Chapter Text
Mary is sitting on the balcony of her chambers, inside they're people coming in and out, repairing her bed. This morning the terror striked, the young queen woke up with a stag's head hanging about her, blood dripping out it's nose, neck, covering the lovely satin white sheets staining red. The queen woke up with horror and fear. The fresh air from outside the castle walls did the queen well, doing nothing just staring into the woods and waters that were placed in front of the French court. Closing her eyes didn't do anything good, she saw her bloody fingers and when she looked up, the stag's head was staring down at her. Francis and Bash were sure that it were the pagans that did this to her, both of the brothers shared feelings for this girl. Francis was sure that whatever Bash needed to do, that he should do it, for her, for the queen of Scots. She remembered them fighting in the hall, hearing snippets of their conversation. The queen itself cared for both, but one more than the other. It was always Francis who popped up in her dreams, that made her laugh and blush more than Sebastian ever could.
"The King and Queen are asking for your presence in the Queen's chambers." A pager said walking into the balcony finding out that the queen wasn't inside. The future queen of France nodded once to the pager showing him that she understands and that he could leave the queen back dreaming alone in her thoughts. The pager turned around and left her. Mary turned back to the landscape of the French court and prepared herself mentally for what might be the conversation.
Walking into Queen Catherine's chambers she found not only her and the King, but also the dauphin, her fiance. She was surprised to see him, trying not to show her surprise. She looked sharply at him. The young queen didn't like the way he was shutting her out and being with Olivia, the girl he had so much history with, his first love. When Mary looks at Francis she sees it, the betrayal that she felt so dearly in her heart that was totally inexperienced in the area of love, but he showed it to her, bit by bit. Now, it was all over, he went back to the girl who taught him all about it.
Soon her eyes found Henry's and Catherine's. The room was tense. Francis was looking at Mary he cared for her deeply. His thing with Olivia is different, everytime they are together they kiss, touch, are close with one another. With Mary they're always fighting, fighting for stupid reasons, but still they can't let those confersation let go. He as Mary had no idea what was going on. His parents called for him as sudden as they did to her. Now that Mary is here it must be an important conversation.
"Mary, nice of you to join us," The king began, Mary nodded sharply once at him, her eyes slowly finding their way to Francis, seeing him staring at her. "As you know, this morning there were some unfortunate events, whoever did it will be dealt with." The king continued, grabbing the young queen's hands, showing sadness in his face as a comfort for her. She found it an uncomfortable gesture, the queen noticed the king's behavior and the dauphin did too. He looked away quickly, trying not to show his jealousy slowly creeping up to him, he turned to his mother who was standing next to him. "Your bed is at the moment in repair, there is a risk that the canopy of the bed could fall down. Also we will make sure that this intruders couldn't come in as easily as they did at night." The king walked closer to his wife, letting go of Mary's hand. Now Francis and Mary were standing next to each other both facing the King and Queen of France. "So, now you can't stay at your chambers, the guest chambers are all unavailable because of the English and some guests that are staying here at our court. So my wife and I agreed that you would share your bed for the following few days with Francis." Francis and Mary turned to each other immediately, both confused and mixed with feelings.
"Why can't I just stay with my ladies?" Mary asked immediately, feeling very uncomfortable about the idea of even sleeping in the same bed as Francis.
"Oh dear, you can't stay with your ladies, their chambers don't have the room and space that queens need, and they're commoners with no royal blood flowing through their veins. And you and Francis are going to be married soon, it would be a logical thing to do. Also if now any intruders would want to hurt you, they couldn't find you because your not in your old chambers anymore and if they did find you Francis could protect you." Catherine blended into the conversation. She looked at Mary with a reassuring smile. Francis was very confused about this. Mary sleeping in his bed? Next to him? He couldn't breathe the idea of it. His future wife was shaking by the idea of it. They both couldn't believe what these two rulers did to them. They're both not even speaking to each other.
"The servants are already transfering all of your belongings into Francis' chamber." Catherine ended and they left, leaving Mary and Francis standing alone, still next to each other breathing in and out trying to process the news they just got. Mary couldn't even look at him in the moment, she breathed in keeping that air in her lungs and left the room, leaving Francis alone, he watched her leave.
[-/-]
"How is it going with you and Francis?" Kenna asked Mary, who was resting on Kenna's bed. Kenna was sitting next to her seeing that something troubled her. She assured it was Francis, he was showing Olivia off, it seemed. Of course that hurted Mary because she admired this young man.
Mary inhaled deeply before speaking about her situation. "Catherine and Henry decided that I should stay at his chambers for the following few days. I can't stay in my own bed because it could be dangerous and now I'm in this tricky situation with Francis who's Olivia, and I don't know what more surprises I could expect from the King and Queen of France." She exhaled looking up to Kenna who was gasping at the information she just received from her queen.
"And Francis is obviously with Olivia and now I need to sleep at night in the same bed that he does, perhaps even where he sometimes sleeps with his beloved Olivia." Mary was disgusted by the young girl who perhaps would ruin her marriage that she perhaps once will have with Francis.
