The Serenade: The Prince and the Siren [Daughters of the Empire 2] (BookStrand Publishing Romance) Read Online Free PDF Page B

with the hand we are dealt? Do we respond with honor and discipline or with selfishness and slovenliness?”
    Touching his heart, he then touched Alejandro’s. “Do we come from here in all that we do?”
    He knew that Alejandro was much like the hatchling craving an imprint, looking out of the egg for the first stirring of life to claim, even as the king of Spain made the decision not to raise his own son. The irony was that King Don Bartolomé considered the raising of his son his most important duty. And yet it was not a duty that he undertook himself.
    As Esteban directed Prince Alejandro to dress for bed, he reflected that it was terrifying to consider that the character of the man who would someday lead a great country and thereby impact the world was at this point not solidified. It was hanging by a thread, as would be the case with any eight-year-old who had been abandoned by his parents, the relationship severed in the most traumatic of methods. That this boy, who would someday hold the lives of millions of people in his hands, should have his ethics, his very nature, determined by chance, by a roll of the dice, was almost inconceivable.
    And then, as if to answer Esteban’s concerns, the boy gave him a sign. Alejandro patted the older man’s hand as if to comfort him, and his lips began to form a shaky smile through his tears. “I will do my best, Señor Esteban.”
    “Then you will succeed, Alejandro.” Esteban almost choked on the words. “It is time to go to sleep, querido .”
    Alejandro yawned, despite his alert expression.
    “What is the prayer of your heart, Alejandro?” Esteban covered Alejandro with his blankets and made the sign of the cross on the prince’s forehead. “What do you wish for, and I will pray with you.”
    “The people who say bad things about me, who say that I am not strong and cannot lead, let us pray that God will enact his vengeance upon them.” Alejandro’s expression was troubled but determined.
    Esteban stroked his beard. While most endeavored to insinuate themselves to the young prince, there were enough who fell on the other side of the fence, making every effort to assassinate the royal prince’s reputation.
    “You must remember the exceptional person that you are, Alejandro. Brave and smart, sincere and full of empathy for others. You are the tallest and the strongest in your age group, and you apply yourself with a vengeance to all sports—in which you excel.” Prince Alejandro particularly liked fencing and horse riding, but there was no sport he could not and did not show to advantage.
    “Even what I’m good at is used against me!” Alejandro sniffed as he sat up in his bed. “Didn’t you see the cartoon where they made me look huge and clumsy? They called me ‘the Loggerhead Prince.’”
    “I have seen it.” He had hoped that Alejandro hadn’t. He wondered how to respond. Anyone might feel the same, longing for the day when one’s persecutors received their just rewards.
    “It isn’t true!” Alejandro exclaimed.
    “No, it isn’t.” Esteban took Alejandro’s hand. As he studied Alejandro’s forlorn expression, he knew that the child would not survive if he did not learn to dismiss his enemies from his mind. “Indeed, they deserve God’s vengeance and judgment, but it has already been taken care of.”
    “It has?” Alejandro beamed as a smile expressed itself for the first time that evening since producing the letter.
    “Yes, being who they are is the worst punishment. We must pray to God that we would not do harm to another in that way, thanking God for the kindness that is in our own hearts. And pray that we might be even better.” He pulled the covers up around Alejandro’s neck.
    “Even better ?” the child asked, as if that were an impossibility.
    “You will survive, Alejandro. And you will shine like a beacon of light for España. You might always carry your heartache, but you will also know who you are and why you were born