Lairs of Heir - Vol 1 // Young Royals

Chapter 48

Everyone had arrived at the palace, where the young royals had spent a large sum of money to decorate one of the larger ballrooms to fit their wedding guests as they dance and sing the night away.

Everyone had eaten as soon as they arrived - as during the planning process for Astrid and James's wedding, Astrid had insisted that the guests would not wait to eat, as she knew James would probably be more upset if he didn't surround himself with food.

"James! Where have you been?" Ace asks as she runs up to him.

"I was just admiring the church, where's the new Mrs Windsor?" He teases, making his sister blush.

"She's saying hello to some of her parents colleagues, I managed to get away from the boring business talk when you walked in."

James stares at her in amazement, not fully comprehending how much his sister had grown into an amazing woman, who was ready to take on the world.

"Never would I have imagined a day that Alice Windsor would find business talk boring."

"I'm a married woman now, I've changed quite a bit." She states with a smile.

"I'm pretty sure you haven't completely changed within a few hours." They both laugh, knowing Ace was talking rubbish because of her giddiness. "Wanna dance?" He asks his sister, who instantly grabs his arm and pulls him to the dance floor.

They both spend a lengthy amount of time dancing with each other, when they are asked to sit down, as speeches were about to start - unbeknownst to the couple, everyone was only really wanting to hear from James, but seeing as he hadn't really been present the last few days, he had nothing planned.

"James, you're up." Simon hands him the mic and walks away. James was feeling pure panic, but decided to just wing it and hope for the best.

James finally gets onto his feet, standing in front of the large crowd of people who were so invested in what James had to say.

"Okay." James laughs slightly, Turing around to give a worried look toward Ace, who just holds up her two thumbs as a sign of encouragement. "I'll be entirely honest, I have absolutely nothing prepared." He laughs, making the crowd chuckle at him. "So, I think I'll just try and configure all the thoughts I currently have, and try to come up with something memorable,"

"Firstly, I should say on behalf of everyone who was involved in the last minute planning of the wedding, that we all really do appreciate everyone who actually turned up. It was no secret that the sudden change of people getting married, was a shock, but I'm glad that so many people decided to join us in celebrating my sister and her new wife." James raises up his champagne glass, saluting all the guests.

"So, I think you're supposed to talk about the brides, so I'll start off with that." James turns toward Astrid and Alice, making them both gleam as they smile at James. "Astrid, when I was first came back to the UK, it was no shock that I was in a hard spot of my life - I had nobody that I could really go to, because everyone who I cared about, was either in another country, or they were being ignored by me. It wasn't until I got engaged to you that I found a real friend in the UK. I think everyone could tell that we weren't meant to be together - we had nothing in common, we were both gay, and we both didn't want to get married to the other person, but in all those negatives, we ended up becoming family to me. You helped me at my lowest, and I helped you at yours. You truely have become like a sister to me, and while Ace will never be replaced in my life, you really are something special to our little family. I remember the day that you first showed up at the palace, in fact."

"We we're both just told that we were to be married, and you arrived in the UK so that we could do some modelling for the media to finally release the story. You walked into the palace, not having seen a picture of me, and instantly assumed I was a butler, and handed me your luggage, and while I was slightly offended, I couldn't help but smile and go along with it as you went on and on, about meeting the princess, until I had to break the news that Alice was still in Sweden, and I was the guy you had to marry. And while you did hide it quite well, you should know that I clearly saw the disgust in your face when I said we were going to be married, it truely stung my inflated ego."

"But all jokes aside, being able to live with you for the last year and a half has taught me a lot - for one, I'm now amazing at doing makeup, and I know how to sneak to the kitchens without anyone knowing. So as my final words to you, thank you for not only putting up with me long enough to meet Ace, but thank you for making her the happiest I've ever seen her.

Everyone claps as James then turns to Ace, who he just knows will start crying as soon as he speaks about her.

"My dearest Ace." His eyes fill up with tears, which makes him turn toward the crowd of people, practically refusing to look at his twin. "I'll just talk this way, because if I look at you, I know I'll cry like a little baby." Everyone laughs at James's honesty, with only Ace crying at his words.

"I honestly have so many things I could say about my sister, but I'll start off with the fact that we're twins, if anyone doesn't know, and all my life I've been convinced that we've had a telepathic connection - I could feel when she was sad, happy, confused, or anything, and it scared me for a while, because I didn't want to put her though the kind of pain that I would feel," He focuses on August as he hints at his situation with Sam when he was younger.

"I basically spent my teenage years protecting my sister as best as I could, hoping to guard her from situations that would make her sad, or angry, and I took a lot of shit for it." Ace giggles loudly at the memories of james running away so many times to escape his time outs.

"There were times that I had successfully helped keep her completely oblivious to certain situations, while in other situations, I had no control over the amount of pain that she would feel. One instance that sticks out for me, was a day about 4 years ago, when the King was pronounced dead. It was a hard day for everyone, but unfortunately, my sister had been the one to find him, and it was something that I couldn't stop her from feeling, thinking about, crying about, or just blaming herself. I felt helpless when she would come up to me daily, sobbing about our father, and I could do nothing to stop her feeling that way."

"I always knew that my father had a special place in his heart for Ace, and it showed until the day he died. He and I weren't ever really on good terms, and quite honestly I had no respect for him when he was alive, but seeing Ace grieve for someone, in the way that she did, made me respect the fact that he made sure to give my sister all the love he could possibly give her, it did earn him his respect back. Although I know that I'll probably never be able to tell what he would think about this day, I know that he would've been proud of Ace. She's been a light in our family since she was born, and lately she's been the glue that holds us all together. She's one of a kind and I'm honestly so excited that she found someone so perfect for her." He turns back to the couple, finding them both in tears.

"I truely wish you two the best in life, and I really, really hope you make each other as happy as you can, to the newlyweds!" James raises his glass once again, making everyone follow his action, as he pretends to take a sip.

Everyone seems to settle down, talking amongst themselves as Ace walks over to James, crushing him in another hug, as she had been void of words to describe her emotions. She had been shocked over James's control to talk about their father with such ease, when she knows that her father treated James so badly when he was alive. She knew in that moment, that when James said he would do anything for her, he really did mean that.