"Mary, I have the perfect idea." Kenna said, standing up from her bed and pacing back and forth on the stone floor of her chamber. Mary got up out of curiosity and looked at Kenna who was processing this idea of hers.
"What?" Mary asked, looking at her friend. She truly wanted to know what this idea was of hers.
"I have an idea how Francis gets rid of Olivia because he would much rather be with you." Kenna said standing still in front of the queen and smiling with the idea, Mary was dying to know what the idea was.
"You have to be irresistible." Kenna spoke, Mary's eyes grew of what she thinks Kenna meant with that.
"Kenna, you don't mean that I-" Mary almost didn't dare finish that sentence.
"No, no of course not, you need to look irresistible at night, when he walks in late in your chamber and he sees you lying on his bed, in a nightgown, sleeping that would do something tricky to his mind. Or when he wakes up and sees that your face is just inches away still sleeping as a beauty." Kenna smiled at her own idea. Mary was intrigued in the idea of her trying to seduce Francis into choosing her over Olivia.
"You need to be the only thing he thinks about the entire day. You could also turn around in your sleep and accidentally touch his hand or arm, you have no idea what that would do to him." Kenna tells her queen this, while thinking about her affair with the king and what he likes. Like father, like son, right? Mary grinnes at the idea.
[-/-]
The evening slowly falls, Mary will go with Kenna's ideas and will see where they throw her. She is very nervous about the entire 'sleeping with Francis' thing but she hopes she will go through it and hopefully after these few nights Francis will want her, only her. The young queen walks through the halls of French court, turns around the corner, seeing Francis' chambers at the end of the hall. She hopes that he isn't there yet, so she could change into her nightgown before he would walk in, she opens the door making a light sound, it's dark, cold no one's here. all of Mary's stuff is transferred to this room, it's utterly full. She walks over to the huge closet, taking out her nightgown. Usually the servants would do this for her but now she just wants to be alone with her thoughts, she needs absolutely everything goes as planned, seducing Francis that shouldn't be too hard, Olivia can do it. Searching for her most prettiest nightgown, all white with satin patterns. The nightgown hugged her figure perfectly. She braids her hair into a messy braid and lays down on Francis' bed, it feels weird, it's still cold but if she wants this plan to work she needs to lay on the covers not under so Francis would be head over heels for Mary. She blows out the candle letting darkness take over the cold room, her and Francis' room for a few days.
After a while she hears the door open and a shadow lands on her, Francis' shadow. He closes the door, stopping the light from the halls letting into the room. He's searching for a candle and lights it up, he looks into his room seeing Mary lying in his bed. He breathes in sharply and looks away quickly. Mary hears his change of breath and opens her eyes seeing Francis in the corner of her eye, he grabs his nightshirt and changes, taking off his doublet and the shirt under it leaving him shirtless.
It's more like he is seducing me, Mary thinks. He walks shirtless around the room leaving out of Mary's sight he walks back and puts on his nightshirt. He stares at Mary for a while and she is trying very hard not to open her eyes, she feels the mattress shift and Francis lies down next to her. He stares into the air above him also lying on the covers. He doesn't close his eyes, he can't not with this siren lying next to him, he hears her slow breath. Mary tries to keep her breath steady but sometimes he can hear some pauses or acceleration in it, for her it's hard as well no one has ever laid next to her. Mary turned around, after a long hesitation now facing Francis, she would look right into those blue eyes if it wasn't so dark and if her eyes were open. Francis gasps lightly by the change. He turned his head looking at Mary, her plumpy pink lips slightly opened, her eyes both closed, her face porcelain white even in this darkness.
God, what are you doing to me? Francis asks himself. He stares at her for a moment, trying not to move or make a slightest bit of noise not wanting to wake this beauty up. She started moving her hand to his arm. He stares at the gesture and knows that she isn't intending to do this if she was awake. Mary's hand is resting on his upper arm feeling his muscles over his shirt. She knows he's looking at her shocked. And she tries not to bite her lip so hard. Francis' breath is increasingly unsure how to act, she's playing with his mind. Mary moves her hand lower, now touching his hand, fingers. She rests her hand onto the fingers. He entangles his fingers with hers, he thinks that she is asleep and wouldn't even notice it. Mary gasps at his behavior and her eyes flicker open. Francis notices and lets go of her hand at the same second. Mary's eyes find Francis' he's looking right at her and so is she. They both can't look away being hypnotized with each other. They can't see a lot in the dark but still they found each other, they would always find eachother only they had to know that first. Mary breathes in and holds onto that air for a while.
"I- I'm sorry I woke you up." Mary said, turning around, stopping their stare. Francis snaps to reality. Turning his head again to stare above him, his breath unsteady.
"It's- It's fine." Francis said, whispering so that she still would hear it. Mary's eyes were wide open and staring at the room, not seeing a lot. Francis turned around, still lying on top of the covers.
He grabbed my hand, he held my hand, Mary thought to herself, she truly thought that that was the last thing that he would do. The light of the moon was shining onto them, both turned away from each other, both gasping for the things that just happened, both thinking about each other.
Francis... Mary thought. Mary... Francis thought.