The Cursed Prince's Strange Bride

"By all means marry. If you get a good wife, you'll be happy. If you get a bad one, you'll become a philosopher"

This was a quote attributed to the great philosopher, Socrates. And now, Harold could understand why. Because he had been doing a lot of thinking that could make him fit as one and ascend to the heaven of philosophers. Should he let her be or should he not?

And why is that, one may ask?

It was the same reason Alvin's eyes almost popped out of their sockets when he arrived at the garden to pass a piece of important information over to Harold, and he couldn't stop himself from exclaiming as he moved away from Harold in both shock and disbelief.

Harold's dark gaze fell on his face with a deadly aura around him, daring Alvin to laugh or say something funny.

Alvin wanted to take him seriously. He swore he wanted to take Prince Harold seriously and would have been kowtowing right now, but he just couldn't, especially seeing him with his hair parted into two and braided to the back. He could tell that the culprit was none other than his bride, who was sitting across from him with her head on the table. She looked like she had been knocked out. By chance, that wasn't his handiwork, right?

"Y-Your..." Alvin swallowed his words and pursed his lips as he tried to suppress his laughter.

"Your... High— muahahaha." Alvin could no longer hold it in as he placed his hand on his belly and had a good laugh. "I'm so... I'm so sorry your High hahaha—"

"I must look amusing to you," Harold said with a stiff, spine-chilling smile that got Alvin to quickly stand upright as he nodded. "Yes, your high— I mean... no, your highness. I will help you get rid of that thing now," he said with a serious face before taking out a brightly shining dagger from its sheath, which was hanging on the waistband of his trousers.

"What are you going to do with that?" Harold asked, hoping Alvin really knew what he was going to do because he had tried to take down this nonsense she did on his hair, but he couldn't figure out how or where he was supposed to start from, and waking her seemed futile.

Alvin looked at Harold with confusion before looking at the dagger. Then he shook his head as he returned the dagger to its sheath and said, "Erm... I have... no idea, your highness. How do I take that down?"

"HOW THE HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO KNOW THAT?" He bellowed angrily, startling Alvin before pointing at the criminal that had done a hit and run on his hair. "This little devil did this and suddenly collapsed!" He said, fuming. It was a good thing he had sent the remaining guards away before she started messing with his hair. How was he ever going to earn respect from them again after this? He still could not get over the fact that they were talking about how she had literally thrown him out of his chamber and now this! He couldn't understand how she tied his hair, as if she expected him to live with it like this forever.

Alvin was confused since he didn't know what he was supposed to do either. He had only ever seen this hairstyle on little girls outside the palace, and the girls were usually around 5 years old or younger. He always found it cute but didn't think he would one day see it on a man, and not just any man, but Prince Harold. If others saw him like this, then his reputation was over. He wished there was some magic that could make him capture this moment and save it somewhere to look at it whenever he was having a bad day. Another thing he could not get over was the fact that he had allowed her to touch his hair, and not only touch it, but she had also braided it.

"How about I wake her up so she can—"

"NO!" He refuted it immediately. He would rather have her asleep like this than have her awake. He was tired of the endless cries and only the heavens knew what she was going to do to him again if she was awake.

"Bring me a cloak," Harold ordered.

Alvin bowed, and as soon as he disappeared from the garden, he got a good laugh until he was satisfied, before he fetched a black cloak with a hood from Harold's chamber and returned to hand it over to him.

Alvin had to confess that he felt like pinching Harold's cheeks and calling him adorable. But what he didn't know was that Alicia had done the exact same thing before she fell unconscious.

As Harold wore the cloak and used the hood to cover his head, he glared at Alvin, who he knew was having a good laugh at his expense.

"Get Paulina. Ask her to meet me in Ali..." Harold hesitated, wondering why he was calling her by her name more often now. "Ask her to meet me in her mistress chamber," he corrected as he stood up, and Alvin bowed before leaving once again.

After Harold adjusted the hood over his head, he went around the table and lifted Alicia from where she was knocked out. As he walked out of the garden and into the palace, he tried to ignore the stares he was getting.

It seemed to him that everyone was becoming less scared of him these days. How could he explain the fact that they had gathered outside his chamber to eavesdrop on his conversation with Alicia the previous day, and even after she pushed him out, most of them had stood there staring at him in disbelief?

All of this was Alicia's fault. Why did she have to keep embarrassing him in this manner?

As he walked down the hallway, Tyra and Susan, who were taking a stroll, stopped to stare at him when they noticed the cloak he was wearing in broad daylight, and seeing Princess Amber lying unconscious in his arms, they could guess that she had probably done something.

What they weren't sure of was whether or not he was responsible for her unconscious state. This was the second time they'd seen him carry her to her chamber, princess style, and they were worried.

"Did something happen to her again?" Susan asked with concern as they approached Harold, hoping that this wasn't like the sleep she had fallen into a few days back.

"She's drunk... She drank my wine," Harold added stiffly, since he could guess what they were probably thinking.

"You... let her drink your wine?" Tyra asked in dismay as they followed him. Even she had never tasted the kind of wine he drank.

Tyra quickly hurried to open the door to Alicia's chamber once they got there. Seeing how she easily opened it, Harold could not help but frown. What happened to locking doors? He wondered as he looked down at Alicia.

As soon as the door opened, he glared at the two girls behind him. It suddenly hit him that they were interrogating him, and there was nothing he hated more than that. As expected, they quickly snapped their mouths shut and disappeared from his sight as he walked into Alicia's chamber and used his right foot to kick the door shut.

Once he got to the bed, he gently laid her down on it and glared at her sleeping form when she giggled in her sleep. What was she finding so funny about the disaster she had made here?

He turned to the door when he heard footsteps followed by a light knock. He could tell that it was Alvin who had returned with Paulina. "Come in," he called to them, and immediately the door was pulled open and they both walked in.

As expected, Paulina rushed over to Alicia's bedside, and immediately she saw that Alicia was unconscious, she broke into a sob, and it was all Harold could do not to roll his eyes.

What was wrong with both the mistress and the servant? They both seemed to know how to bawl a lot, and he found it very annoying. He was particularly not fond of Paulina because, despite the fact that Alicia wasn't from here and kept trying to go back, Alicia seemed to like and care for her a lot, enough that she didn't want to leave without her if she wasn't sure she would be fine.

An idea on how to keep Alicia occurred to Harold, making him scowl. He did not like that the idea involved Paulina. It would hurt his pride to rely on a maid to help him keep his wife with him.

Harold glared daggers at her as he cleared his throat to get her attention.

"Your mistress is sleeping. She is just drunk," Harold assured her, and Paulina's eyes almost popped out of their sockets.

"D-Drunk?" Paulina repeated in disbelief since Amber had never tasted alcohol in her entire life, and when she looked at Alvin, he gave her a nod.

"She will be okay," Harold said confidently so that she would stop crying, and once Paulina finally stopped, the first thing that occurred to her was the strange clothes he was wearing.

"Do you know how to undo this?" Harold asked Paulina as he pulled down the hood from his head, almost giving the poor girl a heart attack.