Ruled by Love Read Free Page A

in fact the truth.
    At the time her father would encourage her to tell him exactly what she thought some dinner-guest was really like, and later he had her sitting with him when he engaged a new aide-de-camp or a servant.
    â€œNow tell me what you think,” he would say when the candidates left the room.
    He was forced to admit that Zoleka was very clever in spotting a weakness in someone they had talked to.
    As she grew older she used the same powers to choose those whom she wished to be her friends.
    She refused point blank to speak to one visitor at the Palace. Desperate to be accepted, the visitor constantly bought Zoleka and her mother bunches of flowers and presents.  Before too long it became difficult to accept the woman’s kindness and still not invite her to any Royal festivities.
    â€œShe is bad, Mama,” Zoleka had said. “And I have no wish to accept her presents.”
    â€œYou can hardly refuse them, dearest,” her mother had replied firmly.
    Zoleka had accepted the largesse and thanked the woman politely, but later her mother found she had made a bonfire and burnt the presents until they were nothing but ashes.
    â€œHow could you do anything so foolish, Zoleka?” she scolded. “If you did not want them, there are plenty of girls your age who would be grateful for them.”
    â€œThey are bad, Mama, and I don’t want anyone to touch them,” Zoleka insisted.
    It was a year later that the woman in question was found to be an addict and arrested for smuggling drugs into the Palace.
    Her devoted servant had tried to physically restrain her in a desperate bid to prevent her smoking opium, but she had resisted so violently that the man had nearly died in the struggle.
    After that it became clear that she would never give up taking or selling drugs and the woman was barred from the Palace and forced to leave the country.
    Zoleka’s father and mother had been compelled to admit that she had been right all along.
    â€œHow did you know she was like that, dearest?” her mother enquired fervently.
    Zoleka smiled.
    â€œI looked at her with my Third Eye!”
    *
    When the young diplomat, Anton Bauer, who had travelled from Krnov to meet her father, was introduced to Zoleka, she thought he was quite pleasant.
    He was clearly frightened of saying the wrong thing concerning his visit.
    Zoleka smiled at him.
    â€œDo tell me about Princess Udele. Does she find it rather hard being an only child, as I have?”
    â€œI expect so and it will be very nice for Her Royal Highness to have your company,” replied Anton Bauer.
    Zoleka asked him other questions about Krnov, all of which received rather vague answers.
    She began to think, like her father, that perhaps the whole country was limp and ineffective.
    In which case the Prussians would certainly start to infiltrate it.
    As her father had said to her, the sooner she went to Krnov, the sooner it would all be over.
    Zoleka agreed to the arrangements he had made and began to choose those whom she would take with her.
    Marla, her lady’s maid, was an obvious choice as she had been in her service for more than six years.
    The aide-de-camp, whom she chose next, was forty-year-old Pieter Seitz. Pieter was known to be a sensible man and she thought he could probably use his easy going manner to visit places where she would be unable to go and talk to people she was unlikely to come into contact with.
    She was quite certain that he would be most useful in finding out what she needed to know.
    *
    Finally the day arrived when they were to travel to Krnov in two carriages.
    It was not a particularly long journey, but some of the route was over mountainous roads.
    The night before Zoleka left, she dined alone with her father, which they always enjoyed so much more than when they had to have other people with them.
    â€œYou must take extra good care of yourself, Papa, whilst I am away and think of me every