and the rain was pouring down hard. It poured so hard that little by little, the castle was caving in. Of course the Queen and King were in thier decorated, hard beds sleeping. Then the rain became a bucket and like a wave, banged the castle, and down the castle came. Only two died that night since the rest were at the town or at war. The people who died were the King and dear Queen Isabell.
A cat from the town was right by the old Queen and was the only one who survived and heard Isabell‘s last words, “I’m going, I’m going, I’m gone…”
It was hard being a royal in those days. You could get sick, you had to work, and it was even harder for princesses. Wow. Once a king died, you had to marry again, and then again when he died. Isabell had three sons who took on the throne, though all of them died before being King but there were some good intentions. There was always a chance children would not make it to aduthood like, Isabell’s sister and brother. What happened to her brother, Will, you ask ? Well, he reigned at Gilder when the old King died and never had a tragedy, and lived to be an old King. Isabell would have went to church everyday. Church was the most important thing back then, and their religion was Christianity. That just about ends our story, so if you ever find me again, since I’m a traveler, ask me to tell tales and I’ll surely be glad to.

“I’m going, I’m going, I’m gone…”

THE END