Chapter 16 - THE QUEEN ON TRIAL
The Royal Council chamber had not been used for a succession challenge in eighty-three years.
By sunrise, every seat was occupied.
Judges.
Ministers.
Nobles.
Constitutional advisers.
The Speaker of Parliament.
Prince Leopold sat at one end of the chamber.
Helena sat alone at the other.
Daniel watched from the gallery beside Adrian.
Leopold rose.
“My niece deceived her government.”
Helena did not react.
“She established a false identity in a foreign country.”
“She entered an engagement that created an undisclosed conflict with a major defense contractor.”
“And she permitted personal feelings to compromise the dignity of the Crown.”
Daniel’s hands tightened.
Adrian whispered.
“Do not move.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“You were.”
Daniel remained seated.
Leopold continued for forty minutes.
He spoke beautifully.
That was what made him dangerous.
He turned Helena’s search for ordinary love into recklessness.
Her privacy into deception.
Her grief into instability.
Then Helena stood.
She carried no notes.
“Yes.”
The chamber became silent.
“I concealed my title.”
“I did.”
“I lived under another name.”
“I did.”
“I became engaged without seeking council approval.”
“I did.”
Leopold smiled.
Helena looked directly at him.
“But I did not sell classified information.”
His smile disappeared.
“I did not accept sixty-eight million dollars.”
Several council members turned.
“I did not conspire with a foreign corporation to manipulate my country’s defense procurement.”
Leopold’s face tightened.
Helena continued.
“And I did not spend months trying to manufacture a scandal so I could take a crown my brother and I never believed belonged to us personally.”
Adrian lowered his head.
Helena placed Keller’s confession on the central table.
Then she placed bank records beside it.
A council judge began reading.
Leopold stood.
“This evidence was coerced.”
The doors opened.
Matthias Keller entered under guard.
Leopold went white.
Keller looked at Helena.
Then at the council.
“No one coerced me.”
For the next hour, he explained everything.
Leopold’s first payment.
Evelyn’s later deal.
The stolen palace records.
The defense contract.
The plan to leak selective information if Helena refused to pressure ministers.
When Keller finished, Leopold looked like an old man.
The council retired.
Daniel waited with Helena in a stone corridor.
“You were terrifying.”
Helena looked at him.
“That was not a compliment in my childhood.”
“It is from me.”
She almost smiled.
A door opened.
The council returned.
The chief judge stood.
“By unanimous decision, Prince Leopold is suspended from all royal duties pending criminal proceedings.”
Helena exhaled.
“And regarding Her Majesty’s constitutional conduct…”
Daniel held his breath.
“The council finds serious errors of judgment.”
Helena lowered her eyes.
“But no violation sufficient for removal.”
Adrian smiled.
Daniel closed his eyes.
The judge continued.
“However, any marriage affecting succession must receive parliamentary consent.”
Everyone looked at Daniel.
Helena squeezed his hand.
May you like
They had survived the palace.
Now two hundred elected politicians would decide whether they could have a future.
